Pulsatilla - bud to seed

Pasque flower - Pulsatilla Vulgaris, April-June

Seeds are often as beautiful, or more beautiful, than flowers, as is the case with the Pulsatilla. Last year I only had one flower/seed-head, this year I had lots, waving softly in the breeze. The Honesty has been amazing this year too, with some of the clumps developing purple seed-heads, which have kept their colour even after 2 months. You can see a few are still the usual green colour at the back. See my garden in detail here.


Honesty -Lunaria annua

Otchipotchi tiny white vases

Otchipotchi porcelain vases available to buy here. I'd love to add one of these to my little collection of tiny handcrafted white bud vases but as always, it's the postage costs that stop me. If I ever find myself in Portugal I'd love to visit and buy lots of Paula's wondrous white delights.

Scottish jewellers

Iona Brown - Ring with salt crystals - DJCA graduate 2011

I love making crystals, haven't done it for years, so it was nice to be reminded of them and even better to see them incorporated into her jewellery. I don't know how wearable or lasting it is but that is part of the beauty. Lots of my own paper and twig jewellery pieces are still going strong after 20 years despite everyone telling me they would fall apart quickly.


Merlin Planterose - Necklace, Ring and Silver Bowls - DJCA graduate 2011

As someone who liked working with nature to create my own metalwork, bowls and other works I'm really liking the techniques used by Merlin Planterose to, in her father's words, turn silver into stone. She used stone as both hammer and anvil to give a beautiful natural texture to her pieces, which includes stone dust from the process which gets embedded into the silver. I'd love to see and feel the effect in real life.

Scottish jewellers

Not posted jewellery/metalwork in ages, in fact, for the first time in my life I actually forgot about Degree shows entirely this year (says something about the 'brain fog' taking over me this year, which I find worse than the physical symptoms of M.E./CFS).

Found a few online that I liked. Some from this year, some from previous years, here are two and I'll post more when my brain gets going:


Hannah Eccles - Brooches - ECA graduate 2010


Roisin Connolly - Edinburgh Street - DJCA graduate 2011

Adding June flowers to Flickr

Finally uploading my June flowers to my Flickr plants album. Not necessarily great photo's but gives a good overview of the variety of life out the window. All the plant details are available on my Folia pages, which is what these photo's are intended for, so I can keep track of what's where when they retreat underground over winter.

I love how I say fill it out, as if there is any space left to fill!


Indoors my handy salad, growing has been a bit thin on the ground because all the space is taken up with plant cuttings. Mr P doesn't mind buying annuals for his garden but mine is on a very, very tight budget so I need to grow as much as possible now to fill it out next spring and summer for free. It's making me look differently at plants I didn't used to like. Suddenly, if something is easy to grow from cuttings and takes up very little space in winter I get interested. I've got a lot of varieties of Dianthus going on, it looks more like Granny Creates than Cally Creates. Another fave is the bright Oxalis which roots really quickly from cuttings. I don't know if I can keep it going indoors through winter but if I do I'll have masses for Spring. The little piles of leaves in the previous post were prunings from the Oxalis which has already been potted on and is growing happily...


Oxalis 'Sunset Velvet'

More June FLowers - spice tones

Bearded Iris, Oxalis, and Herb Robert leaves all brought some warm spicy tones to the garden this June. The irises have finished but the others continue on rampantly with the Herb Robert always a big hit with small bees. The Oxalis is an annual in Scotland but well worth it for all the vibrant colour it brings, really livening up gaps between other plants and always great next to purple toned foliage. See my garden in detail here

Is a Vitamix too noisy for a mobile home?

Question, does anyone know how loud a Vitamix sounds in a Mobile Home?

Update 18th July 2011: I bought it, and it is loud, but I don't need my things to be smooth so I mostly only have it on for 10-30 seconds. The violence of it still freaks me out a bit and my heart races with fear before I hit the button, I'm sure my face is a picture of scrunched up worry as if it's going to suck me in and mash me into a savoury dip. I certainly wouldn't dream of having it on long enough to make soup, but that's not why I wanted it anyway. Three days in it's already invaluable.

Deeba Rajpal - Passionate About Baking

I don't get about blogs much these days, as you know, so when I do it tends to be to get recipe conversions to UK measurements for things I have already or in search of Gluten and Lactose free alternatives to recipes I can't use anymore. I usually head straight for a few key GF/Vegan blogs as they tend to have tried most alternatives, but sometimes I stray into other territory and find new food blogs that I'd missed in my allergy free searches.

Such was the case today with the blog Passionate About Baking, written and photographed by Deeba Rajpal. I clicked on it and the most beautiful series of photographs of Black Sesame Macarons with Cherry Chocolate Ganache appeared and I had to share a few with you. And if you want to make them the recipe is here on Food Wanderings where she guest posted.





Macarons, not to be confused with Coconut Macaroons, you can see the differences in basic recipes here.

More June FLowers

More flowers because I said I show Liz the garden. See my garden in detail here. First up pink and grey/blue tones, more to follow in other colours.







1. Aquilegia 'Nora Barlow'. 2. Hebe in bud. 3. Dianthus 'Starry Eyes' uncurling it's petals which become white with wine red central markings. 4. An unknown Dianthus in bud, opens mid pink with darker pink markings. 5.The filigree leaves of Cineraria with the flowers of Calibrachoa. 6. Herb Robert in flower and bud.

Food and Flowers

Got a bit of a shock to realise that June will be over in 1 minute so in a rush to get something blogged I only have a few garden pictures fit for viewing. The best part of June has been fresh food and fresh flowers, and for the bees, the food is in the flowers, what could be better. In the face of a lot of freak weather the gardens have done pretty well and there has been a definite increase in wildlife. See my garden in detail here.



Bees on Cirsium Rivulare




Lunch


Tulips and Alliums

Fallen Tulip petals

Honesty Flowers