Today’s guest picture is another from Gavin in America. He found something more beautiful to look at than yesterday’s ugly car on his walk today.
We had a day here that started off dry and grey, and ended up wet and grey. It didn’t encourage excursions of any sort, and apart from a quick walk up to the High Street and back, I stayed at home.
It helped that Sandy came round for coffee in the morning, and we had some very cheerful conversation to go with the Brazilian beans.
Mrs Tootlepedal was out on sewing business, and in her absence, I mooched about after Sandy had gone, spending time looking at siskins . .
. . . and wandering about the garden before the rain started.
There are things already out . . .
. . . and things coming out.
The lawn peckers have been busy, but not as busy as in some years.
I liked the way the the cotoneaster horizontalis is shaping up against the house wall . .
. . . and it should be very attractive to bees quite soon.
I went back to looking at the birds when I went in.
I particularly like the male and female chaffinches waiting in (on) the wings in that last picture.
While I was waiting for Mrs Tootlepedal to come home, I spent quite a lot of time listening to two episodes of a very interesting podcast about the ramifications following the sinking of the Belgrano during the Falklands War.
The afternoon got wetter and greyer as it went on, and the visit of a chiropodist to look after my rather battered toes was a welcome diversion. She has done an excellent job in keeping my walking comfortable.
Then, apart from putting another scanned parish magazine on to the Archive Group website, I did very little until it was time for our regular Monday Zooms. Our son Alistair and our granddaughter Matilda brightened up the day a lot in the first meeting, and my brother and sisters did further good work in the second.
The forecast is offering better weather from tomorrow, so we hope that this return to wet, chilly weather was just a blip.
A siskin is the flying bird of the day.
Tootlepedal's Blog 
The flowers are so beautiful. You get a.great selection of birds..
It is worth buying the birdseed.
Spring is looking quite lovely there.
Another week and a sunny day will be peak green I hope.
That white trillium is beautiful. I bought some roots and planted them years ago but they never grew. Maybe I’ll try again.
It looks like the apples will have plenty of blossoms. The bees better be ready for action.
I like the geum. It’s a plant I never see here.
The verges have a lot of wild geums and they are just coming out now, The garden ones are a bit more colourful
I have been in the garden piling up autumn leaves, so it is lovely to see your spring flowers and so much greenery.
I really enjoy podcasts these days, so I’ll look out for the one you enjoyed…( the sinking of Belgrano during the Falklands war.)
It is a London Review of Books podcast.
Thank you. Our favourite podcasts at the moment are The Rest is Politics & for long distance travel, The Rest is History.
Despite the weather you managed some good floral and avian pics
I got out and about while the going was good.
You appear to have made the most of it. Glad to know Sandy came for a visit and that the flowers are doing so well despite the weather.
I needed a rest so the rain was quite welcome.
Your coneaster is shaping up very nicely. Here’s hoping for better weather today.
That is a beautiful assortment of spring flowers and birds, enough to brighten any drerich day. Thank you for the photo of that nice patch of white trilliums. You still have a daffodils. We are down to one left now, a poet’s daffodil that came up late near the house.
I noted yesterday that our recovering redbud tree I thought was dead is sprouting tiny leaves now. It was mowed over by a car that went off the road some years back. The young tree suffered damage and died back, but came back from the roots. Good to see it still lives.
It is amazing how resilient some plants are, (sometimes when you don’t want them to be). We only have a handful of daffodils left now.
I’ve only just started back out in my garden, and your pictures are an inspiration for further work. The past 3+ weeks have been spent with my son in hospital both here and in a city more than 3 hours drive away. He’s improved and I felt comfortable taking the train back home a few days ago. I’m now trying to catch my sleep up and remember what my garden looks like. There’s a lot of work to be done out there!
I am sorry to hear about your son. I am glad that he is improved and you can get out into your garden. Gardening can sooth the troubled soul quite a lot.
A quiet relaxing post with well behaved birds at the feeders and lovely plants to enjoy in your garden. I love listening to the radio . I just turn it on and listen to whatever programme is running. I learn so much about things that I never knew I was interested in!! I then bore people silly telling them all about the things I heard!
You can learn a lot from the radio, it is true. We used to listen to Radio 4 a lot, but Mrs T has got rather addicted to YouTube recently and finds a lot of interesting things to listen to there now.
Never thought of listening to YouTube…I’ll give it a go! Thanks.
You have to be careful as there is a lot of rubbish on it and you can find yourself wasting time, but there are many interesting things too.
Gorgeous garden closeups, most enjoyable to view!
I like the shapely Cotoneaster
It looks as though it is giving itself a trophy.