It was no use sleeping longer today, even if I´m hoe, since I´m going to work tomorrow again. It´ll be overtime tomorrow afternoon so it´s a good thing I always take the day of from blogging on Wednesdays. The morning was cool as most summer mornings are up here in the north. I can´t trust my thermometer this time of year, because the sun hits it already as soon as it goes up and again when it goes down. Around 530 miles (85,3 european mil) the sun doesn´t go down at all for yet some time.

We won´t get any blackberries this year, they started to flower today.

But the temperature had dropped to around 5C (41F) just before the sun started to rise above the horizon. I love these cool mornings when summer heat arrives. I always wake up early and I and my dogs takes our morning walk before those blood sucking flies starts their day. It seemes they are a bit tired in the morning You see :-) :-) But before leaving the cottage I started a fire in my stove and burned some paper garbage. It´s to hot to do it during the day now, but if I open the kitchen door at the same time in the morning, the heat flies out directly. It´s also so much easier to start a fire when it´s cool outside. Later in the day I usually gets a bvack haul in the chimney and all smoke goes in to the kitchen instead :-) :-) It´s those day I know if my fire alarm works or not :-) :-) :-)

I´m going to mowe the lawn before we go to the vet today. I could really start now if I wanted too, my closest neighbour has gone to work and the others is that far away that the sound shouldn´t bother them. But the grass will be very wet from the due another hour or so and I just love when it is this silent in the village. There are just some birds singing and some cows can also be heard. Nothing else.

When we came home again this doe stood outside my garden.

She was in no hurry walking away either. I think this is the doe we´ve met all winter so she knows my dogs rather well by now.

It´s time for another cup of tea I think, then some relaxing before the lawn mowing.

Have a great day now!

It might be that her youngling is close too. I know of one doe that placed her youngling in the garden where there were dogs too. She trusted them and probably thought the fox wouldn´t get in there. She was very right indeed :-)

Big sage, Stachys grandiflora. Can grow in the most shaded areas.

Every one loves Orvar and the feeling is mutual :-)

Finally the warm weather has come. We have 26C (79F)  and I´m happy :-) It will stay much like thie for the rest of the week too. Clouds will gather afternoon every day, but that´s quite normal here. It´s a bit to hot at work to be honest, but I dont care. As long as I drink lots of water I´ll be fine :-)

The white rose of Finland. This is one of the three not wild roses I have in my garden. Since it´s mostly sand here most roses don´t like it especially much.

The common Dog rose.

Japanese rose, Rosa rugosa.

The old lady loves this weather too. She´s more active in an hour now, than she was all winter :-) :-) She plays with her sons and digs for dandelion root all day when I´m home.  Her apetite is back too so now she doesn´t look like she´s been starving for half her life :-) :-)

My double Cinnamon rose, Rosa majalis. Here with a sort of hoverflie. They look like wasps but are totally harmless. They are also our friends in the garden. Their larvae lives on aphises.

Meadow rue, Thalictrum aquilegiifolium.

I´m taking a day of from work tomorrow. Orvar has an appointment at the vet and it will take so much time first going to work, then drive home fetching Orvar. Take almost the same road back and beyond work to the vet, drive home agin and then back to work :-) :-) :-) So it´ll be an early blog tomorrow. But back to Orvar. He started to limp rather bad last week and we didn´t get any time at the vet until tomorrow. He´s much better, but there´s still a slight limping and thinking back there has been for some weeks now. So I better check what it is even if he´s better now.

The flowerbuds on Codonopsis clematidea, Asian bellflower. The outside if this flower is plain white. It´s the inside that has the beauty.

It´s time for another cup of tea and then out to visit You all.
Have a great day now!

This is one of these flies that wants my blood! Just look at that diabolical orange eye! If You get the light from the other direction it´s diabolical green instead :-) The big thing under it´s head is what it cuts open the flesh with. It hurts like H....! and for a long time too. It took me almost 30 minutes to hunt it down on my bottom floor. They are smart also I´m afraid. Chrysops relictus is its name, we call it Blinning. 

We went out an hour later this morning and the weather was as fine as yesterday morníng. Around 13C (55F) and a weak breeze passed through the trees. Now a couple of hours later the sky is almost totally covered with clouds. I´ve just checked the weather forcast for this day and it doesn´t show a single cloud on our sky here. So there must be something wrong with the sky! How do I fix a broken sky? If You know please tell me, it seemes to happen more frequently nowdays than it did just a couple of years ago :-) :-)

It´s almost impossible to see the little pond now. But it is still full with water.

Now my kitchen door stays open all day long. But I do put away any leftovers from the cat food. The Magpies has once again choosen my garden to raise their young ones. Even if this garden is one of the few with lots of different bushes where they can hide (this is farm district and only usuable things like berry bushes and apple trees are allowed here. They think I´m a bit strange :-) :-) :-)  ) I do have two cats and three dogs. That would scare of most animals to be honest.

But they are smart birds. Yesterday forinstance. They had found something on the ground that they wanted, but there was the problem with my two cats resting just besdie it. The two magpie parents then landed not far from my cats, making a lot of noice to get their attention. Naturally my cats started to follow these two obviously stupid birds. Second by second they came a bit further away from what ever the magpies wanted. When the young ones, that doesn´t fly especially well yet, thought the distance was far enough they flew down and picked the thing up and the parents flew away from my cats :-) :-) :-)

I can´t find any fish in my pond any longe, I wonder if perhaps Bertil and Teodor is behind that. The water is full of algies so they might be further down, close to the bottom, but I doubt that. So this week I´ll have to buy that anti algie thingy one puts in the water and I also has to buy new fishes. I don´t want a mosquitoe farm so close to my kitchen door :-) :-)

There were surprisingly many people that doesn´t eat bananas at the birthdayparty yesterday, but the more the rest of us got :-) I was wondering if I should perhaps make half of it as a banana pudding and perhaps try strawberries in the other half next time. I think that strawberries would work and every one loves strawberries. This was indeed a delicious dessert that I will make many more times :-)

Every single flower on this delphinium is this big. Makes it fall when the winds blow from the wrong direction unfortunally.

It´s time for another cup of tea, sitting on my kitchen stairs looking at the mountine I can see from my cottage. Perhaps I´ll see some dragon flies? Their season has started and I just love them.

Have a great day now!

The rising of the Midsummer pole in Gudhem (Gods home). If You use Your dirty imagination You´ll see what that really is :-) :-) But to be honest, most people doesn´t know that.

The sun is shining but there are some clouds lurking around in the neighbourhood. But I think it might be fog slowly rising from the ground and that athey will dissapere before blowing with the wind to an unfortunate position blocking the sun for us here in the village.

Now all flowers on the Guelder-rose has opened up. It almost looks like some hydragenas and since most hydragenas can´t survive here I really would like to have a couple of guelder-roses in my garden. I have two cuttings in pots now and is hoping for the best.

Bertil followed us as usual. My neighbours always laugh when they see us comming :-) :-) That cat really has some identity problems :-)

We went out on our morning walk already at 5:30 and the temperature had only reached 12 (54F). Since the flies were so active in the forest yesterday morning, we walked by the fields instead. Birds were already singing and flocks of starlings went like waves over the fields catching insects or worms. Usually we have a starling nesting somewhere on my neighbours house, that sounds like a Cuckoo clock :-) :-) But he hasn´t arrived this year. I´ve heard him for the last ten years, so now I miss him very much.

These cattles are semi wild so that bull is nothing to play with :-) But it´s the cows that is really dangerous. If they see me and my dogs and feel we are dangerous towards their calfs they will defend themselves. Thankfully the fields they walk on is hughe so they know that they can walk away if they feel the need. It has happened that people walking their dogs through fields like this has been attacked. Even if it is allowed to walk through fields with cows it´s just plain stupid to do so, especially if they have a dog with them.

It was a bit colder by the fields so there were almost no flies flying around at all and not a mosquitoe in sight either. Since it´s a day after a holiday no cars could be heard at that time either. The feeling of being the only one left in the world followed me all the way. Now however I know that at least my neighbours further down the road is alive. They are taking care of their doughters two small dogs and they bark as soon as they get out in the morning :-) :-)

Teodor greated us when we came home. He almost never follows us on our walks any longer.

He preferes to stay indoors and sleep behind my lap top :-)

I´ve made the banana pie and I tasted the vanilla pudding mixture. I ever, never say "OH MY GOD!" But I will do that now. It´s deliucious!!! It is worth dying for I think :-) :-) :-) This will spread, I´m certain of that. I now know where to find condensed milk, so now we´ll have to figure out a replacement cookie for the Nilla wafers. It´s going to be fun to see my friends faces when they taste this :-)

I´ve learned one thing this morning. If I play with cutting photo´s and happens to save the changes, the original photo is deleted??!!  :-) :-) Well, You can see my bananapie and how I followed the instructions on Joyce´s blog Octoberfarm.

The Beauty bush, Kolkwitzia amabilis, has started to flower. We call it Paradise bush.

The tea pot is ready and it´s time for some breakfast. My potatoes will soon be ready to be put in to the ground and then I´ll tell You a couple of ways to grow potatoes.

Have a great day now!