The smell of pine.

Another day, another garden centre, another mass of Christmas trees. We have obviously got to Christmas present purchasing time as the only cyclamen available is as part of a be-ribboned wicker basket gift. Ah well.
The birds are going through the peanuts and Nyger seed at a rate of knots and every day we see little dive bombers dipping and rising across the garden. The lone squirrel has not visited again after getting a few shots of it in the tree behind the fence. We are waking to misty mornings and seeing the day light offer violet streaks of cloud  before rapidly turning to darkness by 1700 hours.
I was reminded by two people that a year ago today we had snow and plenty of it. By the end of the day we had gone from a few swirling flakes at 11am to 20 cm of white powder 7 hours later.Total chaos for us Brits who weren't used to it. Hello Russia, someone kindly reads my blog from that cold country and must chuckle when I mention 20 cms of snow and -12.5 degrees. Small fry to Russians, I expect. Anyway, today we had a warm sunny afternoon and people were wandering around in short sleeved tops. A funny old world in which we live, don't you think?

Give me a break.

Having planted some late purchased tulip bulbs in big pots (I like to plant my bulbs deep rather than just under the surface as some gardeners do, using them as annuals.) I find tulip bulbs are too pricey to throw out after a year, besides, they are happy to come up more than once. Anyway, I digress! I buried them in the pots for springtime colour but that leaves a bland soil top and 'naked' pots. So off I went to the local garden centre to get some cyclamen and winter flowering pansies only to find trees, Christmas trees and hundreds of them. MY choices were fruit bushes, hellebore or Christmas trees. It's November! The weather has been so mild that dahlias are still in bloom and now we are weeks away from spending fifty pounds on a cut tree.
So with no choice at the garden centre my pots are still bare but it meant I got home earlier which allowed the chickens to have a good time attacking the ripe raspberries. I think they were the winners today.

No need to be dull

We haven't hit the freezing temperatures yet that will cut any tender plants down to size so there are still patches of colour in the garden though you do have to look for them. This is where the evergreens start proving their worth by offering shape and colour when the annuals are well and truly over.
Here's our last bit of 2011 colour.

A handsome chap

This is our regular morning visitor. He arrives at half past eight and spends ten minutes hammering away at the peanuts. Sometimes he's joined on the tree by great, blue and crested tits, sparrows. crows, magpies, chaffinch, green finch, dunnocks and goldfinch whilst the robins and our chickens hover underneath for any messy eaters' leftovers.

An Autumn stroll before all the leaves have dropped....., frost has been forecast for next week and my  last few tulips which arrived in the post last week have been planted up into large pots for moveable displays. We are getting through the wood at a rate of knots (wood, knots...., sorry for the pun) and Christmas is round the corner - the Christmas trees have taken over the garden centres. However, some of the Spring flowering bulbs, planted up in the pots, are already shooting through the soil. Life's a funny old thing, isn't it?