More summer, bats again, the longest day of the year 2017…

So today is the longest day of the year 2017. Here where I’m living, the sun rose at 3.52 AM, and the sun sets at 23.13 PM – the length of the day is 19 hours 20 minutes.

The bats have now been here for the fourth time. Or, we have seen them here four times now, in the woods next to our garden and flying close above our heads in the garden. Nice and delightful! 🙂 They were here on Sunday again. They always come just before twelve o’clock at night. On that night we also saw a whole rainbow here, although it hadn’t even rained. It was the first whole rainbow that we’ve seen from our garden.

The black woodpeckers have also been frequent visitors in the woods next to our garden. One really notices when they come – they have the loud and long flight call “klee-yee” when they enter the woods.

lake Pyhäjärvi

By the lake Pyhäjärvi here in our home village on Saturday. I was standing on a dock as I took this pic.

lilac

Lilac and the big Norway maple beside our driveway once more.

lilac

lilac

White lilac flowers in the garden as well. We have loads of purple or lilac lilac flowers in big bushes, but only a few white in a small bush. I must say that the purple truly is my favourite lilac anyway… But these white flowers are charming, too, and it wouldn’t be the same without these adding up to it in our garden.

lilac

red campion, red catchfly

A few more of red campion or red catchfly flowers in the garden.

river Pyhäjoki

We found this lovely spot by the river Pyhäjoki in the municipality of Säkylä on Sunday.

river Eurajoki

Welcome to the countryside! 🙂 With this pic, too, and on Sunday as well. By the river Eurajoki in the municipality of Eura.

oregano & sage

Oregano and sage. These two green friends are a bit different in the way that we, who usually grow herbs and everything from seeds, have bought them fully-grown – at half the price at the local grocery store. These are grown in Finland, which we naturally really appreciate. And these aren’t the usual herb pots that you can buy at the grocery stores in wintertime, these are for summer gardening outside… hmm, just to be specific, not that it should make much of a difference…(?) 🙂 But yeah, these for the garden actually are bigger, sturdier… And we have re-potted these, for better growth.

lettuce

Grow some lettuce, lettuce wants to grow for you! 🙂

strawberry

By our strawberry field today. There are surprisingly many strawberry flowers and strawberries growing already.

mountain cornflower, perennial cornflower

The first fully opened centaurea montana or mountain cornflower or perennial cornflower or mountain bluet flower in the garden today.

park lilac, Hungarian lilac

And our park lilacs or Hungarian lilacs have started to open their flowers now as well. There seem to be many more flowers in the bushes now than a year ago.

-Leena

Bats here again, lilac flowers & other flowers, light summer nights, lovely scents all around…

We had one really rainy day, it was, like, more than 24 hours of rain here where we are living between Monday and Tuesday this week. Everything is so green and colourful out there now. And the scent of the summer is charming and fresh…

And the bats have been here again. – We have seen them here already three times now! 🙂 In the woods next to our garden and in our garden, and flying close above our heads. They were here for the third time last night. And we heard the cuckoo calling at the same time as well, the cuckoo’s been calling somewhere near here every day now, really around the clock. 😀

Lily of the Valley

Lily of the Valley flowers now everywhere, in our garden as well. The scent of the flowers is one of my favourite scents in nature.

Lily of the Valley

Lily of the Valley is the national flower of Finland. Lily of the Valley is called kielo in Finnish.

lilac & apple flowers

A week ago the lilac flowers were starting to open and the apple trees were still flowering…

starry forest ground

Starry forest ground in the woods beside our garden after 23.45 PM a week ago. Chickweed wintergreen flowers or arctic starflower flowers. – The stars are not in the sky in Finland now, they are in forests, on the ground level, because of the light summer nights.

Today, here where I’m living, the sun rose at 3.53 AM, and the sun sets at 23.11 PM, the length of the day is 19 hours 18 minutes, and the darkest hours of the day are not that dark either… the special weeks up here… 🙂

fly honeysuckle & friend

I met this very busy friend at the fly honeysuckle tree in the back of our garden…

fly honeysuckle

Our fly honeysuckle looks old, we’ve thought…

lilac

Lilac flowers! My darlings! 😀 Oh, the scent in the garden now… Okay, I’d better go outside, soon…

lilac

I took these pictures on Wednesday.

raven feather

On our regular walk – in the raven forest near our home. A raven feather, one of them – there are always many of them there on the ground in the summertime. And the noble and funny ravens are croaking there… 🙂

And after the walk, more lilac flowers, in the evening light:

lilac

lilac

Under the lilac flowers, in the pictures above and below.

lilac

lilac

Lilac and the big Norway maple in our driveway.

red campion, red catchfly

Red campion or red catchfly flowers in the garden now as well.

garden nasturtium, Indian cress

These feet, duck feet, or what are they… Hmm, that’s tropaeolum majus or garden nasturtium or Indian cress growing. Something to admire and eat…

We’ve planted numerous seeds… flowers, food, everything. I’ll take pictures and write about everything here, when it’s the time… And if something doesn’t grow, I’ll think about it here as well. 🙂

-Leena

Summer flowers, little friends, eating brain mushrooms…

Finally we have had the rain that the garden, nature and we people needed… now we have had two rainy days, the first one last week after that blog post of mine, and today is the second rainy day. The cooler air also returned for a day or two last week – especially Friday was a ridiculously cold day… Now it’s been all summery again.

narcissus, daffodil & spider

One narcissus or daffodil flower was a home for this little guy for two days. This spider really stayed here for two days, but when the cold Friday came, he was presumably off to some warmer place. 🙂

rockfoil

Some rockfoil flowers in our garden, not many, but they are beauties.

rockfoil

plum flower

Our plum tree has been blooming, now the flowers have already started to disappear. Last year the tree was in bloom already on May 23rd, and there was well over a hundred flowers, but this year… I actually didn’t count them, but I think 20 flowers (or fewer?), definitely not many more than 20… so let’s see what happens… 🙂

plum flower

High up…

gyromitra esculenta, false morel, brain mushroom

These brainy friends… highly toxic friends… We got some brain mushrooms from Eastern Finland. Brain mushroom, gyromitra esculenta, false morel… These are real delicacies in Finland. Quite unique taste! But very dangerous, deadly, before boiling them at least two times. And most of the poison disappears during the boiling – up in the air, so one has to make sure that the house is ventilated well – we, for example, opened a door and two windows. We ate the first part of our brain mushrooms – cooked them with just cream and a bit of salt, and ate them with potatoes. Excellent food! We still have those mushrooms for two meals in the freezer. In Finnish this brain mushroom is called korvasieniear mushroom. 🙂

bird cherry

Okay, I never knew until now that we have this fairly tiny bird cherry tree in the back of our garden. I just found it. And I found it blooming! It’s in a spot where, umm… many different things grow. So, yeah, we still have that sort of spots in our garden. 😀

forget-me-not

Good morning! Forget-me-nots in the back of our garden again, by the ditch… My favourite small flowers!

forget-me-not

In German, Spanish and English the name of the flower means the same: Vergissmeinnichtnomeolvidesforget-me-not. But in Finnish the name is lemmikki, literally pet or darling, and the name can also be understood: “a flower of love“. 🙂

forget-me-not

forget-me-not

forget-me-not

apple flowers

Apple flowers now…

apple flowers

apple flower & ladybird or ladybug

But who’s here?

apple flower & ladybird or ladybug

A ladybird or ladybug is here! The first one for me this year. 🙂

apple flowers

apple flowers

apple flowers

chickweed wintergreen or arctic starflower

The first chickweed wintergreen flower or arctic starflower flower this year, in the back of our garden…

globeflower

Globeflower blooming in the front yard. We have these also in two other places in our garden, in the backyard.

globeflower

One of my favourite perennials…

-Leena