The Event That Caught Us All By Surprise

 24 January 2022

I haven't written posts for my blog for a couple of years. Life became a bit challenging after my last post on 8 Dec 2019. Both personally and globally.

In December 2019 Pa was doing ok in the rest home although he was declining - though he wasn't too bad for ninety-three! He especially enjoyed the singing with musical therapist Rani. One day I noticed an area on his temple that looked a bit suspect, plus some swelling of his jaw and his speech was a bit muffled. Tests were done and ultimately showed that the Basal cell cancer he'd had in the past had returned. This was not unexpected as when he'd had an operation for it previously lab results showed the surgeon hadn't been able to get all of the cancer cells as the extent of the operation would have negatively impacted his quality of life.

The cancer was terminal and his expected time remaining was around ten weeks to three months. We made the most of the time we had with him. In mid February 2020 he was moved to the hospital level care of the home he was in. I last saw him on 28th February 2020 when I visited with a few other family members. Rani was there and despite his exhaustion there was Pa tapping away on the chair to the rhythm of the songs Rani was playing and singing for the residents. It was a lovely time as music and singing had been such a large part of his life. He passed away in the evening of 29 February 2020 - not exactly expected then but not unexpected either. We were blessed to have his funeral on the 6th March 2020 with many family members present.

We were blessed because the first Covid-19 case in New Zealand was notified on 28th February 2020. It had spread quickly from country to country since about 1st December 2019 when it was first noted. The borders to the country shut to all but New Zealand citizens and permanent residents on 19th March. At 11:59 pm on 25 March, 2020 the entire country moved into lockdown. 

Others had it a lot tougher than we did, all those who couldn't attend funerals of their loved ones due to Lockdown. 

So as everyone knows the whole world has been topsy turvy since then and we are now into the third year of a worldwide pandemic. Omicron is the latest variant to hit our shores - via the border which is still mostly closed, and those who do come in to the country need to spend time in isolation facilities, which are generally hotels.

Life has been weird and challenging for everyone. There have been a few other personal challenges as well but on the whole life has been good.

I'm still sewing and making dance costumes. I created a website for my small business at the beginning of last year. There are a few things I'm doing for professional development to keep honing my skill level for costumes.

Last year I also began a Permaculture Design Certificate which I'm continuing this year. Organics and Permaculture is something I've been interested in for over 20 years so I decided some more in depth study would be great. 

I'm planning on posting regularly and using this blog as a record/journal of my "wilderness" garden exploits. 

So here are a few photos to start off with. Bits of it haven't changed much in a few years - especially the long spring grass!

We planted some grasses a couple of years ago down the front which are doing well. We've just planted some more to fill in the gaps

Two baby oaks are surviving of the ones we transplanted from acorns that had sprouted, dropped from the tree we'd grown from an acorn as children. We got them before the family home was sold last year.

Boar has just replaced the treads on these steps as the other ones were rotting, becoming unsafe.

Treasures under the Camelia. A fern and some Kawakawa.

So excited to finally have a lemon tree growing reasonably well - and some decent sized lemons on it. I've been trying to grow one on and off for thirty years. Must have finally got the right place!

A cherry tomato - I did plant a few more but they died. Still time to plant some seeds as they might grow in the greenhouse. I spotted buds on this a few days ago.

And today when I checked the first one is opening. This year I'll try to get them underway earlier.

Two of my favourite books. I've had them nearly 20 years. So much great information in them.

A mandarin my brother grew from a pip and gifted to us. In the teal bucket is some nettle I planted a couple of days ago. I got the nettle from whanau in Pongaroa. It's best in a tub so it doesn't spread.

I gave the nettle a chop so it will have a better chance at growing roots. 

A few strawberries. Not the plumpest, and something has been eating one but they tasted ok.

Some pavers I made a couple of years ago. 

The comfrey had become all overgrown so I harvested it and it's being turned into liquid fertiliser which is very good for tomatoes, and other plants too. 

I picked a Compassion rosebud today. I usually pick a few each year to enjoy inside. They have such a lovely scent.

 

8 December 2019

Today it was raining most of the day. There was flooding in parts of Wellington. We're up in the hills so it's mainly surface water for us. The rain meant I wasn't able to do what I had planned. I knew the greenhouse needed some attention though so this afternoon I decided to do some work in there.

This was what greeted me when I opened the greenhouse door yesterday, except for the two buckets full of the fennel I cut yesterday. Boar helpfully put them inside which was good or they would have been full of water with all the rain.

Of course if I had been in the greenhouse recently the day of the triffids wouldn't have happened!

So much rain that the water tank is overflowing. The outlet hole is in the side and I keep thinking I should put a pipe in so that when it rains like this we can collect the overflow as well.

The other day I decided to de-head all the arum maculatum, or Lords-and-Ladies as one of it's common names is and how I shall refer to it from now on. I went to find my basket and the watering can. Usually they're sitting in plain view but no, totally covered. Extricating them was fun 😁

It's a pretty clever plant convolvulus! No discrimination, it'll wrap itself around anything it can. I couldn't resist this photo of the rake. Just standing there innocently minding it's own business then it gets wrapped. On the framing is my all important cuppa in a thermal mug to keep it warm for a wee while.

In the two back pots are a couple of lavender I got a few months back. I need to plant them out. They've been in the greenhouse so I put them out in the rain for a bit of a wash. The development next door has created so much dust they get coated in it. In the front icecream carton is a Chatham Island forget-me-not. I'm hoping it will take off.

This is a close up of the seed-head of one of the Lords-and-Ladies. Those berries turn orange and drop to the ground. Yes, they're even in the greenhouse.

Another view. They're quite pretty really. I wondered how many seeds or little green berries there were and estimated around sixty. So then I decided to count them . . . Ninety-two! And each one has the potential to become a new plant. Even if only one germinates from each seed-head it's more than I want.

Ta-da! After a couple of hours this was the result. So much better. I don't hurry or I get tired more quickly.

There are two and a half bags of weeds at the back, as well as rubbish in the teal bucket, a bit of fern I'm going transplant in the white bucket. There is also a fern I chopped back which I'll dig up and try to transplant. It's too large for the greenhouse.

It was nice being in the greenhouse getting some work done while the rain was beating on the roof. By the time I finished it had stopped raining. Now to plant some seeds. Tomatoes I think. Probably a bit late but better late than not at all. I'll probably start them off in pots first and I have some newspaper ones ready so will use them.

7 December 2019

I got up to the garden today after we had been out to Porirua to do a few jobs. When we got home I found a parcel I'd been waiting for had arrived. It's for a commission I'm working on so I'm happy it is here.

Going up to the garden/backyard isn't just a matter of popping out the back door. There are generally a number of steps.

Step 1) Put on my gumboots. Earlier in the year I got a pair of these boots - Grubs. They are great and have made such a difference to me. So much easier to just pull them on than to do up my old tramping boots. They also support my feet really well and the neoprene uppers keep my legs warm and creepy crawlies out!

These are my somewhat muddy ones. They're also great for walking the pup in wet grass.

Source

This is what they actually look like. They cost a bit but will last me a long time.

Step 2) Grab my handy clear case that I put my phone in. It protects my phone and is easy to see. No risk of my phone dropping out of my pocket and me having to spend ages searching for it! I found it at Bunnings, where my older brother bought one last year.

Step 3) Once we've headed up the first set of steps to the patio area I tie up Paddy briefly. Full name Paddington but Paddy is easier for everyday use. He's 8 months old and a Mastiff cross - and hasn't quite yet learned to leave the chickens alone! Or to come down when called. So the last couple of days I've put this long lead on him. It also means I can get hold of him easily when I've finished. One day he'll be an old plodder, but not yet! He's large too, 40kgs already so not a pup I can pick up any more!

Step 4) Head up through the gates at the archway because these girls come down when they hear someone coming. Get them some chook pellets, they follow me to the coop and I shut them up till I've finished what I've decided to do. Paddy romps around while I get some things done. Then repeat steps 3 and 4 to let the girls out again!

I suspect these girls are laying but most likely it's in the long grass somewhere. I need to replace the lid on their nesting box and then shut them up each night, because otherwise one or two of them sit in the nesting box overnight which means it gets messier quicker.

Today I wanted to clear at least half of this path. This time of year all the weeds seem to go crazy, as though they shoot up in a few weeks if you don't pay them enough attention! The fennel is doing wonderfully. Apparently the fronds and seeds are edible but I haven't tried them. I want to clear this path so I can request the temporary fence is taken down by the developers. That's the waratah's, boards and orange mesh in the photo. The other side we haven't been able to access for months.

I pottered away, and in about an hour got one side mostly clear. I chopped it into pieces as I went so it took a bit longer than if I had chopped it down and just laid it somewhere.

The after photo. I can see most of the path and tomorrow I hope to clear the other side. Not long after I got up the back and began cutting the fennel it started to rain . . . but thankfully it was just a sprinkling so I was able to keep going.

A closer photo of another patch of the arum maculatum, which will also be for the chop tomorrow, the seed heads at least.

It's a bit hard to see in this photo and I didn't think to get a close up but these are some forget-me-nots I sowed earlier in the year. I saw a few leaves come up so watched them and weeded round them carefully hoping it was what they were. I'm hoping they will self-seed and there will be more next year. It's the small things like this that bring me joy and give me hope that I can eventually have the whole place looking better.

Lastly I took a photo of my Compassion rose. I did what you are not supposed to do and cut it right back to the two main stems as it had become very sparse. There was another strong shoot off to the left but a certain puppy broke it off leaping round. Usually it will have flowered by now but it's going to be next year before it gets any I suspect. Need to weed and mulch too.

After a bite to eat I did some work on the commission then we went to have dinner with our son, daughter-in-law and granddaughters which was lovely 😊

6 December 2019

The years seem to just whizz by these days! This year has been busy with family happenings and life in general. I did get up into the garden sometimes but not as regularly as I would have liked.

I'm typing this post on my tablet as Boar has the computer, well, he's dozing but I can guarantee if I try to move it he'll wake up! I'm going to post a couple of photos I took this evening and then try and write some posts with photos from throughout out the year in a few days. Most of my photos are on my computer so if I can get them into a new post I can do the writing on my tablet later.

I've been aware that the arum maculatum will be starting to form their seeds, and they have. Tonight I had some unexpected free time and so I decided to go have a look up the back. Yes, there they were, lots of seed heads formed. Thankfully green so a way off dropping the seed. Where I'd pulled them out earlier in the year was free of them which was great. Each of the beige papery looking spikes is a spathe that has withered after the seed head forms. I decided the quickest method to get rid of them would be to chop them off.

Boar came home partway through and helped too so double the amount got done. The tub is nearly full of seed heads and there are still lots left. I'll try to get rid of more as I figure the more I chop or break off the fewer plants next year. 

This photo is just to show how tenacious this rose is. We chopped it back hard and it's put out lots of shoots and given a lovely display.

I think Boar has plans for the old fence palings. We shall see.

27 Jan

We decided to use up some of the bricks to make a small incinerator up the back. Boar dug a small area for it to go on below the deck.

Getting the bricks up was a bit of work. I used the trolley to haul them from the driveway where they are stored, up the path . . .

To the bottom of the steps.

We got the young ones to carry them up to the deck. Brains carried around 10, 6 in a backpack and the rest in his arms.

We used one of the paving stones we found as a base. Then just stacked them on it.

We had to test it out of course!

The ferns got a little singed from the heat.

A lid so it doesn't get drenched.

I'm standing just below the greenhouse in this photo.

And now I'm down by the archway and you can see the incinerator in the top right of the photo. A good morning's work 😁

20 Jan

Another post I thought I had done. So I'll just make a few comments because who knows what I was going to say!

The first photo is a Karaka tree we transplanted.

We also transplanted several patches of smaller seedling Karaka's to see how they go. This is so we end up with a bit of privacy from the places being built behind us. It will take time.

We also found this feijoa has broken off. It's one of three we planted around 15years ago. Bit of a shame.