As I sit on the porch I suddenly hear a thump, and then another one and later again. No problem: they are the apples falling from my tree. The weather is playing games this year. The trees are full of apples, each one fighting for a place on the branch. Switzerland tells us that it will be a super year for fruit this year and they are already ready for picking. Mine will not have to be picked, they are jumping from the tree voluntarily. I am expecially proud of the red apples as they are from the tree I grew from a pip that I planted in a small pot in the office. I always ate an apple with my break in the morning and now I have a tree full of apples. My other tree was a small seedling that I bought and that produces apples since almost 20 years.

We put the fallen fruit into a basket and the fruit flies were delighted. Eventually Mr. Swiss and I spent an hour peeling them and afterwards put them in the microwave with sugar for 10 minutes. Now I have stewed apples which go quite well with pork, or whipped cream according to the taste.

Another surprise I had this morning was my amaryllis. I have about three of them spending the summer on the porch, where they produce leaves and I hope again produce flowers in Winter. It works so I am quite happy. This amaryllis decided to jump the gun and I noticed this morning that it had already produced a bud. Yesterday the gardener paid us a visit as we are planning on having our small back garden redesigned: removing the lawn and other plants etc. The idea is that Mr. Swiss and I are not longer able to bend and look after our garden. We cannot cut down the plants that grow tall or even remove the weeds. We will now have the lawn removed and replaced with small stones, very small. We will have two raised beds, one for herbs and the other wit flowers and many of my other plants will be removed, although the apple trees will stay. The gardener did mention that I amaryllis are so cheap today in the stores, it was probably not worth the time and effort to reflower them. I think he is right,

We will be having plants that slugs are allergic to and that grow every year. He made a few good suggestions and we are looking forward to having it done. It will be much easier for us to look after although I will miss a few old colleagues growing in my garden. This year it looked promising in spring when the plants began to grow. As the summer arrived we got the heat days and no rain and were invaded by the cock chafer grubs which finished off the lawn from below. Climate changes here and there, we have had enough and will now get a radical change.

I am not going anywhere at the moment. Today is a bit of a mixed day with this and that and tomorrow Mr. Swiss will not be here for a few hours in the morning so I will be making the roads unsafe with my driving knowledge.

It will not be as bad as these guys in town on one of our strange clocks. I will be the one siting on the chair in the middle trying to organise the others.

And now to move on and do something useful instead of just sitting around and playing with my computer. Have a good day everyone and take care.