Horse Chestnut

 After cutting out this page below from last years Folklore Diary for my scrapbook I decided to do some 'Following a tree' posts through 2026.

Horse Chestnut trees (Aesculus hippocastanum). Were introduced to Britain in the late C16 and native to the Balkan States, they can grow to over 120 feet tall. They were often used for ornamental avenues of trees in parkland.

It says

 "in folklore the horse chestnut is associated with bringing wealth and carrying conkers in your pocket would ensure you will always have money. The beautiful large flowers on a may time horse chestnut tree were known as 'Mary's candles' due to the Catholic association of the Month of May and Mary, Jesus' mother. The tree's name may derive from the base of a plucked leaf looking like a hoof or horseshoe shape."

The only Horse Chestnut I know of locally is in the car park of our village health centre where doctors and pharmacy serving this and several other villages  are based. I still have lots of conkers from this tree on my window sills - and no spiders all winter.

The older Horse Chestnut in February

And there's a ditch between the edge of the car park and the tree so I couldn't get close enough for photos of the trunk.

Then I remembered there's a young Horse Chestnut on the playing field of the village hall where we do the Keep Moving Group, much easier to get to. 

Below is the young Horse Chestnut tree in March 

The trunk of the young Horse Chestnut, the bark is grey brown and scaly.

A not very good close up of one of the 'sticky' buds - I need to take my proper camera

I'll follow this tree through 2026, taking pictures around the middle of each month.....remind me!

Back Tomorrow

Resorting to a Photo of Shopping...

Thanks everyone for comments yesterday. .....the boring boot-sale photo and today because I'm short of blogging topics, I'm resorting to a picture of shopping .......another boring topic! but curiously fascinating to so many people - including me although...................

I looked at 2 minutes of a frugal youtuber unloading her frugal shopping before deciding that I'd seen enough of someone saying she was frugal while buying things that aren't (in my opinion anyway!) Of course they might be vital to her existence, even coca cola!

I don't know who the youtuber was as I couldn't find it again. I really shouldn't watch even 2 minutes of these as mostly they make me cross!

My shopping ...............

Everything from Aldi again. Vegetables were salad leaves, purple sprouting broccoli, celery, mini potatoes(British from Norfolk - well done Aldi), baby plum tomatoes. Fruit in season British apples and pears . Into the fridge -  4 pints milk,  extra mature cheddar, Shropshire blue and 'salad' cheese (aka feta). For the freezer 2 packs of sweet potato fries, petit pois peas and fish in batter. For the store cupboard - wholemeal bread flour, cashews, multi grain crackers, ground coffee, jar of olives and stock cubes. Total spend £30.89.

............with no coca-cola!

Sorry folks, seems I'm getting cranky and boring!

Boot-Sale 'Treasure'?

 It was a frosty morning on Saturday for the car boot sale but nice and dry and sunny, it was good to be out early.  I didn't walk all the way round this week as my back was telling me I've not done any back exercises lately.

All I spent was £1. The pack of dishcloths and pack of Christmas serviettes were both from the same house clearance man and cost me 50p. The book was 50p and is another to add to my collection of country poetry.

I'm still using my own knitted dish cloths, but they don't last forever and I'm out of craft cotton to make more, so 4 cloths for 25p is handy.

 I noticed diesel at the Co-op garage as I passed on my way back from the boot sale at £1.57 a litre and on Sunday when I went over to the coast another petrol station had it at £1.66. It was around £1.37 - £1.43 ish a couple of weeks ago so has gone up but not by the amount that heating oil has shot up. Government are going to help with heating oil costs for the most vulnerable - that's doesn't include me, I'll just be hoping for prices to drop before I need to fill up again in September. 

Back Tomorrow