A Prairie in Sussex?

Mum and I have been visiting another garden.  We visited the Sussex Prairie Garden in nearby Henfield.  I don’t know why we hadn’t heard of it before!  It is a 6 acre field planted in prairie style, with large blocks of plants in interlocking beds.  The great thing is that you can wander through the beds on little bark chip paths, and enjoy the plants close up

!

The weather was much cooler and overcast today so much better for taking photos.  Here’s a better on of Mum sitting on one of the gorgeous benches scattered around the garden:

Finally, one for the Scavenger Hunt.  Didn’t expect to see buffalo on the South coast of England did you?  So this is my ‘thing clearly out of place’.

 

I am linking up with Rinda’s Scavenger Hunt roundup for July.  Do pop by and see what everyone else has captured through their lenses!

Buses and coaches

Every year in Worthing we have a ‘sea front fayre’.  It includes lots of a fun activities along the seafront, including a fun fair, market stalls, car and bike shows, and a bus rally.  The bus rally takes place just nearby, so we usually walk down to have a look.

There are always lots of the Routemasters, the iconic London bus:

Our local bus company had this cream and green livery.

Ahhh!  These take me back to my childhood, early 1970s coaches!  I would have sat on one of these on school outings, and my grandparents would have caught one of these when they came to visit from Birmingham. I remember once going on a coach day trip wioth them to Hastings.  I think we have photos somewhere…. I feel a scrapbook page coming on!

 

We always enjoy looking at vintage vehicles that have been lovingly restored.  As we walked home Maurice asked me if it brings the ‘anorak’ out in me.  I have to say, no, it doesn’t.  I like looking at them and appreciate the hard work and patience that has gone into them, but have no interest in the history, the mechanics and details of which garage these buses and coaches operated from!  However, it must be great to show off your bus at one of these events, along with others who share your passion.

Finally, I managed another Scavenger Hunt photo.  An outdoor market.  Yesterday we had the charity stalls along the seafront

Roses. roses, roses

Yesterday Mum and I braved the hot weather to visit the RHS garden at Wisley in Surrey.  The forecast was for a few degrees cooler (high 20s), but it is beginning to get humid now, and a bit uncomfortable whenever you start to do anything!  We took umbrellas to shade ourselves from the heat of the sun!

It is Mum’s most ever favourite place in the world, and one of mine too.  It was worth it!  The roses are especially spectacular right now!

We walked down to the ‘trials’ field where new varieties of plant are grown and tested for ‘garden merit’.  The best varieties receive the AGM, award of garden merit.  It’s always a good bet to buy one of these! Here’s the sweet pea trial, and some towering pink delphiniums:

We found a picnic table in the perfect cool spot under this oak tree:

Wish my veg patch looked like this!

This bonsai pine forest grows in about 2 inches of soil!

Of course, no day out this Summer is complete without ticking off a few Scavenger Hunt items!  How about this tree bench?  We found it in a shady corner with hostas and ferns growing all about it.

Or this one in the rose garden?  That’s Mum posing for my photo

And a contender for my funny sign!

This beautiful rose is called:

We Challenge You!

 

Over on www.ukscrappers.co.uk, they are running a Summer challenge.  The idea is to get more scrappers joining in with the various challenges set weekly and monthly.  So for this challenge we had to do 7 pages plus 1 card.  Here’s mine:

Challenge no 1: Shimelle’s Break It Down class, this one is week 2.

A cute page about my niece’s baby Tillie.  The challenge was to record a conversation, and the sketch was multi layering.  I’ve recorded in the journaling how it looks as though Tillie is talking to her dolly, and how her Mum talks to her all the time!

Challenge 2: Simple Recipes, this one is from April

Flowered paper as background.  This one is an ancient American Crafts paper!  Using old metal – I found this great metal flower, which I sewed to the page.  Journaling tells how I challenged myself to walk across the glass floor at the top of the Spinnaker Tower and looked down!  (I surprised myself that I did this!)

Challenge 3: Weekly Challenge – June week 2

Outdoors as a theme, stripes and plenty of blue!

This page records our last walk down the beach with Merlin.

Challenge 4: Old Stash, New Stash, June

Using old stash and following the sketch.  I turned the sketch on it’s side.  Making no apologies for scrapping the best photo I ever took of Merlin!

Challenge 5: Have I Got Scrap For You June

What to do with old stash – well I’ve got plenty of that!  This page records the gorgeous tulips at Arundel Castle

Challenge 6: House Challenge – May

Using the sketch.  DS Nicholas and niece Michelle in nanny’s garden, about 23 years ago!  Michelle is Tillie’s Mum (in first LO above) – can you see the resemblence?

Challenge 7 Snap 2013 week 27 Flower

The challenge was to scrap the photo taken for the photography challenge.  Of course I had to scrap this photo.  Scraplifted from an old Scrapbook Magazine – last Summer I think.  Original page by Liberty Chance.  I think this is my favourite of all these pages.

And finally a card challenge!

52 Card Challenge – Week 27, Summer

A card for nephew’s baby who turns 1 next week:

I have really enjoyed doing these challenges, and quite proud of myself that I completed them all, and managed to upload them properly to the gallery of UKScrappers!

My Summer Garden

Sitting in my chair sipping my coffee one sunny morning, I noticed how the lovely view across my patio.  I had decided on an orange colour scheme for the pots this year.  Love my pink watering can in the background!

Here’s a look from the other side and you can see my little vegetable patch.  I have beetroot, carrots, courgettes, potatoes, radishes, garlic and shallots in that tiny patch!

This almost blue rose (veilchenbaum) scrambles up an obelisk just behind the greenhouse.  It has been full of flowers! 

This view is from the back of the vegetable patch across behind the greenhouse.  I have been really successful with sweet peas this year, such a lovely smell!

Finally, here’s the 3 bags of stuff I cut down yesterday!  I was cutting and sawing quite large pieces of wood, removing a dying cotinus shrub and begniing to cut down some overgrown conifers etc.  I think Boot Camp on Thursday night which was all arms and upper body exercises helped!

A sunny weekend

The UK has been basking in glorious warm sunshine – at last!  After a very long cold winter, we struggled through a very cool, dull Spring. Now all of a sudden the sun has come out and it is hot, hot hot!

We went to Brighton on Sunday.  We actually went there for a whisky tasting session!  I bought it for Maurice’s birthday this week. 

He does rather love his whiskies and is fairly knowledgeable about the different styles of whisky and the distillation and aging processes.  We tasted 5 very different scotch whiskies.  (Needless to say we took the train to Brighton!)  The tastings took place in the very atmospheric wine cellar of one of the seafront hotels. It was quite nice to go down to the cool, dark cellar after the bright hot sunshine outside.

We wouldn’t normally venture very far from home on a hot weekend day, for the simple reason it’s what everyone else does!  It was amazing to see the beach so full of people!

Must go for a ride on that big wheel next time we’re there.

A few more for the scavenger hunt:

A theatre.  How about this Punch and Judy puppet theatre on the beach?  Very traditional.  Or the stage door of the Theatre Royal in Brighton?

Local pub, cafe etc.  It is said that in the old days Brighton had a pub on every street corner!  I think they looked like this one: