Feeling very average yesterday morning I knew I really needed to get out to walk; to clear my head and get the blood pumping. I hadn’t had a proper walk since Monday and sometimes the need is real. We went off to walk a familiar loop around the field paths, it is just over 3 miles.
The weather was really warm and pleasant, although doesn’t the sky look ominous in this photo? It had rained overnight so the lane was pretty squelchy and the field paths too, in places. My walking trainers got pretty muddy, but it doesn’t matter. It’s only when I feel the heel of one of my shoes slipping and I go sliding backwards, nearly landing on my bottom that I worry! (This happens more often than you would imagine. I must lean slightly backwards, or something when I walk, or can I blame my footwear…)
This is Fiddleneck and has many other names including purple tansy or blue tansy. According to the Picture This app (so useful, I highly recommend the free version)
Fiddleneck flowers open in a sequence that allows for a long flowering time, which is why it attracts bumblebees, honeybees, and other pollinators. It is typically grown in vineyards and along agricultural fields. This plant is native to the southwestern United States and is grown as a cover crop, green manure, and decorative plant.
It’s so unusual to see oilseed rape planted and flowering so late in England. This field had barley and was edged in beautiful poppies during the summer. Actually I think you’ll find a photo, or maybe two, if you look back a few posts ago.
I’ve just messaged a family member who farms in Wiltshire. I’ll report the answer if I get it before I press publish on this post.
As we walked along this field path a jay was hopping along the field, we disturbed it and so it took off in a blaze of colour. We don’t see jays very often, so this was a special sighting
Then three quarters of the way around there was a longish sit in the sunshine, coats off, basking in the warmth of the sun on our arms and faces (I always think ‘Oh good, vitamin D!’) occasionally sipping water while staring at the stunning view.
I would say I left home feeling a three or four and came back feeling a seven or eight on my personal wellbeing scale. Good stuff!
~~~
My question about the crop has been answered:
Hi Rachel
Good to hear from you. I hope you are all well. My guess is it’s a cover crop of mixed flowering crops. The yellow is probably mustard and purple phacelia.
It’s done to reduce soil erosion and nutrient leaching. The crop will get destroyed in the spring for a crop of barley or wheat.
M❤️
So my use of the app was spot-on for the tansy, because that’s another name for purple phacelia, but my assumption that we were looking at oilseed rape was completely incorrect. Sometimes what you don’t know you don’t know becomes really apparent!
I’ll keep an eye on this field and see if I can catch what happens in the spring and what crop replaces it in the summer.
~~~
If you’re not feeling great this weekend, and you’re able to, I suggest that you go for a walk. It doesn’t need to be a field or footpath, of course it can be urban; in the centre of the town or city. Maybe along a canal, or riverside, through a wood, or even a residential area.
Have a think about how you feel on your own personal scale of well-being, where’s your head at, how does your body feel, what is your general mood like? And then reflect how you’re feeling when you’ve walked a little way, and again at the end of your walk. I would guarantee that it will be a higher number and you’ll feel better. It’s SO good to get out and move.
I’ll be back soon with a books post.
Just before Sewing Club ended for the year another sewer told me she couldn’t see the point of wasting time and energy on making bottle bags; as they wouldn’t be appreciated for the amount of effort that goes into making them. Well, happily I’m glad to report that definitely wasn’t the case. I gave them to members of my family who sew and who totally got the point. They made my (Christmas) day by saying how impressed they were with the quality of the sewing etc etc. Every year we pass around card gift bags and bottle bags, saved from previous Christmases, and last year a few lamented that they had to buy new bags. The horror! I knew that these would be used again and again. It will be quite fun seeing them reappear. Am I revealing my sad nerdiness? Ah well! They’re fully lined with contrast fabric and reversible. Now perhaps I need to make Birthday bottle bags…
We all seemed to arrive at Mum’s with presents for Barty the powder puff tail. My cousin and my nieces all did and I took him a set of jingle mice. But this one was the clear winner: my friend and her dog George sent him a crocheted pillow filled with catnip (bought in Asda, it’s fab.) After I took this photo he got a bit manic. It was so funny to see this laid back ‘I can sleep for England’ young cat so excited. The pillow is already all tatty and with ends sticking out! 
It was so lovely to see this ornament again when we decorated the tree on 23rd. I remembered that one of my nieces bought it for me last year, with her pocket money.
My Dry October turned into Dry November and Dry December (bar 3 occasions where I’d finished in November but then decided to carry on.) All I really fancied was a glass of champagne and so on Christmas Eve I had my first drink in weeks. And my second. And on Christmas morning felt so very ropey that in the middle of drying my hair had to turn off the drier, sit on the bed and take deep breaths! Oh this was not the plan! How pathetic. Seeing a line of just-filled glasses on Christmas morning I apologised to my brother and declined one. During the toast I tasted a sip from Someone’s glass, just to try, and decided it was really rather nice, that perhaps that old chestnut, the hair of the dog thing would be worth a try. My brother said it was the fastest turn around he’s ever seen! I stuck to a single glass all day and it did the trick marvellously. I had another glass on Boxing Day evening with family too. There is a champagne diet, apparently good for weight loss (perhaps not for the liver.) Maybe that will be the one for me in January?
On Boxing Day morning we were so glad to see a crisp and bright morning. We headed out for some exercise. It was a great walk, albeit 7 1/2 miles, not the planned 5. I think it was a combination of a lot of chatter, passing a big group of walkers at a crucial moment and wishing them a Good Morning that meant we missed the intended turning. We ended up in open countryside surrounded by grazing sheep. I turned to my iPhone for our location and saw on a satellite map that we had walked in the opposite direction and were approaching an unexplored village in the west. Oh well, new public footpaths have been discovered and it was a great yomp. Very good for walking off some of the mince pies and Christmas pudding. 
We took ourselves off to the sales on Wednesday and popped into a new-to-me coffee shop, where we sat on wooden boxes and spooned our Demerara from a communal jar with a wooden spoon. How very hipster!
The Little Room of Rachell 
You must be logged in to post a comment.