Our newly revamped patio . . . circa 2004 . . . . . . . . Photo by Chris Duffy (no enhancement)

As promised, here's a picture of the patio after Mike and his two day laborers tore up the old flag stone, washed it all off, resanded the area, relaid the flagstone (not as close together as before), leveled them and finally grouted them.  I never criticized the other patio to Mike, but it was not very usable.  It was so unlevel that it was almost impossible to get a chair to sit squarely on it.  Then if you moved your chair the slightest bit one of the legs would sink down in between the flagstones.  Mike loves to eat outside and it soon became apparent to him that we wouldn't actually be USING the patio that much, because it was so uneven and unlevel. 

I'm really proud of the job they did on it.  It is so pretty and so much nicer to eat out there now.  We had company this week end and ate on the patio three times.  I can see us using it a lot now.  It's even fun to sit out there and watch the birds feeding. If you sit still they'll go ahead and ignore you and feed.  Today we saw two cardinals.

Our tiny little bird sanctuary in the corner of our back yard . . . . . . . . Photo by Chris Duffy

This is I'd guess about ten or twelve feet from our patio table and where we have several bird feeders.  Mike added a path from the patio to the bird feeders because he was always getting his shoes dirty when he'd go out to fill up the bird feeders.  I like it, even if he didn't actually use it.  Our favorite time to listen to the birds is early in the morning.  My goodness, they can sure start your day out on a pleasant note.

Looking up at a cathedral in Oxford, England           Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

I just love looking at all the old buildings in England, and especially the many churches.  It's amazing to me just how many statues, gargoils, posts and columns the architects were able to put into some of them. Take this one for example, in Oxford.  It had so many statues on it that I bet they almost doubled the total weight of the structure.  Kind of mind boggling how they managed to build all these wonderful structures without benefit of modern machinery.  And, they built them so well that they're still standing a couple hundred years later. 

The Old New Inn in Bourton on the Water, England     Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

OK, I promised I wouldn't do another graveyard for a while.  This Inn caught my eye as we were walking around Bourton on the Water; it's called the Old New Inn.  Does that mean that this used to be the New Inn, but then they built a newer New Inn, so now this is the Old New Inn?  I'll never know, because we didn't go in to find out the scoop.  

My hubby took Friday off and hired two day laborers and tore up the patio and completely relaid the flagstone and regrouted it.  It looks 1000% better than it did.  He's bushed, but he's proud of what they accomplished today.  They worked from 8 in the morning and didn't finish until 6:30 in the evening.  I'll post some pictures of it later.  They really did a terrific job. 

Burford Church Yard Cemetary in Burford, England          Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

OK, OK, this will be the last blog about cemetaries . . . for a little while anyway.  It really looks neat the way the moss grows on so many of these gravestones and above ground tombs, but then it can hardly be helped with all the rain they have there.  

Church Yard Cemetary in Burford, England        Photo &enhancement by C. Duffy

Here's another one of the many above ground tombs we saw.  This one was also in the Church Yard at Burford.  We attended the Palm Sunday services in the Burford Church and found it to be very interesting.  They had a choir only once a month and luckily it was that Sunday.  The preacher has several congregations and therefore is only at any one of the churches about once a month.  The Sunday we were there just happened to be his Sunday at the Burford Church and the Sunday that all the choirs from all the surrounding churches gather at the Burford Church. It was a small choir, about 15 people, but with a very nice sound.  I'm sure the accoustics in those old church buildings doesn't hurt the sound any.

Gate to Oxford Graveyard               Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

In case you're counting, this does not technically count as a photo of a graveyard, because I'm standing outside the graveyard and so think of it more as a picture of the gate and the bicycle.  I was really blown away at how many people get around in Oxford on bicycles.  They far outnumbered the cars we saw.  Now, we did see a lot of bikes out in the country towns too, but never to the extent we saw in Oxford . . . but then it is a college town.  They even had their own lanes on the city streets. 

Church Yard in Chipping Campden                 Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

Let's see, have I told you lately that I really like OLD graveyards?  Yeah, I thought I had.  This one was particularly interesting.  It had the usual randomly placed gravestones in the main yard, and then they had another separate yard with rows and rows of neatly placed gravestones.  In fact, it's the only one like it I've seen in England. That's not to say that it IS the only one, but it is at least the only one we came across.

Church Yard in Chipping Campden                 Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

This was either just before or just after we got rained on for the 4th time that day.  For anyone interested in seeing more England pictures visit "An English Encore", the website my sister Alice made for me to showcase a lot of our pictures of England.

As always I'd recommend you click on these pictures, and then hit the F11 key to see them at the size they were intended to be viewed at.

Well, I bit the bullet today.  I ordered a new computer for home.  It cost a little bit more than I wanted to have to pay, but I sure don't want to buy one that's outdated the day after I buy it, so I went for as much computer as I could afford.  I'm actually having it customized to fit my needs (excuse me, WANTS).  And, it'll sure be nice to be able to apply the filters when I'm enhancing my photos without having time to fix myself a cup of tea while I wait for the filter to "apply" itself.  And it certainly will also be nice to not have to reboot my computer three or four times per evening because it keeps locking up.  Now, what do I do with THIS old one, that I hope and pray lasts until I get my new one in about two weeks?  So, how do I recycle it?   Don't have a boat, so I can't use it as an anchor. 

Someone's yard in Bourton on the Water                                            Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

We passed this yard on our way from where we parked to downtown Bourton on the Water.  I thought it was quite unique.  The yard was triangular in shape with the ever present Cotswold toad stools as it's fence and the lovely stream setting it's boundary on one side.  It had lots of daffodils and two red bud trees which were just beginning to bloom.   Not very private, though.  But then, what have our 8 ft high privacy fences gained us here in America?  Many don't even know their own neighbors, and that's a shame.   

Church building in Oxford, England                         Photo and enhancement by Chris Duffy

I planted more sedum today and 3 flats of PerryWinkles (at least I think they're PerryWinkles) There's usually  those little plastic things sticking in each pot to tell you what they are and what kind of sunlight they like and can take, but not these.  I should have asked when I bought them what they were, but they looked so much like the PerryWinkles I put out front last year that I just assumed that's what they are.   I planted them in the "meditation garden" in that narrow strip between our house and our neighbor's house . . . where I'd seen the rats, but since I haven't seen hide nor hair of the rats since we caught the one, I thought it might be safe to actually get down on the ground out there and do my gardening . . . without any rat visitors.  I also see that the purple hyacinth vines have little 6 inch shoots sticking out of the ground.  That's going to be beautiful this fall.  I haven't seen anything from the tiger lily seeds I planted yet. Perhaps I kept the seeds too long before planting them.  I don't know NEARLY as much about gardening and the plants that I plant as my sister Alice does.  

We also put up a Millsap stone border for the Crepe Myrtle trees we have outside our bedroom window, and then filled in around the trees with ivy starts.  Now if there was just a way to hide the big old air conditioning unit.

Syringa Cottage in Lechlade, England                     Photo and Enhancement by Chris Duffy

Yet another cottage that would be perfect as a retirement home.  And it's off the beaten path, so it might not be quite as pricey as some other ones. . . but alas, even at, that it's probably so far out of our price range it's pathetic.  Oh, well.  It was wonderful to go visit there.  I suspect I wouldn't like the Cotswold winters anyway . . . wet and cold and more wet and cold.  Hubby would love that, but I definately don't like cold winters.  Give me spring and fall any day. 

I have more ivy and sedum to plant today, so I'd better get to it, instead of sitting here dreaming of things that will never be.