I'm back, after taking a break away from my blog for awhile.

I had to get my priorities in order during our upheaval period of house painting and decorating, preparing for our summer letting.
In  mid June my other half and I decided to take a break and took our eldest grandson to visit my family in Wales and England.
Maybe you might like to see some of the places we visited. My grandson met cousins he hadn't seen before, and they took him to visit the places I had grown up in.

This was the old city of Chester.

Boat trips on the river Dee.

Then we went to Llandudno which is on the coast in North Wales, where my brother has an apartment
and  he can spend time relaxing and enjoy the milder weather.

This area is very popular for retired and elderly people to visit as it has a micro climate, due to the mountain called the great Orme which makes it sheltered from the cold wind in winter.

You can take the tramcar to the top of the Orme.
The view is spectacular. Unfortunately we didn't have time.
 But I remember it from my childhood visits with my mother.

   

This is the small island of Anglesey just off the coast,

which can be reached by crossing the bridge over the river Menai.

The name of this town on the island  is written in the Welsh language 

and has 58 letters and is the longest name.

We went to where the old railway station used to be.
which is now a great tourist attraction with lots of small boutique shops.

This is the translation of the name .

Just a little bit of info

Whenever I have my camera, I like to capture the things I find amusing.
I stopped to talk to this elderly gentleman. who told me he motors along the promenade everyday with his two dogs ,One who sits between his feet. but had just that minute jumped off for his daily run along the beach.and this one who rides in the basket, looked too fat to do much else but enjoy the sea air.

I Hope you enjoyed seeing some of the places I visited.

I'll show you some of the other places we visited next time.
Until then.

à bientôt

Barbara Lilian

My trip to Denmark.

I feel like I don't know what season we are in ! It will be June in a few days and I'm still wearing winter clothes. I've told you before I love my garden, but when it's cold and raining everyday I would rather be indoors doing something else.

Which means  I've made  very little progress in the garden. Usually by this time of the year all my hanging baskets and balcony troughs have filled out and everywhere is looking colourful, ready for the summer.

I have to tell you I had most of my plants hardening off ready to go in the baskets and we had a severe frost overnight and it nipped the tops of most of the plants, , the weeds are growing like mad, they don't mind the frost.

Although I've been busy planting my baskets ready to hang when we get some warmer weather, I thought I'd wait awhile  until  they are worth showing you. So how would you like to see some of the things I saw on my trip to Denmark at the beginning of May.

If you've ever visited Denmark it would probably be Copenhagen , which is a beautiful city, however my son and his family live in the North of Denmark, so it was a family visit, with some sight seeing.

Here's a taste of some of the things I loved seeing

and a few of my favourite places we went to.

After looking through the window on a rainy day, I could see that the Forsythia needed pruning.
and I know they don't have the time for jobs like this, so I went out with secatures. 



This is what I did with all the pieces I had pruned.

I just pushed the cuttings into the ground. I can't say planted as their ground is so soft. I hope they take.

I have a very good friend, who just shoves bits off plants in the ground and they always grow.
If she reads this she'll know who I'm writing about !

Where I live it's very stony ground, so I'm not always successful.

Bikes can be seen everywhere.
I think even I would ride around on a bike if I lived there as it's so flat.
I loved this pink/white one I saw outside a super market with a wooden box on the front
 for those small things we always forget when we do our weekly shopping.

This one looked so pretty with a large basket decorated with silk flowers.



Bicycles in the nearby city of Aalborg.

 Some of the flowers at the supermarket.

Which I thought were a better selection than I have here in France.

Our son lives near the Fjord/sea and 
we always like to take a walk at the harbour.                       

Half timber modern houses at the harbour.

We spent a lovely weekend at our daughter in laws parents
 summerhouse on the North west coast.

There was a special reason that this piece of architecture was hung here.

 it was to warn you there was a step.

I loved this idea.

 Each time everyone goes for a walk on the beach they collect pebbles with holes in

 so they have been threaded onto a cable.

A sheltered corner.

Our walk on the beach.

I just love the coast, even when it's windy

and as you can see so do my grandchildren.

we walked on to the cliffs and saw lots of birds.

 Some of the Kittiwakes.

They  build their nests on the very narrow ledges of the cliff.

I always love to visit this chateau, as it's so different from the ones I see in France.

These colourful houses are in the northern tip of Denmark

This  circular maze was amazing.

It was designed by a Dane and built from planks of wood.

It was an echo maze, the echo came back 4 minutes after the sound.

A familiar sight over Denmark.

Now we're back to where we started
nearby the local church.

Hope you enjoyed seeing some of Denmark from my visit.

and you'll join me again soon on my next trip .

.Until next time

à bientôt
Barbara Lilian.

Wisteria in full bloom

I just wanted to show you this beautiful Wisteria I pass on the way to my daughters house. 

I'm so glad hubby told me about it and we dashed to take these photos.

 We've had so much heavy rain this past week, I doubt if there's much blossom left

Enjoy your gardening.

 

à bientôt

Barbara Lilian

  

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Happy May day.

I almost forgot to wish all my friends

 a Happy May Day.

A pretty posy of  Lily of the valley.

Take a look at my old post

   A posy 'du Muguet.'

for the story of my first experience of receiving a posy of Muguet from my old friend Leonard 

à bientôt

Barbara Lilian

Springtime garden

I love this time of the year when everything starts to wake up after being dormant during the long winter months. I've just been wandering around the garden seeing what's growing and what's not, also what needs to be moved because it doesn't like where it is, or I think it would look better somewhere else.

I could never call myself a real gardener, I love my garden, but I don't let it rule me. I don't talk to my plants, well maybe sometimes, telling them they have 2 chances in life... 'they either grow or they go..
 I let the weeds that flower stay, if I like them, you might say I'm a lazy gardener, but who has the right to say a plant is a weed. if it happens to grow somewhere that's not choking the special plant I have planted then it can stay. The only no go in my garden is I like the grass to be green, I don't like daises or dandelions to sneak in and this year we have an abundance of dandelions growing in all the fields around where we live.

If you read my last post  you will have seen them everywhere, but that's OK as long as they stay put in the fields.
I'm going away in a few days so would you like to see what my garden is looking like at the moment.

One of the many Pieris ( Forest Flame )
Always gives colour throughout the year.

Japonica Japanese Quince

Alyssum ( Saxitile )

Flowers first from April to June, cut back after flowering

then the leaves are a lovely silver grey

forming a good ground cover.

 I hope I don't miss too many things, the Peonies are about to burst into bloom,  if it rains a lot while we're away and we have wind they soon get damaged ,so fingers crossed they'll still be here when I get back.

The Roses are beginning to grow again after the late snow & frost damaging them.

Today I've been splitting and moving the ornamental grass's a friend gave me, I hope it will look as good in it's new home as it did last year.I'll show you that when it's growing, as it's still at the stubble stage.

 I didn't realise it would grow so tall and spread so much. I hope it will be happy where I've put it, as it was hard work digging it up, I had to get help from my other half to dig the holes to replant them. I feel much happier now going away, knowing they will be able to start growing in their new place as it would be too late to move them when I get back. Did I just say I don't let my garden rule me, well maybe I do occasionally.

 The terrace with lots of young plants in pots waiting to go in the garden.

They'll have to wait a little while longer.

We love this area especially for summer evenings.

A few herbs.
Which I always keep in pots near to the kitchen.

Lavender cuttings waiting to go into the Lavender bed

Choisya ( Mexican Orange Blossom )
This will probably be in full bloom when we return.

The Last of the Tulips.

Sempervivum ( succulents )
Which grow out of the crannies in the rockeries.

I put this photo in as I wanted you to see the sweet little viola  that popped up all by itself.
The seed must have come from a flower pot that was there last year .

I've sown seeds in trays and never had success growing them on.

After my busy day making sure everything was able to look after itself during my absence,

 I took several pictures of the sky.  It's amazing how quickly the sun went down.

I'll be back in a couple of weeks and then I'll show you where I've been.

It won't be as warm as it here in France, but it's a beautiful country.
Just a little clue ! it's my favourite place to visit as my son and his lovely wife & grandchildren live there.

à bientôt

Barbara Lilian.