Spring has sprung...let's Countdown to Christmas 2024 (Thread 2)

[NoWordForFluffy]

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For the forgetful of thinking AKA me tomorrow, repeating the countdown!

Hoping to catch a glance of the northern lights here too but very doubtful. I spent ages looking last night but didn’t see anything, but have seen photos from others here. Fingers crossed for us @NoWordForFluffy

227

Morning!

No northern lights for London last night - my neighbour got a good pic of them on Friday night. Gutted I missed them as its on my bucket list.

I did catch a bit of Eurovision - as beautifully bonkers as usual. I had a sudden idea that Abba might do a surprise appearance but think I'd just had too much wine. I watched Conchita et al "do Abba" from between my fingers, it was a bit cringey.

I'm just onto my third bowl of crunchy nut cornflakes - haven't had them for years and now I've started I can't stop!!

No Northern Lights here either. Really annoyed we went to bed 30 minutes too early on Friday night! If I hadn't had to be up for my hair cut on Saturday, we'd have been up. 😩

Gorgeous start to today. We had breakfast in the garden again. The balcony gets a little bit too hot we've discovered, especially for the 🐕 It's hazy across the fields...no sign of the Welsh mountains today!

No northern lights here, really gutted. Not sure if there’s a chance tonight or not?

We’re on the beach. Lovely sunshine, but breezy and hazy. There are about 50 swimmers in the sea - brave people!! On the dog free beach, with 2 dogs 🙄 Have a good Sunday everyone!

We missed the northern lights too. DH had some sort of asthma kick off on Friday so we didn't venture out and there was no sign of them last night. Shame but we've seen them while away so I'm not too disappointed.

We're just about to go to the garden centre before going to my mums for lunch with dsis and her dc.
I have a garden shopping list as I spent part of last night sat on the patio making a plan. I'm so frozen by over-researching plants I've deliberately left a few pots empty so I can decide what to do with them later.

Jennifer I am a cold dipper but wouldn't brave the sea (because it's often not very clean 🤢) but I've been for a dip this morning. The place I go has bought a pump to keep the water at a steady temp so it was a cool 4° today. It's very refreshing!

I didn't see Northern Lights but there was a sliver of orange moon last night (don't know if it was waxing or waning , anything vaguely sciencey is not my forte )

In case this is useful for anyone, I've just ordered my photo cards for Christmas from Bonusprint
They have a big discount on at the moment with an auto applied code
I have just ordered 10( of my dog in a hat!)
The early bird catches the worm, so to speak
I've also ordered a couple of ornaments from Vinted

226 Well what a change in the weather today. Risk of sunburn yesterday, non stop rain today 😳

I'm not going to be doing anything Christmas shopping wise for a while as there is too much going on here.

I was proud to have finally gone on Whistlefish and bought all the birthday, Father's Day and event cards I need for the rest of the year. Made (almost 40 year old) me feel like an adult 🤣

I also ordered my bay trees and winter flowering jasmine yesterday. Hoping both will establish themselves a bit over the summer and provide some greenery and colour in the winter 🤞🏼

It was dry here until this evening, and then there wasn't as much rain as forecast. It's meant to rain for most of tomorrow though.

I've ordered lavender and herbs to put along our border, which will hopefully look good once they're established.

My mini Christmas trees should hopefully turn up tomorrow. They'll be dry and dead if they take much longer!

I had my second carpal tunnel injection today. My hand felt very odd afterwards!

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Our cats were looking folornly out through the glass door with a Mum make it stop look on their judgey little faces

Not having to go out and water plants was the only upside - it's not as though my car looks any cleaner <sigh>

My cat also blames me for the rain 70 🙄.

Made (almost 40 year old) me feel like an adult 🤣.

This made me laugh Meeces, going to the Butchers and hanging the washing out always makes me feel grown up and I'm 52.

Evening!

The rain didn't last as long as it was meant to today, though not looked like it had tipped it down overnight when we got up.

I was in the office today, then met up with a friend who I've not seen in ages, which was brilliant!

My mini Christmas trees have arrived, as has my lavender. Just the other herbs now, then I can start to get sorted!

224

Morning!

My head hurt a bit this morning. DH walked the 🐕 so I didn't have to! 🙈🤣

I've just put my little trees in pots. The pots for the lavender are on the way (bad timing!), plus I need more compost too.

It's meant to be dry today, until later, but it's looking ominous! Hopefully it won't rain as our washing needs to go out soon. 🤞

The house martins have adopted our balcony and sit there shouting. From about 4am. 😩 😴 Good job they're cute!

Morning. Those trees will grow in no time Fluffy

My bay trees should come today and winter flowering jasmine tomorrow.
I haven't really got as far as deciding what pots the trees will go in. Oops.

Yesterday I spent my lunch hour in the garden potting on tomatoes and peppers and moving things into the cold frame. Having them in the conservatory was annoying me and DH because it looked so messy.

Magnolia you'd think feeling like an adult would just happen over time but it hasn't - I just get the feeling every so often when I do something that feels especially grown up (like buying things way in advance and having laundry under control)

223 Morning!

The day looks like it's trying very hard stay nice and sunny.

Not much happening today - work, walk, cold dip and my mum is coming for tea.

My bay trees came yesterday. They make your Christmas trees look giant Fluffy 😂 They're teeny <oops >

Now I have a question. I have an empty big plant pot and a solar lamp post in the garden that I really like (see pics).
I'm considering putting the lamppost in the pot, filling it and adding lavender, rosemary and sage around the post. Similar to the last pic.
Do you think it'll look ok once the plants are all in?
I like having herbs & lavender in the garden for the colours, smells etc but right now they take up 3 pots that I'd like back for something else.

I think that would look lovely, Meeces. I think you'd need to protect the lamppost from the damp earth though. Nice thick postage bag from a parcel should do!

I often buy plants which are more mini than I'd expected! 🤣🤣 I'm hopeful my trees will grow well. They have all summer, after all! 🎄

It's nice here today. The washing is out!

Fluffy and Meeces your gardening endeavours look fabulous and I will be spurred into action as soon as this bloody rain stops.

I've just been busy writing down what I might do when the rain stops. I've gone from almost using sun tan lotion to umbrellas to wondering if I need to switch the heating back on in the space of 48 hours 🙄

Thanks both. Great idea about using a postage bag Fluffy - I've got some here already.

Magnolia I sound like I do a lot in the garden but you wouldn't know it if you saw it!
I have toms, peppers and sweet corn in the cold frame and I threw some beetroot seeds in one of the big pots yesterday.
Aside from that I have patio pots in the back, and a rose bush that currently doesn't have any roses.

I do have a 12 year old cactus that I love but seems struggle every summer so yesterday I finally got around to buying him a nice pot and some new cactus potting mix so a weekend job is going to be repotting him and probably getting stabbed to death with his spikes 😂

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Nice even number

I have some tiny tomatoe seedlings that I;m keeping protected till they're ready to go out ,

Sunny here , I have things I need to do , get getting organised ( ie off MN and on my feet )

It got sunny here at lunchtime today. Just as I had to go back to my desk. 😩

After work I potted up my plug plants (12 x lavender; 6 x rosemary; 6 x thyme; and 3 x curry plant) as my pots finally appeared! Hopefully they grow well so they can go into the ground in a few weeks. I also strimmed the grass, so it looks a bit neater out there again.

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I went for a quick garden wander yesterday , my clematis at the bottom has just peggged it , it grew a bit then the slugs got in.

So that's Cleamitis ( I've tried at least three ) that die and Passionflower ( three again) that die .
These are plants that thrive round these parts .

I'm thinking now of a new plant but I might just put the tomatoe seedlings in there ( which are still tiny but doing ok) and cover with a mesh

I've never had anything attack my tomato plants, 70. So that may be a plan!

DD and I are off to Chester today to do another murder trail (it was the only other one which is semi-local to us and relatively straight forward to get to on the train). It's a gorgeous day here so may be busy!

The dog keeps sodding pissing on one of my astilbe; it's annoying! Hopefully it doesn't die a pissy death.

Apparently the starlings were having fun in our new birdbath today, which is good news. Good to know it's in use!

We don't usually get birds in the garden ( except fat pigeons who are not bovvered by the cats as they know if one of the cats caught one they could fly off with them! )

We've had dozens of starlings on the lawn so there must be something on there or hatching from the ground ?

Very dull here. I finally have a washing line, and have been joyful whilst putting the washing out this week. The forecast said rain today, but haven’t had much yet.

On the way home from school yesterday, one of the DC started belting out Feliz Navidad - my Christmas spirit is definitely catching 🥰

Favourite vision of the day 70's pigeon borne baffled cat soaring into the sky 😂.

I've been digging out a bamboo runner - I only popped out to check the seedlings and 30 minutes later was still wrestling with the damn thing. I swear to God it had teeth. Finally managed to pull it out. Its about 7 foot long and had lots of bamboo babies coming off it. Its definitely now coming back to haunt us after we thought what a good cheap screening idea. Might have to crack open the glyphosate 😬.