Balance...
Gardeners need to balance their life amongst their plants (and animals) with other experiences - like doing things with real people. Oops.
Walking in the hills, going swimming, having coffee and sushi with their friends, going to cricket matches (yippee! We won)...
Thursday 26th February
And joining yet another choir (my friend and I have joined up to a jazz group) and getting out on the bicycle - maybe doing that four day rail-trail ride in Otago.
- 'Gardeners need to do things with real people.'
- -Moosey Words of Wisdom.
Gardeners must be adventurous at all times, go on the Garden Club trips even if they don't feel like it, read interesting books on odd topics (like the Crusades), look after health and family, and go to bed early.
Out Walking - View of Akaroa Harbour
Yesterday's walk was really nice - through farmland with pockets of bush and gorgeous views through the light misty rain of Akaroa Harbour. I am inspired, yet again, by the greens and textures of New Zealand native plants.
New Zealand Hebe Flowering
Right. Tempting though it is to stay inside and play with the new kitten, I have a bored dog and a gardenful of weeds to deal to. I also need more stones for the path edging. I must be prepared, too for the first of the March-Easter nursery sales, happening this weekend - 30% off deciduous Azaleas. 40% off Rhododendrons. A mail-order daffodil catalogue has arrived in the post. Ha! 'Tis the season of popping bulbs into spaces in the gardens around the house... I might even get some more tulips...
Oops - Where's The Path?
Much, Much Later...
Ha! I have been cleaning up by the Hen House - a squillion pieces of gum tree bark, a twillion old flax leaves, a zillion gum tree leaves. I've trimmed hebes, raked out rubbish, and cleared the paths. There are lots of natives planted in this area of the garden, and the textures are wonderful - Pseudopanax, Hebe hulkeana, Pittosporums with different coloured variegations...
Compost! Aargh!
Friday 27th February
Phew! I have had a super-big day. I've been to the river to get some more stones, got a trailer-load of compost, and finally found one of the two shovels and two spades that I've lost (oops). I filled the wheelbarrow ten times, tipped and spread the steaming compost out...
But There's More...
I trimmed a tree and found a nice place for a yellow poker and some violet irises I've been given. My area of focus has been the Frisbee Border and the Driveway Garden. And I wonder, wonder, wonder if I could enlarge the top of the garden by Rusty's small Lavender patch. I found some flowerless white Agapanthus plants, too, which I can use somewhere else.
I am soooooo tired - tonight I have three TV programmes to watch all at the same time (the cricket, the rugby, and America's Next Top Model). I intend to do this by clever use of the remote - I'm sure that no-one will want to sit with me!
More Shakespeare Roses
Then tomorrow - eek! The first big nursery sale opens its doors, I have to make a decision about pea-straw (twenty bales?), and all that compost has to be shovelled onto various gardens before the log-splitter arrives and it starts raining. Aargh!
Saturday 28th February
Eek! The nursery sale has been going for over an hour and I am not there. Snug in powder blue dressing gown I've been doing some Moosey photographs, with Minimus the smooching kitten and Mugsy chirping at her kitty litter box. Quickly now, before the drizzle starts...
Daisies by the Water
Late Lunchtime...
I am now the proud owner of two new pink Camellias, two Escallonias named 'Alice', a one dollar Astelia 'Silver Spear', a sad little Cistus, a little 'sun-loving' red Azalea, and one huge deciduous Azalea which only cost me $22 and promises me rusty red blooms and brilliant autumn leaf colour. I was very restrained, and ignored all the water features and quasi-metal urns which were on special.
Burn, Burn, Burn...
And the fire ban has been lifted, so I've been clearing the dry rubbish and burning it. And shovelling and spreading compost and wet ash on the Frisbee Border. Being inside for lunch, with a stimulating cup of coffee, should surely revitalise the flagging Moosey spirit.
Gardening maintenance-only days like today are hard work. I am already so sick of wheeling my barrow ('through gardens broad and narrow...', and have been pathetically moaning that I need help. My feet are wet through, my gardening gloves are fingerless, and I still can't find either of the two spades. Alas, woe is me, that sort of thing.
Gum Bark :- Aargh! Who took this photograph?
I blame the silly concept of visualisation - seeing all the fence-lines clear, all the piles of gum tree bark gone, forgetting that I have about thirty hours of work to reach this 'look'. Right. I'm going back outside to hopefully empty the compost, burn for another four hours, and plant all my new things. I mean business - thanks to that rather strong coffee!
Two Hours Later...
I tried. I REALLY tried. I got cross with just carting fence-line rubbish so I raked all the wattle seeds and gum leaves off the Wattle Woods paths and pulled all the seed-heads off the Fountain grasses. But the rain got heavier, and noisier, and heavier, and noisier...
Time to bid a fond farewell to fabulous February.