single happy moment
A bowl of sunshiney happines, from my very own garden, helped to quell the drearier days in the final months of winter.
The delight that I can actually grow things hasn’t worn off yet, even though we moved into a garden house almost a year ago now. A YEAR! Can you believe it? I haven’t thought yet of what we’re going to do to commemorate our move, but I am thinking the planting of yet another plant, maybe a magnolia. Any thoughts? We have a part sun, part shade corner of our backyard that’s just begging for a tree that would be pretty!
single happy moment: garden joy
I’ve always been a bit useless at gardening, but since we moved into our house-with-scary-garden 8 months ago, I’ve really taken a shine to it. I’ve been experimenting, with varying results, with flowers, annuals, perennials, fruit and vegetables, creepers, herbs, hanging baskets, mulches and fertilisers – all terms and things I’d previously had zero knowledge of.
Mostly though, I was just a little bit tentative about my foray into gardening, and so for the most part, tried to leave it as the old owners had left it to us.
I did make one huge change though – my ultimate pride in the garden for the first summer I had with it, was harvesting some delicious tomatos from my 2 plants I bought as soon as I moved in and found a sunny spot.
pride and joy!
They were just regular tomatoes from the nursery, Burkes Backyard ones I think, but they were the single successful thing I grew that then gave me the confidence to tackle other plants, and even a bit of a landscape makeover (which is still in progress!)
Delicious, and inspiring. What helped you gain confidence as a gardener when you first started out?
Read Moreproud parents
ok, hold up, relax. This isn’t what you think. Yesterday, S and I became the proud parents of…
an eggplant.
Yes, the very first eggplant we have harvested off our tree and grown from flower! Whoo hoo!
Back story: 3 months ago, when we were at the height of our gardening frenzy, I sighted this eggplant tree at Direct Plants, my favourite nursery. Chantal, the owner, assured me that they were easy to grow and would bear wonderful deep purple orbs of goodness.
this was the tree's info card
Me, being a total garden newbie, decided WHY NOT, after all, I like eggplants, and I like useful plants even more. I also knew I had the perfect spot for it by the side of the house where S would NEVER notice it. Why was this important? Well, when we started clearing the jungle that was our garden for proper planting, I started getting superbly excited about veggie patches and growing my own fruit, but S disallowed it, citing veggie patches as ugly, and homegrown veggies and fruit as over-rated.
Of course, ME being ME, this made me crave the growing of the edibles EVEN MORE, after all when you tell me specifically NOT to do something, I want it even more. Ask my parents – my dad begged me for years not to take up that dancing rubbish even as a hobby, and now I own a dance school! HAHAHAHA!
So I started planting little pots of herbs – basil, coriander, thyme, and spring onions. And then gradually the pot collection in the sunny spot of the yard started growing, with tomatoes and a chilli plant, then a lemon and lime tree.
my sekrit herb and tomato section!
And he didn’t even notice at ALL except to note I was giving some weird EXTRA care to certain parts of the garden. When I first handed him a freshly plucked tomato, he was INCREDULOUS that I had managed to do this all right in front of him. Sometimes I get frustrated that S doesn’t notice new haircuts or dramatic changes in my look but this was one time I ADORED his lack of observation skills.
Slowly I added the eggplant tree, even successfully getting him to PLANT it for me in the ground without him realising its err, EDIBLE attributes! Ahh, the joy of feminine wiles!
Fast forward a couple of months and yesterday I harvested, exceedingly happily, our first eggplant from the tree, and it is huge, glossy deep purple, and almost perfect.
look at it! aww shucks, I feel all glowing and proud.
For size reference, here it is next to our TV remote controls!
huge!
When S saw my facebook post about our eggplant, he proclaimed himself its proud father – so I guess that little quip has stuck, and I now can tell you all on the interwebz that we are proud parents, to our eggplant.
BOOYA, and hooray for novice gardeners!!!
(and yes, I have some idea of how annoying we will be as parents of young kids because I’m shoving our EGGPLANT news in your face. don’t say I didn’t warn you!)
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day 2 after epidural – update
I just thought I’d let all of you know after my last post, that I’m feeling much better.
Saturday was a really hard day, with combination of pains and a pretty bad fever in the evening that lasted hours. It got to 10pm, and I was pretty hot, sweaty, and weak, and S told me not to go, but in the end I just made it to our anniversary party and I’m SO glad I did (even though I don’t remember much of it!) – it was lovely to see how many people came down to celebrate with us, and our teams and couples performing so incredibly.
If you were there and I failed to say hello to you – I’m very sorry! I was seriously delirious! I was almost in tears seeing so many of our old and new students all there in our gorgeous space, and it was amazing, when I asked who in the room had been students of ours from when we first started 4 years ago, and to see so many hands go up. In particular, it was lovely to have so many of our pro team members from over the years up there with us. Everyone has contributed so much to our lovely little community, and for that I was so grateful to have been there to see it.
Today, the pain has been much better – I’ve managed to be off painkillers from after lunch, and after a 15 hour sleep last night, shrugged off the fever. I can still feel twinges of pain down my legs and where the needle went in, but it’s totally bearable. Also managed to cook us dinner, so I must be feeling a LOT better! I also got to enjoy some of the last of our warm weather out in the garden, watching my lovely man get all dirty and manly with a shovel.
the new roses S helped me plant this weekend
By tomorrow I hope to be in barely any pain (coz the cortizone should’ve kicked in) and I want to start my daily swim. The idea is, I use this 2 week window of pain relief to get my body up to strengthening some. S tells me to chill for another day, but I reaaaallly want to, even just a gentle swim. Mental note: 2 weeks of pain relief is NOT the time for me to dance like a crazy lady, and I MUST establish boundaries for myself!
Thank you EVERYONE for your lovely well wishes. It has truly been an overwhelming weekend, with turmoil, pain, happiness, joy, gratitude, love, anger, sadness, and a WHOLE lot of WOW.
Read Moreof herbs and spice
I know this whole green thumb thing isn’t going to last that long – I’m sure it’s a strange fluke or that nature is simply being kind to me in my betrodden state. Whatever it is, I’m not only going to keep taking advantage of it, but also going to rub it in your face any time I have any kind of success with the dastardly business. I’ll take the little victories. Even if they have nothing to do with me.
I’m really enjoying the process of learning, as I always do, and mostly, I’m enjoying the directatorship sense of glee when I note that my actions directly impact the plants. *rubs hands together*. It’s also pretty magical when plants go from boring green things to flowering, budding, sprouting and growing, sometimes overnight!
My garden herb pots are flourishing, and the other night I made a thai curry with its offerings (and some store-bought ingredients like chicken and vegetables!)
basil, jalapeno chilli, spring onions
The chilli was surprisingly potent – I like spicy as much as the next Asian, but man, this one little bugger in a big pot of curry and it was still a little full of mayhem. The curry turned out good though, if not one of the best times I’ve made it – proof is in a man eating over 2 dinners, what was measured out for 4. I give the fresh herbs credit. Kind of. I think he’s getting a little weary of me taking herb cuttings, then SHOVING them under his nose and DEMANDING he declares how wonderful it is that I have fresh! garden! herbs! to cook with!
All said, it’s very gratifying cooking S a good meal – he is at once heartily pleased and adorably grateful. He lauds its praises and then makes me feel like a domestic goddess (which I am far from). A while later, I can expect him to ask me to cook it again, complete with gratifying begging and joyful fist pumps when I agree. Sometimes love is blind, but in this case, love is glaringly obvious and wonderful.
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