Ellie's Place

When I was in my mum's garden, waiting for her to come home the other day, I was wandering about and taking pictures of her lovely flowers. My mum and dad's garden is full of lovely colours (I certainly didn't inherit my gardening expertise - or rather lack of it from them).While I was wandering around I found a plant pot with this leafy shrub in it. It had been raining and the plant was very wet. I loved the colour of the leaves and the water made it look so shiny and pretty. So, I did what I usually do and I took a picture. 
There are so many beautiful plants and flowers out there aren't there? 
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and  with Lisa at Macro Monday

Well today I have been a Mrs for 23 years, yeah 23 years, how can it possibly be that long!  I, or rather we, look soooo young in the picture. I look a bit different now, a few (quite a few) pounds heavier lol, a few wrinkles and grey hair. As a sideline, why is it that Danny has less grey hair than me - don't think that is very fair - do you? I think I must have had a harder life than him - or something!!!
Anyway, when  I woke up 23 years ago today it was a beautiful day, blue sky, sun shining but very cold. One of my abiding memories of that day was I had no where to put a hanky and boy my nose was running that day. But my lovely husband had a hanky in his pocket which he gave to me so I could blow my nose and of course I had to give it back to him as I had nowhere to put it. He took it and put it back in his pocket - Ahh true love!!! lol.
We had a great day and I truly enjoyed our wedding day. I would do it again in a heartbeat - but, it would have to be with Danny again. 
Happy …

Can you see incy wincy spider?  

When Dan was looking my picture he said to me "You weren't close enough to the spider" . Let me tell you, I think I was plenty close enough thank you very much. I'm not a great fan of spiders I'm afraid, not sure why 'cause what will they do to me? That wee one would never eat me (it really was very tiny) and I think he might have been sleeping! lol.  I think it's the really fast ones and the big fat hairy ones that I really, REALLY don't like.   Then again lets face it they are probably more scared of me!!!

When I was out on my walk yesterday I found a few brambles - I thought they would be finished by now but these look quite healthy. I didn't pick them as I had nothing to carry them in. So I just took the picture instead.  I don't know if you remember when we picked loads of brambles a few weeks ago. Well, I rinsed them in clear water and then in salt water (as I heard that encourages wee beasties that may be hiding in there to come out), and then in cold water again. Well, the next day I looked in the bowl and it had mould in it - yukk. So  I threw the lot out. So no jam for us  :(  Maybe next time...
I
Linking up with Deb at debduty

Today we had such a lovely morning I just had to go for another walk - my goodness if this keeps up I might start to get fit, ha.  Where to go today, I know I'll go see my mum and dad. They live about 20 minutes walk away from me. But as I took my camera with me it took me about 35minutes, ooops. Well, you know how it is.

The Lane to my mum and dad's house

When I saw this picture above I thought it looked like an arrow pointing down the way, when I asked Karen what she thought she said it looked like birds flying, Laura spotted the heart shaped leaf. What do you see?


When I saw this view I just had to shoot. I love all the colours and it's such a lovely day.

? Blades of grass!  They really look like sharp blades don't they?
When I got to my folks house guess what - they weren't in and I didn't take my key.  So I decided to wait in their back garden for a short time. While I was there I took some pictures of their lovely flowers. Do you recognise them mum? Hee hee I…

It is a lovely morning this morning, dry, warm and calm and the sun is trying to come out. Just right for a nice walk. Of course I took my camera with me!  We have a few golf courses in our town - in fact the Open Golf Championship is played here (I think every 7th year). I have occasionally toyed with the idea of taking golf up but have successfully managed to talk myself out of it again lol. I think I like the idea of golf better than actually playing it.




Just a few shots of the golf course, it was quite quiet and not many golfers out today or dog walkers for that matter - you usually see a few out walking their dogs. Made it a bit easier for me to take my pictures.


One of the many bushes on our golf courses is the gorse bush.  This is a picture of a gorse bush it has lovely yellow flowers - the picture below is a close up of the little flower. When it is in full bloom it is a sea of yellow. Very pretty. 
Another very pretty shrub we have is the heather. I didn't see too many heath…

Now even I know what this lovely flower is called.  It's a daisy and according to my book it means 'innocence'. I really love this idea that flowers have meanings. I'd never really heard of that before I read my book "The Language of Flowers" which by the way I've almost finished. It takes me a while to read a book as the only chance I get to read is in the bath and when I go to bed.
A Lovely Daisy
 I don't really want to read this book in the bath as it is a hard backed book and I don't want to drop it in the bath - which I have been known to do lol.
Linking up today with  Lisa  at The Creative Exchange
and  
Lisa
at Macro Monday

This afternoon Karen and I took a trip down the coast to Largs.  It is about a half hours drive from home. I took some pictures but they are very poor I'm afraid the weather was drizzly and very grey.
You can catch a ferry from Largs over to the Isle of Cumbrae, also called Millport, which is a lovely little island about 22 miles all around. The ferry journey only takes about half and hour. We didn't go over to Millport today but I did take a picture of the ferry,

You can see that the weather wasn't too good. When we arrived it was just drizzly and a bit cold.

 There is a yacht club at Largs and there were lots of boats out, I was amazed how many.

We decided to nip into Nardini's cafe (famous around here for their ice-cream) for something to eat for lunch.

It was really busy and is a really lovely place. There was even a pianist sitting at a grand piano playing music. Very civilized.  Guess what Karen had - yup you guessed it chips. But guess what - even worse - I had chips…

I have been very kindly awarded the  “One Lovely Blog Award” award by Dianna  at  thesedaysofmine.com. How nice is that!!!  I'm extremely flattered. 

Dianna has a lovely blog that you really SHOULD go and visit.  She posts most days about everyday life and takes the most beautiful pictures - especially her sunsets and sunrises (which I really love) and she has the cutest wee cat called Sundae. So you should go over and visit her and tell her I said hi.
Now the rules to this award are that you have to tell 7 new things about yourself  and the second is to pass on to 15 other bloggers.
Seven things about myself - I'm scratching my head trying to think. This could be a bit boring - sorry!
1.  I feel younger the older I get - is that strange?
 2.  I have 2 younger sisters.
 3.  I love blues music. I just have to tap my feet - can't help myself.
 4.  I will have been married for 23 years at the end of the month - can you believe that, where did the time go!!
 5. I seem to use exclamat…

Have you heard of this?

Last night Emma said to me "Mum, will you do the Oreo lick race with me" So, of course I said "What on earth is that". So she explained to me that you need a glass of milk and an oreo biscuit.  You have to split the biscuit in two and lick all the cream off (you can only lick it off) and then you dip the biscuit into the milk and then eat it. The person who finishes first is the winner.  Sound like fun!!!!   Yes of course it does, nothing like a bit of childish fun lol. Well, I'm always up for a laugh (and a challenge) and I love oreo biscuits so I agreed to do it.  I didn't take any pictures of us doing this as it's quite messy and a bit unglamourous (not me at my best).  Guess who won -  ME!!!  Emma was well miffed (unhappy). That will teach her to ask me to do these things, lol. It didn't half bring out the inner child in me!!!

I do hope you're not all fed-up with my River Ayr walk pictures. Because I'm posting another one.  I took a few different views of this shot and I couldn't pick which one I liked - so I asked Emma and she said this one.

I think it shows what a lovely day we had that day.  However, I think it was the calm before the storm because we have had 2 solid days of rain (heavy), hailstorms and wind. In fact we had flooding in town - which made the news on the telly. The fire brigade and police had to close streets as it was so deep in places.  It is amazing though because today all the water is gone. You would never know there had been a problem.
Isn't is strange that some places are suffering lack of rainfall and here we are waterlogged. 
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Another picture from our walk along the River Ayr.
When I saw this I just had to take a picture.  It made me think of the title 'Mother Nature's Washing Line' because it looks like all the leaves are hanging out to dry.  What can I say, that's what my crazy mixed up brain thought, lol. 

Linking up with Wild Ginger Photography

You know there is still plenty of colour out there at the moment.  I was amazed when we were out for our walk on Sunday just how much there still is. And, I'm not just talking about Autumn leaves. There are berries, roses, flowers and an  assortment of others. 







 These are just a few of what we saw.

I've got no idea what this flower is called but I thought it was very pretty.  Note to self - I really must start trying to find out the names of flowers.


 I'm reading a book at the moment called 'The Language of Flowers' by Vanessa Diffenbaugh, it is quite interesting as it is basically about the meaning of flowers. Apparently this idea dates back to Victorian times  when flowers were used as a form of communication. For instance did you know that  Lavender means Mistrust, and that a Purple Coneflower means Strength and Health. It's all very interesting and at the back of the book is a dictionary of flowers giving all the meanings. I now look at flowers in a different way. (I just have to find out what the unusual flowers are called). 
So, if anybody knows what this is called I'd be happy if you would let me know!!

Linking up today with  Lisa  at
The Creative Exchange





And Lisa  at Macro Monday

My photo buddy (and daughter) Karen, came with me on a walk this afternoon along the River Ayr.  We only did a very small amount of walking because when you take LOTS of pictures it can take a lot of time. The actual walk covers 44 miles (which I think is quite a lot). I think we would have been lucky if we covered 2 of those miles (yes I said 2).
 I took 177 photographs - can you believe that!! It's just as well it's not on film anymore. Anyway I'm sure there will be a lot of duff pictures amongst that lot. Probably leaves me with about 10 half decent ones lol.
I'm posting pictures of the river today. I love how the sun was shining on the water and the smooth and the rough of the first picture.
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The water was pretty murky but there were some reflections in it which I quite liked.

This walk passes some beautiful scenery so I must try and walk and visit some more of  it.

After lunch today Karen said "Mum do you want to go to the Garden Centre with me".  What could I say but "Ok, but I'm not buying anything".  That girl is a bad influence on me - yeah really she is! Ha, guess what I did!  Yup you guessed it I bought stuff. Who can resist all the lovely shrubs and flowers on display. And as you probably all know by now I am NO gardener. Anyway these are the two plants I bought (just because I thought they were pretty).
Hypericum  'Magical Gold'
A close up shot of one of the flowers - isn't she pretty.
Skimmia Rubella
A close up of the buds on this one.
They are all nicely tucked up (planted) in the garden. Now as I said before I am no gardener - so I thought it was a good idea to take a picture of the flower and also of the name of it so that IF it doesn't survive with my tender loving care I will at least know what it was called and have a reminder of what it was like.  Well, I thought it was a good idea!!!