Busy Bees

After watching our church service online this morning, we repaired to the kitchen to prepare for the arrival of #2 son and his family for lunch. 

We had a most enjoyable meal, then the adults, including The Traveller, sat outside for their coffee, while Granny and the girls wandered about the garden together. The little ones were fascinated by the wildlife they saw. First of all they noticed some tiny, tadpole-like creatures darting around in the ornamental bird bath at the top of the garden path. I haven’t seen them before, and I cleaned the bird bath only a couple of days ago and re-filled it with fresh water from the water butt, so I was curious as to what they could be. They were absolutely minuscule and I discovered later that they are probably mosquito larvae. After the girls tired of swilling the water to make the tiny creatures dart around even more frenetically, they checked out the various types of bee on the lavender bushes, and then L also noticed the black and yellow harlequin ladybird on a nearby rose leaf. 

Later they spotted the box tree moth, and spent quite a while chasing it round the garden and squealing with delight when it landed on them. (I confess those moths are not my favourite because of the way they decimate my box hedge, given half a chance.) H also picked flowers and spent some time wiping each of them very carefully with a damp leaf and then bringing them to show me …

By the time they went home, Granny and Grandpa were utterly exhausted. Despite the fact that Smithers had set the dishwasher off twice today, we still found ourselves standing at the sink doing washing up by hand of all the larger items like the roasting dishes once the family had gone. We love having them, but we no longer have the stamina we used to have for entertaining, and having a house full wears us out.