Catching up

Lupins - they just keep on flowering. 

We dont call it the yellow peril for nothing!

Even the thistles are enormous this year. 

Visitors this weekend so we took them to the Sheep Festival - no sheep, but some very furry pigs. 

First decent sunset for a while. 

And some work on the landscaping in the layout. 

Grass

Yesterday was dry enough to cut the grass at last. 

The butterflies are still about. 

 And autumn is still impending  

Butterfly heaven

We spent last week in the caravan near to the Pales where we were helping with a week of activites to celebrate the three hundred years of its foundation - www.thepales.org.uk Back home the butterflies have taken over. On a walk round the garden i counted twenty four red admirals plus tortoishells and peacocks, mainly on the michaelmas daisies. 

 

 

Signs of autumn are all around. 

 

No work.

Yesterday was a Pales day ( Google The Pales ) and today was mainly a 'doing all things i agreed to do yesterday' day.  That included making various signs and structures. 

 

But there was also time to carry on with track laying. I now have the sidings for both the main line and the branch line in place. 

Back in the pond.

Another day of clearing the pond growth. 

The lupins still put out the odd flower.

And there was some time to lay track on the layout. 

Scary beasts.

Today's first task was to clean the caravan - it was raining but i get soaked washing it anyway. 

The i tackled the pond - clearing away the excessive vegetation. It was while doing that that i encountered this scary beast. 

Elephant hawk moth caterpillar

The pond water begins to appear from the green. 

Summer!

It has been hot today! Still the work must go on. But there is still time to spot the odd gem. 

Fritillary on Michaelmas daisy.

The rocky bank is finished - looks just as it did seven years ago when it was first done.