Purple Pom Poms

Or rather, Echinops Bannaticus 'Taplow Blue' thistle, seen at Little Garendon late this afternoon, the second of the two Shepshed Open Gardens I managed to visit this weekend. Would have liked to have visited more but energy escapes me, particularly in this heat.

Prepared a green salad in leisurely style this morning for Len and me to take to Joy's for Sunday lunch. What a superb spread! Joy had worked really hard at it. She started us all off with a G&T before we moved on to the prosecco that Len and I had brought.

Sadly, the prosecco did wear me out. No stamina you see.

Was grateful for the veil of cloud today that took the edge off the heat. Little Garendon sits on the edge of Charnwood Forest, well, within the borders, so I think it may escape the incursions of developers who have been plastering the south and west of Shepshed with new building. Ugly the houses look too.

Being a little higher up, the garden has wide open vistas up to the ridge on which Mount St Bernard's Abbey sits, and a breeze blows along the Black Brook that runs in a channel 300m from the garden boundary.

My album of photos of Shepshed Open Gardens is on Facebook.