4 OCTOBER 2009

The camera is working again!   But before I get sorted with my own photographs, I have to share with you these few that my father has just sent me.  Last week when he came to stay we took the dogs out for a long walk as we often do, and stopped for me to have a swim, as the tide was right and the sea a gorgeous calm and unrippled blue, the like of which I thought I might not see again this year.  Swimming in it was utter bliss, with seagulls wheeling in clear sky above and the water just warm enough still to be pleasurable….  And I was not the only creature who thought so…. Look closer towards the top middle of the photograph and you will see….

…. an enormous seal!  Thank goodness Dad had his super zoom lens on him – but in truth the seal was not terribly far out, and came nearer than shown in the top picture.  As it swam along near the surface you could begin to get an idea of its length – around nine feet or so long, it seemed to me.

At first I was startled and swam back so I could stand and look and really make sure it was a seal. I’m used to seeing those squarish heads, reminiscent of a labrador’s, swimming quite far out, but this one was huge!    He (she?) swam nearer and seemed genuinely curious and benign, so after a while I swam out again till we were only about 10 feet away from one another.  Eventually the seal dived down beneath the surface and swam off.  I later learned that he has been seen in the water quite a bit this summer, hanging around the fishermen’s nets.  What an extraordinary thrill on a fine autumn morning.

For background on our project to turn two Victorian railway carriages into an eco-home, plus more photographs, my garden writing and other journalism and information on my current and past books, please visit my website.

14 SEPTEMBER 2009

In the continuing absence of a functioning camera, I’ve had a very pleasant trawl through my library of photographs for pictures of autumns past.  This view, from 2005, has changed very little in the intervening years, although the stag’s horn sumac bushes have got a little taller.  They are just beginning to turn now, and then there is usually a week or so of glorious fiery colour before the first October gale blows all the leaves away, leaving just the curious red-velvet-covered seed heads that look like glowing torches.

The bushes used to afford a fair amount of privacy, but I’ve allowed them to grow too tall so that the leaves block out the light rather than the sight-lines of passers-by.  Time for a bit of judicious pruning once the leaves have blown away.   The light can be truly lovely at this time of year, especially in the mornings when it shines straight in these double train doors into our sitting room, back-lighting the leaves.  Here’s another view just before the leaves started turning….

…. and another in our bedroom, before it was painted, with the vintage patchwork quilts hung at the windows lighting up like stained glass.

There’s more autumnal magic – look at Mary, aged one and a bit, discovering dahlias in her bright red wellies in the patch where the porch is now….

… and these dew-spangled spiders’ webs – one of the true signs of autumn (along with rosehips,  sloes and blackberries all winking from the hedgerows – more on them in my next post).

2007 was the year we grew ten enormous pumpkins and had a great Hallowe’en party here, with each of Mary’s little friends able to carve a pumpkin lantern to take home.

And then came The Build. Compare this shot from 2007…

… with this from last September. You can see the porch just taking shape on the very far right.

I must remember to look at this picture next time I feel impatient about my lack of progress in the garden. We have come quite a way….

There’s still a long way to go until it’s the garden of my dreams, but we are getting there.  And the journey has certainly been a lot of fun so far….  I’m really looking forward to the next stage.

I hope to be back with some more recent pictures soon.

For more background and archive photographs of our project to turn a pair of Victorian railway carriages into an eco-home, plus writing on gardening, interiors and green issues, and details of my current and past books, please see my website.

4 SEPTEMBER 2009

Apologies for the blog hiatus over the past few weeks.  We have been in school holiday mode doing a lot of this:

….. and then in Devon doing a lot of this:

…. as a consequence of which the garden is rather overgrown and the house very untidy.  Added to which, I dropped the camera after taking the above picture, after which none of the subsequent photographs are downloading on to the computer – so even if I wanted to post some pictures of the overgrown garden and untidy house – I can’t!   So there’s only one thing to do… which is start restoring some sort of order to the place….  Not a task I particularly relish, but it has to be done.  I am rewarding myself an interim swim in a couple of hours’ time.   Normal Blog service will be resumed as soon as possible.

The only other thing to report is that Tinker had her first birthday yesterday. How amazing to think that just a year ago all those six puppies were the size of small guinea pigs. What an awful lot has happened in the course of this year…

For more background on and photographs of our project to turn two Victorian railway carriages into an eco-house, plus more writing on gardening, interiors and green issues, plus information on my past and current books, please visit my website.