Summer Gardens, Bees, Monty Python Live (Mostly)

The gardens are looking lovely at present, with my pots of lilies trumpeting their colours. Hydrangeas do particularly well here and driving around the area one is overwhelmed by these massive displays of rich purple, blue & cerise flower heads leaning over garden walls and banked in borders. I have several vast hyrdrangeas that are looking spectacular as are the giant red montbretia that are sending up their vivid flowers and sharp spears of leaves creating sharp architectural backdrops to other smaller plants that fill in the front of the beds like blue cranesbill. It's all rather lovely with the Farmers bees very busy throughout the gardens and in the trees. We seem to have a strong colony & the Farmer is happy that they are working well. I have just had a phone call from a neighbour to say he has swarm of bees in his shed so the Farmer has gone off to collect them, hopefully. It is not the best time of year for swarms, being rather late but if he can capture a good good size cluster they should have chance of survival.
'A swarm in May is worth a load of hay.
A swarm in june is worth a silver spoon.
A swarm in July is not worth a fly.'
We shall see.
Well, a wasted trip...the bees were bumble bees, not honey bees. Our neighbour really should be able to tell the difference! Farmer now disgruntled!

It has been another misty morning which again promises a hot day. Walking across the shrouded fields I was treated to the lovely sight of thistles with their mauve flowers, draped in dew-bejewelled cobwebs glinting in the emerging sunshine. This is perfect time of year for shimmering cobwebs adorning plants and laced between the bars of gates dripping with dewdrops.

The Farmer & the Sons are once again busy working on the silage crop after a few days respite. Younger Son went up to the CLA Game Fair at Blenheim at the weekend where it was unpleasantly hot & humid. Here that day it was grey, cool-ish and we were swathed in mist all day...it was so miserable I even lit the fire (!) just to air the house.

Last night the Farmer & I went to our wonderful local theatre in Cardigan (www.mwldan.co.uk) to see Monty Python Live broadcast from the O2 arena. The theatre was packed and with a palpable sense of anticipation. The show was great. I haven't laughed so much for a long time, with all the old favourite sketches being wheeled out interspersed with terrific dance numbers to the hilarious songs. The Pythons were on top form and seemed to be enjoying themselves. There was certain poignancy to the event which served to add a depth to the more cynical & ironic lines being delivered by five elderly gentlemen who had first made their surreal world available to us all 40 years ago.

Nursery School Sports Day, Octogenarian Film Show, Carmarthenshire Tourism

A misty morning promising a fine day of sunshine. Going out to walk the dogs before the mist has lifted is lovely with trees & cattle emerging through the grey veil that billows gently across the fields. The dogs race through the grass disappearing & re-emerging through the mist like ghost hounds. As we walked through apart of the farm where there is a derelict building two barn owls suddenly swooped out of the mist and floated across my path to disappear into the mists, a beautiful sight.

Yesterday was a day of the ages of man.
The morning was spent on our local little village sports field watching the pre-school tots have their sports day. So sweet & very funny! All these tiny children running races with absolutely no idea what it is all about and some very competitive parents, especially when it came to the Father's race! Our small grand-daughter (aged three & a half)) nonchalantly ran her ten metres race & then sauntered throught the egg & spoon race with the specially bought plastic spoons & plastic eggs (what happened to a metal spoon & a hard-boiled egg like in the olden days, pre health & safety idiocy?)in a very unconcerned manner. She was more interested in playing on the bouncy castle. Every child was presented with minute silvery cup, gold medal & a certificate even if they had refused to take part.

In the afternoon I went with a friend to our local market town to give showing of the film 'Teifi, From Sea to Source' that I produced last year (see the side panel to this blog for details), to the town's Friendship Group. About forty very old people came along, average age probably 80, and they were wonderful, one of the most appreciative & interested audiences we have had. Many of them were locals who had lived in the Teifi Valley all their lives and they very sweetly told us after the showing that they had learned a lot from the film & had so enjoyed seeing the countryside that they knew so well, from the air.
We sold a good number of copies of the film too which was very gratifying.

To round off a very busy day the Farmer & I attended a presentation by the Carmarthenshire Tourism Association
which was to tell us all about the success of a project that has been running for the last couple of years to inmprove tourism in the county. Many of us in local tourism have been involved in the consultations & this has resulted in our area, the north west of Carmarthenshire, in a new (albeit discreetly tucked away) visitor information centre in Newcastle Emlyn and a website,www.iteifi.co.uk. With some help from volunteers & general tweaking both projects should be reasonably successful.