There is nothing like getting a shoe dropped onto your face to awaken one to the delights of the day. Truly. But, that is what spaniels sometimes do when they’ve decided you’ve had enough sleep and should be awake playing. My reluctance to get up often has to do with a dreary environment outside. True to form, today’s morning was heavy and dark. Once there is a breeze, however, I quite like being outside on this kind of morning.
So, half an hour after being unceremoniously ousted from bed, I was trudging up the hill, climbing over a stone wall and crossing over a hilly ridge to greet the cloud that had come to say hello. For that was what the heavy morning was all about – a cloud dropping by.
The mist was swirling and the droplets of moisture quite pronounced on the grasses and heather as well as the berries on the rowan trees. Oh what understated calm and beauty! The cloud came in even lower and the mist turned into fog for a little while, which made me quite happy. I love fog, always have. This wasn’t true fog though, this was just a temporary cloud hug, but I was reminded of the foggy mornings a few weeks ago.
This far north, summertime fog tends to signal a very hot and dry day to come. Sometimes that kind of fog doesn’t lift until midday or thereabouts, but as soon as it lifts there are no barriers in the sky to prevent the brilliance of the sun from beaming down. I enjoyed one of those mornings a few weeks ago. The fog was quite thick with visibility reduced to only about 30 metres. It was absolutely beautiful seeing everything in a softened natural filter. What was striking though were the dewdrops on the spider webs strung amongst the tall grasses in my back yard – which is really a field or small pasture. These small field spiders would only hurt a fly, although it would be rather helpful to society at large if they trapped midges, so it wasn’t an ominous vision. Actually, it looked like a covering of lace, adorned with crystals, draped through the grasses, glittering and all dressed up for a fancy event. It was eye catching.
With clouds dropping by to embrace us on their journey, the breeze getting cooler, and the sun still managing to produce warmth, this late-summer-into-autumn transition period has been a good one. Throughout my 5 years living here, the gales have usually started mid-to-late August. This summer has been relatively dry though, so I’m enjoying things as they are now. This, of course has translated into a couple of things getting done in the garden – woohoo!
As Monday was cool and breezy, and no flying cannibals were around, I decided to tackle a couple of the beds in the cluster of flowerbeds area. These beds had largely been left to their own devices this summer and if you remember one of them had gotten so overgrown that the Hubs had slashed it all down with the strimmer thinking it was just weeds. Thankfully, the stubborn daisy and red hot poker plants I had there can’t be easily killed. Everything else buried under the weedy turf were spring bulbs. So, quite frustrated with work and how my summer hopes for the garden had been unceremoniously squelched, I vented on two flowerbeds and now they are nicely edged and prepared to welcome spring bulbs and some mulch. This makes me much more mentally satisfied now.
I also cut the grass around the veg beds in the back garden on Monday. Not a terribly interesting task to report on, but it made me immensely happy. We haven’t been doing it regularly this year due to a couple of different factors. I do think it might have been different if we had managed to fill the beds and properly plant them up this year. But let’s not cry over spilt milk, the veg planting plans have already been drawn up for next year and I’m mentally plotting the landscaping projects to suggest to the Hubs that we do soon to reduce such manual upkeep for next year. It will all work out I’m sure. You see, our quad bike trailer has arrived!!!! Woohoo! We are now up and running to transfer soil, rocks and boulders from place to place on the croft, including the back garden! I have quite a few project ideas, to the point that I suspect the Hubs is becoming allergic to them!
And finally, no – my massive order of 700 spring bulbs has not arrived yet. Still waiting – impatiently!
