Everywhere looks it's worst at this time of year.
Trees, bushes and lots of other plants have lost their leaves leaving gaping holes in flower beds. The hedges are sparse and through them you can catch glimpses of what is usually well hidden and highlighting the work that lies waiting to be done. It's not just us, driving along the main road it is that time of the year that allows you from the elevated driving position of the truck to have a sneaky nosy into other people's gardens and see things that will be hidden from view in just a couple of months.
Above is the view from the back of Chicken World that shows our bonfire area. The long snaking thing is the inner liner from the old small wood burner flue that was in the house when we moved in, and that will soon be called back into use to heat the workshop, ready for the days when Lovely Hubby will have to time to potter in there making things to sell and doing all those jobs that men find to do in the confines of 'man sheds'.
I think it adds a certain ornamental charm to an area that is now full of Snowdrops ... and it is most certainly home to a small creature or two going by Gingers reaction and intent on sitting at one end of it for hours at a time and walking from end to end as he listens to the progress of little feet inside.
On this side of the fence in Chicken World there are daffodils coming through as well as the snowdrops. They struggle to flower here as the girls think it great sport to pull them up at first signs of shooting and peck off the flower heads as they appear.
I've rescued lots of the small shooting bulbs that appear tossed nonchalantly by a bored chicken onto the surface of the soil, and replanted them into tubs nearer the house.
The ones I rescued in this way last year are flowering magnificently this, and hopefully this years little rescuees will join them next year. The few that do manage to survive, add their colourful beauty to the mess that has suddenly been exposed in the corners of our temporarily barren Welsh hillside.
Have a good weekend.
Sue xx