Memorial Garden

Our daily walk today took us through the old section of St Mary's churchyard that is separated from the church by Chalons Way. When the new road was constructed special arrangements had to be made for the tombstones and remains of the bodies that lay under the route. There have not been any burials here for many a year and although it is still a peaceful location near the town centre, many of the headstones are the worse for wear, much of the area has become overgrown and it is often a litter trap. Footpaths cross the site and are well used but if any organisation ever has any money to spare, it could be landscaped and made into a fitting memorial garden for those that have gone before.

Victoria Park

Had a walk around Victoria Park this afternoon and after yesterday's encounter with the Council's Green Machine, we saw another group of Council employees replanting the flower beds and some natural green machines in the form of trees. There should be a really good flower display later in the year but the park doesn't look at all bad at the moment with some of the trees in blossom, some bursting into leaf and a lot of spring flowers blooming too. I'm sure this won't be our last photo from the park this year.

The Green Machine

The local council workers have got a new machine seen for the first time today on the Market Place and Bath Street. It was doing a good job too picking up the litter and hopefully it will be kept in good working order to keep the town centre cleaner.

It certainly beats the previous method which involved someone going round picking up individual pieces of litter with giant tweezers and depositing them in plastic bags. The machine has a registration plate which means it can go on the public roads too.This is one of the few occasions when I wasn't displeased about a vehicle in the pedestrian zone even if it was going the wrong way! When traffic IS allowed it should only travel up the hill as can be seen by the white arrow on the blue sign.

The Tower & Flowers

The title says it all today as we enjoyed another bright sunny spring day. St Mary's Church has often been photographed from the Market Place but it is not so usual to see a view like this from below the church wall on the Lower Market but it's one of the few places where both the flowers and the tower can be seen together..

Medieval Games

It's been Medieval Week at the Erewash Museum and this afternoon, youngsters were able to let off steam with mock sword fights.

I suppose in the medieval age, youngsters of a similar age would entertain themselves like this - there were no X boxes and Nintendos in those days!

Blossoming

I mentioned yesterday that daffodils were blooming and trees were blossoming. I added a picture a little while ago of some early mini-daffs but haven't shown any of the blossom yet so to put matters right here's one from today.

This is actually on a neighbour's apricot tree and providing there are no late frosts it's likely the harvest will be as good as last year which was exceptional.

Peacock

I suppose subconsciously we've been looking for signs of spring for a number of weeks but now the daffodils are flowering, blossom is forming on the trees and the sight of a peacock butterfly basking in the warm sunshine today is proof positive of the season.

The name for this species of butterfly, owes its origin to bird of the same name and is because of the similarity between the eye patterns on the wings and those on the tail feathers of the bird.