HERE WE GO GATHERING NUTS IN MAY

I know today is the 2nd May, but the first of May, yesterday, is one of those red spot days in the calendar. When we were growing up, we were always told that on the first day of May, you should wash your face in dew, and you would be beautiful forever more. Obviously I did not do it often enough!
In England, where I lived as a young child, this was the day for maypoles and the like. I never had the experience of dancing round one, but my mother told me that when she was a girl, one year, she was the "Queen of the May". I remember they had a maypole here at the school one year..I think it was for the Bicentenary...and after weeks of training from Julie South and Fay Bataille, the girls performed a very creditable maypole dance in the school quadrangle!
In England, May is at the height of spring, and no doubt everyone is enjoying the longer days, the warmer weather, and the blooming of the spring bulbs and flowers.
Funnily enough, here on Norfolk Island, even though it is Autumn, our gardens are looking lovely. Everything is feeling the benefit of the lovely rains, and the milder (i.e. cooler) weather. The roses are all in bud, and the hibiscus bushes are a mass of blooms!
Now I went looking for a picture of my mother as the Queen of the May, but could not find one. But I did find this little beauty of my Dad, aged 2, standing next to a supersize marrow. Notice that he is still in a dress! This would have been taken about 1918!