nursery school is over, favourite class friend emigrated
and 'big' school is looming, dark, unknown, daunting
so we distract around the hot town
with museum visits, ice cream, tight-rail walking  .    .      .









( and still in that white dress !)


. 

the green summer lemons gave a fresh, sweet sorbet
shared with friends one night in the back garden

and as for the lemonade, dear Coco, you need ripe yellow ones, this 
is my 97-year-old grandfather's recipe:

so he says you need 3 cups of lemon juice to 2 cups sugar, you put them in a large bowl and you stir a lot with a wooden spoon until the sugar dissolves. you let the syrup rest a while, then you stir some more, and you can repeat this process a few times during the day, you cover it overnight with a tea towel and then stir it again the following morning (you could carry on for even longer, it just gets finer and finer) and then you pour it into glass bottles and store in the fridge. it might eventually form a thick, cloudy layer on the top but that's alright, you just shake the bottle before pouring out. when you want to drink some, you just put a little at the bottom of a glass (about 1-2cm according to your taste) and then you top up with water. you can add ice cubes or even sparkling water for some fizz, and a few fresh mint leaves.





+

νεφέλη (nefeli)  |  nebula  |  cloud

we're waiting for a little girl called cloud .    .     .














.

"mais c'est comme le ciel, cette mer!"
she said as it came into view
a thin horizon barely dividing the two blues
it was like a magnet, we swam and threw pebbles in it
until the sun went down  














.

a weekend at the family home on the limestone hills, 
reading late into the night to music from a christening feast 
carried down the chimney

the vines were fresh and lush, the roadsides stitched with caper flowers
+  queen anne's lace - did you know that when you cut the stem and place one
in water the little clumps of flowers just keep on growing,  
like small independent satellites?

















.

gathering in the seeds to eat + to plant out again next year: 

/   nigella sativa or black cumin, so delicate and prolific, here we sprinkle it on bread

// papaver setigerum, the one we picked wild from the side of the road many years ago 
    and has followed us from garden to garden. it's also happily disseminating
    itself all over the neighbourhood








a happy month to you!

.