Tea Time In My scented Herb Garden

My garden and allotment are full of herbs, I use herbs in teas and cooking, and medicinally.  On a grey  June day I wrote a list of the herbs I grow and it came to over 50 herbs.   This is a picture I took of my part of my herb collection on that same grey day.  There are thymes,  mints, rosemary, oregano,  sweet cicely, lavenders, and wild strawberries just beginning to ripen.  These herbs I use every day in cooking, for making teas and medicinally. I grow some herbs in pots but most in the ground. At the allotment I have the herbs lovage, angelica, hyssop and chamomile growing in one bed near my shed but I also grow other herbs in the fruit beds, with the strawberries borage., with the chard,oregano chives, rocket.

It gives me a sense of well being to see and  to be surrounded by herbs, and when I stop to rest and play with my dog Pops I brew herb tea picked fresh from the plants around me. Sometimes I may have a mint infusion, or black tea and lemon balm to give me a boost of energy, the combinations are numerous and from my local Tea Store I have learnt to make unusual blends.  I try their expert blends and become bolder in the combination of herbs I use in teas.  I sometimes use Rooibos  teas green, earl grey or black with the herbs.

In March to shield my plot from yet another poly-tunnel I plant a dog rose screen, which have rose-hips in the Autumn, so I have been trying out loose rose-hip tea, All about Tea combine this with hibiscus flower and it has become my favourite tea. I love the Ruby Red colour  of Hibiscus tea, a delight to eye and its flavour is tangy and citrus and delicious. Hibiscus  grow in tropical climates but in fact are members of the mallow family. The Pharaohs used hibiscus tea, and today it's still common as a toast at Egyptian weddings. 

Another combination of tea that I got from this tea store is a Faery Tea called Wendy's Tea.  Here is its description from the Tea Stores on-line store:

Wendy Tea is a magical faery blend of Rooibos Earl Grey,sweet South African Honeybush, Lavender Flowers, Rose Petals, Marigold Petals and Cornflower Petals. A refreshing, uplifting tea that will leave you feeling relaxed and ready for whatever life throws at you!

Delightful to drink on a hot June afternoon, and to share with friends and family  a spoon of honey and there is magic held in your hands and  especially  for children.  

I find a chamomile infusion is delightful, chamomile and lavender tea promises a relaxing evening and sleep,  but for perfection I mix these herbs  with Rooibos, green or black tea. ( I am a builders tea person!)

Oh I love herbs and making herb teas.I feel I might be back to  blog about herbs and tea again

This is the on-line link to All About Tea

Pops is waiting for her evening walk so I must  stop blogging and take her for a stroll in the park.

With Reiki Blessings

MerryB

The first Roses of Summer

Today it is dull summers day with hardly a glimmer of sunshine, I have been out in the garden dead heading my roses, how strange that a little over a week ago I was waiting for the first rose of the year to unfurl  and now that bloom is in the compost bin.

The 9th of June was a perfect June evening I sat in my garden in dappled sunlight and saw three of my Masquerade rose were beginning to bloom, and this climbing rose held the promise of a hundred or more flowers.  It was hot evening and I was shaded by the honeysuckle lonicere sermpervirens. Opposite to where I was sitting was a lovely old English rambling rose running twenty foot down the trellis and smothered in buds but only two were flowering.

The borders in my garden are filled with shrubs and perennial flowers. On the patio area there are pots of lavender,  winter box, herbs  and bowls of salad leaves vibrant in the sun, it  is a beautiful space.On the evening of the 9th of June the silence was only broken by the buzzing of the bees and a wood pigeon cooing in the distance.

Where is my garden? Not in the country side but in a densely populated City.  Yet there in that moment there was perfect peace and tranquility.


I  captured this lovely evening in my journal and thought on this grey evening in June I would share it with you.I

With Reiki blessings

Merryb

Masquerade rose brightening a grey day

Time Out From The On-line Universe

For the past month I have been taking time out from the on-line Universe, I check in to look at emails, and do a few tasks on-line but then I have shut down the computer and got busy in the outside world.  I have never been obsessed with the on-line community, which probably reflects my age!

On the way to local shops I walk by the University bus stop where lines of students wait to be transported into the City Center, often 50 of more students are waiting there, but frequently the only sound is of mobile phones alerting the owner to a new text and the tapping of text messages, or they are using one of the many apps they cannot seem to live with out.  As I weave my way through the University group, I am rarely acknowledge.  Conversation between each other  is unusual and almost frowned upon as disturbing the 'real world'..  I call them a group but they are not a group they are isolated individuals with their eyes fixed on tiny screen where life is really happening.  When the bus draws up they shuffle forward to get on the double decker bus  eyes still fixed on a glowing light and slip silently past the bus driver briefly flashing their bus pass before their hands return to texting or surfing the internet.


I am reminded of  story of The Midwich Cuckoos,  by John Wyndham,  In the which "The Children" were alien beings who were controlled by a one group will. .  The University Students aren't controlled by the group mind but by the tiny screens in their hands, controlled by invisible beings out there in the ether.

I read a tweet yesterday about how the Dorset Wild life Trust is concerned about the use of mobile phones apps at their Reserves   The Metro sets the scene and the consequences for birds:

It’s a beautiful day to be a bird: sun above warming the feathers and lots of lovely insects down below.

and here’s the icing on the cake – a ‘come and get me’ mating call from a chirruping beauty looking for action.

But wait… hang on… it’s only the annoying chatter of a mobile phone-wielding human.

It is annoying for this human being  to hear mobile apps being played  when walking through a Reserve or woodland, but  as Tony Whitehead  of  RSPB  said:

playing a recording of bird song or calls to get a better view of a bird can divert it from other important duties, such as feeding its young.

"Night Jars are rarely seen during daylight, but at night when they are 'churring' on the branch of a  tree they can be picked out against the night sky."

Twitchers on Brownsea Island have been disturbing these rare  Night Jar  by using a mobile app. of its song to locate and draw out the birds for spotting and photo calls.  They maybe people who perhaps do not realise the harm they be doing to the birds well being, or maybe people too busy or impatient, to stand and wait for  one of these birds to reveal itself, or just be grateful to know it is there and is being protected on the Reserve..



The virtual world seems to have become more real than the actual world, for many people. 



Oh dear I  am living up to my name and Rambling! 


I love the world of the internet and the interactivity it gives, but I only spend a fragement of my time on the computer each day.  Life is out there waiting to be experienced, and enjoyed.  All we need to do is pay attention to the present moment and we can see the treasures of nature and live life fully.

With Reiki blessings 

MerryB