The Bees Knees

Bees are one of my favourite little creatures with their jolly stripy jackets, rounded furry bodies and beautiful silky wings like crumpled tissue paper, blissfully going about their business with a glorious droning sound as they merrily amble from flower to flower collecting nectar. They don’t seem to mind you getting up close and personal with a camera and happily bump into you, and each other, as they mosey from one pollen laden flower to the next.

The break in the rain yesterday certainly brought out the bees and it was this loud humming noise that alerted me to the masses of bees invading the Choisyer bush outside my Sun room - large ones, small ones, extra fluffy ones and bees weighed down with pollen fattened legs, the Choisyer was teaming with the black and yellow furry creatures that I just had to capture on film.

An extra yellowy bee

                               Their exquisite crumpled silky wings

                               A bee in mid flight

Finally, this isn’t my own lawn but one I photographed whilst out and about on Saturday. Once again, buzzing with bees. On the surface the lawn looked lush and green but on closer inspection it was an absolute forest of tiny plants - ferns, the weeniest daisies ever, speckled clover and moss. A springy loveliness of dewy green carpet that you just wanted to run through naked ….. well, perhaps not naked but certainly bare footed.  Not exactly bowling green material but certainly the most perfect habitat for our bees.

Doddington Hall Gardens

Doddington Hall is a 16 Century late Elizabethan Manor that has remained in the same family for 400 years. The magnificent Hall is surrounded by acres of gardens, an amazing farm shop and delicatessen and a cafe selling the scummiest homemade cakes.

I spent a very relaxing afternoon with His Nibs wandering round the gardens with its quiet little areas perfectly made to sit and ponder and afterwards, coffee and cake in their award winning cafe – simply perfect!

                                A tiny heart highlighted in the 400 year old brickwork

                                      Lots of secluded areas to sit and watch the world go by

                                 In the kitchen garden even the bean supports are decorative  

                                                   Ducklings resting by the pond

                                        Ancient and beautifully gnarled  espalier fruit trees

                                                                     Bluebells

                                                     Majestically unfurling fern fronds

                                     The stunning view into the Lincolnshire countrywide

                                       ... and little pathways and steps leading round the garden

Wild flowers

                                                          .. and huge twisting branches

                                       And at the end of the walk a visit to the lovely cafe.

Doddington Hall farm shop and cafe are open daily. House and garden openings are on the main website www.doddingtonhall.com

Bring out the Bunting

On this Diamond Jubilee weekend bunting is everywhere! I love bunting - it looks so pretty, especially the flower, stripe and dotty bedecked bunting draped through trees for a sunny afternoon tea in the garden or a traditional English village fete but the sea of red, white and blue bunting festooned across side streets for the Jubilee weekend, looks very jolly.

It’s not just for the outdoors though, bunting brightens any room. When routing for vintage finds I often come across delightfully illustrated vintage children’s books made from thick sugar paper that have been either damaged, are incomplete or with a number defaced pages from a child’s keenness with the wax crayon.

On a blustery, rain spotted afternoon it has been a perfect time to be indoors being creative and I have made some cute bunting from these story books, one book 'Sleepy Time Tales'  is very strikingly coloured just using just four block colours, red, blue, green and yellow.

Vintage Andy Pandy books have also been given a new lease of life in the same way and very colourful they look too, finished off with a buttoned bedecked loop for hanging - something charming to adorn the little ones room ….. 

… and for us older girls, to decorate the bedroom or study….

Bunting made from vintage postcards, Victorian greeting cards, sheet music and other ephemera, decorated with old keys, crystal chandelier drops, suspender belt loops and buttons.

Hope you all enjoyed the long weekend.

Meet the Girls

Meet my three beautiful girls – my little helpers in the garden and general ‘cheerer uppers’ as they never fail to make me laugh out loud at their everyday antics.

Whatever my mood the sight of the three of them hurtling down the garden in response to me shouting  ‘where’s my beautiful girls’ is a joy to behold. Three bodies of feather and fluff immediately forget what they are doing to come to me charging across grass and flower beds. They waddle from side to side, combs bobbing and bloomers fluffed out, hopping and skipping over any obstacle that might be in their path.

Alice is pure white (at the moment without any tail feathers) but always sports a permanent bib of soil or grass stains from her constant dust baths or digging.  She has a very deep voice, which she uses often, and is usually first out of the coup in the morning, trampling over anyone in her way and usually the last to bed at night, always insisting on a final stroll round the hen house or a nose round the food bowl before retiring.  

                                                          Alice enjoying a rest

                                               Alice and Audrey Joy checking for titbits

Elsie May is grey (or blue if using the official name) and is very girly and gentle. She has a very delicate voice and loves to be with you walking round the garden quietly chattering to herself. She enjoys being stroked, closing her eyes in pure bliss when you get to caress the skin round her neck through her feathers.  
                                                              Elsie May posing for the camera

Audrey Joy is the eldest of the girls, shiny jet black with petrol blue markings along her wings.  She is also the shyest and always the last one up in a morning and usually the first to bed at night, grabbing the best spot where she can snuggle down, spread out her bloomers and basically prevent anyone else getting a look in.

                                                                     Audrey Joy

Audrey Joy on a pole in the veg patch

All the three girls love to help with the gardening by digging or scratting and can often deplete the worm population in an afternoon. There have been many times when they nearly get decapitated as they dart in for a worm at the last second as the spade comes down. They are a great time waster too as I spend more time digging for their pleasure than getting things done.

Last year they discovered ten bags of leaves that had been gently rotting for two years ready to mulch the borders. I had heard the commotion; a very excited and prolonged frenzy of ‘ooooh, bop, bop’ and eventually went to investigate knowing it was something more exciting than a nest of woodlice. I was met with a sea of ripped black bin liners and a vast expanse of perfectly decomposed leaf mould scattered across the garden. They were obviously very pleased with themselves and had spent a very enjoyable hour or so scratting for bugs and other critters that had been eating their way through the leaves.

                                                     The girls helping with planting the potatoes

Usually, the girls are ‘all for one and one for all’ always walking together or sharing a dust bath, until they find a tasty treat then it is then each to her own. One of them will find a tasty morsel; usually a worm, and her great ‘whoop’ of delight gives the game away. There is then an ugly rush as the others try to steal it and she runs, darting here and there, in an attempt to lose the others. The worm, dangling from her beak then gets snatched from one beak to another until eventually it is swiftly sucked up into the winners beak.  I have to admit that I have had the misfortune to witness the outcome of an ill-fated worm caught between two hens that refuse to let go - not a pretty sight as each hen ends up with a little bit each…..

Still, the girls are my absolute delight and I would never want to be without them.