One day to the summer solstice...

...and the woodshed rose is doing its stuff,


foxglove season is fully with us, and honeysuckle is taking off

honeysuckle and young birch growing together

It is perhaps not surprising that this rhododendron Toad planted "up top" a good number of years ago has never flowered. It is still suffering deer depredations. Hey ho. We think it will have red flowers when it has outgrown deer chompings.


Meanwhile, the splendour of ponticum, such as it is in its non-Tennysonian way, falls. Also that of fuchsia.


I love the word music of Tennyson's poem and I always think of that first line, minus the castle walls, when spring and summer flowers begin to 'go over'.

The splendour falls on castle walls

            And snowy summits old in story:

       The long light shakes across the lakes,

            And the wild cataract leaps in glory.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

        O hark, O hear! how thin and clear,

            And thinner, clearer, farther going!

        O sweet and far from cliff and scar

            The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!

Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

        O love, they die in yon rich sky,

            They faint on hill or field or river:

        Our echoes roll from soul to soul,

            And grow for ever and for ever.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.

Boggybrae being a little behind the rest of the world, Mouse-ear, Greater Bird's-foot Trefoil, and Lesser Stitchwort are just beginning. Have an African daisy while you're at it. These, like Ox-eye daisies, are doing less well than they were.




The chives are lovely right now. Bees love them. The leaves are always useful as garnish on food or just chopped and chucked into whatever dish one's making. Recently I thought of floating some of the flowers, which are also edible (quite strong flavoured so go easy!) on some soup I made (recipe at the end). Pale Escallonia, some cuttings of which I gave to a friend earlier in the year, is opening its flowers now.



In other news, Toadlet is at a sleepover with a pal. This pal, who is a singer and wants to get into the Korean Pop Culture scene might be moving to Korea this summer. Toadlet could not let her go that far away never having watched the Harry Potter movies so they arranged a Hogwart's movie marathon.

Here is the recipe for mushroom, tuna and sweetcorn soup. There are loads of recipes for mushroom and tuna pasta sauces so it was bound to work.

Ingredients:
home-made chicken stock (approx 300ml)
chopped onion (approx a third of a big one; I was chopping one for something else and chucked a handful in the soup pan)
crushed clove of garlic (I love splatting garlic with a broad bladed knife and a whack with my hand)
chopped mushrooms (100g or so)
small tin white tuna in brine, drained

Boil these up, cool a little and whizz in a blender. Then add

small tin of sweetcorn kernels in water (drained)

Serve with your garnishings of choice. All or some of these work: dash of cream, chopped parsley, chopped chive leaves, chive flowers.