The first snow of the season

Today, on the 26th of October, we have the first snow of the season. It started to snow last night. Fairly early here in southern Finland – already in October, usually this happens here in November.

We have to enjoy this now, today and perhaps still tomorrow. They say, and we know, that this snow will melt by the end of the week. So, now, some pictures that I took in our garden today. 🙂

first snow, October, corn plants

The corn plants and stuff…

first snow, October, echinacea, peony

Echinacea and peony covered with snow…

first snow, October, cherry tree leaves

And leaves of the cherry tree

first snow, October, clarkia amoena

I see something pink… They are clarkia amoena or godetia flowers! 🙂

first snow, October, clarkia amoena

first snow, October, peony poppy pod

Peony poppy pods…

first snow, October, peony poppy pod

first snow, October

first snow, October

And there are Christmas trees… :p

first snow October

-Leena

Flowers in September

There are even some new summer flowers for this year in autumn, and some perennials flowering as well.

common poppy & friends

To begin with… there are still common poppy flowers in the garden. Friends are loving it.

calendula/marigold & friends

There is no autumn without pot marigolds or calendulas… 😉

calendula, marigold

My personal little autumn sun…

calendula, marigold

calendula, marigold

calendula, marigold

clematis

Clematis growing and blooming as well. Our first ever clematis plants, planted in summer this year. Yet another new favourite… now I would love to have many different types of clematis flowers.

clematis

clematis

Our clematis is growing by an oak tree.

clematis

annual mallow

And there are still many annual mallow flowers at their prime…

cosmos

There is no summe… yeah well, I planted cosmos seeds this year as well, but there’s been only few flowers – all the green parts of the plant have grown, but not much blooming this year. I think it’s the a bit strange summer and the spot where I planted them, both. I planted them by the ditch by the woods – that was the only place I could squeeze them in this year. 😀

shrubby cinquefoil

Shrubby cinquefoil is flowering this autumn as well.

sunflower

This year we have finally succeeded in growing sunflowers! We’ve tried to grow sunflowers already in the summers of 2015 and 2016, and last year we thought that we should start the pre-growing earlier. But… we didn’t pre-grow them this year at all, just planted the seeds directly into the ground. We think it’s the soil – this year we used both fresh soil and the fertile soil in the places where we put our grass clippings and some leaves. Worked like a charm. 🙂

sunflower

clarkia amoena, godetia

Candies… There is no autumn without clarkia amoena or godetia flowers.

clarkia amoena, godetia

peony poppy

And there is still at least one peony poppy flower.

peony poppy

dahlia

Dahlias growing and blooming. Our first ones ever these, too. Planted in spring this year, and new favourites again…

dahlia

Mellow…

dahlia

Cactus dahlia. How charming!

-Leena

Summer flowers in August

This year everything is a little late, so also the summer flowers are at their prime only now in August.

peony poppy

Peony poppy. There is no summer without peony poppy flowers…

peony poppy

peony poppy

Dutch iris

Iris hollandica or Dutch iris. Siberian iris and German iris flowers in July… and this year I have also Dutch iris flowers now in August! 🙂 They are grown from bulbs that I planted in spring this year. My first ones ever.

annual mallow

And there is no summer without annual mallow flowers…

viper's bugloss

Viper’s bugloss, a bit wild now – I planted the seeds last summer.

cornflower

More cornflower flowers…

cornflower

cornflower

cornflower

A busy friend.

schizanthus, butterfly flower, poor man's orchid

And more schizanthus or butterfly flower or poor man’s orchid flowers…

schizanthus, butterfly flower, poor man's orchid

Maltese cross, burning love

Maltese cross or burning love, a perennial, flowering this year as well.

tropaeolum majus, garden nasturtium, Indian cress

Tropaeolum majus or garden nasturtium or Indian cress flowering. The taste is good as well – a bit peppery. 🙂

tropaeolum minus, dwarf nasturtium

And my first ever tropaeolum minus or dwarf nasturtium flowering.

tropaeolum minus, dwarf nasturtium

And the Ibiza lizard lurking… 🙂

common poppy

This summer I have common poppy flowers, too! My first ones ever.

common poppy

common poppy

I love all the colours… Another new favourite…

common poppy

common poppy

You tell me yours and I’ll tell you mine…

common poppy

With the shadow of a peony poppy…

common poppy

A nice skirt…? 🙂

common poppies & peony poppies

-Leena

More flowers, one new tree, a hedgehog…

July flowers… German iris is now flowering for the first time in our garden! We brought our German iris from Eastern Finland with us two years ago, my boyfriend’s mother gave it to us.

German Iris

I read somewhere that when German iris is taken to a new spot it will flower again on the second year that it is on the new spot. And this indeed is exactly what happened to our German iris – it didn’t flower last year, it only had the green leaves. But now… and the colour of the flowers was a surprise to me – I remembered that they would be white… 🙂

German Iris

German Iris

daylily

Daylily, very short blooming, such a lovely scent… We’ve had many many daylilies flowering now in July, in the place where we put some of the leftovers in our garden… I’m not sure but I think that daylilies may be the ones that were growing already in the beginning of April there, at least these have been the only big flowers growing there this summer.

garden rose

A bit of rose garden in the pictures above and below.

garden rose valamonruusu

Rosa splendens, valamonruusu is the name of this rose in Finnish. The scent of roses…

cherry tree

And a cherry tree. We’ve had this new tree in our garden already since the beginning of June. A nice, fairly tall pole is this tree.

cherry tree

This tree is grafted and it should be self-pollinating. And it naturally hasn’t bloomed this year. Now just waiting… 🙂

Siberian Iris

Siberian iris flowering now as well. These came with us and the German iris from Eastern Finland two years ago, too, but these were flowering already a year ago. And they bloomed already in June last year – this year everything is a little late.

Siberian Iris

purple-flowering raspberry

Purple-flowering raspberry blooming again, too.

purple-flowering raspberry

This very busy little friend was like rolling there inside this tiny flower…

peony

My words are failing me now… the first peony flowers are here! More pictures coming… luxurious days in the garden now… 😉

peony

peony

peony poppy

The first peony poppy flowers are blooming, but not in our garden, not yet. – We’ve managed to plant peony poppy seeds just outside our front yard and our driveway as well. 🙂

basil

Basil growing from seeds in our garden, in the shelter of the house wall.

European hedgehog

We’ve had yet another late night visitor in our garden, now a hedgehog. Hedgehogs in Finland are European hedgehogs. We gave the little friend a tiny bit of cat food. The hedgehog searches for food constantly sniffing the ground and the sniffing is very loud. An adorable creature. It likes worms very much.

lake Pyhäjärvi

By the lake Pyhäjärvi last night, 23.15 PM. It was a rainy day yesterday. I was a night driver and this was a lovely spot to stop by for a while. It was very foggy, one couldn’t see the opposite shore, the air felt very warm, it was easy to breathe, it was silent with only the light sound of the small waves… I need to be a night driver more often! 🙂

-Leena

The last pictures from August

Now the ones from August I talked about yesterday…

Pyhäjärvi

The first two pics I took at the lake Pyhäjärvi, on a dock, 8th August. At the end of the dock.

Pyhäjärvi

The next five pics are peony poppies, 9th August. I thought I already had seen all my peony poppies this year, but all of a sudden there were two more – with colours totally different from my previous poppies this year. 🙂

poppy

Two pics of the first one…

poppy

And three of the other:

poppy

poppy

Nice surprises they were… 🙂

poppy

On August 21st we visited for the first time a bird watching tower quite near our home. It’s called Kauklaisten lintutorni in Finnish, Kauklainen bird watching tower in English. 🙂 It’s located in Rauma.

at bird watching tower

A beautiful, soft, quite harmonious view it was from the tower…

at bird watching tower

There’s also a walking trail there, but we visited only the tower – have to go back someday.

So, this was the last from August here in Owlnature. From now on it’s all about September, mushroom hunting, and so on… 🙂

-Leena

It’s raining cats and dogs… on peony poppies…

Right now, it’s raining cats and dogs… so, I decided that it’s now a good time to publish the rest of the peony poppy flower pics that I have. I love rain, too, but right now I’m just having my coffee and I don’t feel like going outside at all… I just love hearing the sound of heavy rainfall on the roof and looking out the window now… 🙂

The first six pics are from Tuesday.

poppy

poppy

This must be the most peony-like peony poppy I’ve managed to catch up with this summer…

poppy

poppy

poppy

The same flower in the evening, after some heavy rainfall and hailing… Still so beautiful… 🙂

poppy

The rest of the pics are from yesterday.

poppy

Red, redder…

poppy

poppy

poppy

“Enough with the flowers already, and what do you mean with “raining cats”… and the freakin’ dogs, anyway?” :

cat

🙂

-Leena

Just more peony poppies (July 31st & August 1st)

These days I’m taking as many pics of peony poppy flowers as I possibly have inspiration to take. And inspiration I have. 🙂 I’ve been having already too many pics to be published right away. So, with these pics we are still on the last day of July and on the first day of August. The first six pics are from Monday, August 1st.

poppy

poppy

Enjoying the red colour of the flower…

poppy

poppy

poppy

And the purple… and the sunshine…

poppy

The next two pics are from Sunday, July 31st. I took these pics late in the evening, just before I started to build the campfire that I had in the blog post on Monday…

poppy

I try not to be afraid to take pics in different kinds of light every once in a while…

poppy

I already had this, a bit blemished white peony poppy, in the blog post on July 31st. I was actually enchanted with this flower – it looked like a bit blemished fairy dress, or a bit blemished wedding dress, or a bit like my own white dress, a bit blemished by the Mediterranean Sea… 😮 🙂

On the left you can see the first cosmos flower before it opened for the first time the next day.

The rest of the pics are from Monday again.

poppy

More red…

poppy

poppy

It’s been mostly sunny lately, but we’ve experienced some heavy, very heavy rain showers – they have come like some tropical rain showers, except that we had some heavy hailing, too, for a while yesterday. And heavy rainfall and sunshine at the same time. – That’s so lovely! 🙂

poppy

I took pics of peony poppies yesterday and today as well – nobody’s surprised about that… 😉 The pics here in my blog a bit later…

-Leena