Hail, sleet, sunshine… and these growing in the garden right now

But first one pic from Thursday… we had like ‘forgotten’ all about our Nordic walking poles, but on Thursday we felt the need…

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…the need for speed. 😉 In the forests here at home. Hopefully there will be some more pics and stories about my Nordic walking here in my blog later on. I mean, that I will now continue this hobby of mine…

So the weather has been a bit on the weird side lately; it’s been hailing and sleeting, but there’s been a lot of sunshine, too – even at the same instant – for example yesterday, it was hailing heavily and the sun was shining at the same time, I even ate one of the tiny snow balls yesterday, but today, is it summer yet…? No, today it’s been sleeting, again, but the sun’s been shining, too. Clearly, the summer is coming to Finland. 😉

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Dandelion greens – food! (Not weed… 🙂 ) I already started the nettle tasting season. Yummies, let us eat more nettles and dandelions – the buds and flowers, too, later on, here in my blog…

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A garden bunny is a happy bunny.

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Just one pic of the whole narcissus plant we have in the flower pot…

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In our garden there’s narcissus growing from the ground, too. Here’s some of them. They have bigger flowers and also some different colours in the flowers. The previous owners of this house have planted them. Thank you!

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Rhubarb, coming through! We’re used to having a rhubarb overflow, had to cut some of them down last summer. The previous owners of this house have planted these, too. Thanks! 🙂

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The peonies! Here’s some of my growing darlings. Aand, the previous owners of this house have planted these as well. And I am so thankful! 🙂 Peonies are my great favourites.

-Leena

At the Botanic Garden II

The second blog post about my visit to the Botanic Garden in Turku. The first one: here.

More photos… 🙂

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Mandarin. It’s nice to take pics of the fruits at the botanic garden…

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A banana plant.

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Under the banana leaves…

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Grapefruit.

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Oh lovely… 🙂

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A lime fruit. The scent of the flowers was so strong and stunning – loved it!

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A casuarina tree.

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Some other lovely citrus fruit… I can’t remember the name right now. 🙂

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The Ruissalo island, on which the botanic garden is located, is an island of oak trees – a very special island in whole Finland.

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In the outside garden of the botanic garden there were lots of blooming crocuses. I took just a couple of pics of them – but had to take the pics, because we don’t have crocuses in our garden here at home – yet! 🙂

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A marvelous springtime…

-Leena

At the Botanic Garden

Today it was mostly sunny, but it was a bit cold and even hailing a bit – the perfect spring weather to visit a botanic garden. My favourite place in the city of Turku: The Botanic Garden of the University of Turku, in the Ruissalo island. It’s lovely to visit the botanic garden in wintertime or when it’s not an actual summertime in Finland. A tropic near us! 🙂 I have photos for two blog posts, here’s the first one.

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Welcome to the jungle!

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Epipremnum aureum, golden pothos, devil’s ivy… We have many of these – the house plants, at home… I should count our house plants, I don’t know how many we have… 😉

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I’m gonna need some more coffee…

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A bird of paradise.

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A taro leaf.

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A trunk with attitude. A kapok tree.

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Beauties… an orchid…? 🙂

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A red-eared slider, and she came to pose to her name tag! She has a beautiful name: Alma, and she is as old as I am…

Aaand… in the second post will be different kinds of citrus fruits and some other things, too. 🙂

-Leena

Some things to one’s heart’s content

I visited the city of Turku last week, and visited the garden store Plantagen in the town of Raisio on Friday, too. I met this wonderful plant there… just had to take a couple of pics of it. I like very much going to Plantagen – there are so many flowers, plants, bushes, trees… everywhere around there. It’s actually one of my favourite places in the Turku region. 🙂

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A garden croton or variegated croton are the names I could find in English, in Finnish this plant is literally a wonder bushihmepensas. 🙂

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Just for the colours…

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On Saturday here in the region of Satakunta, my home region.

In the evening we stopped by the lake Pyhäjärvi, the lake that is our great pride and joy here in Satakunta. A lake large in size, a bit sealike. It was windy and the sound of the waves was so powerful and lovely. I like very much visiting the lake in any kind of weather.

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On Saturday, a bit later, a campfire in our garden. We, me and my boyfriend, are real campfire people. 🙂 We build campfires here and there, all year round, and in our garden, too. I love the scent, the sound, the atmosphere…

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The food… We have a wok pan for the campfire. We like campfire cooking very much, too – on a wok pan, on a grill grate, on a stick… all year round.

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The first fully opened flower of the narcissus in our garden yesterday. It was a rainy day again. But this beauty dazzles!

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And yesterday in our garden, nettles – food! Nettles have started to grow nicely, let us eat nettles and speak of them later on. 🙂

-Leena