My World Tuesday & Poppy Love

Hello dear friends,

I hope you are all doing well.

I've been fairly busy as usual as I'm helping build a house and picking out paints, looking at bathroom and kitchen cabinet design, water connections, electric connections and building flower boxes to set outside the kitchen window and gaze at flowers. It is a lot of work looking for design ideas and figuring out everything from scratch on a budget.

I am also busy trying to keep my little garden growing. It has been very hot for several days.

I found this guy in the bird bath on the hottest day so far. I don't know if he was trying to get cool or if he had fallen into the water from the tree above.

My garden soil is of mixed health.  There are parts where I need to water a lot because the soil doesn't hold the water for long.  This is the area where the vegetables are planted.

There are other areas where I've over watered and see I've drowned a few anenome plants that were not that hardy.  I also have a few seedlings I started a few weeks ago that need to go into the ground but I haven't had the time or energy to plant them. Maybe tomorrow.

My vegetables are doing fairly well.  But I've discovered there are lots of tiny holes my cabbage leaves.  Last night I looked up the problem on line and see the holes are made by cabbage loopers eating the leaves. But I haven't caught any of them in the act yet and I'm not quite sure what to do about it as I don't want to use any chemicals. I will have to do a bit more research.

The petunias I planted just the other day are starting to flower already and the geraniums are doing well too.  The pansies easily wilt under the hot sun and need some good watering and deadheading on a regular basis.

I've also been busy trying to get the blood glucose under control. I have been doing my very best for years and it doesn't seem to make much difference to my average blood sugar levels which are slowly rising. The doctor now has me on another drug and I'm cautiously optimistic that it is going to work.  I should have a better idea in a few weeks time.

I made a nice Greek dinner recently just for something different. I had a rack of lamb in the freezer that I had been saving and wanted to use it before it got too old. I didn't get a good photo of the lamb but didn't much like it anyway. I prefer lamb in a stew.

Greek Salad

Roasted Greek Potatoes (garlic and lemon)

Homemade Tzadziki (cucumber) sauce & toasted pita bread

It has been a long time since I did any crafting or extensive reading. I've been trying to do both but haven't gotten very far. Hopefully I can do more of both over the coming weeks. One book I'm reading is called London by Edward Rutherford. I am at about page 700 and have about 500 more pages to read.

I went to the eye doctor for my annual check up the other day. I was relieved to discover that my eye sight had not deteriorated even more. There is a new optometrist I was booked in with. She is a young and bright doctor and gave me some new contact lens to try. They are for presbyopia and can eliminate the  need for reading glasses on top of contact lens. I'm trying them for a month and have to see her again at the end of the week to see how things are going. I think the prescription still needs a bit of tweaking.

Well that is what is going on in my world this week. I'll be by to read about your week.

Joining in with Our World Tuesday this week and I Heart Macro.

Not My Garden

(If you missed my sky post which was posted on the same day, you can  see it here.)

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One of my favourite things to do is to take photos of flowers in someone's garden as I walk around doing my errands. 

Mostly I photograph flowers planted by guerrilla gardeners; that is gardeners who plant in public spaces. 

Today's flowers were taken with my phone.

The flowers in this post were planted by a retired Asian man who simply loves gardening.  I often see him out planting and tending to his many flowers.  He is planting in spaces around his condominium building that do not belong to him. I don't know if he has asked for permission or if he just decided to beautify the space and didn't bother seeking approval.

Over the past two years the garden has really mushroomed and is getting quite gorgeous.. 

His flowers seem to grow like weeds compared to mine.  I've notice the soil in the space is very dark and rich compared to what I have in my small patio garden.  Every year I add bags and bags of manure and soil hoping to make the soil nice and rich. It has improved a bit but still has a ways to go.  It is a lot of work to carry the bags of manure and soil required every year for the small garden otherwise I might do a big job of it and get it all over and done with but I have to do it bit by bit.

Do you like to garden dear reader? 

How is your garden growing this year?


Please don't be shy to leave a comment. I love to hear from my readers and always try to return the favour.
 Enjoy your weekend!