Strawberries in the garden

It feels like Summer. We are enjoying a wonderful week of sunshine. Of course,  it has to be enjoyed while it is here!  We had a walk on the shore and for once I never collected anything to draw,  instead I just took in the views and I felt so calm and peaceful  as we slowly wandering along the shore.  We sat on the large boulders and watched the birds on the sand, the ducks sieving in the water and the oyster catchers.  I felt really happy just looking around and enjoying the moment.  I had been to my Tai chi class and I have no doubt that also was contributing to my very relaxed state.  The sunshine seems to have such a huge influence on everyone, when you wake up to a sunny day.  Then we have had the strange creeping fog each evening,   changing our view of the estuary and sometimes it totally blocks out everything.

  We have woken in the early morning to views of the fog, then it all disappears to a wonderful bright day like today.  It is fascinating to see how it changes our estuary.

   I bought some English homegrown strawberries. They smell, look and taste like strawberries, the kind of strawberries my Dad grew when I was young. I wanted to draw them, so sat at the kitchen table and started a new page in my square sketchbook. I painted it with acrylic ink and a number 3 brush.  I could smell the sweet strawberries, I was transported to Dads garden.

Then I did the pencil drawing of another large strawberry. I liked the fact that they are all different shapes and have bumps and damage marks, real strawberries as nature intended.

I was thinking about the wild strawberries we used to find when we were children. They are so tiny and yet they have such a beautiful flavour like nothing else. The scent lingers on your fingers. I found an old sketch book, the drawings of those tiny wild strawberries dated August 2004. I know they grow in August because it would be in the school holidays when we picked them and ate them each year.

And I found I had drawn a pencil one too, placed in the middle of the page.  Just a minute I have some growing in my garden, or is it too early ?

The tiny white strawberry flowers will give me some of those precious fairy strawberries later in the summer.
And then I remembered that last year I was drawing a strawberry which was used by Kimberley Bell on Fabric, at "Peony and Sage" website. (Link in my side bar)

Picture copyright of  Peony and sage....used with permission of Kimberley Bell.

So after I had finished my page,  I sat outside in the sunshine with a bowl of strawberries and ice cream, yes they were delicious. The garden looked lovely, bees were buzzing, an orange tipped butterfly flew by and lots of white butterflies. It is nearly  time for the Snake head Fritillary seed heads to ripen and I will collect the seeds, then we will cut our wild flower patch.

It is not a perfect garden, but the birds and the insects and me,  all  love it. 

 I am hoping to have lots more days sitting out in the garden eating strawberries and of course some gardening too.  Hope you like the page.

Thank you for the lovely comments which I always love reading.                             Millyx