The Last Hurrah - Sissinghurst

It looks quiet from up here on the tower parapet

but actually it was very busy

as people took advantage of another beautiful Saturday

to visit Sissinghurst before it closes for the winter.

Back home I brought in the last of the Cosmos

in anticipation of the Arctic blast being  excitedly flagged up

by the tabloids for the end of the week.

The clocks go back, the days contract

and I have taken delivery of a new chair.

(I'll show it to you later.)

I see more sitting in my future.

There has not been much of that of late.

One thing and another

My headmistress had no suggestions to offer me for my future 

apart from occupational therapy.

I looked it up in the dusty Careers Room and saw that it meant basket making.

This may be why it has taken me 47 years 

to get around to making a basket.

I went on a one day course at Charleston Farmhouse

and came out with a willow  basket that now has pride of place

on the table, but I don't think I'll be making another one.

A visit to Eastbourne, 

the first place in the country to have an average age of over 70,

has persuaded me to buck up my ideas about the rest of my future.

Meanwhile gardens continue to delight.

My day lilies

and Sissinghurst's - 

only a tower and a flagpole missing from mine.

Seeking shade I lingered between high yew hedges

and sheltered in the gazebo,

away from those pesky strolling tourists.

I leave you with this three year old's depiction

of a sad fox howling at the moon.

Time to get the crayons out again I think.

Chasing my tail

It has been a particularly good year for hawthorn

and pink campion.

The foxcubs - there are three this year 

don't be fooled by this tender only-child scene -

have trampled happily over most of the emerging plants in the garden,

but the runner beans have a bamboo barricade 

which has survived their predations, 

I think.

I'd better go and check.

Yes. It's working.

And while I was out there I managed a little garbage collection.

The new game is scattering other people's refuse

all over the garden.

We have a handy new recycling system which separates out

the food waste into smaller bins for the foxes' better convenience.