Today’s guest picture comes from our son Tony. He was up early enough a couple of days ago to see this sun rise in East Wemyss.
After the excitements of yesterday, we had a quiet day at home today. It was not dull though.
In the morning, we were visited by Tom Elliot, my South African correspondent, who had come back to his home town for Common Riding. He arrived at coffee time with a friend with whom he often goes cycling in the hills round Worcester in the Western Cape where they live. They were excellent company, and we learned a lot about life in South Africa in these days.
We had a good tour of the garden after coffee, and between the coffee, chatting and the garden tour, it was nearly lunchtime when they left.
It was a damp and occasionally rainy day, and I didn’t pick up a camera until after lunch when I looked at the bird feeder. The new bird seed continues to find favour with the locals, and a sparrow and a siskin were playing ‘musical perches’.
A siskin got pipped for a perch by a sparrow and flew past pretending that it hadn’t intended to stop there at all . . .
. . . while a moment later, another siskin was clearly focussed on the task in hand.
We went out in a dry moment to do some tidying up, and I spotted some welcome sunshine.
The first of many we hope.
I am happy to report that one of Mrs Tootlepedal’s packet of small mixed dahlias has turned out not to be white.
The lily hidden under foliage in the back bed has continued to flower. I am amazed that it has done so well without any direct sunlight at all. I have to sweep leaves aside to get a picture of it.
The fuchsias in the garden have overcome a very slow start and are beginning to put out more flowers.
This is good news because I love fuchsias.
I had time to note that some calendulas look better from behind than in front . . .
. . . when the second visitors of the day arrived. Ian is old friend of our daughter and of ours, and he arrived with his wife and a Ukrainian refugee who is staying with them until it is safe for her to return home. This time we started the visit with a garden tour, where I noticed a hoverfly on a inula . . .
. . . and we enjoyed the water lily in the pond . . .
. . . and I picked up a twig which was covered in tiny coral spot fungus.
Then we went inside and talked over a cup of tea and some ginger cake. Once again the company and the conversation were excellent.
After they left, we got busy in the garden again. There was a good deal of shredding to be done and while I did the shredding, Mrs Tootlepedal added to the pile. Then I created some more mess by trimming one of the internal hedges in the garden.
Our last visitor of the day arrived as we we working in the garden. It was our friend Mike Tinker, so we broke off and had another cup of tea, and another slice of ginger cake with him.
I was planning to take Mrs Tootlepedal out for a gentle cycle ride in the early evening, but the weather gods had other ideas, and the day took a turn for the worse.
Although the rain stopped after a while, it had discouraged us, and no amount of raindrops on roses . . .
. . . could cheer us up enough to persuade us to go out.
The weather should be better tomorrow so we may get our cycle ride in then.
The flying bird of the day is a young sparrow.
Footnote: the missing trail hound and its owners were reunited safely yesterday. It had gone a long way off course.
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That sounds like a busy day.
I liked the red dahlia and the sunflower, and the back of the calendula was pretty. I don’t remember ever looking at the back of one.
The coral spot fungus sounds familiar but if I’ve seen it, it was quite a while ago. That’s a nice shot of it.
Mrs T likes that variety of calendula. The coral spot is reasonably common round here but that was the first that I had seen this year.
It sounds as though you were looking for excuses to eat ginger cake today! Luckily the rain held off for the great day.
I need no excuse to eat ginger cake. 🙂
Thank you for the update on the errant dog. I’m sure I’m not the only one who was concerned.
Another happily busy day! It is great to be able to have visitors again after such a long period without. I too am glad that the dog and its owner have been reunited.
Yes, we have been leading lonely lives for quite a while.
I like your internal hedges and am always happy to hear a lost dog has been found.
Friends dropping in is good. Not something that generally happens in modern life. You did well to spot that well-camouflaged hoverfly
They have been even scarcer than bees this year so far.
How nice to have all those interesting visitors, you must have enjoyed all that conversation. Could you kindly send the rain this way, we are so dry. Thanks for the fuchsias, always a pleasure to look at them.
Glad you had such a sociable and interesting day.
Good news that the trail hound was reunited with its owner.
Glad to read the missing hound was found. What a lovely day of company and conversation you had, with your garden as a beautiful way to conclude the visits.
It was most enjoyable.
I love the pictures of the flying sparrow and the bird in the rain! Well captured, Tom.
I liked the blackbird in the rain. It showed what I felt about the rain too. 🙂
You are getting some good rain! I don’t think your area normally has any kind of summer dry season like we do here. We have had some dingy cloud days, but nothing that would amount to rain. Spot watering has taken up a lot of time. Temperature have been in the mid 90s, with one day at 102 by late afternoon. Our everbearing strawberry plants are bitterly complaining.
Our temperatures have dropped back to normal levels after a short burst of unusual heat. You are right that we normally have rain from time to time (almost all the time it seems in some years) throughout the year but we have been getting longer dry spells in recent years.