August 2021

Monday morning, drinking coffee and listening to a lovely dawn chorus from the local birds.

Winter has flown by, barely noticed apart from the one frost that burst the hose – which hadn’t been turned off at the tap. Hastily sown broad beans are filling up my little garden. You can eat the tips as green veggies, and the beans once they’re ready of course. So far I’ve harvested a grand total of one bean, but I’m sure in a month I’ll be drowning in broad beans.

My blue moon rose decided not to take a break over winter. Instead, it flowered among the broadbeans. I got my pruning done for my other roses. I love roses, but I don’t ever spray them or fuss over them. I prune them and feed them and hope for the best. I get to enjoy some lovely flowers from them, but I’m never going to seek bloom perfection at the expense of my gardens biodiversity.

My stripy figs didn’t ripen, and sadly fell off in early winter. I got a few harvests of purple peas before powdery mildew took over. It’s been a rather odd time, trying to get the garden back on track after being away for most of 2020, and very very busy in 2021. But I’m looking forward to spring and starting again.

I would love to take some time off work just for spring gardening, but unfortunately with having been hammered by winter colds and a stomach bug, it’s just not going to be possible to have more time off. But that’s what weekends are for I guess!

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Strawberries, Raspberries, and Black Currants in a stainless steel colander.

Three Years Later

Giant Sunflower

Popping Corn Polenta

Blue Shelling Peas

Bees and Blossoms

Ellechim Art

Really Small Bees

Garden Harvest and things

Three Years Later

January 9, 2025

My last update was March 2022*, and it’s now January 2025.

Close enough to 3 years, and coincidentally, around how long I had been telling myself it would take for my new garden to ‘get good’.

The definition of good, well, if you don’t include ‘tidy’, and simply measure it’s ‘goodness’ by how many imperfect raspberries you can pick on a summers day, then I think it’s doing ok.

It has been a chaotic few years. But, probably starting to feel a little settled now. Have had the first family trip back to Auckland, and it actually felt like home on our return here.

I always intended to become a writer in my 40’s, but I never took into account how much I actually dislike writing. However… blogging is somewhat cathartic. And with the youngest off to school next month, I may have a little more time to hammer out a few words between work projects.

I may even endeavour to do more cooking stuff. I don’t know. It’s a beautiful sunny day so I’m feeling very motivated and optimistic, but who knows how long that will last!

*Edited to add, I’ve since been working on transferring a lot of social media posts to the blog, so many more will pop up between these two dates!

Giant Sunflower

April 4, 2024

I haven’t posted in ages again. Hard to find a handful of uninterrupted minutes outside of work hours. But here’s a collection of garden photos from summer.

1. Giant sunflower and sun
2. Random self-seeded dahlia with bumblebee
3. A handful of ivory raspberries
4. A yellow tomato from the garden, joining a fruit bowl full of veggies from

… Well I’ve been interrupted before I’ve finished writing notes for the photos. Pressing post anyway I guess.