This is my first time joining Six on Saturday, but I do love making lists!

It’s been super dry and warm in our corner of Finland through most of June, which has taken its toll on the younger plants in our garden. Luckily, we had the wells to draw from and we made it through without too many losses. Now, as we’ve rounded the corner into July, there is rain expected every day this week! I’m looking forward to a jungle by the time I do my second post.

1. Strawberries have arrived! We picked our first strawberries this morning and they were worth the wait. Soon, we will even harvest enough so that everyone (and not just certain people with small grabby hands) gets to taste them…

2. Our ‘Sarah Bernhardt’ peony unfailingly times its bloom to coincide with the first thunderstorm of the year. It’s uncanny and hilariously contrary of it. Once again, I rushed out just before the heavy rain was due to cut the two flowers that were most at risk. The flowers in the middle with the cute yellow poofs are from a young ‘Garden Lace’ peony, which I just planted last year. It has proven to be quite an overachiever, growth-wise, and reportedly stands up to rain pretty well too! Two different personalities that combine so prettily in one vase.

3. The hose stand arrived in the post yesterday! Now the garden hose is happily tucked away in its very own place rather than trying to trip everyone whilst snaking its way around the entire property. Safety win!

4. ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ was the first of my Austin roses to bloom this year, and it’s doing so very enthusiastically. I just planted it last year, so was happy to see it easily overwinter and put out an impressive number of big buds considering how little water it was getting. Just one of these flowers is perfuming the entire kitchen right now.

5. This bird feeder fell off its admittedly inadequate stand two years ago. I finally put it to rights this week and added a platform made of spare boards so that it’s better balanced. Owing to my having neither the right-sized nails nor a power drill, this was all accomplished with garden twine. Hopefully, I will have better tools by the end of summer to make this sturdier.

6. This one is actually from late last week, but I wasn’t doing SoS then and really wanted to get it in. The ‘Lemon Chiffon’ peony, planted last year, was the first of my lactiflora peonies to flower. It had just one enormous semi-double bloom with the loveliest scent. I can’t wait to have more of these next year so I can take some inside.

Other SoS can be found here!