Friday, June 20, 2014

Malleny, Balerno


Thank you for your comments about where you would like to live. How encouraging that many of you are happy where you are. And we're fairly happy where we are; but would quite like to lift the house up and plonk it down in Portobello/Joppa, near the sea. Today the children and I took a walk along Portobello Prom. Grandson likes bollards - among other street furniture.


Granddaughter was more contemplative.


He runs ahead but always turns round to make sure I'm following.


My cot quilt is making progress. Slowly. It wouldn't be so slow if I didn't keep having to rip bits out to make the corners meet more accurately. I'm being so careful but still have to make adjustments. Grr. How do the rest of you manage to get perfect results every time?


Three strips joined; four to go.


Yesterday Mr L and I went to Malleny, a National Trust garden on the outskirts of the city.



 It was full of colour.


Who can tell me what these pink plants (above) are? The nearer one looks like campion - it has campion-like leaves, which leads me to suspect that it's ... campion. But I'd never seen it as a bright pink, double flower. And the leaves of the one behind it, with balls of blossom, look like what we'd call Sticky Willy - and are actually slightly adhesive, like Willy (goosegrass) himself. . Again, I'd never seen it in this pretty flowering form. Anyone?



We often get the garden to ourselves but this time we coincided with a coach trip. However, it was pleasant to see so many people enjoying the flowers. Also, we felt positively youthful in comparison to most of the members of the party.


I do like lupins.

7 comments:

  1. What a lovely garden! You shouldn't perhaps expect so much perfection with your small quilts....It's just on the larger ones that small errors compound so...

    Do you have a tape on the plate to the right of the needle on your sewing machine? Most people put it on at the 1/4 inch mark and use it to guide them. Makes it much easier....

    Your grandchildren are, as always, quite lovely to see.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous7:06 pm

    I like Lupins too but they just won't grow for me.

    The garden and the children look lovely.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yes, I do have the tape. I still get it slightly wrong! Sigh.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Malleny looks delightful.
    Your wee quilt is coming along very well - don't stress too much about meeting corners. Do you have a quarter inch foot on your machine? That should help with precision.
    The 2 young ones are growing fast and looking bright and happy. Lucky you!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Such a beautiful garden to visit and lovely to have familiar seaside so close to you. I`m not surprised you are happy to live where you do.

    You asked me in a recent comment about contentment. Yes, I suppose I am, most of the time. Contented but never complacent. Things can change in the blink of an eye can`t they?

    ReplyDelete
  6. I like lupins too but looove delphiniums. They WILL be in my garden but not this year sadly...

    ReplyDelete
  7. What a beautiful garden to visit! I need to find some around me. The Chicago Botanical Garden is wonderful, but so large that it might be a bit beyond me until this foot is better....

    Getting seams to meet in quilting is THE challenge! No matter what you do, there always seem to need to be adjustments. Blame it on the fabric ;-) I use pins where I want the seams to meet neatly, and remember to put the fabric that seems to be too long on the bottom, so the feed dogs will pull it in for you a bit. And like someone else posted... Don't let it worry you too much if every seam isn't perfect. Only God is perfect.
    I just planted a Lupine in my postbox garden. I'll let you know how it does!
    Those Grandchildren are just adorable!!!

    ReplyDelete