Well that was February

I missed these two photos taken the 28th January.  A beautiful sunrise.

and then a few days later we were into February...which was pretty wet and dismal as well for the majority of the month, with the odd dry sunny day or usually afternoon here and there.

I slipped on our driveway and hurt myself, so hubby spent several hours pressure washing it.  We do have some special stuff to put on it, but it has to be dry afterwards, and we never have long enough dry weather to put it on.  Needless to say we are still waiting for several days of dry weather so we can put the moss/slime killer down.

Beautiful varieties of snowdrops by our pond.

A caterpillar...this is I believe an Oak Eggar caterpillar which was on our buddleia plant I was pruning.

The 18th February was one of the few lovely days we had this month.

So a productive day was spent in the garden.

Beautiful berries.

Primrose

The grass is getting long, but it was still too wet to mow.

Fortunately a couple of days ago (now 29th February) we had a couple of very windy days with no rain which dried the grass enough to cut.  

We have also spent a couple of days (not in a row due to the terrible weather) when we have been able to get up into the orchard and do some hedge trimming, apple tree pruning and more buddleia cutting!  Oh and even managed to get the back lawn mowed - yes after those high winds. Two days of lawn mowing, which hubby did thankfully.

My Valentine's Day flowers.

So that was the month of February.  I can't believe it is March tomorrow!
So much for my blogging more regularly.

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I finished several books in February:

Mere Christianity by CS Lewis.  I also watched Shadowland which I enjoyed.

The Penguin Lessons by Tom Mitchell

The Bullet that Missed by Richard Osman 

 

Books to Read 2024 & the Garden

Gosh we are almost at the end of January already, and my idea to do a blog post at the beginning of the month just didn't happen.  

On January 2nd I got the news that my dear Mum had died after suffering with Alzheimer's for at least 16 years.  Absolutely heartbreaking.  The last time I saw her was in 2019.  

We then had almost 10 days with our son, daughter in law and little grand daughter which was absolutely lovely and a good tonic.  

I've started reading properly again.  I always used to read a lot and have recorded the books I have read for a number of years on my blog, but the last couple of years I haven't read much at all.  I have a nice book journal that my son set up for me, and I will also record the books on here. I will have to include photos of my book journal in another post, as I just have photos of the books I have read, and planning to read at the moment.

The first three books I read were Jeremy Clarkson's Diddly Squat Farm series. 

Nice easy reads, humorous in parts, but also irritating in other parts.

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The next was:

I've been meaning to read this for years, and after the slow start, it became quite enjoyable.

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After that was a goodie, a children's story:  Shadow the Sheepdog

Having had rough collies I enjoyed this very much. 

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In the next group, I have  so far read Meadowland, and really enjoyed.  My father will too, so I have ordered it to have it sent to him.

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Of the two below, I am currently reading 1984 and am about 2/3rds the way through.  It is hard reading as the print is very small, so I need good light.

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Following on from these two are the latest Daniel Silva books that I didn't realise had come out.  I have a vague recollection of perhaps being slightly disappointed with the book that was published in 2020, and that might be why I hadn't bought these, I hope that is not the case as I have always enjoyed this author.

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The three books below I picked up in The Works.  Peter May is an author I have read before, the others I don't know, so they should hopefully be interesting reads.

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The books below I picked up during 2020 and although I have read bits of them, I want to sit down and read through them properly.

These might be the books I read after finishing 1984.

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This book is a favourite of mine and I have read it before.  An absolutely charming story about the life of a Dunnock.  I will enjoy reading it again, probably inbetween one of the 'heavier' books.

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To finish off three photos of the garden just after we got home.

The dreaded badgers got in again while we were away and made a mess of the garden again.

Snowdrops flowering (actually I don't think these are strictly snowdrops, but a look alike)

My wondering NZ Hebe, that I have had since moving to the UK. We have moved it with us, although his is a cutting from it as it is still in Hertfordshire where my son is now living, and it has taken really well and looking lovely.