A Quick Stroll By The Sea.

It was raining yet again this morning so I finally got down to doing some school work in preparation for the final half term of the year. Our school issue diaries run from September to September and it is amazing how quickly we are coming to the end of yet another year. (It has been a very hectic year but at least we got outstanding for our OFSTED inspection.) Once the SATs tests are over and the reports done there will be lots of fun activities to do with the children including a whole school outing to the beach. (No going in the water because of health & safety rules! )

The rain was slowing down by mid-day so we went for a stroll down at Barricane Beach. I feel sorry for all those people who have come down to 'sunny' Devon for the half term holiday. There were lots of people at Woolacombe and we were very lucky to get a parking space on the road (£1 for an hour instead of having to pay the whole day charge in the private car parks.) When we left a man rushed up and asked if we would wait while he got his car as he was desperate for a space so we sat there ignoring another car that was waiting for us to leave our space. There were quite a few people out in the water but the waves were not that good either.

The tide was in so we couldn't walk along the beach but stood and enjoyed watching the waves rush in. We didn't bring sandwiches, only coffee which we drank while leaning against the rocks. The weather started to clear while we were there and it was quite warm on the sheltered beach.

Back home it stayed sunny for a while so I did a bit of gardening. I've been repotting my tomato plants into some big tubs which used to be outside but were so old and scruffy I had intended to take them to the dump. I'm going to keep all my tomato plants in the conservatory as our climate isn't good enough to grow them outside. So far all my seedlings are doing well in their individual modules but the test will come when I plant them outside. It will be interesting to see what some of my exotic leaves taste like. Peter went off for a late row with the gig club and has just come home, tired but happy.

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Summer Snow.

The Purple Beech starts the year with autumnal shades of orange.

It's days like today that make it so hard for us to even imagine leaving the peace and beauty of our little valley. I think even Peter is rethinking his plan to live closer to 'civilisation' when we are older but it is going to be hard to find somewhere that matches this place.

The atmosphere in the garden has been truly magical as all weekend long the air has been filled with a blizzard of fluffy white willow seeds blowing and dancing in the gentle breeze. (The white specks on the picture above.) The sound of birdsong resounded through the valley, apart from when Paul got on his industrial sized ride-on mower to cut the field or the contractors zoomed around at the top of the hill collecting the cut grass for silage. The song thrush sat in his perch almost at the top of the highest tree to sing his heart out both morning and evening as he does every day.

I'm not so sure that the spiders appreciated their webs being filled with fluff instead of nice juicy flies. As I walked through the garden I could occasionally catch the sunlight glinting on the on the singles strands of silk, sometimes 10ft+ long, spun by little spiders that launch themselves into the breeze. It has just been such a lovely warm day, 22C in the shade and at least 27C in the sun. I put on the final coat of gloss paint , pulled up lots of stinging nettles, did some school work and ended the day having a barbecue with Peter and Linas. They had the barbecue while I filled up on cooked cauliflower drizzled with some tadziki.

A male orange tipped butterfly feeding on the aubretia.

PS I do have the flower Snow-in-Summer which is just beginning to come into flower.

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Plenty Of Company.

It was a pleasant end to a productive day. Sitting outside in the sun, (at last) in the peace and quiet of the evening, watching the swallows swooping about and the clouds wafting across the sky. A cup of coffee to hand and the satisfaction of washing and replacing all the gravel. I could do with more gravel , maybe when we get a big load in for the drive and yard. Now all I have to do is tidy up the various blocks and stones that are scattered artistically? about the paving and make those steps.

As well as watching the ponies and their foals I had the company of my neighbours' son and his dogs for a while. It is hard to garden when a dog is trying to lick your ear and then runs off with your gardening glove. I was also watched intently by the Canada geese who had brought their goslings up to the field, not a good idea with my cats around.

I dried and ironed my multicoloured t-shirt before putting it in the washing machine with a dust sheet. The result - one light pink dust sheet and one muted pink and purple t-shirt. Obviously the dyes were not colourfast. I had such fun with the dyes that I've searched on the net and you can buy powder that you mix with the dyes to fix them but at £12.50 a tub it's a bit pricey. Dylon do sachets of fix for their dyes but I don't know if it would work with the dyes we have at school.

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Signs Of Spring.

I thought we might be in for a good weather day as I emerged into sunshine driving down the hill towards town this morning. Unfortunately the rain had set in by 9.00 and continued all day. It is never much fun when the children are stuck in the classroom all day because it is too wet to go out. They even had to eat their packed lunches in the classroom. Despite all this the children were fairly well behaved and spent part of the day making owl faces on paper plates with moving eyes and 3-d beaks. They chose and cut their own feathers from a selection of wallpaper samples so every one was different.

As I drove home through the rain this evening I noticed that the muted greys and browns of the countryside are being enlivened by the occasional splash of brighter green. On the verges clumps of new growth of wild garlic, (ransoms), are appearing and even the bare branches of the bushes and trees are looking less sparse as the buds begin to thicken up. At home the honeysuckle buds are unfurling their sage green leaves so that it doesn't look as if the wall is covered with random sticks. I also noticed that those pesky jackdaws have been working on the wire netting I put up so I'll have to get the ladders out again and bang in a few nails to hold the netting fast. Should have done that in the first place.

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Too Icy To Drive.

Last night's clear skies turned all that lovely slush into ice. There was no way I was going to attempt to drive on the ice so I rescheduled my physio appointment and Linas did the same for his Job Centre appointment. The jigsaw puzzle has been completed and is now back in its box waiting to be returned to the charity shop. Instead I have being doing more constructive work. I continued to catalogue my photo files which are currently stored in date order on the hard drive and on back-up pen drives. Being an old fashioned sort of person I prefer to flick through a real book rather than turn pages on the pc so I'm using a diary from last year to categorise the photos I took each day. At the same time I'm making a note of the best photos as I would like to make a photo book of 2009 with my favourite photos from each month. I also worked on my portfolio, sorting and labelling photos from my previous classes. That way, if I ever do go for a job interview I'll be able to show a little of the way I teach and organise my classes.
The sun has been shining so I went for a walk around the garden to check out the plants in the snow.

Even last year's dead leaves have their own calm beauty when outlined with frost.

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Indian Summer.

Today we had the most glorious sunshine. In fact it was positively hot. Just like a summer's day. In fact better than a summer's day seeing as it was grey or rainy for the whole of August. And what was I doing today? Soaking up the sun in the garden? Roaming the countryside looking for those special shots? No, I was teaching all day. An easy class and we had a fun day though the big topic of conversation is the fair. It's a really big event in their lives. One lad was telling the class how he was going to the fair yesterday but couldn't because his sister had broken the car window. I was rather surprised because his sister is a petite 10 yr old but it turned out that the window switch had broken. Dad was getting a new car today which was 'like a jeep'. 'Ah' I said, ' you're getting a 4 wheel drive vehicle.' I was treated to a very odd look and told ,'yes, it will have 4 wheels.' Obviously elderly teachers can get a bit confused about cars.

I couldn't resist taking a few shots of the flowers in the lovely evening light.

I walked round the garden yesterday, putting off doing some mundane weeding, and I counted 50 types of flower still blooming. Some ,like the aubretia,honeysuckle and the roses have just a few flowers left but others are still giving a lovely display.

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