Sunday forays

What better to do on a family Sunday than visit a garden centre? 

We started with pansies -

8 flats of 6 plants for £10. That's a lot of pansies ... but there are a lot of window boxes ....

Will it all fit into the car? The car seemed full of pansies already...

 Of course it fit (once Gemma and I held some things on our laps). Most of the pansies are hidden away in the secret compartment -

This looked like quite a lot needing planting - and then we remembered the pansies in the secret compartment -

Apart from new windowboxes full of pansies, and some still to plant, the front garden has wallflowers, new grasses, a bottle brush tree, a tiny japanese maple in temporary position (access to the brickwork is needed until it's repointed)

The bags are filled with rubble sifted out of the soil - they're heavy and need taking to the dump. Once the final stretch is sifted and replaced, and the repointing is finished, bulbs and seeds will go near the house.

The view from the window -

and the view through "the round window" (soon to be renewed) and its frosted glass -

Lots of greenery

The day also included a visit to a car showroom, which I mention because anything to do with cars is completely off my radar -

Another unexpected component was a twilight walk along Hornsey High Street, to the foot of Alexandra Palace park, with a glimpse of the New River, and back along pleasant streets.

Hornsey Church Tower, 13th century

The Railway Tavern (built 1897, lately refurbished) looked inviting ...

... and so did this eatery, but dinner was bubbling away in the slow cooker

Nightingale Lane - working-class housing erected around 1899

Ally Pally (opened 1873) in the drizzle

New developments along the New River

The National Hall was opened in 1888, became a cinema in 1910 and then
Hornsey Parish Hall in 1916, and is now used as a Turkish religious centre

Grand doorways on Hillsfield Avenue N8