Every year August passes in a blur, remembered as a series of moments snapped and seared in the memory. Images of children running around the garden or the family sitting around the table in the sunshine, the smell of harvest dust or the scratch of wheat stubble on bare legs. Each one a snippet of happiness.

Snippets of happines this August, so far …

Marvelling at nature. The garden is a mass of seed heads and their intricacy amazes me. This hollyhock seed head reminds me of the carousel that fed the slides into an old fashioned slide projector. Inevitably there would be at least one slide placed upside down and at some time during the slideshow the carousel would jam and there would be muttered cursing in the darkness.

Raspberry Loaf Cake is the cake we eat all summer using the early ripening rapsberries through to the autumn fruiting raspberries. With the sunny days we’ve had recently, I swear the raspberries ripen behind me as I pick them. This cake is easy to make and is robust enough to pack into lunch boxes or slice up for tea in the garden.

Posting letters into this old letter box set in the wall of a nearby Post Office, I wonder what stories have been held by the envelopes slipped in here over the decades. I hope this letter box doesn’t get replaced or removed.

Watching a lawn artist at work as he mowed a giant picture into the grass in one of our fields. Watch this video to see him in action in the field.

A snippet of happiness when I’m the only person in the kitchen and get the chance to lick the whisk after whipping up a batch of raspberry ripple ice cream.

Who can resist licking the spoon or whisk?

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