The Oriental Poppies are at there best now and the paeonies are just coming into flower. Although they are later this year they seem to be having a good one as there are lots of buds on each plant. I have 3 fragrant varieties. The fragrance is heavenly, what I would describe as old fashioned rose. The white one at the front has very slender stems for the size of the flowers and I have removed several that were knocked to the ground during the recent downpours. They are now in a vase in the yoga room where we can enjoy them.

The roses are in bloom and they too have a good number of flowers. I catch their scent when I go up the back steps or hang out the washing.

Yesterday I cleared out one of the big pots and planted a courgette in it. I already have one courgette in a pot, planted out about a month ago, and small fruits are developing on it already. The pot had had some chives growing in it. They had increased in girth dramatically and it was quite hard to get them out. I split the clump and planted up two pieces in pots which I have plaed either end of the trough in which I've put some carrot seed. The idea being that their smell will confuse carrot root fly. The trough is also up on the retaining wall to further try and outwit the fly which flies close to the ground (where the carrots normally are). The chive flowers are a real bee magnet. There seem to be a lot of mason bees around in our garden at the moment. They are always welcome.

I have a couple more courgette seedlings which I started off a couple of weeks ago. They will be put in the ground when the broad beans are finished.

Having planted up the courgette I just had enough compost left to fill a squat pot in which I planted some kenyan beans. The pot is up on the back terrace this year, for the first time, so we'll see how they do up there.