A February visit to Wisley Gardens

My friend Judi and I had a lovely late February trip to the Royal Horticultural Society Wisley Gardens, which is located just up the road from our Hillside home.

There was a butterfly exhibit in Wisley's big Glass House, but I found that the warm humidity caused my camera lens to fog over. However, just outside the butterfly area, the orchids were in full and impressive bloom.

In addition, I took a few photos of the snowdrops and crocus growing on the extensive grounds of Wisley.

What a great day we had!

Gluten-free pie crust

Teawife's Gluten-Free Pie Crust

1/3 c. Potato starch/flour
1/3 c. Tapioca flour
1/3 c. Rice flour
1/3 c. Almond flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. xanthan gum
1/2 c. cold butter, cut into pieces
1 beaten egg
1 tsp. vinegar

Egg whites as needed

If you don't have almond flour, double the rice flour to 2/3 cups.

Use a food processor and whir up the butter with all the flours, salt and xanthan gum.

After the mixture is crumbly, drop in the beaten egg into the mixture and whir again. Now scrape down the edges of your food processor to release some of the butter/flour that might be sticking to the sides and bottom.

Add in the vinegar and continue whirring the mixture.

Check to see if the mixture has the right consistency. If it doesn't, you can add in egg whites (I always have a carton of egg whites in the house).

Don't over process or add too much liquid. You can tell the consistency is right when you can squish the mixture together.

Put out on a pastry board and roll it out.

Big Elk Bulls

Earlier in the week, tourists were stopping in our neighborhood to take photos of a gang of Bull Elks (or wapiti, as they are called here in Colorado). I've never seen four to six Bull Elks travelling together before; I thought they'd be too territorial. However, here they are, sharing the shade of a tree located across the road near our Loveland home.

Feathered Visitor

We have a new regular visitor to our English garden: a pheasant. 

She's been coming once or twice a day to poke around on the seeds that fall from the bird feeders. She mixes it up with the wood pigeons that fly over from Norbury Woods across the road. 

Hopefully, she will stay clear of the other garden visitor, Foxy, that I mentioned in the previous post.

Foxy Visitor

While we've known we have foxes that come nightly to our gardens in England, we rarely see them during the day. However, one fox seems to be particularly brave and unconcerned that we have a Border Collie, Sophie, who usually is quite demonstrative about unwelcome parties. While this particular fox was scrounging around the bird seed, I was able to snap some photos through the window next to my crafting table.

Canadian Geese

These Canadian Geese seem to be right at home in our back yard in Loveland! They are coming every afternoon before sunset.

Snow Pictures

Here are some photos from the latest big snow, which began on Tuesday November 30th and kept snowing through Thursday, December 2nd. Now it is about 23 degrees F, so the snow is going crunchy!