Things that make me happy 178-180/365

178. A drawing, by GD1, of me, her and her baby sister.

179. I've just finished a couple of cushion covers for the garden chairs

180. I've been clearing the moss and weeds from between the brickwork of the path round the house, I've almost reached the back door.

Things that make me happy, 174-177/365

174. Tomatoes growing in the garden

175. Another al fresco breakfast

176. I love this clematis

177. A view of our garden from the loft skylight window. Our house is built in what used to be the garden of East End House (now a petrol station!). The brick wall that you can see coming in from the left side at the back of next door's garden is the original wall between the main garden and the utility/vegetable area, and the buildings immediately behind our garden chalet (shed) were the chauffeur's cottage and the coachhouse.

I've just noticed that we seem to have a bit of a garden theme running through this post, probably because that's where I've been spending most of my time this week.

Things that make me happy, 168-173

168. Meeting up with friends for a long-overdue cuppa and natter at The Rowdey Cow

169. A fuschia in one of the hanging baskets

170. A beautiful sunset

171. Al fresco breakfast

172. Summer Solstice Sunrise

173. Warminster Wobble, a free fun day in the park, devoted to all aspects of cycling

Summer Photography Scavenger Hunt - Midsummers Day

13. A sunrise - taken from my studio window, located about 16 miles to the west of Stonehenge at approx 5.15am on Midsummers Day.

(with apologies for the cheek of "blogger" to lighten the shot, I find it very annoying that they alter my upload without my knowledge or choice - a big boo to "blogger"). To see the shot as I would like it to be seen, please visit the facebook page.

ZIZO

A very ordinary and a bit scruffy hanging basket on the outside of the garden shed

. . . but look what I found on closer examination of what I thought was a muddy lump.

To see the other ZIZOs for this week please pop over to Helena's blog

Summertime Photography Scavenger Hunt, a start.

Once again Rinda has organised a Summertime Photography Scavenger Hunt, which you can view here.

I decided that rather than randomly finding stuff, I would try being a bit more methodical, and where possible would go through the list numerically - I know this wont be possible for the whole list, but at least I've made a good start with finding the first three which are:

1) A sign welcoming people to my home town.

2) A garden gnome. Meet Janner, he is a garden gnome, bought for GM by GT for his last birthday. GM is a fan of his home-town football club, Plymouth Argyle, and Janner lives proudly on a shelf in GM's office rather than in the garden where he might suffer from the weather. Does anyone else have a garden gnome in their office, I wonder?

3) Birds on a wire - well one bird on and another watching, as seen from my studio window.

As the next item on the list is a group of tourists, I may have to go a bit further from home to find them.

Things that make me happy 167/365

A returning to the car after a walk at Shearwater Lake

Things that make me happy 166/365

I bought this lovely pack of 6 flatpack boxes at Lidl the other day, only £3.99.

They were incredibly easy to assemble . . .

. . . and are perfect for keeping my Phoenix stock tidy and dust-free. I think I'll pop back to Lidl today and buy some more for some of my other bits and pieces.

Things that make me happy, 165/365

Foxgloves in flower, a bee collecting pollen.

Things that make me Happy 162-164/365

162. One of the fuschias, grown as a cutting from last year, in one of my hanging baskets, which were hung out yesterday.

163. Our first al fresco lunch of this year

164. New summer shoes

Things that make me Happy 161/365

I really, really love my "job" as a Phoenix Trader

and the fact that I get to "work" in places with such a fantastic view.

Things that make me Happy, 158-160/365

158. My favourite clematis is about to burst into flower

159. Sorting my buttons into my new button box

160. Come on England - waiting for the World Cup to start

Things that make me happy 153-157/365

153. A pair of craft scissors, 1 handle and 4 interchangeable cutting blades (available this week only 6th-12th June from Lidl at £2.49)

154. Freshly picked raspberries, the first this year

155. The first strawberry, about to be picked

156. Flowers on the runner beans, a promise of deliciousness to come

157. Honeysuckle, smells divine.

Another thing that makes me happy is Rinda's Summertime Photography Scavenger Hunt, which started on 1st June. If you would like to join in, the link is here.

Five on the Fifth, The Epping Ongar Railway

GM and I are post-war baby-boomers, and as such we can both remember from our childhoods the thrill and excitement of steam rail travel. I dont know if all (or any) of our contemporaries feel the same, but we have a certain nostalgic love of those days, and now we take the opportunity to visit a heritage railway whenever we can.

It just so happens that the newest of these is the Epping Ongar Railway. I was born in Epping and lived there until I was 20, then lived in the Ongar area for the next 16 years, but I can honestly say that in all that time I never once travelled on what was at that time an extension of the central line, run by London Underground. You can read a full history of the line here.

However, we recently found ourselves back in Essex on a Sunday morning with a couple of hours to spare, so what better to do than to pay a visit to the EOR. We were too early to see any actual trains running, but we enjoyed an hour or so just mooching around the station.

In the proper spirit of 5 on 5, these photos should have been taken within a five minute period, but, hey ho, rules are there to be bent (sorry Sandie), mine were taken over a leisurely hour on a lazy sunny Sunday morning.

To see the other Five on the Fifth entries, please visit Sandie's blog, itchifingers.

ZIZO - High Beech, Epping Forest

Recently in Essex, with a couple of hours on our hands, we made our way to this local beauty spot for a bit of fresh air and a short walk. We spotted this fallen bough.

Closer inspection showed us that we weren't the only ones to have spotted it

Zizo (zoom in, zoom out) is a weekly meme hosted by Helena, you can view the other participants here.

Things that make me happy 151 and 152/365

Not photos I have taken myself, but they were taken with my camera, so they sort of count for my photographic 365 (my rules)

151. A wonderfully happy day with all the family to celebrate my Mum's 90th birthday

152. A quieter day for reflection and recovery on Mum's actual 90th birthday

Things that make me happy 150/365

I've fallen a bit behind with my 365, but I'm not worried, as there's plenty of time for me to catch up over the next few days. But in the mean time I just wanted to show you this lovely bag that Tracy made for me to go with my outfit for my mum's 90th birthday do. I gave Tracy such short notice I was amazed that she took the job on at all, but take it on she did. The bag was absolutely perfect, thank you so much Tracy.