Random snapshots from a short week

Enjoying the asparagus.  It's absolutely delicious at this time of year.  I cooked it in a little butter, and it couldn't taste nicer.  And I've put some in a tart as well.  In a few weeks we'll be blase about it (sorry, no idea how to put in an accent over that "e") but right now it's a bit of a luxury.

Loving this little herb garden that I spotted at the allotments.  The whole area was immaculate.  You can see on the side of the shed there's a plastic tray container filled with the kinds of things insects like to hide in.  The blue tub was labelled "samphire".  I'm thinking this plot must be in with a shot at the "Best Plot" award.  There are extra points for wildlife stuff and nice labels.  Almost no points for the things I've got on my plot.

I may have mentioned that this year I won't be growing any chillies.  None at all.  All of that effort for, well, chillies.  Which I don't use much at all.  Last year I bought a huge 99p plant from Aldi and I had enough chillies to last a lifetime.  So imagine my surprise when these little plants magicked their way into my shopping basket.  

Two Jalapeno pepper plants for 98p.  What is it about chillies and tomatoes?  They are very hard to say no to.  I think it's because they say "summer" to me.  They're here for the whole long season, right from the cool dark beginning until the crisp dewy end.  Theirs is a slow journey.  At first it seems unlikely they'll grow fast enough to produce any crop before the autumn.  But suddenly they take off.  And then they're fun to watch, as the flowers fade and tiny fruits appear.  I like to watch them swell and ripen, week by week.  So it was no big surprise that there would somehow be chillies again this year.  I'm hoping they'll maybe be mild enough to stuff.

And in case you were wondering, those plant holders in the car have a bit of a design flaw.  As you drive along, the soil is shaken up one side of the pot, and a couple of miles into the journey it will start dropping down onto your shopping in big clumps.  It needs a rethink.

This is the littlest boy playing the piano.

He likes to bang random notes and sing an actual proper song.  For him this constitutes "playing" the song.  I could listen for hours.  But only because I'm his mother.  

Something he's learning to do properly.

He used to like making up his own moves, which usually involved bouncing pieces across the board and taking off whichever of his opponent's pieces he fancied.  I'd shout things like "Cracking move" and "He didn't see that one coming".  But now we're doing it properly.  It's not nearly as much fun.

A glimpse of the castle wall.  There's the most beautiful clematis flowering over it at the moment.  This was taken with my point and shoot camera.  I really want to go back with my DSLR and see if I can get a better shot, I just love it.

A rare shot of Nibbles the hamster.  He's not often seen in a good enough light to photograph, what with being crepuscular and everything.  (This is a word my eight year old taught me recently - apparently hamsters aren't nocturnal so much as they are crepuscular, ie. out and about at dawn and dusk.  I do love it when the children teach me stuff.  It happens more and more.)  

Tomorrow morning I shall be standing in the rain watching the last football match of the season (excluding the four tournaments that are coming up).  Then in the afternoon we're going to see some older guinea piggies to see if there is possibly a new buddy for our lonely piggie.  You may remember we lost a pig in the Easter holidays.  It might seem callous to just go out and get a replacement, but after giving it some thought it seems the right thing to do for our remaining pig.  She's five, so she may have two or three years left, and that's a long time for a social animal to spend alone.  A local small animal rescue place has some older girl pigs, so we'll have to see if there's one for us.  I'm not sure how our pig, Mrs Armitage, will react to an interloper, but I'm hoping she'll be happy to have a friend.  Fingers crossed.

I hope you all have a lovely Sunday, whatever you may be doing.  And watch out for that rain.