Foxgloves 2024 and 2025

Foxgloves are wonderful flowers that come and go on Littleworth Common.  I don't propose to dwell too long on the reason for their name but I found this on Wikipedia:

The name is recorded in Old English as 'foxes glofe/glofa' or 'fox's glove'. Over time, folk myths obscured the literal origins of the name, insinuating that foxes wore the flowers on their paws to silence their movements as they stealthily hunted their prey. The woody hillsides where the foxes made their dens were often covered with the toxic flowers. Some of the more menacing names, such as "witch's glove", reference the toxicity of the plant.

In 2024 Littleworth Common was going through an interesting time with proposals to turn the 1832 Jolly Woodman pub into a Hindu Place of Learning (a.k.a. Temple).In a moment of fantasy I saw some similarity between what was going on and the stealthy movements of a fox.

I tried to visualise this ... My mother had acquired a stuffed fox many years ago so I wondered if I could see what this would look like with gloves like the flower.

I cannot really imagine a fox on Littleworth Common stalking his prey dressed like this!

So let's look at the real foxgloves of Litteworth Common from 2024 and 2025.

Looking wonderful early in the morning sunlight.

Even better close-up.

And in different colours and different shades of colours.

Foxgloves don't necessarily grow every year and 2026 was not a good year for foxgloves on the Common. Strangely we had almost as many foxgloves this year in our own garden to the South and West of the Common.

I have been accused of playing with AI in some photos and videos. These wonderful flowers do not need AI to make them look good. I was intrigued, however, to read in the marketing details for the Jolly Woodman that it had a bear garden. Was this a misprint, or not?

More about the future of the Jolly Woodman soon ...

Why ... links and other things

So what is the purpose of this blog?

Put simply, it is to tell the world (or at least us and our immediate neighbours) what a wonderful little Common and community we have here. A Common and community that we want to preserve for our successors, be they our children, our grand-children and/or whoever buys our houses from us! 

The idea, the real inspiration for this blog came from a controversy over the possible conversion of a pub to a place of worship (this proposal has now been rejected). I found myself having to "object" to this which I realised might not seem like a positive, life-affirming activity. So I decided I would try to turn my objection into a positive portrait of a beautiful space I wanted to protect: Littleworth Common. And I found others who agreed with me.

To be honest, we don't want to develop a big tourist business here since there are not an enormous number of available parking spaces. We do want those who live here or nearby to enjoy what we have: a beautiful area where we can appreciate the natural outside pleasures of walking (or riding or cycling on designated paths) around the Common. In years gone by, when I was running marathons, I personally would have added running or at least jogging to that list, but nowadays I leave that to others! 

As an example of this beautiful area we live in, on or nearby, just look at these first two photos of one of our ponds. Photos taken yesterday afternoon,

In fact, this is not two photos: it is the same photo twice, but one is the other one but upside down. The absolute calm of the pond makes it a little difficult to tell which is which! Walking a few yards on, I got another wonderful photo:

I think that is the right way up!

So I hope my readers understand what I am trying to do here. It's a record - mainly mine so far - of all the beautiful things l love about Littleworth Common. But it's a record for which I will be delighted to get the contributions of others. With your photos, videos, words, memories, whatever. Contact me to let me know what you want to share here.

And this being an age of social media (apart from yesterday when Instagram and Facebook disappeared for a few hours: did you even notice?), we'll be posting some photos elsewhere too.

Here are our current social media links: 

Instagram

Facebook

Twitter

Looking forward to sharing more photos, more memories. And looking forward even more to seeing your photos and hearing your memories!

Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours

Confession: I don't believe that I have ever watched an episode of Neighbours. If Kylie Minogue had been singing Padam Padam when starring in Neighbours, maybe I would have tuned in. At least once!

I do, however, agree with the sentiments in the title of this article and we count ourselves lucky (cue for another Kylie song?) to have such good neighbours here! The rejected proposal ro convert one of our pubs ro a place of worship has drawn the local Littleworth Common community closer together and we now feel (drawing on all the local households) as if we have another 40 sets of neighbours!

Of course the neighbours who live next door are our closest neighbours and we are fortunate to have Mic on one side and Leanne on the other. While Mic has lived locally for many decades, Leanne is the new girl on the block and has been a great neighbour for the five years she has had to put up with us!

I mentioned to Leanne the idea of sharing photographs of our Common and she leapt at it! Savour this superb collection ...

That's a great set of photos, Leanne. Perfectly capturing the sun and the shade, the frost and the ponds of the Common. We both live on the other side of the Common with great views of the sunset so I really appreciated the morning/sunrise photos. However this collection wouldn't be complete without Leanne's dogs, Dave and Jack. Here they are in this short movie, albeit not in a starring role (the Common is, as ever, the star):

Thanks, Leanne!

I opened this by referring to one of my favourite Australian singers. A few weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to see (but sadly not meet) one of my favourite Australian actresses: Nicole Kidman. She was probably one of the last actresses to star in a Netflix series (The Perfect Couple) that was part-filmed at the Jolly Woodman. I saw her walk into the Woodman just a couple of months ago, and waved. She didn't wave back. But with neighbours like Leanne, who needs Kylie or Nicole ...  

Little Worth? Totally Uncommon

I recall remarks made years ago that we should “re-brand” Littleworth Common. The name may deflate house prices and it certainly doesn't communicate how exceptional our Common really is. But “MuchWorth Uncommon” doesn’t sound quite as good.

So I'll just have to show a few pictures I've taken over the years to show how exceptional our Common really is.

No matter what the light, whether bright and clear, or foggy and misty, the Common is a wonderful place to walk. If one needs cheering up or escaping, the Common can help lift one's mood. During Covid, in particular, the Common was stunning, and I reflected it must have cheered people up during pandemics, global wars and personal tragedies over many centuries.

No matter what the light, whether close-ups or panoramas, roads, paths or tracks, all beautiful.

With dogs and, in our case, with goats, “creative” or just plain beautiful!

 

Please feel free to share your best photos (maybe ten or so?). I’ll follow up on this post showing yours. I’m trying to create an album for us, but more importantly trying to create a permanent album for the children, grand-children and successors of today's Commonners!