Camera Woes

I have been wondering how long I should expect a camera to last? and whether, like our computers, there is an element of obsolescence built into them? 
For the past few months mine has been playing up. It has been acting like a mischievous child doing it's own thing, and certainly not what I want it to do! It seems that I shall simply have to bite the bullet and purchase another.

This almost end of February day was a perfect moment to walk along one of our many canal towpaths and take in some much needed February fresh air. According to the forecasters, our weather this week is coming up from the Caribbean!

 The Blackthorn blossom - Prunus spinosa is now fully open and busily decorating many of our hedgerows and byways. It is this blossom that produces the small deep blue damson like plums during the Autumn known as drupes or more commonly sloes.

Not much activity seen on the water, apart from much chasing and splashing about from the ducks - the drakes were busily pursuing any hen (female duck) that appeared in their view outnumbering them by at least three to one.

The canal boats were locked, shut up, and tied to their moorings following the winter months. Easter is late this year so they will probably begin sailing again before then.

It was lovely to walk in the sunshine and enjoy the surroundings which we had almost to ourselves. Birds were twittering and chirping in the hedge, and all was peaceful. There was just the occasional ringing sound of hammer meeting metal from across the water where the local boatyard were carrying out repairs.

Anemone blanda growing along the towpath.

Indian Summer

Each golden day must be cherished to the full, for one has the feeling that each must be the last. 

Elizabeth Enright

The perfect weather of Indian Summer lengthened and lingered, warm sunny days were followed by brisk nights with Halloween a presentiment in the air.

Wallace Stegner

"Indian summer comes gently, folds over the hills and valleys as softly as the fall of a leaf on a windless day."

Gladys Taber

".....and all at once, summer collapsed into fall."

Oscar Wilde

"By all these lovely tokens September days are here With summer's best of weather

And autumn's best of cheer."

Helen Hunt Jackson

"One can follow the sun, of course, but I have always thought that it is best to know some winter, too, so that the summer, when it arrives, is the more gratefully received."

Beatriz Williams

******

Addendum

I planted a fruit pip outside in the garden almost 20 years ago which has grown into a fairly substantial tree with large leathery leaves. Possibly as a result of the long hot summer, and now our Indian Summer, it has decided to bloom for the first time. Although the flowers are not appealing the fragrance is lovely and is attracting much attention from the local bee population. Apparently this is the tree's normal flowering period, and presumably if it was growing in its natural habitat with mild weather on the horizon rather than facing our looming winter, then it would set and bear some fruit.

When I had a visit earlier this year from Wendy, an Australian blogger, she said "gosh is that a ...... tree you have growing there", and she was correct. Do you know what the name of this tree is?

Buscot

During this season of blossom and renewal I am reminded of the words used by A.E. Housman in A Shropshire Lad, written as a young man of twenty at a time when seventy was considered to be good.
"Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room".
These thoughts are a gentle reminder of how time is of the essence and every moment so precious.
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The weather has been perfect, and we have been making the most of it following what felt like a very long confinement during the winter months.
A visit to Buscot Park for a stroll along the water rill designed by Harold Peto for Lord Faringdon at the beginning of the c20th was our choice of destination. There was plenty of welcome dappled shade beneath the canopy of fresh green growth on the trees.

Buscot is surrounded by parkland, a formal walled garden, and has many magnificent vistas.

The steps leading down to the water rill and the lake beyond always pleases and provides a source of anticipation.

Having now reached the lake, I also discovered when back at home, that it was also the end of the line as far as using the computer was concerned. I could not finish this post or export photos - was it blogger or the computer?

Previously I have solved problems sometimes with wise advice from eldest son, but I was finding things far too complicated to solve via a long distance phone call. Everything I tried led me down a different dark pathway with no light at the end. The machine was taken away, and has only just now returned. It appears that my Apple Mac is not the junior I thought it was but is really past it's retirement date. Obsolescence is built into them from the minute you bring them home. I am not sure how things stand at the moment as problems are still being encountered. I may be absent for some time during the foreseeable future.

Friday 4th May

I made a promise for tomorrrow, but I need a good bright day in order to fulfil it. I am keeping all of my fingers crossed and will let you know the outcome within the next few days.

Today is perfect, here's hoping it continues, but in the meantime enjoy some blossom from our garden.

Lots of wild flowers growing in our garden including some pretty yellow cowslips - one of which appears to have hybridised and turned from yellow into red!

Fritillaria meleagris

I always look forward to the arrival of the delightful Snakeshead fritillaries in our garden where they can now be seen in great abundance. Knowing how rarely they are seen in the wild these days makes me feel particularly protective of this precious lily. Checking on them today revealled four naughty red lily beetles who had already sought them out, but they were promptly vanquished. In a matter of days four could become many and then they would all start descending on my newly emerging summer lilies. I had thought that the cold winter might have killed the beetle's lavae, but I was mistaken.

The pretty Erythroniums have also arrived on the scene in yellow, white, and pink, they too are members of the lily family - this one is called pagoda, but luckily they are not preyed on by the lily beetle

Judging by the blossom I am anticipating making delicious plum jam, plum pies, and plum crumble during the fruiting season.

Easter Garden

Euphorbia cyparissias

  Erythronium 'pagoda'

Dicentra spectabilis - now reclassified as Lamprocapnos spectabilis - bleeding hearts

Erythronium revolutum 'White Beauty'

❖Enjoy the weekend break❖ 

How Green is my Valley?

The cyclical wheel keeps turning - sap rises, awakening trees and hedgerows from their winter slumbers; Mother Nature decks them out in luminous shades of green, her seasonal choice, chartreuse, a glorious sight to see.

Accessorised in pinks

and whites

imperial gold and purple at their feet

 

"It seems to me that the natural world is the greatest source of excitement; the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living." David Attenborough