Around the lake

 

Collage to start with

 

The swans and cygnets beside the lake, the near one in hissing BTW because of our puppy

Bull rush by the lake

Well more do grow along it but a few have not gone to seed

The swan was preening itself and moments later flapped it's wings from which you could feel the air move 

I watched the ducks swim up and get over coming to see if they would get fed, sadly for them no but it did not stop the swans coming near to see what was on offer. Seems people must feed them to be so forthcoming 

The Red Admiral was on a Buddleja and I could not resist getting a photo

 Take care

St Giles Oxford

 

This week the Church Explorer visits St Giles Oxford a church that sits between two roads at the end of  St Giles in Oxford

A walk around St Giles

 

Some photos from my recent trip to Oxford to visit  some churches there 

Collage of some of the places I went

The north end of St Giles where the Woodstock and Banbury roads meet, St Giles church is in the middle

Oxford War memorial

 

St Giles Church
 

Little Clarendon Street, I used to visit a restaurant here with my Wife

Browns another place I have been to in the past

 

The Radcliffe Observatory 

 

 

John Radcliffe himself

 

 

The Radcliffe infirmary where I was born back in 1951 

 

 

St Lukes chapel 

 

 

The plaque is very recent and unveiled in the last few months

 

I'm sure this was the hospital entrance as I seem to remember being taken through here to A& E a few times due to work related accidents. Basically dumped off and told to phone for a lift back when you were sorted

The Woodstock road

 

Finally St Giles looking south

Take Care

Happy SkyWatch

St Bilo Llanfilo

 

This week the Church Explorer is back in Wales visiting St Bilo Llanfilo where I got to see something I had been longing to see. A rood loft an original medieval one, the churches in Wales have rarely been disappointing 

Cloudy Sky

 

Some clouds and blue sky I took during a morning walk last month

 

This is a wheat field we walk though along a footpath there are a lot of fluffy white clouds in the sky

 

The dog roses were in bloom

 

They showed up nicely against the sky

 

As we got near home I noticed these two balloons by the allotment gate, left over from a previous days party

Happy SkyWatch  

A look in the greenhouse

 

I've not show you in here for a while since the plants were just growing, it's all changed now

 Like I said changed, the plants have all grown 

 

 

These peppers were late growing so I'm not sure how they will turn out

 

Tomatoes growing well and have flowers on them 

 

Cucumbers

Which as you can see have fruit and we have eaten one already, these will not be far behind

More growing

More tomatoes from on the other side of the greenhouse

 And I am glad to say they are starting to fruit

 Even on my patio we are growing cucumbers

 More of an experiment, the two outer ones are small verities about 100mm or 3" long the middle one was a spare I did not want to throw away

Take Care 

St Mary Magdalen Oxford

 

This week the Church Explorer visits St Mary Magdalen the third of the churches he on his last Oxford visit. I have see the church many time and always wondered what it looked like inside, this time I found out. The church is one end of St Giles near the martyrs memorial  

 

A peek at the Sky

 

This week some photos showing a peek at the sky where it just comes in the photos 

Morning walk with the pup and we pass this field

Up in the distance some cows with their calf's

 

In the back garden the sky showing between the rose buds

 

Through the Rosa Californica 

More of the rose and sky

Sneaking in behind the Mavern Hills rose

Happy SkyWatch 

Ugly bug diner

 

Not sure you can get much uglier than a ladybird larvae  

 Collage of them munching away

I came across them on one of my globe thistles 

Which came as a surprise because I hardly saw any last year

The one good this is they were eating the blackfly on the thistle 

 

Ugly critters 

But they eat the blackfly and turn into beautiful ladybirds 

Take care