Puffballs and pearls .. and Samuel

Look what popped up in my garden! We usually get the normal sort .. tiny little brown things .. which I am not sure if they are poisonous or not, but Bradley has stricked instructions 'not to touch' and now I will have to teach Connor the same. Anyway, they're for the fairies that come at night time and not for us!

But this magnificent 'beast' appeared on Friday! I wonder what the fairies made of this one !!

I then had to find out more, as I am really not sure what are mushrooms and what are toadstools. My Mum always told me that mushrooms are 'brown underneath and toadstools are white'. Mmm .. that doesn't always follow so I have done a 'little digging' !!

Firstly, I found out that the name of my 'magnificent beast' is a Puffball. Very apt as it weighed nothing at all. And it's a mushroom - no brown or white gills visible ... sorry Mum, bang goes your theory - and grows between 8 to 51 cm!!!!!! This one was a 'baby' being around 8 cm. When it's creamy white on the inside, you can eat it, but when it turns brown and powdery (like mine) ... DON'T !

What an interesting article - firstly looked up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mushroom and then did the 'old fashioned' thing of actually taking down volume 18 of the encyclopedia, blowing off the dust, and looking up 'mushrooms'

Did you know ... there are 14,000 described species of mushrooms! The mind boggles, and there are names like stinkhorns, polypores, jelly fungi, paddy straw mushrooms, shaggy manes, hedgehog mushrooms, etc, etc.

And after all that, I am still not sure what the difference is between a mushroom and a toadstool! I think it's just safer to buy them (mushrooms!) from the vege section of the supermarket!!!!

Because of all the rain we've been having, my garden is not only scattered with mushrooms/toadstools (?!) for the fairies, but I went out early this morning, and it was a beautiful sunshiney morning, to find the plants dripping with sparkling pearls ....

a string of rain 'pearls' on the hebe shrub

Scattered 'pearls' on a canna leaf

Cheating here - took this photo a while ago when the Silver Birch was still in it's 'winter slumber' and needed a little helping hand with 'manual' watering ... but it's one of my favourite photos of 'water pearls' ......My hydrangeas are going to be beautiful this year - I think! I usually give them a 'very decent' haircut as they grow huge every year and I have three in a corner, under the dining room window. They grow so big that it becomes difficult to open the window, but the shrubs are usually covered with huge flowers in the most magnificent purpley shades. These past few years I have given them more than a decent haircut - right down - and they're not happy with me at all ... they sulk and produce only a few of their magnificent large blooms. I keep reading that hydrangeas only need a third cut back. So .... this is what I have done this year ... and wow, that are happy chappies again !!!! Large, very large already (so the window is going to be problem!) but they are covered in flowers. Once they get their beautiful colours, I shall snap away and share their splendour! These three plants are some of the very first plants I planted in the garden 28 years ago!! Still going strong!!

But this morning, the new flowers, still in their 'early in the season' colour range, were covered with a sprinkling of pearly droplets ....

Must also add - had a little giggle just now! The gardener, Samuel, has just left (he comes once a week on a Saturday) and was in his element this morning. Hubby does the mowing and trimming of the lawn .. always has done ... anyway, it's good exercise for him! ... but today I asked Samuel to do it as Pete is away in Australia on a business trip. He obviously loves to mow the lawn as I see him doing the neighbours-across-the-road on a weekly basis. He also loves to do other things like cementing stuff, etc.

So anyhow .. he came and told me that the screw that holds the garden shears together fell off into the 'mass' of ivy that he was trimming, but it's OK, he will find it and fix it. When he left just now, with umbrella in hand, as it looks like rain again, I asked him whether he found the screw and fixed the shears. "No," he replied, "it's f-----d up" but if I buy another screw, he can fix it. Now, I am from the 'old school', I do not allow swearing or foul language AT ALL in my home !! Oh my .. it's become such a normal word (!) .. I didn't want to look too astonished either - but quietly giggled once he had gone out the gate.