Untitled

[carolinesarah1963]

Anaemia strikes again....

Following on from my previous post detailing my fleeting experience with anaemia in 2022, after almost a year with no symptoms it struck again athe end of 2023 and start of 2024. The dreaded breathlessness and dizzy spells returned suddenly after Christmas Day 2022. Just how sudden was the onset is almost unbelievable-my neighbours still talk about the difference in my health in just two days;…

[carolinesarah1963]

Let's catch up...

Time to grab a cup of tea/coffee, whatever your poison of choice maybe and gather round. There’s quite a lot of catching up to do. As those of you who have read my Blog posts before going back many years, I have been plagued with “depression and anxiety” all my adult life. [More of this in later posts] Apart from the usual childhood illnesses, some of which spilled over into adulthood, namely…

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Well, well,well.....

After a hiatus of two years I am finally ready to resume my account of my journey living with depression, anxiety and (watch this space) anaemia. More to come but suffice to say “I’m back”

[carolinesarah1963]

Move on

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

A sky full of stars (Northern Lights 3)

A sky full of stars (Northern Lights 3)

I know several people who have had seeing the Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis) on their bucket list for many years waiting for the opportunity to visit a likely location. Some people are lucky enough to see them on their first attempt, others are not so lucky and despite all the planning, come home disappointed. I also know some who have seen them multiple times and all I can say is that success…

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Iris

My first yellow water iris of the year

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Northern Lights-Part 1

Seeing the Northern Lights has been the Number 2 would-like experience on my Bucket List for some time and I was hoping to arrange a visit to Iceland or one of the Northern-most parts of Scandanavia next year to celebrate my next “big” birthday. After an evening out with the Hubster and Pooch I came across an online advert for a 12-night cruise on the Cunard Queen Elizabeth calling at various…

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

I can't live.......

I can’t live…….

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Give a little love......

Give a little love……

The New Economics Foundation Back in 2008, the New Economics Foundation published the “Five Ways to Wellbeing” with 5 funky multi-colour postcards to accompany the launch. Each card details mental health messages under separate headings aimed at improving mental health and wellbeing for everyone. Although the original ideas are over a decade old, they still resonate perhaps even more so whilst…

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Where do I start ?

Where do I start ?

Taking up my blog again, I realise that not only have I a lot of travels and experiences to share, but I should also bring everyone up to date on my mental health. I started this blog more than 10 years ago after admitting my experiences with depression and subsequently starting to work with my employer, various mental health charities, friends and colleagues to encourage more open and honest…

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Back for the Future

Back for the Future

To start my blogging again feels like coming home. I always keep a journal but doing it online means that I can pepper my posts with pictures and photographs much easier than on paper. I have a lot of catching up to do but am looking forward to re-connecting with my blog-hobnobs. See you soon!

View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

Another damp day much appreciated by my garden.

#gallery-0-6 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-6 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

30 Days Wild-Day 7 Another damp day much appreciated by my garden.

[carolinesarah1963]

30 Days Wild- Day 6

30 Days Wild- Day 6

Sadly, due to Covid19, the annual village Open Gardens event in its normal format has been cancelled but it still goes ahead online.

I spent a few hours preparing photos of my wildlife garden to upload to the Lubenham Open Gardens Facebook page. 

  View On WordPress

[carolinesarah1963]

It has been a few days since I left my trail camera pointed at the hedgehog feeding station overnight so last night I thought I’d catch up with our hedgehog visitors.

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

Wildcamera

In addition to dry kitten biscuits, there are many water dishes spread around the garden and the hedgehogs know where they are.

Sadly, we lost one of our rescued juvenile hedgehogs to dehydration during the heatwave. She had come back to us just a month earlier after spending the winter at the Leicestershire Wildlife Hospital. She was discovered on a neighbours lawn, falling over, with very sunken eyes and very thin. There was no obvious signs of trauma and otherwise looked unhurt. Three local vets told me to call back in the morning (this was 5pm) and said I could try to revive it by feeding it rehydrating fluid with a syringe. It was clearly too far gone to survive without proper medical intervention and despite taking some fluids onboard, she died a few hours later.

Luckily, we have lots of hedgehogs visiting gardens where we live and plenty of my neighbours feed and water them all year round. I did, however, take this opportunity to post a note asking everyone to put down water dishes in their gardens in the hope that we don’t lose any more of our spiky friends because of dehydration.

    30 Days Wild-Day 5 It has been a few days since I left my trail camera pointed at the hedgehog feeding station overnight so last night I thought I'd catch up with our hedgehog visitors.

[carolinesarah1963]

30 Days Wild-Day 4 I recently found a set of watercolour pencils which I bought many moons ago but have hardly used.

[carolinesarah1963]

Hurrah! I never thought I would cheer when it rains but I did today. I love the warm sunshine and being able to sit outside in the wildlife garden and just chill out to the sound of birdsong, scuffling of hedgehogs and the gentle “plop” of the frogs jumping back into the pond but my garden needs water! It started off as a light drizzle this morning but has gradually increased to a steady rain this afternoon. I just hope it doesn’t last long!

At first I was able to sit under my apple tree as now it is in full leaf I am sheltered from most of the wet stuff but I soon found that my glasses were steaming up and splattered with rain so I put Plan B into action.

I have many and varied bird feeding stations in the garden. Different feeders, at different heights and filled with a variety of food. I soon realised that I would be spending most of my day indoors, so I thought I’d shake it up a bit.

I filled a teapot with a pre-prepared mix of “songbird” food but with extra black sunflower seeds and mealworms (dried). I then moved it from its normal position in the open garden, to well inside the canopy of the apple tree. This is very near to my Girl Cave and where I usually sit to watch and learn. Whoever finds it will either be lucky or pretty astute and brave. I then set my trail camera up to watch whilst I was happy and warm indoors….

So look who got there first? No surprise it was a flock of starlings both adults and their young queueing up to take their turn and dip their head into the teapot.

Its easy to dislike these birds. They are noisy (gobby), demanding, hang around in gangs and are happy to chase off other birds if they want to eat. But they are also clever and if you look close, their feathers are almost luminescent in shades of blue and green. I can’t say that they are my favourites; they are too skwarky and opinionated for me but I do respect their intelligence and ability to feed their many juveniles.

#gallery-0-6 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-6 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Clever Starlings

      30 Days Wild-Day 3 Hurrah! I never thought I would cheer when it rains but I did today. I love the warm sunshine and being able to sit outside in the wildlife garden and just chill out to the sound of birdsong, scuffling of hedgehogs and the gentle "plop" of the frogs jumping back into the pond but my garden needs water!

[carolinesarah1963]

Sadly, walking the dog through the countryside yesterday brought on my hay fever and therefore today I decided to make the most of my Wildlife Garden and stay home. I created my Wildlife Garden in 2016 on a piece of land hidden behind our garage. Hubby spent a lot of time and hard work growing beans in very dry and barren soil, even though we had worked diligently to improve the soil with manure, conditioner etc. I managed to persuade him to give up gracefully so I could take it over for my Wildlife Project.

Luckily it has been very successful and 4 years later I enjoy sightings of many varieties of birds, insects, hedgehogs, frogs and the odd dragonfly. We even have a couple of squirrels which come to scavenge the peanuts.

My favourite bird which visits my garden is the goldfinch but only because of the vivid colours of its feathers. It’s almost tropical. Unlike the cheeky and almost tame blackbirds and robins, the goldfinches are a bit skittish so if I am to get a photo I need to set my camera up well before they arrive with the shutter button within reach of my hand without alerting them to movement. If they spot anything out of kilter they fly off.

I have managed to take some photos over the last couple of days so here’s my Random Act of Wildness contribution for Day 2.

          30 Days Wild-Day 2 Sadly, walking the dog through the countryside yesterday brought on my hay fever and therefore today I decided to make the most of my Wildlife Garden and stay home.