Month: May 2025

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Chicago, Box and Seedlings

At last, half term has arrived, and last night Becky and I went to see Chicago in Bristol. I enjoyed the show, and I enjoyed the Italian meal we had beforehand at Moltobuono 59. What I didn’t enjoy was having to get up at 5am this morning to take Becky to Bristol airport – she has flown to Edinburgh to visit an old school friend, and returns on Wednesday. I have felt tired all day, and my afternoon nap hasn’t completely refilled my batteries. I’m sure an early night tonight, though, will do the trick.

And having enjoyed a wonderful May so far, it is typical that the weather has changed in time for the holidays. It rained last night, has been dry today, and windy, but the forecast for the next few days is for rain. Which did mean I’ve tried to make the most of the outdoor weather today – changed the oil in Becky’s Ka, took down the Box hedge/tree in the front garden – it has been demolished by a caterpillar, a shame to lose it but it was just a skeleton of twigs.

On Wednesday I got my first sunflower seedlings planted outside in the big trug and, fingers crossed, they seem to have taken hold. The alliums look great, but are just beginning to turn

But not to worry as all the Love in a Mist are beginning to flower to give a burst of blue and white across the lawn.

On Monday evening I took Sam to Bridgwater station to return to Cardiff – I head up there later this week to bring back a car load of stuff – his time there is nearly done.

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Sam, sun, and Tony Ann

On Monday, Becky and I went to Bristol to see Tony Ann, a young pianist and it was a wonderful evening of culture, a rare outing on a school night!

Having parked up, we ambled across College Green in the warm evening sun, before sitting for a drink, al-fresco, at an Italian on Park Street. It did feel a million miles away from home, and was a lovely evening.

It helped that the glorious weather continuous. We’ve been treated to blue skies, sunshine and (almost) uninterrupted dry weather all week, culminating in another lovely Sunday, spent outside, pottering, reading and snoozing.

I say “almost” because on Tuesday evening the sky darkened, thunder rumbled and then the sky was rent asunder with lightening.

For about 30 minutes, it was quite some storm

but the water was welcome. I suspect we may end up in a drought this summer – a price I’d happily pay for the wonderful weather to continue. Its only mid-May, so everything still looks fresh and green, and my sunflower seeds sown a couple of weeks ago show great promise.

And we’ve been blessed with a visit from Sam. He came home on Friday afternoon, and returns to Cardiff tomorrow evening, but its been lovely to have him home for a short while. He has completed all his assignments, he just has one exam to do on the 6th June, and then that’s his university days done. I think he is looking forward to finishing, there are times when it looked like he’d never be a university graduate. but now that’s a racing certainty. He’s not sure what the next steps of his life will be, but I’m sure he’ll work it out.

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A Sunny weekend

After a dry, but not necessarily warm, week, the temperature rose for the weekend, giving us a couple of days of pleasant temperature, blue skies and sunshine. Certainly “usable” weather, and we’ve spent much of Saturday afternoon and Sunday outside. The alliums are currently the “pic of the crop” providing crowns of colour against the green backdrop. They look particularly good in the lawn, and in the trugs by the lawn. I will admit to being disappointed with my alliums in pots – they dried out whilst we were in Crete and now are only producing a few feeble flowers to offset brown, curled leaves.

The difference a few days can make – above are the alliums yesterday (Saturday), below was them on Wednesday.

Have provided us with plenty of blossom flowers, the apple tree is now laden with young fruit:

The hostas are looked full and green, and new to us this year, some dahlias are providing a splash of colour.

Across Saturday and Sunday, I dug up all the bulbs from the front trug – a job that seemed easier this year than I remember from previous years. I suspect it was because the soil was so dry and friable – March, April and now May have been very dry months.

All this work can be tiring, so I took the opportunity to take a quick nap ….

(and just for info, today I planted 5 pumpkin seeds (why five? that’s all I had!) and most of the sunflower seeds planted last week have sprouted.)

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A wonderful week of weather

We’ve been enjoying a wonderful week of weather, a mini-heatwave that begun last Sunday and has continued all week, bathing us in blue skies, and warm weather, nice and warm, but not unbearably hot (although it has got a little warm at night.)

Sadly, though, its all change today – still bright, light and sunny, but the temperature has dropped significantly, and a chill wind whips through you when you step outside. However, it forecast to remain dry this week and beyond, after a dry March and April, it looks like May is following in the same way. The ground is getting hard and, whilst everything remains a lush green at the moment, I don’t think it will be too long before pots and plants begin to dry out. The alliums I planted in pots way back in Autumn have already suffered from the hot dry spell, when we were in Crete – the leaves are wilted and brown at the edges and there is not multitude of strong flower heads that I had hoped for. All is not lost, though, the alliums in the lawn are now in flower, and the ones planted in the small wooden trugs are set to open soon.

Today I sowed some sunflower seeds – 12 “High Hopes”, 24 “Start-a-Garden” and 24 “Earth Walker”, all in the front porch. The bulbs in the front wooden trug have all gone over, I’ll look to lift them in the next couple of weeks ready for these sunflower seedlings, and geraniums that are on order from Thompson and Morgan, due to arrive late May.

We had a little bit of drama on our street this morning – as I returned from my run there were two police cars parked up and four police, ringing the doorbell of a few doors down. Becky kept watch as I warmed down, after a lot of waiting around, the eventually spoke to our neighbour for a few minutes, before driving off.