A little bit of this & a little bit of that

As always I look forward to my time off from work,  but as usual it went far far too quickly and before I know it I'm back at my desk once more. I  start off with all good intentions with a list of things I am going to achieve whilst I am off.  It usually involves a number of chores needing doing around the house or the garden that I've just not had the time to do on a weekend or finishing off a crafting project of which there are usually quite a few but if I can complete one that's an accomplishment.  The weather was glorious again over the bank holiday weekend and we did manage to get a few jobs completed but then the weather turned on us.  I had arranged for friends to come for lunch on the Tuesday, fully expecting that we would be able to eat alfresco as we so often end up eating aldesko when we are at work. It would have been lovely to  follow this with a long leisurely walk with the furry paws. Unfortunately the weather had other ideas so it was lunch around the kitchen table with a lot of chatter about various subjects putting the world to rights as we always do, a lot of food was consumed and tea drunk as you can imagine.

As the week went on the weather did improve. The garden is still very much a work in progress and will be for the foreseeable.  It's lovely having such a big garden but it's almost a little overwhelming.  The bearded one would like everything done yesterday and constantly asks me what else needs to be done, but I like to be able to formulate a plan and bring out my inner Alan Titchmarsh not just plonk anything anywhere just to fill a space.  I think he finds this a little exasperating. I want the garden to be a wildlife friendly garden and attract lots of bird, bees and butterflies. We already get the odd little field mouse but it would be lovely to see Hedgehogs in the garden, so any suggestions of plants would be gratefully received. 

It's taken the best part of a year but the bird feeders are now very much established and in demand on a daily basis. We joke that we must have the fattest sparrows in the area. We have been visited by the resident sparrows but we have also had chaffinches, blue tits, great tits and there was great excitement (by me) when we had long tail tits and gold finches pay us a visit,  we even get queues of birds along the picket fence waiting to get a turn to get to the feeder.  The local garden centre definitely does well out of us for peanuts, fat balls and bird seed. 

The Swallows are back and have been nesting up in the eves and I can hear them calling to their parents in the mornings for yet more food. The hedges are in desperate need of clipping but at the moment they are like the local maternity ward, full of nesting birds.  It's been lovely to see the little fledglings in the garden and how attentive the parents are in encouraging them to take flight.  To see these little balls of fluff getting ready to make their way into the big wide world is wonderful. 

The human boys went off training spotting for some of the week which meant I got to catch up on my crafting projects. 

crocheting.

cross stitching 

My little hedgehog cross stitching. I now have approximately 400 stitches to go plus the back stitching to go

and even started on writing up and making a little cardigan to form part of the layette set for my new grand baby, which I will share with you when it's finished.

There was of course a little baking and making going on at the farm house over the course of the week and I did make time to catch up on writing up posts and blog reading.

Eventually the weather brightened later in the week,  which meant we could get out and about with the furry boys for walks.  We are still on a journey of discovery of all the best places to walk them.  I am still astounded that living in the idyllic countryside that people do not pick up after their dogs when they go out walking.   We found a lovely woodland walk but having got 100 yards a long the path found that we were playing dodge the poo and had to turn back........... we continue on this particular journey.

Finally it must now be summer as the starlings arrived back en mass on Wednesday evening taking over the back lawn for a little R & R before taking flight once more. Watching the murmuration of these birds is simply magical but it did remind me of a scene from Hitchcock's 'The Birds' and what was even more bizarre was the next night on each of the back posts sat a crow which then made me feel that any moment now the music from 'The Omen' would start.

Lastly The bearded one was sporting a very orange T'shirt which I think this little bee thought meant he was a giant gerbera daisy as it kept coming and sitting  before on him eventually staying on his thumb. It stayed a while before deciding that maybe he wasn't a giant gerbera after all.

Our teen has ASD and attends an additional needs school, they always move up to their next class the term before summer to give them a chance to get settled before the summer holidays.  This means he is now a year 10 student and quite a lot of changes for him in the coming months. I hope for those of you with school age children that the first week back has not proved too problematic I can't believe we are in June already and that the summer break will be here again before we know it. 

Hope you have a good week one & all.

Mx