Saturday 10 July 2010

This England

When I was a child we would have many 'doorstep' services but not so now except for the delivery of milk to those who prefer that to the supermarket.(Oh and I nearly forgot the ice-cream van who stops outside my window playing his noisy chimes every day - I do not buy prefering the supermarket) We do though have a knife and garden tool sharpener still visit in our district. How he manages to sit outside all day without a hat in our current temperatures I do not know.


And talking of temperatures it was 100 degrees in my garden yesterday and 88 degrees indoors. My thermometer registered 86 degrees during the night in my bedroom. Could be hotter today. With the high humidity and lack of breeze it has been difficult to sleep for the past few weeks. The only air-conditioning available would be my car but I don't want to sleep there!!

The garden is suffering with 2 inch wide cracks in parts of the lawn that are a foot deep. Here you see we have been filling them with sand. Our ground is clay which floods in the Winter and then contracts and dries out in heatwaves such as we are having.





However there has been an 'upside' this week. We had friends over for dinner and having eaten in the garden in the shade we spent most of the rest of the evening sitting at the bottom of the garden amongst the Lavender and enjoying it's colour and fragrance. These pictures do not do justice to the vibrant colour. The lawn generally has lost it's green and is turning brown after so long without rain. Newspaper today showed pictures of Hyde Park in London looking like an arid desert. Some river beds are drying out and reservoirs very low. Some rain would be appreciated.




We will put up our Gazebo today as our Grandchildren will be visiting for the day tomorrow. So excited as they have only been once this year. Don't see them so much now that Janie is back working full time.

14 comments:

melissa said...

Here in the sunny southern U.S. we're having the same, exact weather. Temps. are about the same as yours, but wondering if you get the humidity we do. Sure hope not.

And also hoping you have fans in your house. 'Course we have air cond. inside (otherwise we'd melt!), but the fans really are a life-saver, aren't they?

Praying the both of us have relief soon. You take care. :)

Elizabethd said...

The same here, we and the plants are gasping....but it is set to change next week, so we are told.

Lavender is so lovely at this time of year. I'm picking mine now before it goes over. Then will dry it and use for crafts later.

The callers here are the Fish van and the butcher, no one else. I'd love to have a knife sharpener!

Vee said...

Not much rain around here lately either, but today is making up for it. My only wish is that it were a gentle one. It's a downpour. We have a lot of clay in our soil, too, so I understand that story. You'll have such fun with the grands and they'll love a gazebo. What a blessing to have a man visit to sharpen all the dull things. I'd love to have my scissors and knives sharpened! Try to stay cool...feet in ice water? Hope that you get some rain soon.

Susan said...

Oh that has to hurt, seeing that happen to your beautiful backyard. Can you not water the grass? We water here ALL the time during the hot summers. Also we have air condition, Praise God!! Have to. I could almost smell the Lavander from here!!!!!

Jenny said...

Your garden looks lovely.

Jenny <><

Michael said...

I so love your Garden, Barbara. I can only imagine how wonderful that lavender smells and how cooling that would be to sit outside in the evening, but gosh, 100 in England!?!! Crazy hot I can imagine with the humidity. Here in CO it is very dry so at least we don;t sweat as much. lol. Enjoy the cooler evenings then is all I can say.

Lovely photos too--i am quite sure they don;t indeed do the garden jsutice.

Sara at Come Away With Me said...

The lavender is lovely and blooming so profusely. Despite the awful cracks in the ground, the garden still looks good. Have fun with your family tomorrow!

kathleen said...

Well Barbara,here in southern Ireland its been raining steadily for the last two days and is set to continue into next week!No chance of any drought here! I love your lavendar and must try growing some its so colourful,obviously it loves arid conditions!
Stay cool!

Patsy said...

it is hot and dry here in our part of the USA and we need rain bad.
I don't see why the moon flower vine would not grow for you. They are lovly in a moon garden.
Patsy

Needled Mom said...

Wow!!!! That is HOT for you guys. I can't even imagine what it must be like. Meanwhile our high today was 68 and tomorrow is forecast to be 66. What's happening????

We have the same clay soil. We are constantly adding amendments to it for planting.

That blue in your garden is just gorgeous. I'll bet the smell of it is heavenly too.

I'm mostly known as 'MA' said...

We just experienced about a week of near 100 degree temps and 2 weeks without rain but have had a good rain now and are enjoying much cooler temps for the past 2 days. It has been wonderful. All spring it seemed as though it would never quit raining so we are not experiencing any thing like what you have there. I hope you get some rain soon and also that you enjoy your day with family. Try to keep cool.

bristowmom said...

Do you put the sand in to break up the clay for future planting?

It sounds as if we are having similar weather. The difference is that we have central air conditioning because the heat is normal here.

A Brit in Tennessee said...

I'm afraid I've become slave to the air conditioning unit, and do not fare well sleeping without it.
For that reason alone, I would consider sleeping in the car ;)
Joking of course..
Your Lavender is absolutely spectacular, I can only imagine the fragrance, and sitting in the garden amongst it would be a little touch of heaven.
Aaaaahh.

Betty said...

Barbara,
Your garden is always lovely, cracks and all...our temperatures are in the high 90's and above 100 quite a few days...

Alan and you continue to be in my prayers...especially on the 15th that Marion mentioned to me.

Thank you for the visit and kind comment on America's birthday. I conveyed your sweet birthday greeting to our grandson and he deeply appreciated it.

God bless...Betty