A Working Day.

I've had a quiet day getting on with various jobs both indoors and out. The weather has not been too cold and a fine rain has just started late in the afternoon. As well as tidying up some digging that the boys started I did some work in the stream and then I decided to try and move our garden table up into the shelter by the scree garden as I don't really want it sitting outside for the next few rainy months. I should have moved it up at the end of the summer but it is rather heavy and I didn't want to ask Peter to help. It just the kind of awkward job that can cause damage to his joints and set off a p-arthritis attack. Instead I planned to ask the boys to carry it up over Christmas but time ran out. So I decided to think laterally and see if I could do it by myself. I didn't want to use my normal method of 'walking ' it from corner to corner as I thought that wouldn't be good for the joints, a wheelbarrow would be unmanageable and then the solution occured. I could tip it on its side and roll it along. I still had to do a bit of heaving to get it up the steps and to roll it up the hill but I got the job done and now it is under the shelter away from the worst of the weather. (Just seen a squirrel running through the trees out in the garden.) I do like flowers and these dianthus that Kate brought me are making the kitchen bright and cheerful. We may be in the middle of the winter but there are still a number of flowers in the garden. Some like the roses are hanging on from last year,
and others like this saxifrage and the primula have begun their spring flowering.


Out in the lawns the daisys are flowering and on the porch wall the winter jasmine is covered with its small yellow flowers.

This group of daffodils which are sheltered by the house have been flowering for several weeks and I can see more daffodils and narcissi spears on the banks of the stream behind the house.