Most of my photos look better enlarged - just click on the photo to do this



Monday 13 September 2010

Mellow Yellow

I was pegging up the washing this morning when I happened to notice this stunning flower on my courgette plant - it's a yellow courgette and although it's had loads of fruit they have been very small and pretty tasteless but this flower makes all that seem unimportant. It got me thinking about the colour yellow....






.. how sunny and bright it is and how it can lift the greyest of days.



.....So I went round my garden taking photos of all the yellow bits I could see - it is a dull day here so maybe these yellow pictures will help dispel the gloom.



Something else to dispel gloom is the wonderful support and friendship one receives via blogging so I also wanted to say a big Thank you to all those lovely people who have commented on my recent posts - I wish I could respond personally to you all but for now here are some comments of my own on your comments - if you see what I mean?



Several of you said I should wear the green shoes and Lesley even suggested I flaunt my ice skater's legs! Well of course the legs in the photo are not quite like that now - it was after all nearly 45 years ago - and I really wouldn't want to frighten the horses so I will wear the shoes but certainly not with a skirt like the one in my picture you'll be glad to know!


For those who liked the sound of elderberry syrup the recipe is simple: Take 4 lb elderberries picked from their stalks and rinsed. Add to 1 pint of water and add 8 cloves. Briung to boil and then simmer until all the fruit is crushed and the juice pressed out. Bring to boil and skim off any froth (apparently you can add the beaten white of a new laid egg to help clear the liquid but I didn't do this). Strain through a sieve and to each pint of liquid add 1 lb of demerara sugar and boil till it thickens into a syrup. Cool and pour into clean dry bottles and when quite cold seal and store in a cool dark place. To serve add boiling water to taste and a slice of lemon. Yum! Sorry the recipe is in Imperial measurements but the book is from the 1940s - I am sure you can convert if need be.

It was interesting to see your comments on badgers and squirrels - it obviously depended on whether you had been plagued with either. Helsie badgers are quite large weighing in at about 10 kg and being abbout 750 mm long and maybe 300 mm at the shoulder. check out this website for more info. They can and do cause immense damage especially to lawns - nobody round here has a bowling green striped lawn! Are they timid? Well I came home in the car one evening to find a couple having rumpy pumpy on the drive and they were not keen to move!!! I don't think they are that timid and they certainly don't seem mind the security light coming on and are happy to sit about under the street light but would probably rather avoid man where possible.

Squirrels - we probably all know that they are considered a major threat to our natural bio diversity and are to blame for the decline in our native red squirrels now sadly very scarce since the arrival of the greys. But they are amusing to watch and it's not their fault that they were introduced back in Victorian times but it does just show how dangerous it can be to tinker with different species and to introduce them to other habitats and so on. Cute? - yes and no!!


Now I need your help:



1) How do I delete a blog I no longer wish to follow? I have several - mainly from various magazines - that I don't find interesting anymore and I know I got rid of some before but now I can't see how to do it.



2) How do I upload a scanned document or photo? I know Jill you said you had scanned your memory posts as jpeg files and uploaded them that way but I can't seem to do it - can anyone help me?


3) Has anyone discovered how to get the spacing right on a post - I never seem to achieve a post with evenly spaced text - so often it it too near the photos and other times there are too many line spaces. As a one time typing teacher (I know you'd never think so to see my skills now would you?!) it offends me like this but I can't seem to do anything about it.
4) Anyone know why when I follow a blog my little icon comes out showing just a grey shape and not the coloured photo as on my profile?

Speaking of followers I see I now have 99 and although not all of you actually comment - wouldn't that be something? And although by now some of you may not even read my posts I am amazed to think so many people find what I write interesting enough to add themselves as followers. Now since I missed my 1 year anniversary and I also missed my 100th post I thought that when I reach 100 followers I will stage a give away of some sort so watch this space!

22 comments:

  1. Love your yellow flowers Jane, very happy!!

    Sorry can't help with the technical stuff as I'm on wordpress and I'm sure blogger is different. In fact wordpress doesn't always do what I want it to. I know how annoying it can be when you can't do what you want!!!
    Vivienne x

    ReplyDelete
  2. I know the answer to number 1! Go to the blog you want to stop following and click on the "follow" text at the top left under the tab bar (sounds daft I know but keep with me!). Then a white box comes up and says something like "You already follow ......., cancel or stop following". Click on Stop Following.

    Sorry don't know the answers to the others, although I think the icon issue is sometimes to do with whether you click on the "follow" text at the top left, or the "follow with google friend connect" which is usually on the right of the blog - but I'm not 100% sure on that.

    Su

    ReplyDelete
  3. The perfect post for today which has certainly been less cheery and more dreary than yesterday. As a lover of the colour yellow (as well as blue) I really enjoyed the yellows around your garden. The courgette flower is amazing. Sadly mine have been rather disappointing as well, they haven't even managed to flower quite so spectacularly either. As for spacing... I spend hours sometimes trying to sort it out...sometimes you have to go into the html editing thingy ma jingy, but I know that is no help.

    Can't help on the icons either...in fact one blog I comment on, I come up as a slightly grumpy smilely face?

    He he, not a lot of help am I?!

    Talking about the dangers of introducing species, I am very aware of that as that was the very thing that caused the extinction and near extinction of some of New Zealand's wonderful native species.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Wish I could help with the bloggy stuff, but I am a new blogger and am trying to figure it all out too!

    The photos are lovely. Yellow is so cheerful!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Love all the yellow flowers, very pretty and really do make the day seem a bit brighter!
    I know the answer to number 1, but Su Harris got there before me! Sorry I can't help with the others either! :) x

    ReplyDelete
  6. Lovely cheery photos, needed that here today. Can't help with the tech stuff I'm afraid, I need all the help I can get too!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Oh Jane........... it can be a nightmare, can't it? I would have gone a totally different route to stop following a blog and so have been pleased to see the method described by Su Harris! Haven't a clue re the icon and photo thing.... Re uploading scans, I have checked out my scans and they tend to all be already converted to JPeg files therefore SHOULD upload like an ordinary photo. With regards to line spacing.... this is one of my biggest bugbears too.... some days it seems to work out alright, others it is just a waste of time. Just how rubbish was I at helping you out??????? :O( Love all the yellows in your photos.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Pretty flowers! I love when you do 'thematic colour posts'. Yellow is so bright and cheerful!

    I know the answers to your doubts but as English is not my first language it is going to be very difficult to explain. :-(

    About 2), you upload any image the same way you did with today's pictures. Just make sure the scanned files are images (.jpg .gif or .png files). Look for them in your computer and select them.
    If you can't scan them as image then you should play a little with your scanner program to "save as" one of the files I mentioned above.

    Explaining 3) would be more difficult. It has to do with HTML code (that tab you see when you are writing your post). Everytime you press space, or back, or insert something and then delete it... the code changes. You may delete the text you wrote but the tags between brackets remain (they say whether the text is red or blue, big size or small) and they make your text look funny sometimes. To solve it you will have to switch to that HTML tab and delete those useless tags and make sure all spaces are even.

    And 4) it may be the blog isn't a blogger one but another kind? Not sure, just guessing. I will let you know if I find something.

    I tried my best. Hope it is understandable.
    Have a great week! :-D

    ReplyDelete
  9. Sorry - can't help with the techy stuff - I'm "virtually" challenged myself! Pleased your courgette is still flowering - I'm now rueing that I pulled mine out yesterday thinking it was too late for any more!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I love all your yellow flowers. I was once told by a horticulturalist that everyone should have touches of yellow in their garden to "light it up" and I must say that it seems that way to me too.
    Sorry I can't help any more than the others but your icon comes up OK on my blog. I scan things and put them on my blog occasionally and they come out Ok. They scan as jpegs so then I just insert them as photos so I'm afraid I'm no help at all. I just bumble along and I certainly don't know any of the html stuff !!!
    I love to read all your posts about life in England. My dream would be to go to England and live there for a year - go through all the seasons , the rain, the cold , the beautiful weather too. I LOVE the public walkways you have all over the country and how you walk freely through people's land. We could never do that here, you must keep off private property. I love all the wi=onderful National Trust and Heritage properties too. Oh well, you never know .....
    Cheers
    Helen

    ReplyDelete
  11. There's just another example of not proof reading before I publish !!!!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yellow is my favourite flower, which luckily for me shows now - Daffodils

    ReplyDelete
  13. The yellow flowers are gorgeous. I'm always really happy when the wattle trees start to flower here in Australia in July/August when it's been so gloomy during winter.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Not much help to you either I'm afraid, I changed my setting to Old Editor because the line spacing was driving me nuts too but I've just noticed that they'll be phasing that out soon. I'd like to know the answer to that problem myself. I'm finding myself liking yellow as a colour these days although deep down I'm still a red girl!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Love the yellows Jane - I think your techy questions have been answered. Certainly when I have scanned something and save it as a jpeg it is in the My Pictures folder but you need to locate it there - different makes of scanners save them under different headings.
    As for the spacing it is all a bit hit and miss with me and several edit returns are needed to adjust. For example in my last post all my photos were centred when I put them in, but several managed to left align themselves. I usually go back and re-centre them! But this time I hads better things to do!
    Can't help about the icon thingingy, but you are not the only one. Is it on the settings when you started up - perhaps if you went back to that page there may be a tick box.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Thank you for the sunshine in your post! Needed it to cheer up the grey skies.

    I hope everyone's contributions have helped with your technical issues - I just feel lucky if I can even get into my blog nowadays!

    Chrissie x

    ReplyDelete
  17. I thoroughly enjoyed your YELLOW post, such lovely cheerful photographs.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Hi Jane
    Love the yellow theme, especially the nasturtium!
    On the blog questions - another way to stop following a blog, just go to your Blogger dashboard, and under the list of blogs you're following, you'll see a button named 'manage'. Click on that and your bloglist will appear. Now click 'settings' and you'll see 'stop following this site', click on that and Blogger will ask you if you're sure, say yes, job done!
    The other queries I would just add the same as Alhana, though sometimes the spacing also goes funny if you cut and paste from Word.
    And you have 100 followers now - yaay!!
    Dan
    -x-

    ReplyDelete
  19. I love your sunny yellow flower pictures - and your gorgeous green shoes! As a rather new blogger, I've been wondering about the spacing between pictures on posts myself! Sometimes the text is squished up to the picture or sometimes it has HUGE gaps and the more I try to move things around the worse it gets!
    Helen x

    ReplyDelete
  20. Hello Jane! I love your yellow flowers, they are beautiful. Sorry I can't help with your techy questions,I am still struggling with blogger myself! So happy to see you've hit 100 followers - I just love your blog and I am certain all 99 of the other followers love it too!
    Louise x

    ReplyDelete
  21. Your yellow flowers are cheering up a dull day. Sorry can't help with the techie stuff. Nice to know I am not the only one out there. I find most techie things very mystifying!I am with Wordpress which seems fairly easy to cope with. I love following your blog. 100 followers eh? Well done.
    Penny

    ReplyDelete
  22. Thank you for your kind comment regarding the badgers, it is a tricky subject for a blog and I don't like to upset country dwellers who may have a different opinion, but I was so incensed this morning that I had to get it off my chest.
    Once again thank you
    Briony

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for visiting and I hope you have found what you read of interest. Do please leave a comment as I love to hear what you think.