Monday, May 27, 2019

Bank Holidays with miserable weather

Forgetting all outside news, I shall concentrate today on flowers.  A walk down the roses by the wall shows each bush brimming over with buds, a sheer show of delight to come, even the foxgloves are producing buds.  On the other side of the garden the colour blue has arrived. knapweed, veronica and Jacob's ladder not forgetting irises.


Jacob's Ladder has always intrigued me, you can see its leaf, bottom left of the photo, structured like a ladder.  It was first discovered in this country at Malham Cove in the West Riding in 1666 under a great wall of limestone.  A gentle non-assuming flower but a native.  Of course it takes its name from the biblical story that Jacob 'slept with a stone for a pillow' and dreamt that he saw a ladder reaching to heaven with angels ascending and descending on it.  The plant reminds me of the front of Bath Abbey which has this  story depicted in stone, the angels climbing to heaven.
Paul continues to slowly improve, soon it will be a rigmarole of doctors and outpatients but for now home is a safe refuge.  Jev (his old car) is attached like a patient to a battery charger in the garage, and I am grateful that I bought a car a couple of years ago, my 'hairdressers car' as my daughter calls it.  Not sure why, its red and small and is a Kia from the local showrooms in Kirkbymoorside.  I would have preferred a blue one but it was the only secondhand car with low mileage and it has done me proud.  Though sadly I scrapped its shiny paintwork at the doctors the other day trying to back out of a narrow space.





11 comments:

  1. Glad Paul continues to improve. Glad also that you have your own little car. If there is anything good to come out of your necessary recent hospital visits it is that you have gained driving confidence again. My little Corsa has served me well for the last two years. If I am still driving I shall change it next year when it will be three and as it has less than five thousand miles on the clock it will sell easily. But I am not certain my eyesight will serve me well enough by then.
    I love those blues in your garden - it is the one colour that is missing as I plant up my garden - I have iris reticulata almost out but other than that - haven't found anything yet. Raining as I write this. Friends walking the West Highland Way started on Thursday and it has poured solidly since they started but they are salwart.

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  2. Well if you had an acid soil, the blue poppy - Meconopsis, is probably the most fragile beauty of all. Failing that there is the blue of the ceanothus shrub which is appearing at this time of year. Yes getting back into driving has been a godsend.

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  3. I like the look of the Iris with its almost orange 'tongue'.
    Rainy days can be dreary days - we're having plenty of them at the moment. Cold ones as well!

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  4. Hi Cathy and welcome, our part of North Yorkshire is only getting patchy rain unfortunately when we need a lot. Plus of course over this Bank holiday it has been cold and windy. The irises can come in a beautiful range of colours, just had the Autumn catalogue for bulbs, etc. Wil I buy more?

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  5. I took a cutting of a Ceanothus(well, shall we say stole) when I was walking round the estate last year. It took very well, is quite tall and has three flowers on it this year so i have planted it out and let it take its chance.

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    1. Mine is growing quickly and yet to flower this year, but ceanothus has a powder blue colour hard to find in flowers.

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  6. I hope you won't mind me pointing this out but I think you meant "scraped" rather than "scrapped".

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  7. Thanks, spelling noted. It definitely isn't ready for the scrap yard yet....

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  8. Sorry to hear that Paul has been ill - I must have missed that post but we have been so busy here I am way behind in blogland. You will be glad to have him home again anyway, and will enjoy feeding him up and getting him back to normal.

    I am having some hotter colours in my garden this summer, to brighten up dark corners - Geums are definitely doing the job, and I also got a Digiplexus "Berry Canary", a lilac Veronica and a pretty Astrantia.

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    1. He will take sometime to recover, but is happy to be home Jennie. I am going cooler in the garden, white plants amongst the roses but we will see if I give in to colour.

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  9. I have some beautiful blue Aquilegias, and if purple comes under your cool colours, there's a lot of choice there. Good to hear that Paul is on the mend anyway.

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