Going out in a blaze of glory

I have just realised that I haven't posted any photographs of the most amazingly beautiful hollyhock we have growing by our front door. It really is something to behold! I put in a rather small, insignificant plant before we went away in April and it has been working it's way upwards, reaching for the sky, for five months now. It is now as high as the gable end of the porch

and it's flowers couldn't be more feminine if they tried!

The hollyhock still has a lot of life left in her yet and I think we will be enjoying those gorgeous flowers for a good week or three yet.

In the meantime I have been waiting for the right kind of day to have a bonfire. I cleared a huge amount of stuff which was completely swamping a flower bed and smothering part of the fence along the south boundary of the garden. The cuttings - Virginia Creeper, wild roses and other bits and bobs - have been languishing for several weeks now, slowly drying out and becoming ideal bonfire material! I was cut to shreds whilst excavating the fence and now I am going to get my own back! I have been waiting for a quiet morning without wind for my bonfire and today was the day!

It seems to me that there is something vaguely tribal about a bonfire. I find there is a huge temptation to do a Red Indian dance around it! I do have a real fear of fire but all the same there is something very addictive about a bonfire. Apart from having to keep it safe and under control, it's something I just can't help fiddling around with, adding more and more twigs and other stuff to keep it going. Today I really wanted to use the embers to cook some spuds and sausages with the children for their tea, but they had other things to do after school - two going to tennis and the other two to their first session at Beavers! So, another day, another bonfire. That day could be coming quite soon as the end of summer flower beds need tidying up and there will be plenty more to clear away. I've got lots of lavender bushes and some of the clippings will be a lovely fragrant addition to my next bonfire.

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In a vase on Monday - colour

The intense colours in my vase this week come from nasturtiums, sweetpeas and a single glorious zinnia! Their beauty and love of life speak for themselves and need no further words from me! Enjoy!

Coastal walk from Gullane to North Berwick

By the time I have walked about four miles, my toes are screaming at me - it's the arthritis, you see. One of the joys of being that little bit older than I was. However, for a long time, I have been keen to walk along the beaches, and follow the coastal path, between Gullane and North Berwick. So, having worked out the tide times, I decided today was the day, and off we went. Below is our starting point, the bay at Gullane. It's a lovely beach, very popular with dog walkers. This is looking east, the direction Tilly and I were going to take. Looking back, up the Forth, the unmistakable bulk of Arthur's Seat, and Edinburgh's skyline, just clear enough to see. For most of the walk, there is the choice between wandering along a series of beaches, or following a path along the top of each. There's no denying it, at heart I am a shell-seeker. I have loads of shells at home. We lived on one of the out islands in the Bahamas for a just over a year, ...

Possibly the last post and a sizzlingly hot vase on Monday

The border in our tiny garden is in an in-between phase at the moment and not very colourful, but elsewhere there are pops of high summer colour and I have brought them together in my vase today. The running wave uses Blogger as it's vehicle and they are changing the way a post is created but unfortunately I cannot make the new format work. I can't progress beyond the title! I cannot navigate to the main body of the post to create text. The new template has no prompts for adding photos, weblinks, to format the text, change font etc. It may be my old MacBook that's as fault but I can't do anything about that!! Are any other IAVOM bloggers who use Blogger having the same problems? I have tried, three times, to contact Blogger through their 'Help' prompt and received no feedback or contact whatsoever. This post is using the old 'Legacy' format, which no longer permits any kind of formatting of text, and so after four attempts I have finally manage...

the running wave

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