Wintersweet

Wintersweet (Chimonanthus) flowers smell better than anything.  It blooms in winter and there are some of these shrubs in our nearby park.  The shrubs are big rangy things and the flowers are quite small but their scent is very powerful.

The front porch

I've talked before about how we love sitting on the porch.  I've posted pictures of the garden from the porch so I decided to post pictures of our comfy spots on the porch.

My side gets the best scents right now from the roses and the sweet peas.  But soon that will change because the lilies are about to bloom and John's side will get their fragrance.  We also get very different garden views from our two sides.

    

A bit of my view

A bit of his view

Here is my rocking chair.  Very comfy.

           

And this is John's chair.  He loves to read on the front porch.

Summer comes to Portland

Summer is here!  True to Portland form, it happened just after the 4th of July.  Most of our spring, up to and including the 4th of July, was unseasonably cold with lots of overcast skies.  When the sun is high in the sky (like it is now), overcast days have a  very cold and not at all friendly light.  It's a little ominous on days like that.



But now it is sunny, sunny, sunny.  The highs are in the 80's and the nighttime lows in the high 50's.  Our windows are open to the fragrances outside which include sweet peas, nicotiana, and roses.   


As it cools off in the evening after a warm day, I find the night time fragrances especially intoxicating.   It's good to be alive and it's good to have a porch to sit on.