Roses, Swarm of Bees, Redecorating Holiday Cottage

At last we have some sunshine & rather more seasonal weather than we have seen recently. Because it has been such a cold, slow spring & early summer the roses are only now beginning to show some colour and this one Maigold outside the holiday cottage door is in full flower a month later than usual. The scent as one walks past is glorious.
Our local village shop has an amazing array of plants for sale and I indulged myself last week (to cheer myself up in the rain!) buying ten floribunda roses  to add to the garden. Many years ago we had a commercial rose grower renting a field from us in which he grew 20,000 roses and I was fortunate enough to be allowed to cut flowers whenever I wanted, so each summer I was able to fill the house with bowls of roses which was just wonderful. To walk down to the rose field on a summer's evening was a most wonderful experience with the swallows swooping through the perfumed air & the sea of colour at our feet.

Yesterday we had the good fortune to capture a swarm of bees. I was walking across our larger garden and was aware of a deep thrumming sound and realised that the swarm was gathering itself together, so I rushed off to find the Farmer who found the swarm collecting on a fence post (not the most convenient place for capture). He shook water over them to make them think it was raining which makes them settle in one place and then left them for a short while before persuading them into a collection box and delivering them into a hive that was made ready for them.
We have not had a swarm for several years and this one was not from our existing colony. There are a few bee-keepers locally so we cannot be sure where it came from. Lets hope they like being here & that they will stay and survive the winter.

I have no guests in the cottage (http://www.penyrallt.co.uk/) this week and so have taken the opportunity (my last chance before the autumn) to do spot of decorating, the small twin room was looking rather shabby so yesterday I set to with my brushes & pots of paint. It is small room but quite complicated to paint as the beds are fixed in with a 'proscenium arch'  which looks marvellous but does make painting the room awkward. Also the room being in an old former piggery is not square and one side is higher than the other whcih makes my reach on step ladder or on a board across the bed-base rather precarious...in fact I'm going to have to call the Famer in to do the very tops for me.
Having filled in time waiting for a cake to come out of the oven by writing this I shall now head off back to my painting & try get the room finished before lunch.