wet Saturday

After I wrote last we had some more sunny days, if windy.  Yesterday it was very hot while we were at the hospital all morning for last preparations before John's chemotherapy starts next Wednesday. In the late afternoon I managed to do a bit of weeding in the front garden and watched the ducks there including Dotty [her first visit to the front garden!].  It didn't take long before the rain started and hasn't stopped since, it seems.  It's raining heavily this morning and I REALLY DON'T WANT TO GO OUR AND DO THE DUCK RUN!

I first spotted Dotty through the kitchen window yesterday, she's the one on the left under the camellia in this photo.

Here she has joined Tuts in a lie-down, they're still very fond of each other ...

I went out to join them and do some weeding - only the usual suspects Dash, Winnie and Vera came to join me.

I found it funny in this photo how both Anke and Dotty stuck to their favourite black drakes.

                     Honey hadn't joined the group, she was resting by a water bucket near the rose arch.

PS: It wasn't so bad this morning on the duck run, rain had almost stopped and now the sun has appeared again.
I wanted to add a couple more photos.  I haven't taken many recently but these are some I liked:

                                              The white rose looking gorgeous before the rain spoiled it.

Because the rose 'New Dawn' that had been chopped off to make room for the baling machine to gy past had looked so nice in a vase in the kitchen I cut off some more after the first lot wilted.  I think it looks very nice there.

 
These were the Luncheon Club bunches for Wednesday 2nd July.
The beautiful ruby red Dahlia head below snapped off, so I saved it on a saucer with some water.

 

The mock orange is in full bloom now and its scent fills the air.










On the left some of the ducks on their morning run to the big pond - it's looking very green here!

 
An elephant hawk moth I spotted while raspberry picking, and below, in the sun lounge, Gerd and Maria's orchid present is flowering again unbelievably, having flowered almost non-stop last year.