the running wave

Whatever time of year, it is rare to see a patch of lawn without the bright little face of a daisy flower.  Adorable, familiar, a child's first flower, and pretty as a picture, the common daisy,  Bellis perennis  is the star of my vase this week.

I think I have used her expression before in a vase on Monday post, but it applies once more.  My mother used to refer to really pretty things as "sweetly pretty".  I always think of her when I put a little posy together.  The garden this weekend yielded up the contents of my vase today, and I do think it is sweetly pretty!  I hope you agree.

This morning I revisited part of yesterday's walk.  The dogs enjoyed a new route and I enjoyed being able to look out across the Firth of Forth without being blown over!  Today is a lull between storms as  more wind and rain is forecast for tomorrow.  Yay!  The colours today were gentle and soft, the air breezy and fresh, and it was altogether a more peaceful experience than yesterday!

Our walking group walk today was a wild affair.  We walked in a big circle, starting in Gullane, across the Aberlady Reserve to the dunes at the back of the long beach of Aberlady Bay.  In the distance, to the west, Edinburgh and Arthur's Seat were just visible .  We slithered down the sandbank on to the beach, about four feet, where the sea had recently gouged out the dune, and headed north along the beach to the headland, and then back towards the beach at Gullane.  We were more or less blown along the beach with the wind at our backs, and there was a little warmth from some welcome sunshine. It was an exhilarating and epic walk!  Any cobwebs left over from 2019 were well and truly blown away and are probably half way to Norway by now!

I feel as though we are well into the new year now.  There are green shoots pushing through the leaf litter in the woods, with a peep of white and the promise of a snowdrop.  The witch hazel is in bloom, I have seen viburnum in flower in other people's gardens, and now catkins on common alder are very much in evidence too.  Plant life is stirring. It is also the start of my annual campaign to rescue as many bunches of supermarket daffodils as I can afford.  So to accompany the alder catkins, I have a few flowers from the first three bunches of daffodils I bought during the week!

With the sun in the sky and a dusting of snow on the distant Pentland Hills, the dogs and I set off to recce a walk for my walking group.  I am a walk leader and have to come up with a two hour walk three or four times a year.  Not being a local to this part of the world, I do sometimes struggle to find a four to five mile walk which will take exactly two hours.  So this morning was a test run that didn't quite work out.  I got tangled up with too many golfers and will now have to rethink! Part of my proposed walk did involve the grounds of Gosford House, because it's a place I can't keep away from.  It is a place that never disappoints, and far too relaxing to miss on a quiet, sunny winter's morning.

Time to move on from the Christmas colours of red and green and kick off 2020 properly.  I thought I would start with a celebration of purple and lavender.