How is summer doing?

It's my first summer in my new house and my tenancy is not permanent just yet so I am not doing the main of the garden until it is. I am, however, doing a little garden just outside the back door, which I am turning into a fairy garden where my chair will go under next door's tree for shade for my doggie. I have received a fairy bridge, unicorn and fairy and have tiny minions on order (they are the handymen for the fairy village), more fairies and I might get a dragon too. I will put up some fairy lights and some rocks. I have a tree stump I can attach a little door to and driftwood I can use for something, I will have a think. I am looking forward to the warm nights when I can sit out there and see my little village coming to life. I will post pictures when it is all done. My son thinks I've gone nuts!

annsixty i thought you were talking about someone's husband with CH!

Summer was here until Saturday. DH came down in shorts this morning - then quickly went back upstairs and changed! Can't get over how cold the winds have been. We have had some strawberries from our garden (so have the slugs!) and the tomatoes are coming on apace. We also have some plums on our young plum tree but whether they will make eatable size is anyone's guess. It is the first year it has fruited. The flowers are beginning to make a good show too. The only disappointment is my roses which are sparse of flower this year - especially the climber. Don't know why; I haven't done anything different with them. I was out on the river on Friday with that - for me - quintessential sign of summer, the mayfly, hatching all over the place. Robins were snatching them in mid flight. A feast on the wing!

Another here who has had the heating on. I'm in a brick built Edwardian house that keeps wonderfully cool in a hot summer and cosily warm in winter. In a cold summer it's just....cold!

The garden and allotment have been slow to get going this year, but we're now eating mange tout, globe artichokes (amazingly good number this year), salad leaves and plenty of strawberries. I made five bottles of elderflower cordial at the weekend and am eyeing up a ripening fig on my new fig tree.

Roses and English lavender are finishing their first flowering and my climbing rose is heavy with buds. One of my house guests kindly did some weeding for me and filled a wheelbarrow just by clearing the banks of my front path - I seem to have no problems generating an abundance of weeds!

Very good when. I almost lit my fire yesterday. Instead I wrapped a crochet rug around my legs while I was watching Strange and Norrel last night. Why aren't we sitting in our sundresses or shorts and tee shirts? I've brought out my winter sweaters again.

I have had CH coming on for an hour in the morning until a few days ago when I though just how ridiculous it was in June so I switched it off for the "summer". It is decidely chilly again this morning but I have resisted the temptation to put it back on.
I so liked that when

just how I feel!

Application definitely failed here blue with cold emoticon!

This made me laugh.

Jomarie, do you have a Woodland Trust wood near you? That's where we hear nightingales. There are skylarks in their open meadows, too, where they are growing the young trees.
Still have noisy starlings in my roof, messing on the doorstep every day after I have washed it all off.
Had greenfinches and goldfinches in the garden today, but it's been very cold and wet , so not much else apart from the woodpigeon that always sits in the water bowl while eating all the seeds.
Very good this time of year for teaching grandson. He's done a chart to show the differences between swallows, swifts and housemartins, even though we only see housemartins round here. He actually saw the young leaving their nest.

Our evening primroses have just starting to flower, the thalictrum and irises are now all finished. The miniature climbing rose is starting to flower and in couple of days it will be smothered in bloom. It took a bit of battering in the recent winds, so DH had to hoik it up and secure it again. The other roses all seem to have lots of blossom, more than usual, but roses don't thrive here as well as they used to in Essex. We had some wonderful results there.

Broad beans, runner beans, mangetout all doing well. Looking forward to the broad beans as we've never grown them before, Also we have half a dozen or more dwarf sweetcorn plants, thought we'd give them a try and they seem to be growing well, so we await the results with interest!

House martins have been busy under the eaves and I noticed a couple of newly fledged robins this morning. The tawny owls in the wood have been busy feeding chicks but I haven't caught sight of them with binoculars yet. There are loads of long-tail tits about. The thrush has claimed a treetop spot and sings every evening from there. Plums and apples growing nicely, but very few pears this year. My foxgloves have really shot up in the last week and there are lots of flowers appearing on the pelargoniums in tubs. All looking summery, but some more sun would be nice

The pipistrelle bats have returned to my roof. They come every spring, have their baby, teach it how to be a bat, and then go back to their winter quarters in the autumn. When the weather is warm, and I have the upstairs windows open, it is usual to get a young bat in the house. Last year I had to retrieve one from my shower cubicle!

Our house has been coated in white clematis - they have done so well this year, but are just going over now.

It's a pity I have to crop the picture as you now can't see the whole bush.

Everything in Northumberland is about two weeks late. The rose bush by the gate is in full bloom now. The forecast is for a warmer week so hopefully things will improve.

I'm a bit grumpy about the lack of summer here so far. We had a few glorious days this week and some in April, but otherwise it seems to have been grey, grey and more grey. Cold as well. (wanders off, muttering to self)

Whitewave, similar to yours. Cold, hot, storm, cold, hot, storm... strawberries beginning to redden, raspberries forming.

Peonies coming to an end and suffered in the storm last night. Huge poppies in flower, and the thalictrum too.

Some roses finished their first flush, others only just in bud, clematis blooming beautiful this year.
Nuthatch feeding young, lovely to see them, umpteen starlings of various ages raid my garden too, along with the rooks, magpies and jays (it's surprising any fledglings survive)
Your delphiniums and foxgloves are out ahead of mine, looking like plenty to look forward to!

We had a nightingale a couple of years ago, the most enthralling song I've ever heard

Lovely to hear the baby blue tits cheeping in the hedge - as we do every year!

My delphiniums are nowhere near flowering yet, although they're on their way. We did have a lovely show of forget-me-nots this year, but they've faded now...

Lucky you Mishap - don't think I've ever heard or seen a nightingale. My garden sounds very similar to yours whitewave. Foxgloves and Delphs really good this year too. We have a family of blue tits feeding off the fat balls DH hung on some branches - they are delightful, mum, dad and two fluffy babies. B....y starlings frighten them off everytime but so far they keep coming back when the coast is clear.

Oh! that is lovely mis

Nightingale up on a post earlier. I was not sure whether it was a song thrush or a nightingale, but checked it out on the net, and it was a nightingale - it is there most evenings at the moment. Such a lovely song.