lifting bricks

There's nothing like a spell of hot weather to get you out into the garden - it's about the only time we venture out anyway. But when we do get out there, we try and fit in two season's worth of work to make up for our absence. And it's amazing how quickly the results do show.

Over the weekend I 'watched' my beloved toil away, scraping weeds from between the paving stones in our patio area, brushing the dust and general muck into a nice neat pile for the dustpan ... contributing the odd bit of advice by calling out every so often, as you do. Always a good idea to have one person do the work while the other acts as overseer, don't you think?

We've had a mini pile of bricks stacked against a wall in the patio ever since we moved in a couple of years ago, ahem. Don't ask me why but they were never moved on but this weekend, oh yes, it finally did happen. And who needs ponds to dip into when there are bricks to be moved, because look what we found hiding in between ...

Well, the excitement was almost too much for one member of our family. The nature mad one who ranks newts and snails among her most favourite creatures. And as luck would have it she was given a pond dipping kit for her birthday party earlier this month from a friend at school and has been begging to go in search of ponds ever since. Easier said than done in London, but out it came and poor surprised "Cutie Newty" was duly plopped into some (probably not too welcome) clean water. They're strangely fascinating little things and I love the way the plastic distorts the image, making them seem even more prehistoric.

Work recommenced until, lo and behold, a second was found and so "Cutie" met "Beauty" and all was well with the world.

Fear not though, because their life expectancy was indeed higher than the average beast that's been picked up around here and loved just that little too much - they were let back into the wilderness that is our garden and I swear they moved faster than I ever imagined a newt capable of!!

Do you have any critters lurking at the bottom of your garden?