NAKED LADIES AND MRS SINKINS

I know amaryllis and crocus, especially the autumn flowering variety, go by the alternative name of Naked Ladies. However I am thinking of dicentra spectabilis, bleeding hearts.

If you invert a flower and gently pull apart the sticking out petal extensions all is revealed and a naked lady emerges - always one to delight children.

The house is full of the scent of roses and Mrs Sinkins, a white pink (can you have a white pink?) that smells of cloves. The plant was names after a Mrs Catherine Sinkins who raised it. She died in 1917 so it has been around for almost a century.
It was always a favourite of my mother.

I have just evacuated another grey squirrel up onto Kirkby Moor but whilst it was complaining about being in the trap, before I moved it, two more appeared raiding the feeders!

R has been caking (fattening me up) and here is a Victoria sponge with cream and strawberries she made. I have to admit I did have a slice or three.

They are not, alas, our strawberries as this is their first year, and though we have a crop it is small. Roll on 2015.

The red currants are ripening and the battle is on to keep the blackbirds at bay.
Gooseberries (this one is Careless) will be ready soon and I have had to thin out the plums to stop the branches snapping with the weight of fruit.

We will gave damsons - they have set - and loads of blackcurrants. (Still have 25 pounds of them in the freezer from last year.)

Monty Don on the TV is digging up his asparagus bed and I will soon be following suit, relocating the rhubarb there and, maybe, making a well drained raised bed as another attempt at the asparagus.

Up in the wood the red campion goes on flowering and the bluebells will soon be giving me more seed to scatter.

It is very humid here today - such that I am sitting topless in front of the computer as I type. (Please no cries of horror nor vomiting.)

R and I are about to leave for my sister and brother-in-law's Ruby Wedding celebration about thirty miles away so any daft squirrel that gets itself in my trap will have to wait till we return.

Lawns are mown and, honest, I will get that scythe out soon. The crambe and roses are out and all is well with the world.

 Oh! Yes, I will be interested to see how many hits I get with the title, 'Naked Ladies', and from where.

(And I mentioned that I was topless - cannot lose!)