Bee on echinacea

I've wandered around the garden doing lots of tidying up jobs this morning, enjoying the company of a host of pollinators, so why did I decide to try and blip them when the breeze got up this afternoon?!  Lots of out of focus bees and hoverflies on swaying plant stems, aaagghh!  The echinaceas have taken a bit of a bashing from the recent weather, but I love their colour and how they work their way through all the other flowers.

The living room is filling up with things to take to Oxford in readiness for the arrival of the family.  It's a tough few days for them, saying goodbye to the friends and neighbours and closing up the house.  Euan has been in a brilliant daycare which will be hard to match.  None of us are sleeping very well but we look ahead to a couple of weeks' time.  Tony has spent the day making the allotment a safer place for Euan when he visits, and I've cleared more space on the patio for him to play.  Exciting times.