Friday 27 May 2016

Five on Friday


the irises blooming for the first time ever, after about four years!
I'd forgotten what colour they were supposed to be



I can see you



Joining in with Amy and Five on Friday.

A belated Five thanks to a broadband snafu cunningly fixed by the ancient and well-respected technique of Turning It Off And Turning It Back On Again.

1. Enjoying the wonderful light evenings in these weeks approaching the longest day. As the youngest two and I ate a late supper yesterday after a cross country thing we watched a farmer mowing the fields on the hill. A couple were sat at the edge of the field with their dog. It was the perfect modern pastoral scene. The biggest boy was out playing cricket. Is there anything lovelier than a summer’s evening?

2. Thinking I shall do 30 Days Wild with the children in June. I’ve been tipped off as to the location of a green woodpecker’s nest, where you can see a woodpecker flying in and out of a perfectly round hole in a yew tree to feed his/her chicks. Sounds like too good an opportunity to miss. I haven’t seen the list of Wild Things To Be Done yet but maybe birdwatching will be one of them.

3. I’ve just started reading Gillian Flynn’s “Gone Girl”. It’s one of those books that I’m reading to see what all the fuss is about. I’ve seen it referred to so often, “Following Gone Girl…” “In the manner of Gone Girl” etc. that I thought I’d find out. Anyone here enjoyed it?

4. Down at the allotment most of the cucumbers were mercilessly killed by the huge downpour of rain and hail on Sunday. The squashes and courgettes aren’t looking great either, and I think the achocha have had it, they’re a delicate looking vine in the cucumber family. It’s frustrating to nurture them on the windowsill for so long to have them wiped out in a single blast of weather but in the triumph of hope over experience I shall plant more.


5. Planning a little light caving for the littlest's birthday. We asked the biggest boy if he wanted to join in. He and his father are slightly more wary of tricky spaces than the rest of us. The littlest boy and I in particular share a wild abandon when it comes to such things. The words death wish have been used about us on occasion. 

The biggest boy gave it a moment's thought and then said that yes, he would, after all the instructors would be bigger than him and they must fit through. I said that it would be fine, if he got wedged we would just leave him there for a few days until he was thinner. There was precedent for this; the same thing happened to Winnie the Pooh when he went to Rabbit's and ate too much honey. Rabbit just hung his washing on Pooh and used the back exit for a while until Pooh slimmed down a bit. The biggest boy definitely has the words "stuck" and "wedged" and "tight space" floating around in his head now. Almost certain it won't happen. 

35 comments:

  1. I love your biggest boys logic he will go far! Isn't it strange how a lot of things have flowered this year after a gap. Is it the extra rain? I was wondering about your unusual patterned snail. We have suddenly had an influx of them recently. Hope the weekend goes well, not sure I'm a fan of confined spaces either :) B xx

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  2. 30 days wild sounds fantastic. Would be great to seek out the woodpecker's nest. Caving also sounds fun, i hope you get to do it after all. I am laughing at those words floating around.

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  3. The green woodpecker babies will be fledging soon so don't leave it too long- another week or so usually. The thought of caving gives me the colly wobbles ;-) sorry to hear about the veg. It hardly seems fair xx

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  4. Your pictures are lovely. Funnily enough, I was just remarking on our first ever iris after a similar period of flowerless leaves (not that I knew what it was until reading this post). I know I've read Gone Girl, just can't for the life of me remember what I thought about it. Bravo to your biggest boy. Two words are floating round inside my head now: 'can't' and 'breathe'.

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  5. You surely are happy when the irises open. Plants can be capricious :))

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  6. An enjoyable post and lovely pictures as always. Enjoy your weekend. Flighty xx

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  7. Wonderful pictures. I guess there is hope for a non-blooming plant. Four years! I think I would have given up lol.

    Have a great weekend

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  8. Looking forward to your views on caving, definitely not for me... Beautiful photos as always.

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  9. 30 days wild sounds good, I wish there was an adults version, my boys are far too old now for such things - or so they tell me. I hope you all have fun caving what a wonderful birthday experience x

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  10. Gosh, we are ambling on towards the longest day aren't we; I hadn't thought about it until you mentioned it. Lovely pastoral scenes; you can't beat England on a summer's day. Good luck with the caving. If your biggest boy gets stuck, do tell me if he makes a noise like a cork coming out of a bottle when you pull him out! Enjoy half term. xx

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  11. I went caving several times with my class on residential visits when I was teaching and used the same reasoning as biggest boy! I had to abseil too and reasoned if the rope would hold people much heavier that I should be OK until I factored in wear and tear,

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  12. Looking forward to hearing about the caving. Hope it's not too wet.

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  13. My son is a little wary of enclosed spaces as well. I hope you all have a wonderful time! Bees & Frogs for the win!

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  14. How lovely that your irises are flowering at last and you can rediscover what colours they are. Have a great time caving and hope nobody gets stuck, that would be my worst nightmare! xx

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  15. I always read for the pictures, especially of the beautiful old buildings but I want this one so bad! That house with the hay field for a front lawn, my goodness, it's gorgeous! Fun to see that farming doesn't change too much across the world.

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  16. 30 Days Wild in June sounds like a fun focus for the month. I am planning to camp the first two weeks of June on the other side of Mt. Hood and am looking forward to a moderately wild time, but no caving. As a child I went into the huge Tom Sawyer type cave in Hannibal, Missouri, USA, and remember it as awesome, cold and dark and not too tight. I hope you have a grand adventure and take photos. A red headed woodpecker visited our front flower patch this morning! Sadly I didn't have a camera with me. Sorry about your garden catastrophes. After seeing Gone Girl mentioned in several blogs I read, I cheated. I consulted Wikipedia and got the gist of the story there. I will be interested to read what you think of it if you read it to the end. xx

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  17. I love the first photo – brilliant. Your poor eldest boy! I'd be the same. I am not good in tight spots and the thought of caving makes me shudder. Wide, open spaces are more my thing :-) Have a lovely weekend. Sam x

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  18. I am interested to see what you think of the book, I got 3/4 of the way through it and wanted to throw it out. I stopped reading it I was disgusted with all of the characters. When I see a reference to that book I am hesitant to read the book they are currently talking about. I know some people loved it.
    Hugs,
    Meredith

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  19. I loved Gone Girl. :)
    Have a great weekend x

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  20. What a shame to loose so many lovingly grown seedlings, is it too late to start over? Caving is not top of my list of favourite things to do but for the kids I would. Richard and I once went through a mountain on Cuba, through a narrow natural cave system. It was super creepy. Love your oldest boys logic! I'd love to see a woodpecker flying out of its nest. 'My' woodpecker has been rather elusive lately. Oh and 'Gone Girl': one of the few books I haven't finished, I found it unbearable but maybe it was the narrator, he was insufferable. Let me know if I should give it another chance, I may well have been a bit premature. Have a lovely weekend. x

    P.S. I noticed an email with your comment, it looks like your blog commenting/email problem is sorted :-)

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  21. I am so sorry for the mass murder of your garden due to the weather. I hope you're able to pull a rabbit out of a hat and get some things growing. How about store-bought starts? I think I'll stay away from that book - let us know what you think. I just finished a good one that Meredith suggested called "Saving CeeCee Honeycutt" and I really liked it. I keep hearing about "Girl on a Train" but my sister said it wasn't very uplifting. Have fun in the cave.. hope you share photos. ((hugs)), Teresa :-)

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  22. Didn't care for Gone Girl at all, nor for Girl on a Train, very manipulative. I don't like tight spaces, so I would have given it a miss.

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  23. I've seen quite a few pictures of bees and flowers in Blogland this month, but yours get the Grand Prize! It's not easy to get such detail on both the bee and the flower -- it's a lavender flower, is it not? But I'm not used to seeing the blooms so close-up. Just lovely!!

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  24. I haven't been able to finish almost all of the "must read" books recently, I get too annoyed by them.
    what a shame about the hail.......... save them from slugs and something else gets them.....

    as for the cave. no thank you. I'll wait outside and hold the bags.

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  25. Noo! So sorry about the cucumbers. Perseverance is the word I think. I am with your eldest boy re caving and I will echo the comment from Lovethosecupcakes with the words 'can't' and 'breathe'!

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  26. Would you like a nice cup of tea when you come out of the cave? I'll be waiting.
    The bee on the lavender is a stunning photo!

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  27. A lovely pastoral scene indeed! I'm with Eldest son. Though the prospect of slimming down is appealing, the thought of doing so in a dark crevasse in the dark (or light for that matter) doesn't appeal. I hope you do do it so I can live vicariously though!

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  28. Caving? you are brave! I get scared just thinking of those tight spaces so I guess I would be with the "staying out of there" crowd. Good luck.

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  29. Images of Winnie the Pooh in Rabbit's burrow are not what you need before caving......


    I enjoyed Gone Girl a lot, but what was weird was I hated both the protagonists. You know how usually there's one you can side with? These were both gits who deserved each other.

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  30. Oh, the turn it off and then on technique is a very good one! I use it often :) Love that photo with the snail shell. Thinking of Winnie the Pooh now...

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  31. Gone Girl? worst book I've ever read. Seriously. Weird stuff.

    Caving? I'l wait outside with your oldest... you know, keep him company and all that...

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  32. Caving! Bloody hell that's up there with hornets and wasps and spiral staircases for me, with things that give me the heebiejeebies. I shudder. But yes, summer evenings are magical, especially when it's warm enough to sit outside. I read the last chapter of Gone Girl as I wanted to see what the fuss was all about, and then I wished I'd read it properly. Might take it on holiday with me. Sorry about the cucumbers. Hope you're surviving half term. xx

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  33. oh my god you are horrid to your little boy! LOL! I have been caving once and realised I was slightly claustrophobic. I would hate it if my mother terrified me by saying she'd leave me there til I was thinner! tough love CJ :-) give the boy my best luck for the expedition!!

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  34. Your last paragraph had me laughing out loud. We quote Winnie the Pooh in this household for most things, not sure this was totally apt for encouraging your son to come along though. Love your humour x

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