Green Mile

I watched Green Mile last night.

Well not all of it.

I watched The Castle

and Green Mile in the ad breaks

and when The Castle finished.

I love The Castle.

All time best ever Aussie movie.

An absolute gem.

Darrel Kerrigan defending his home against

big business and the Government when they want to

appropriate it to expand the airport.

Oh yeah did I say the Melbourne airport is right next door?

Location, location, location is relative.

The Kerrigan's coin epic phrases like

"Straight to the pool room!"

"Ya dreaming!"

"Ah the serenity"

And I'm feeling the serenity this morning in my wee castle.

Woke up super early,

sun streaming in the window.

I'm missing my bedside table at the minute

cause it has borer and

I spent a hour yesterday painting it with kerosene.

I'm not quite ready to have it back in my bedroom just yet.

That would be a case of ah the serenity as the fumes fill the room!

It's one of those blissful mornings

when it's already hot and

a wander to the vege patch reveals this delicious wee morsel

A cannonball courgette.

Admittedly we are suffering a courgette glut

all from one plant.

And we are awaiting (read: hanging out) 

for the sweet 100s cherry tomatoes to ripen

so we can fry up the courgette with wee tomatoes

douse with balsamic vinegar

(a word of warning: don't inhale when adding the vinegar

you will regret it when the acidic fumes

rocket through your nasal membrane.)

I am really excited about eating this roundy courgette.

Ah the simple pleasures.

some of my favourite places

are in the Hamilton Gardens.

Saturday week ago when I was in Hamilton

it was hot.

It was Brisbane in December hot,

the start of December but December still.

 The best place to go when it is hot, too hot to swim,

too hot to sit in a car for hours to get to the beach,

soo* hot that an ice block will cool you down,

lazy hot is what it is.

The best place to go is the Gardens.

 The Gardens are a journey around the world.

As you wander into the gardens

you pass the Japanese Garden,

amble along the hedged corridor,

enter before the Egyptian statues,

take a right and stroll under the green covered walkway

until you are standing atop the stairs looking at this garden

then, because it is so hot,

you step down each step slowly and

walk towards the case con giardino at the other end.

Then you step onto the cool balcony over looking the Waikato River.

A place to stop, rest and talk.

The perfect place on a very hot day.

Another peaceful place is the English Garden.

It's like a secret garden,

with paths and gates,

sunken gardens,

pagodas and benches to sit on.

To add the funk and a pool,

there's the American Garden.

Maybe it should be the Californian Garden.

I spent time time in gardens like this in California,

cool blue pools,

green trees,

little grass,

and oddly enough no giant picture of Marilyn.



If in Hamilton,

do visit the Gardens.

They are a secret delight in an already green, green city.

There are Indian gardens filled with brightly colours flowers,

classic rose gardens,

Chinese gardens with bamboo tunnels,

paddocks of daffodils,

and lots of quiet places to sit and reflect,

to sit and talk,

to sit and enjoy the peace and cool of the gardens.

* the double oo on soo has the same impact on a normal so as too is to.

seeds

finally I have sown my seeds for spring....

I have discovered the most delightful thing, The Boss is growing peas this year - 12 acres of them, all for seeds but we get to glean the fields. The whole office is very excited about this. We have already started sharing our favourite fresh pea recipes and the winner is.......

straight out of the pod.

But just in case I've sown my own easy peasy peas (even veges channel Jo Seagar)

directly into the garden

and cucumbers, capsicum and more peas

(as a back up for the garden sown peas - can't have too many fresh peas, ever).

Seed trays are filled and sitting my bedroom bay window soon to be filled with wee plants ready for planting after Show Weekend and devoured by Christmas.

I've just put sweet peas out to soak and soften to be planted with the express purpose of hiding my ugly wall.

The great thing about doing all this planting is by next year I will have forgotten what I planted and where and they be growing all over the place in a wonderfully wild mess.

Like these California poppies that I have no recollection of planting
And now a quizzical photo from Clary

and Penelope Darling who, I believe is peeing in this photo.

Clary was about to defend her honour no doubt.

Oh and as I was cooking dinner this evening, a wee earthquake to keep us on our toes.

dry

dry, dry, dry is my garden.


Good thing the earthquake shifted my house further over an aquifer. Now I have an endlessly running tap from the spring that used to only run when we had three days of rain. Now it flows and floods my backyard. I'm thinking of putting a pond in as a water feature.



I am a bit nervous about contacting the council to sort the spring out. I heard they charge an arm and a leg if you have a spring on your land. For the first two years I was here it was drought so I didn't know there was a spring - I don't think I should have to pay for the privilege of having something I didn't know about, oh wait, council is government and I already pay for a ton of things I don't know I have.... hmmmm.



I have an old watering can (though it should be a watering plastic) under the unspigotted tap and drag it over to water my dry gardens. At this point I would normally put a photo of pretty flowering pansies and poppies but I'm about a month behind in getting my garden into shape and am too embarrassed to show you my weed filled beds. Thank goodness for lambs to eat all the evidence of weeds and flowers for that matter.



This howling wind - which is seasonal for us so it's not like we don't know it's coming - stirs up my sleep and I woke this morning thinking about Tiddy Bears and Oti. I think because I was being teased for having a kiwi accent last Wednesday (way to go missionaries - I don't think you should be teased for having an accent in your own country). Oti laughed and laughed at Tiddy Bears - hope it still makes you laugh Ots!

I yam what I yam

This is the sky today.

It is now much worse than that. Just another winter storm. I've been waiting patiently for the weather to get frosty enough that I could harvest my yams.

I don't recommend growing yams as they tend to take over the garden and apparently you can't never get rid of them. Plus they take six months to grow (thats like 4 days in Farmville). On the other hand I quite like perpetually growing food, between the surprise of where they pop up and my laziness, yams might prove to be my favourite crop ever.

However, on sunny Saturday when I was wearing a t-shirt and bare feet I could have dug up my yams but didn't, not sure why. So it is on this yukky Queen's Birthday Monday that I suit up in my Hunting&Fishing polar fleece beanie, my Swazi polar fleece t-shirt, my Kathmandu polar fleece hoodie with the big pouch pocket, my flannel jamma pants (see previous post for other inappropriate jama wearing), woollen bed socks and my milking gumboots to head out and see how my yams were doing and take in a few.

The soil was gluggy and sticky. I realised that I like harvesting this year's yams cause they are red and easy to see, unlike potatoes that just look like balls of mud.

I filled this bowl, took them inside and washed them....

And have now successfully given away about a quarter of them. There are another quarter for C-loe and another for across the road and then a quarter for me to roast up tonight and then take some to work tomorrow because I bet it is snowing up in Methven and there is no way I'm going out in this weather if I don't have to.

Roast vege salad for lunch, yum!

Leeston Enviro...what??

So Monday last week I organised a meeting I called the Leeston Envirotown Great Sustainability Brainstorm and more than 30 people came! I was so impressed with the people who came.

Basically Sue Jarvis from Lincoln Envirotown came and gave an overview of what they did up in Lincoln and then we had a big ol' brainstorm about what we would like to see in Leeston.

Ideas were things like a community garden, cycle ways, knowledge sharing (passing down traditional skills), native plantings, markets, car pooling, kids classes, twlight tours of composting-off the grid-straw bale houses that type of thing. The cool thing is that the people who are keen on their idea can organise the project under Leeston Enviro?? (we haven't comfirmed the name just yet).

Personally I like the community garden idea best cause although I have a vege garden full of happy, shiney veges I really have no idea what I'm doing. Good thing I'm not a control freak in the garden (yes that lends itself to admitting that I am a control freak otherwise). In a fit of recycling I collected a crate from outside my gym and cut it in half to make two square metre gardens. I got one going (now home to a teapea) but its getting a bit splity on one side.

Today I bought a couple of lengths of timber from ITM (we have a Hammer Hardware as well but ITM is for the grunty stuff but Hammer Hardware is still my local) to build a garden along my wobbly fence to grow my beans in. I need more vege space! Now I have to get a sledge hammer and bash stakes in. That will be a great Sunday afternoon activity after Stake Conference. So I went to ITM and met Jacky who is a builder chick and she invited me ITM's girls night in a week or two and so I'm going along to watch tipsy women play with power tools - should be a good night! Let you know how I get on.

Today's tip!

Yesterday (because I checked Elders weather website and knew today was going to be crap weather) I planted my peas. In my family raw peas are a Christmas treat that we start eating mid December, we also adore asparagus so, well, ummm, yeah smelly wees, let's leave it at that. Peas are best when they come from my garden! Though they are good enough when you buy a shopping bag full from the market gardener by the chapel (thats a relative placement, he is by the chapel for me not for too many others). I wonder if you'll have to bring your own re-useable bag??? hmmmm.

Anyway neato thing I'm doing this year is making pea teepees (or is that teapeas) so here's what you do..
Take 5 bamboo stakes about a metre long, tie them - or as I did - elastic band them together that the top and fan them out to make a teapea shape.
Firmly anchor the none-tied ends of the stakes into the soil (please note: farmers have soil not dirt) spacing them to fit the area you have available,
Then plant two pea plants close to each stake so they will climb upwards and make a little teapea.
When they start growing you'll be able to see them rise above the other veges and they'll be easy to pick - cool huh?!?!