Teatime in the garden

A day that seemed to speed up as we went along.
I cooked a pasta dish and baked a banana cake in the morning, ready to take to Ruth's at teatime.  I added a large bowl full of blackberries and mulberries from the garden (how odd to be picking blackberries in July - a mark of how warm and dry the weather has been).
Later  I picked Frieda up from school as usual, then we both went to collect Simone from her forest school nursery, then back to Ruth's. Meanwhile, Richard drove over with all the food and Jack, and Josh arrived from work.  Ruth had got home earlier.
 By just after 5, we were all at the picnic table in Ruth and Josh's garden, serving out the pasta.
By the time we'd eaten cake and fruit, Simone looked like a vampire: the deep red/purple juice from the mulberries dripping down her chin :-) 
So this is an emergency blip, a phone shot grabbed while Jack and Simone were in the hammock together. It's slung deliberately low, so that any tumbles are manageable ones. A rope tethered to a nearby table leg allows the kids to swing themselves to and fro, with much laughter.
This sums up Ruth and Josh's garden perfectly, I feel: you look at it and it's a mess, but there's love and care in the mess, and it all works for everyone. Seedlings for Josh's farm/market garden enterprise are spread out on tables, bikes are leaning against walls here and there, there's fruit on the apple trees.