Safer than running round the garden with a three year old.
 
I slipped and fell on my face on coarse gravel!

Cut cheek, a lot of bruising and sprained wrist - I may be gone for a few days till the swelling and pain subside. Am hoping that the bag of frozen sweetcorn applied to face will mean I won't be too black and blue tomorrow....

Oh no! It hurts when I smile!!

Do you like to spend time alone?  See this post by Marcie Scudder. It resonated with me, and the photography is superb.

I'm enjoying reading Barbara Sher's It's Only Too Late If You Don't Start Now. Very thought provoking, and quite amusing.

And now for something completely different! Choosing shoes....I am greedy and would like nos 2,7 and 12 please. Which three pairs would you like?

Thanks for the link Lynne.

Fuchsia 'Checkerboard' in the greenhouse this morning..

Adorned with beads of water.

So beautiful, and functioning so perfectly....

A seed of Honesty germinated in the gravel on the greenhouse floor - I had to separate the slats of the staging to let the flower through!


Serendipity.

Nice.

I took myself off today to a gallery, and didn't think of all the things needing done.

Learning to Simply Chill has been one of the best things I've done since starting this blog. A rather serious person (I always have been - look at this photograph of me at about four years old!) I've learned, and am still learning to lighten up.

The sky doesn't fall in if I take a day off, change my mind, let myself off the hook, do something to a less than perfect standard, let the phone ring, skip a meal, or even do nothing at all!

Can you do this?  Simply Chill?

We recently had our annual beach clean and collected 20 bin bags of litter!

Cath commented that this seems a lot.

It is a lot.
 
Our village has almost a mile of beach to clean, strung out as it is along the shores of the loch, from the houses on the far left of the photograph to where I am standing at the sandy beach, and because it is a sea loch litter gets washed in with the tides. (Some of it also gets washed out again..to land on some other beach, or to come back to ours another day!)
 
Winter storms are particulary bad for depositing rubbish on the shore paths as well as the shore itself.

It's a horrible job.

But if we don't do it, who will?
 
I hate litter.

Should you find yourself at The Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh (see yesterday's post) don't miss, a few doors down, Greyfriars delightful Alladin's cave of an art materials shop -

Quirky, with friendly knowledgeable staff. A few doors up is G&T, good coffee and deli, across the road is Open Eye Gallery and Eye 2 with classic prints by Matisse, Hockney et al, just round the corner is the opulent Dome with fabulous flower displays....feasts for all the senses.

We dashed across the country yesterday to catch the last day of the exhibition of Joan Eardley's work at The Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh.

Joan Eardley is one of my all time favourite artists.

Honest, passionate, compassionate and totally committed. Unflinching, unafraid of her materials, a wonderful draughtsman....I could go on, but her work speaks for itself.

I knew the Glasgow she depicts so well and find her work moves me deeply.

The exhibition was busy with others who had left it till the last day, and some who were visiting for the second or third time. The paintings and drawings were all for sale and will never again be shown together as almost all have sold. The catalogue was sold out.

I'm sorry to recommend it only when the show is over, but for high quality reproductions of all the works click on the thumbnails here.
 

20 bin bags of rubbish were collected from the beach and the shore path today - exhausting but satisfying for the 15 or so volunteers, some from other villages, who came to help.

As the first flowers come out in Coronation Wood (click top right for more photographs) we had another bonfire and a barbecue, and made a start on a natural sculpture inspired by the wonderful work of Andy Goldsworthy.

Tired but happy tonight....

Pussy willow against a blue sky, and a walk along the shore with a friend - sun, showers, warm, cold..

But lovely in the greenhouse, stuffed with plants! The fuchsias called Checkerboard - a lovely lively red and white single flowered bush variety will go into a very large pot.

The white petunia with a lime green eye will form the basis of the three large black pots colour scheme for this year.

Much of the fun is in the planning, don't you think?
White and lime green for the hot hot summer days we are hoping for - trailing verbena, lobelia, geranium and petunia - all white, and golden helichrysum and lime green petunia if I can find them.

We filled the boot at Vertigrow, a favourite nursery just outside York. The greenhouse and the studio are bursting with plants - all waiting for warmer days and nights before they can go into the garden.

But at 9 o'clock this evening it wasn't quite dark..

and we saw a swallow a few days ago.

Village Beach Clean tomorrow morning with coffee and cakes in the Village Hall for the workers. Coronation Wood in the evening, with barbecue on the clean beach (locally produced venison burgers - yum!).

Busy wee place Ardentinny.