A colourful Friday morning walk

It has been a cloudless blue day today. The sun has shone from dawn till dusk. I had some Marie Curie fund raising envelopes to deliver about the parish so I set forth this morning with my trusty terrier and a beloved weekend guest. We tramped up and down the drive and then on along the track, round the edge of fields and down a grassy tree-lined avenue to cover the area I have been designated. On such a beautiful day it was a bit of a treat!

Jack Frost danced through the wood last night, leaving his trademark glisten on the leaf litter and undergrowth,

but amid the collapse and decline of this year's growth I spied the promise of the new year with these hazel catkins.

One garden in a steading development we visited had a rose bush in full bloom. There is something poignant about any flower blooming outside its customary season and these beauties were no exception. We have a dainty primrose in flower in the garden at the moment! It's been there for weeks. In fact it's the same plant I photographed last Easter, covered in snow. We live in crazy times.

There is still plenty of colour in the countryside. I am enjoying it all, some of the colours are so intense. In 2011 we had snow on 25 November and it stayed for months, but I have far too much work to do in the garden before it disappears under a blanket of white, so I am keeping my fingers crossed that we do not have a repeat performance this year!

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In a vase on Monday - colour

The intense colours in my vase this week come from nasturtiums, sweetpeas and a single glorious zinnia! Their beauty and love of life speak for themselves and need no further words from me! Enjoy!

Colonsay postcards - on arrival

The first thing I do, once we have unpacked our car, which has been groaning with all the stuff we need for a week's stay in the holiday cottage, is head for the outer gardens of Colonsay House. It is a place of wonder for me! I particularly love the leaves of the giant rhododendrons. There are many different varieties, all planted in the early 1930s. The outer gardens are generally overgrown, having had little tending over the decades. That makes them even more magical! The old woodmill falls apart a little more every year, but that's fine by me because I love corrugated iron and especially if it's rusted! And of course the bees. Colonsay's beekeeper, Andrew Abrahams, has one of his apiaries on the edge of the pine wood. So lovely - the hum of busy bees and the heady smell of the pines. We are here - finally! Delayed by four months by the wretched virus, but now I am on holiday! Hooray!

Found items IAVOM

I am on holiday on the Inner Hebridean island of Colonsay. It is my happy place. Thoughts of Colonsay rattle around in my head each and every day I am not here! I haven't got a vase to share this week but some lovely things I have found over the past few days, which are just as beautiful as a vase of flowers! I hope you agree! Here are some leaves of giant rhododendrons, growing in the outer gardens of Colonsay House. Some skeleton leaves of magnolia. The dried stem of a kelp seaweed. A couple of conkers (can never resist those!), and a branch heavily populated by a number of lichens. The air on Colonsay is so clean that lichens flourish here!

the running wave

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