Mmmmm Mulberries!

 

Today I had a lovely afternoon with my friend who lives around the corner. I sketched her mulberry tree while she pottered around in her garden. I just did the ink outline before I downed tools to help with picking a bowl full of mulberries. I added the paint in the evening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Below are the ones I got to bring home with me! Yum!

 

 

Afterwards we enjoyed a cup of tea on her balcony where I admired her latest craft work and other spoils from her garden.

 

 

Below is a gorgeous old-fashioned rose bush she has growing near where we sat.

 

 

Meanwhile in my own garden the plumbago hedge is beginning to flower and will soon be a mass of blue.

 

 

My standard iceberg roses, which only weeks before, were nothing more than tangles of bare branches and rose-hips, are now lush masses of leaves and blooms after a brisk trim and a dose of liquid fertiliser. 

 

 

The rose below is hidden by the bin so I have to remember to go and admire it.

 

 

My hydrangeas are beginning to bloom but are only small having not been given enough fertiliser I fear.

 

 

The bougainvillea practically burns the retinas out with its high voltage colours. Just glorious!!

 

 

Now if you have got this far, please stay to enjoy some photos I took a couple of weekends ago when I visited the Groat Street festival on the edge of some local bushland. It was an event to promote sustainable community living. My daughters came along and we also met up with a friend. It was such a beautiful day with the stalls looking vibrant and interesting against the bush back-drop. It all felt very country-townish and was a very pleasant way to pass the morning. We joined a women's Aboriginal bush walk with a guide from Bindi Bindi Dreaming who amongst other things showed us which plants could be eaten as bush tucker. Having such a love of our native bush I really enjoy this sort of thing and had been on one of her tours a year or so ago at another bush reserve.

 

Marissa is a very entertaining guide and is a wealth of information about the local Noongar culture.

 

 The seed pods below lather up beautifully with a bit of water and make for a great bush soap.

 

This wonderful stall below made me feel like I was back in Glastonbury in the UK. It was run by Sarah who has a website at www.handmadewonderland.net

 

 

One of my daughters bought a few organic vegetable seedlings.