Category: Latin names

Books · Flowers · Garden · Happy · Latin names · Tea

Kaleidoscopes

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I took a long hard look at my website recently, wondering if now was the time to make dramatic changes. Is it too muddled, are there too many themes I wondered? After all, there’s this blog; Picture Book Reviews, Gardening, Latin names for flowers and Cup of Tea Books. Quite a variety. But no, not at this time. This is me. This is who I am. A person of many interests and this Blog brings me joy and time for reflection and the opportunity to merge these interests. I hope it will bring you a moment or two of calm too.

Thank you for reading and wishing you a safe, healthy and very Happy New Year!

I am reading Americanah by Chimomanda Ngozi Adichie and Friend Me! by Sheila M. Averbuch

bees · butterflies · Garden · Latin names

Our Natural Time and Tide

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September the start of the new academic year but the end of the summer, the seasons sweep me along, caught in the rise and fall of the tide of time. I am excited, new beginnings, time to tidy the garden after the fullness of summer, time to pare down, to cut back and move on. Time to let go but also to plan.

Taking the time to watch the bees and butterflies.

I’ve learned of the importance of the change of seasons on physical health, to me it has an immense bearing on mental health too. We move, behave, react to the natural rhythms of the seasons, the tides of the year.

 

Yesterday I watched the swallows balancing on the line, today I’ll search for the glistening September spider webs.

 

It is a beautiful morning. thumb_IMG_4692_1024The honeysuckle (Lonicera Caprifolium) has grown over the fence and this year we could smell the delicate fragrance drifting on the summer evenings as we passed through the gate.

Now small perfect cherry-red berries have emerged, plump and juicy, a feast for the birds. Sunshine illuminates it on the morning side; the east. The west will have to wait for later in the day to feel the full glow of the light. To sit at the kitchen table and look out of the window at greenery has been my aim since we moved here, it’s getting there.

 

A garden, like everything else, takes time.

 

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This sunflower grew in the pot with the cordon pear tree – a lovely surprise!

I am reading Guardians of the Wild Unicorns by Lindsay Littleson and Swimming with Seals by Victoria Whitworth.

Flowers · Houseplants · Latin names

Word Webs

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I am, I confess, a fair weather gardener. This does make me appreciate the good days even more though.

On wet, dreary, dare I say dreich, days I’m more inclined to be inside but there’s one thing I do know, learning about gardening will never end. There’s always something to discover. Each day is a new opportunity.

When I was a child I watched ‘Beechgrove Garden’ and ‘Gardeners’ World’. As the beauty of the flowers filled the screen their name was listed at the bottom. Not once but twice. The common and the Latin name. The presenters would effortlessly reel off these unusual names and I would listen, unaware that years later I would begin to attempt to learn them myself.

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The mother plant! Chlorophytum comosum

I have a Twitter account and have already stated my intention to learn some Latin names for plants. Apparently if you share an aim with someone it makes you more likely to achieve it. Here’s hoping.

Already I have been encouraged. Watching Monty Don on ‘Gardeners’ World’, he explained how the name for Sedum had been changed to Hylotelephium – this was one of the (as yet few) names I had already learned.

The days may be dark and cold outside but there’s always something to learn and this way I can combine my love of language and gardening. What a winter treat.

 

 

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All these came from the plant above and there’s a few spiderettes to plant out yet!

 

At the moment I am reading, ‘The Cabaret of Plants’ by Richard Mabey – slowly. I’m not very fast at reading non-fiction!