Seeds

Thank you for all the lovely comments on my last post.  This week has been a little cold and damp with some much needed and refreshing rain last night.   The woods behind us have a lot of tree pollen which is causing the men in the house to get itchy eyes and throats.  It's hayfever season and not much you can do about it!  This is actually a view of someone's garden that is by the woods - isn't it fabulous!

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We had a lovely 2 hour walk in the woods the other day - as someone has cut back the brambles on one of the lesser used paths in the woods, we were able to explore along the riverbank for about 3 miles.  There were so many bluebells, garlic and wood anemone and also herb robert and violet, I enjoyed it so much.  We found a little den - these turn up in the woods from time to time, I think it my be a maintenance project as there are  lot of fallen trees.

This week's Art theme over on Rain's blog was 'Planting Seeds'.   I have planted a lot of wildflower seeds in my garden this year which are just sprouting and am hopeful of some success with these as they have medicinal value and also attract bees and butterflies.... I had a search through my paintings and found these 'some I prepared earlier' on the theme of seed heads ...

Dandelion heads in watercolour.

Dandelions painted on silk

dried grass seed heads watercolour

more dandelion seedhead watercolour (we recently started eating the flowers in salads but the leaves are diuretic - I am sure I can't be the only one whose grandmother would not allow me to pick them for this reason!).

I will leave you with a picture of Mollie, she's nearly two now, still nervous and sometimes snaps or swipes but so much better than when she first arrived a year or so ago.  She will now stretch out when sleeping instead of scrunching up in that tight little ball, which shows she trusts us and feels at home.  Still a long way to go with her anxiety issues but she smiles a lot (cats smile by squinting their eyes at you in case you didn't know!).

I have been experimenting with food shopping daily this week... do you think it works out cheaper? I think possibly the opposite as less planning, but then again you can take advantage of reduced items and offers if you are flexible about what you eat.  Hubby is away for a few days with work so youngest son is cooking - it's curries every night yay!