Hello friends!

It’s day 26 of 31, and it’s been raining almost every day it seems since my last post! How much rain is that, you ask? I’d say we’re closing in on 150 mm easily. The rain gauge gets a tip every day – roughly every 24 hours or so, weather-permitting! Today began like this…

The last two days have been complete “drenchers”. Sheets of rain coming down at shifting angles, hour upon hour. Last Sunday, Monday and Tuesday we had a reprieve from rain showers and the sun appeared occasionally throughout the day between otherwise heavily overcast skies. The last two days have presented with heavy rains and warnings.

After the drought-like summer we experienced, the initial rain was welcome. From the first, the ground was so thoroughly baked I was worried we’d have flooding. TODAY, after 3 weeks of rain, the weather forecast included FLOOD warnings for the first time. I have never seen a flood warning issued here in all the time I’ve lived here.

Somehow, the soil took up all this rain, the bushes, trees and plants which were shriveled and parched have been renewed by the abundance of moisture. The specimens which didn’t make it have been unearthed for their ‘final’ journey to the dumpsite, where they will be ground up and become mulch; possibly to wind up back here again as wood chips we spread around the garden. How ironic. And sad.

The abundant rain showers over the last 3 weeks have covered nearly every corner of the country, bringing rivers and lakes to dramatic levels. I would imagine in lower-lying areas, the fields are now surely swamped, and rivers and lakes have become seas. It’s possible the rain amounts might be unprecedented, it would seem to jibe with news imagery, warnings, and my imagination.

Tomorrow is a new day! Tomorrow there are only a few light showers forecast – and then the rain just stops, and we have a week of dry days to look forward to! Let’s see if mother nature plays by the rules!

As you might have imagined, a garden besieged by heavy rain for days will at some point teeter from good to bad regarding the benefits of all that rain vs. the disadvantages of that much rain. I guess every garden would react differently. We happen to have a rather lowish section within our garden, and we also have a shady section which is very slow to dry out each spring. You’d think those two places in our garden would have surely suffered the most from so much rain. Alas, they are fine! Not even a bit boggy! Which boggles the mind really- sorry pun intended!

I was able, for the first time in weeks, to mow the grass last Sunday. With grass 12-15 cm and longer in some areas, this was not ever going to be a “great” look once done. But you have to start somewhere! No edging had been done since late June for the open day! In a word – horrible. That was how our grass was looking – oh it was definitely green but all the weeds were now doing better than the grass!

A thoroughly exhausting endeavor, but a few hours later, the grass was finally cut, and after replacing the edger blade, I ran that edger around every bed – it was like it was the first time! The grass had so overgrown the edging, and even up over the bricks, and was running into the beds. Horrible! I was pretty wiped out after that! The following days I spent working each individual bed removing weeds, the huge clumps of edge cutting and soil, and giving all the roses a tidy-up. So neglected! AND I cut that grass one more time, just for old time’s sake!

For two days we beheld a garden, again bedazzling, glorious! Everything was tidy, the plants were refreshed, the roses were blooming (despite excessive rain), and all was back to fab. Happy. Wondrous. Spectacular! I admired all that hard work from every window – walked through the pathways and soaked up every ray of sun that filtered through the clouds.

Yesterday the rains arrived as we slept. The raindrops were relentless throughout the day, and 40 mm later, we have the results from the last 24 hours.

Now the garden is everything I just described, but is completely soaked again. I’m still enjoying the view from the window and encountered several surprises when I went out for a few photos. David Austin’s ‘Wildeve’ – isn’t she lovely!?

The apple trees are loaded, and I’d go so far as to say, this a ‘bumper crop’ year for apples! The tree in the photo has already shed several kilos of apples. The bad ones get a toss over the fence for the wildlife to enjoy, the good ones we eat on the spot, and I’ve made a new recipe I found – Apple Crisp. If I get brave enough, I might even go as far as to try making Apfel Strudel – the old-fashioned way! Hmm..

It’s amazing that despite going through both feast and famine with this year’s weather, all the hydrangeas are glorious. Some are still pale white or ‘limelight’ colored, while others are already blushing slightly with tinges of pink. Actually, quite a few plants I was worried about look like they might not be too seriously affected by the drought, now that they’ve had so much watering. Of course, we won’t know for sure until next year and the years following – hoping for the best!

Pekka has been a bit under the weather lately- his foot is giving him a bit of a bother. So it’s a rather quite front regarding the shed remodel project. Still waiting there for whenever we open the door and pick things up again.

I’ve got some new woodworking tools on order. I am taking an online woodworking course and planning to carve out a portion of the shed area for a workshop of sorts. I think my first project will be to build a workbench! In the meantime of being able to start that, I’m immersing myself in “all things wood” Wish me luck!!

I’m looking forward to the adult education courses beginning again -brought to us from Hiiden Opisto. You can take everything from languages to basket-weaving. Learn jewelry making like Pekka has done over the years. Even computers and fitness. I’m signed up for Pilates and yoga. I need it! I feel a bit on the ‘fluffy’ side! I’m calling it #PandemicPounds – maybe you’ve heard of it too? hahah. I hope not!

Well, it looks like it’ll likely be another month before I have anything at all to write about. I hope the rest of the month is kind to you, and it bloody well quits raining!

Until next time! ❤