The Irish celebrate like crazy on St Patrick's Day but us English have virtually forgotten about St George's Day. It's not surprising really as there is nothing much known about him or even if he ever actually existed. Yet somehow he has become the Patron Saint of many countries and organisations. Including Scouting - and I had photos of St Georges Day Parade on yesterdays post. The picture below comes from my book 'A Calendar of Saints' by James Bentley. It's a painting by Raffaello Sanzio (1483 -1520) and is in the Louvre. The legend seems to date from the C12, when crusad ..read more

 A birthday present from the family was this photo storage box that I'd put on my wish list.  I have 8 photo albums and lots of loose photos, the albums are falling to pieces or those old type with sticky pages that have turned the photos a strange colour.  The box is supposedly fireproof and water proof and has room to store more than 1,000 photos in separate plastic boxes, which can be labelled and sorted into years or subjects.  My wedding album and my late mum's two photo albums I'll keep as they are. I started emptying an album full of old Scouting photos that I w ..read more

 There was some wild weather this week - high winds, torrential rain storms, ordinary rain and hail. We did have sun on a couple of days but not enough for my liking. I keep peering over the fleece fence at the French Climbing Bean plants - all OK so far. Thank you to everyone for comments all week and 'Happy Birthday' wishes on Tuesday and apologies when I don't see them until next day and don't get round to replying.  I think I have to be thankful that it's just one cat damaging the garden and not deer, rabbits, wallabies and wombats as many people have to garden around in other pa ..read more

 The plant known as Groundsel can be spotted almost anywhere, in many countries around the world mostly on cultivated ground or like this patch below on the road edge. It's one of those plants that everyone knows but I thought I could find out more to fill a blog post! Groundsel (Senecio vulgaris) belongs to the Asteraceae family which also includes dandelion, thistles and sunflower. It is called a 'winter annual' because the seeds germinate from late autumn through to early spring, and one of it's other names is  'old-man-in-the-spring'. It's name comes from an Old English word gr ..read more

 Last year I got a small tray of leek plants from the pet and garden shop in Diss at the end of March and they gave me some nice autumn leeks. I looked both times I was in town at the end of March and early April but they hadn't got any this year. None at boot sales either or out the front of Asda or QD. Finally found some on Stowmarket market flower stall. £3.50 and there were more than 30 plants. Got them planted out on Saturday and covered to keep next door neighbours cat and the pigeons off them.  But on Tuesday morning I found that Bl***y cat from next door had somehow pushed it ..read more

 Another boot sale and  a £1 spend.  Just 3 cards to add to the birthday-card box including two for men which are not so easily found.  Then I spent £1 more on a vase of the height and shape I've been looking for and another £1 for two more birthday cards ready for Grandchildren - the eldest two will both be nine in 2025. Saturday's car-boot sale was HUGE - they even had a sign out saying "Sellers Pitches Full Up" when I arrived just before 7.30 am..  Sunday was the first boot-sale closer to home now that the site had dried out enough. I went, walked all round an ..read more

 69 years ago today I was born in this house belonging to my Grandma and Grandad, in Stowmarket in Mid Suffolk.. My Mum was staying with her Mum and Dad for my birth. My dad had been killed in a motorbike accident a few months earlier and the house they had bought to renovate wasn't yet in any condition for a new-born baby. After that I don't know how or where we lived, but our house was finished for me and Mum, even though there was no bathroom and only an outside toilet  for a few years- which I can just about remember - thank goodness the bathroom was built after a while. As for ..read more

 Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I found a church that was unlocked. Winston is a tiny village - (population  160) a mile or so from Debenham. The church is tucked away down a lane and mainly dates from the C14. The porch dates from the early C15 and is fancy red brick with the niches for the saints. It's a small very simple church and the first things I noticed were the flowers on all the windowsills, left there since Easter Sunday and looking lovely. Looking down the church to the Altar . The pews are very simple and only those in the chancel have carved ends which I forgot ..read more

 Two clay pots were found at the boot sale last Saturday and they were my only spend (£1) on a day when there were more people selling than anytime this season so far. Just nothing much needed. I picked up three Beswick Birds like my Blue Tit and Wren, one was a robin but he had a chipped beak, one was supposed to be a grey wagtail but didn't really look like one and had a chipped tail and the third was a much larger pheasant but he'd been badly damaged and repaired even more badly so all three were left behind and I never wanted a Beswick Bird collection anyway!  I could have bought ..read more

Firstly Thank you for comments on yesterdays post. My birthday month at WI so a birthday 'posy' which was really a lovely bunch of roses in a gorgeous colour.  Our speaker at WI this week was a lady telling us all about The Bevin Boys and especially about her father. At the beginning of WWII much of the coal mined in this country was exported to Poland and Italy so the need for coal  suddenly dropped as war started and therefore it was decided that miners wouldn't be a reserved occupation and many went off to fight. (The government didn't look very far ahead - just like nowadays ..read more