ART OF ANOTHER KIND....

After years of producing beautiful art works and teaching, my old friend, Diane, has finally got it together to produce her own website and, hopefully, spread the beauty more widely. Here
is a link to her work. Go on, have a browse and enjoy.

BADGE FOR ANOTHER WEBSITE..

THIS is especially helpful for gardeners in hot, dry climates, often with poor soil and limited water supply. There are loads of water-wise tips and gardening in these conditions. So, go have a look and enjoy.

BLOGGERS FOR POSITIVE GLOBAL CHANGE.

Yolande has very kindly given me the badge and tagged me to pass it on. I'm going to take a different route in passing on: rather than send to garden bloggers and agonising over the choices, I'm mentioning two websites that are a real asset to us gardeners. So these are my choices


http://www.realseeds.co.uk/
and
http://www.itsnoteasybeinggreen.org/


The first is a wonderful group in Wales, who moved back to UK from Spain some time ago and put all their energies in growing, saving and selling the seeds of superior types of vegetables.
Visit their site and read their latest Newsletter.

The Strawbridge family became famous through the BBC T.V. programme 'It's Not Easy Being Green' and their site is full of innnovative ideas for ordinary people.

The origin of the meme http://climateofourfuture.org/?p=33 and these were their rules.


"It’s easy to participate in this meme. At minimum, you can proudly display the BPGC badge (it’s available in two varieties: Transparent GIF and JPEG with white background) on your blog and bask in the glow of our collective good will. If you are sharing the kudos, however, please make sure you pass this list of rules to the blogs you are tagging.

The participation rules are simple:

When you get tagged, write a post with links to up to 5 blogs that you think are trying to change the world in a positive way.
In your post, make sure you link back to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.
Leave a comment or message for the bloggers you’re tagging, so they know they’re now part of the meme.
Optional : Proudly display the “Bloggers For Positive Global Change” award badge with a link to the post that you write up".

In a very modest way, we do what we can for the environment - saving rain water, not using chemicals and creating an environment for bees, butterflies and birds. More than that is difficult to do in this part of Spain. For instance, although there are recycling depots for cardboard and glass, there's nothing for plastic and this is in abundance as 5 litre bottles of water are a must in many areas where the well water is not drinkable. Just think of the number of bottles that can be generated, and have to be buried.

And, now, to finish here's Ying and Yang keeping cool on the naya tiles on this hot and humid day.

MORE GARDEN ART:

Here are a couple of aspects of the bamboo pot, with a black urn on top. D is just finishing off the paved area to put a bench on, as there's some shade there from a pear tree behind.

There's a whole hotch potch of shrubs and trees in this area - cypress, pampas grass, a false pepper tree and clumps of osteospurmum. I have a lovely pittisporum to go in later in the year behind the bench....just have to nurse it along in a big pot during the hot summer.

This will be the last big pot to be done - we almost gave ourselves hernias carrying this from the workshop!

D is already planning another project - to put a double wall on the edge of the path behind the palm tree, fill it with plants and have Mexican jugs dotted along the wall. We already have the jugs, bought in a moment of mad spending at one of our favourite shops, Casa del Mimbre. Here they are:

It's really too hot to be starting any building work now - this will be shelved until Autumn, when the ground is less like concrete.

WHAT'S BLOOMING TODAY;

I "lost" two days last week and posted my poem too early. Here's what blooming today, when I can get this slide show to work! With temperatures at 30+C, and climbing, many plants are getting ready to hibernate for a couple of months. As soon as the rains come - around October - everything will be like Spring again.