A Woodland Walk

Today was a glorious day!  A perfect Spring morning with clear blue skies, warm sunshine and birdsong.  I walked by the church . . . 

 

. . .and then went across the road and took the path into the woods.  One of the reasons we bought our house is that just across the road is a forest.  I have a 'thing' about trees!!  

My childhood home looked onto a woods and it was my playground growing up.   We used to walk through the woods to school every morning and I always loved how everything changed with the seasons, there was always something new to enjoy.  We made camps out of any old junk, we had an old tyre on a swing and best of all there was a wishing well by a stream that long ago had been a proper drinking well where people collected their water, was now covered in moss and used for wishing.  Just up from the stream there was a very small pond with overhanging trees, quite dark which we called the 'Frogspond' and we collected many empty jam jars of water and frogspawn in the hope of growing our own frogs!  Happy days!  I love those woods, they're very special to me - so much so, that my husband proposed to me there on a warm Spring day underneath my beloved green beech trees surrounded by bluebells.

So when hunting for our current home my with list read thus:
1.  House with view of woods/near woods for walks.
2.  Near beach.

I couldn't believe our luck when this house ticked both those boxes.  So this morning I set off in to the woods for my walk. . .

The trees are just about to come into leaf so still bare but there were lots of pretty wildflowers to enjoy. . .  like these common dog violets . . .

the humble and daisy and dandelion looked so cheery . . .

 

Poor ole dandelion - it gets such bad press and it really is so pretty.  I'm not up early enough to see much wildlife around, although one day I did see a bank vole!  But I did admire these little homes, I wonder who lives there?  Fox, badger??

So many pretty petals to admire. 

Greater Stitchwort . . .

 Primroses. . .

 Herb Robert . . .

Yellow wort. . .

Ivy Leaved Toadflax - isn't that a great name!  I didn't know a lot of these names so I had a great time looking them up in my book when I got home.  It was hard to see some of the pictures so I went online and found a wonderful website,  Wild Flowers of Ireland Click Here

One of joys of living in the countryside is enjoying the changing of the seasons and harvesting some of Mother Nature's crops.  There are a lot of these tasty berries springing up all over the woods. . .

Wild Strawberry. . .



and this beautiful white bell flower, the three cornered garlic - it's a member of the garlic family and as far as I know you can eat it - I haven't tried it yet but it smells very strongly of garlic as you walk past it in the hedgerows.  If anyone is reading and knows anything about eating this wild garlic, please let me know!!

Three Cornered Garlic

Aren't they beautiful? White bell flowers with a green line down the petals . . .

It's hard to pick a favourite wildflower but I think mine is the bluebell . . .  they are only starting to come out so I'm looking forward to lots of lovely walks among these beauties over the next few weeks.   I love the woods at any time of year but when there is a haze of bluebells carpeting the ground it really is quite breathtaking.  Bluebells en masse have a lovely sweet Spring scent as well.

I hope you enjoyed our walk through the woods.  Sorry most of the photos aren't great - I'm only learning how to use my new camera and to take photos for this blog!! but I wanted to show you  what's out at the moment in the woods - it's so pretty!