Summer has arrived. Here the month of June has the longest days of the year, and the countryside all around is at it’s most green and pleasant so as there are only 2 more weeks until Toby finishes college for this year, I’ve been making the most of what free time I currently have. I’m getting out and about with my camera as much as possible, because although we’ll walk every day over the long summer break together, walks with Toby are all about his needs rather than my wants, so we’ll be going at the pace he dictates, along the route he chooses and he’s really not keen on me stopping to take pictures of things.

For my solo adventure this last week I headed off to Panshanger Park. Though it’s on the edge of Hertford town it feels like deep countryside, especially midday in the midweek, when there are few people there. Oh my, this place makes my soul sing, there’s so much there to delight in…

wandering along the woodland paths, dappled with sunlight and cool green shade, listening to the small bird chatter in tree canopy overhead.

wading down through the open meadows, past the great gossamer globes of the goat’s beard seed heads, swishing through the long grasses which move like the gentle swell of the sea in the breeze and buzz to the drone of bees, dragonflies and hoverflies and where the longhorn cattle go about their business of meditative munching.

squelching along the marshy margins of the lakes and the meandering river, where coots, ducks, swans and grebe all call out their warnings from nests hidden deep in the reeds and rushes.

The heat of the summer sun has not yet been with us long enough to have bleached the intense green from the leaves and everywhere there are flowers; exquisitely delicate lace of cow parsley, fragrant heads of elderflower, tiny flowers of deep periwinkle blue that glint in the verges along the path, daisies and buttercups and dog roses. I walk with a big smile on my face and a lightness in my heart that has been a little lacking of late.

Back at home I’m making plans for the autumn, which is when I’ll have time to work properly again. I’m drawing up lists of the patterns that I’m planning to work on, and the tutorials that I’d like to share. As always these lists will probably be rather more ambitious than realistic, it’s hard to factor in the limitations that caring for Toby brings and I forget that everything always seems to take twice as long as I’d imagined it would. I do however already have samples made for a blog post on the increases and decreases that I use in my patterns and their relative merits – I’m hoping to write that up and share it soon and as always I’ll keep you posted on news of new patterns later in the year.

Well that’s it until next time. I hope that you’re able to find some of the same kind of joy that Panshanger brings to me sometime in your week ahead and that you’ve enjoyed seeing some of these pictures, thanks as always for visiting with me here, J x

PS: In my 3 hour wander I managed to take 443 photos! So these are the heavily edited highlights 🙂

 

 

Today is Toby’s last ever day at school. Fifteen years in the same severe learning difficulty school is a long time and it’s hard to know how he’ll react to not going there again. In many ways it feels like we are sailing into uncharted waters, I just hope we don’t lose the paddle along the way 🙂

With the long summer break on the horizon, I decided to make the most of the last few weeks of familiar routines to go on a couple of solo mini adventures with my rucksack and camera. We’ve had perfect growing conditions here this year and the countryside around us is so green with lush summer growth. There are summer flowers everywhere: wild honeysuckle, cow parsley, daisies and buttercups.  Fruit is swelling on the trees and the brambles are thickly tangled, studded with flowers and busy with bees. So many of the things that I love about our local countryside. I also love picnics and am happy to have had five of them recently, including two lovely ones down in Surrey with Amy, who is staying in her uni digs until the end August. We’re very proud of her as she’s done really well in the finals of her English and creative writing degree, getting a 2:1 mark and is now looking for her first full time job, not an easy task in these chaotic times, but hopefully something will come along.

I hope to post periodically over the summer break, but might not manage to be here very much until the autumn. I will definitely be back though to celebrate my 15th year of blogging in early September. I hope you have a good couple of months, J xxx

 

Pictures taken at Tewin Orchard, July 2021