It's the first day of Summer today!

Happy first day of Summer! 

December the 1st is the first day of Summer in New Zealand. It has been a lovely warm 24 degrees C today, slightly overcast and no wind. A perfect day to start putting the Christmas tree up, decorating the house and opening door number one of my advent calendar.

I walked around the garden, barefoot, this afternoon, with Otto following me. He is such a curious cat, watching what I am doing all the time, apart from when he is running up the trees or climbing onto the roof of the house! 

In the garden I found a few ripe boysenberries and raspberries, which tasted delicious, lovely and juicy and full of flavour. The small passionfruit vine is flowering and there is one fruit forming already.

The Feijoa (pineapple guava) is full of red flowers, but I didn't see any Tui birds nearby to pollinate them. Hopefully the Tuis will find them so we can enjoy feijoas this year.

The Pohutukawa tree overhanging our fence from next door, is absolutely full of flower buds. It's going to look spectacular when the red flowers are open. Nice and Christmassy.

I hope that you are enjoying the first day of advent too.

Do you follow any traditions for December the first?

Hugs, Rose x

Busy time for cats - making new cushions

 

The last couple of weeks have been very busy for Otto. He has been supervising me while I made some new cushions. The supervision was necessary because it has been well over 20 years since I made cushions with zips in. I used a YouTube tutorial to refresh my memory. Here is a link to the tutorial that I found easy to follow.

Supervision is exhausting work for a cat. Otto had to lie down a lot to rest on the material as I moved it. Then he had to thoroughly inspect my cushion template and test it for size.

Examining the placement of every pin proved to be a lot of fun for Otto, as did trying to catch the scissors as I cut the material.

When the first cushion was finished, Otto insisted on testing it for comfort and promptly fell asleep! I took it that he approved and that the cushion passed quality control :o)

 

I chose the bird (blue-faced honeyeater) patterned material initially to make cushions for our new outdoor furniture. The material is 100% cotton canvas and was designed by Jocelyn Proust, an Australian designer. 

When I placed a finished cushion on the settee in our living room, I liked how it looked there with the cream throw rug and the dark brown leather of the settee. The background of the material is a pastel sage-green and the stalks of the plants are a light pastel dusky-rose. I decided to keep these cushions for the living room instead of using them outdoors. 

I made 3 of the bird cushions then decided that I needed contrasting cushions with a bit more colour to lift the room. So, I went back to the shop and looked at all the furnishing fabric options. I settled on the dusky-rose pink velvet material, which I hoped toned in well with the bird material. 

The shop assistant wasn't too sure of my choice of colour. However, I liked the colour combination and I asked several other customers what they thought. They said it was a perfect match, they loved the combination too.

I bought enough of the velvet to make three cushions. I have made one already and will make the other two over the weekend.

I am daydreaming about adding some smaller cream-coloured cushions, maybe hand knitted moss-stitch, or crewel work in cream-on-cream. Maybe one day :o) 

What do you think would go with my cushions? Any ideas?

Hugs, Rose x

More Spring surprises in my garden

 

Lords and ladies - arum italicum 

We found large round clumps of white-veined, spearheaded leaves sprouting up under the trees in our garden. We had no idea what type of plant they were. 

I thought that maybe they were calla lilies, so decided to leave them until they flowered. We didn't want to dig up flowers thinking they were weeds.

Then one morning dad called me to have a look at the unusual creamy-yellow flowers that had appeared. On seeing them I knew immediately that they were lords and ladies, also known as cuckoo pint, arum italicum. This is a poisonous weed that we don't want in our garden. We have a lot of work ahead of us to get rid of it.

Willow tree catkins

A more pleasant surprise was to find that the weeping willow trees were flowering. They had long yellow fluffy caterpillar-like catkins all over them. I haven't seen willow flowers like this before. The only ones that I have seen are the furry, silver catkins of pussy willows.

Ornamental quince flowers?

These coral-orange coloured flowers have grown over the fence from our neighbour's garden and are really pretty. The shrub has been flowering for over a month now. I think that it may be an ornamental quince, but I'm not sure.

Bugleweed - ajuga reptans 

The bugleweed has produced dozens of beautiful dark blue flower spikes with unusual square stalks.

Japanese maple leaves - acer palmatum

I love the new maroon-coloured leaves that have opened up on the Japanese maple. I am not used to new leaves being anything other than bright green, so was surprised when these ones unfurled from their tight little buds.

Another big surprise for me was to find that, what I thought was a dead, leafless olive tree, was not in-fact dead, nor was it an olive tree.

Over the past few weeks its new leaves appeared. I didn't look closely at them, I just thought that they were silvery-grey-green olive tree leaves. But when I decided to photograph the tree, to show you the olive tree that had come back to life, I noticed that the leaves were furry.

Most definitely not an olive tree! 

I have no idea of which type of tree this is, nor if it will produce flowers and fruit. Do you have any ideas about what this tree is?

What has been happening in your garden this month?

See you again soon.

Hugs, Rose x

Happy Halloween!

We had a fun early Halloween, called "Fright Night" on Saturday evening. 

Dozens of houses in our village were set up for the children in the neighbourhood to go trick or treating. We registered as a safe house where the younger children could come trick or treating. Others set up spooky houses for the older children. Then afterwards the children went to watch the film Beetlejuice at the village hall.

I was on a very tight budget, so spent most of it filling a basket with halloween-themed sweets and plastic spider rings. These were placed on a chair that I draped with a metre of black tulle that was decorated with ghosts.

Then I made paper decorations, both 3-D and 2-D, which I found free downloads for online on the Canon Creative Park website. I had great fun with scissors and glue making them.

The decorations were hung on the plant growing in a pot on the front doorstep. And the Halloween picture, that I printed and cut out, was taped to the front door.

I bought a length of glittery orange spider web patterned wired ribbon and decorated the basket and the plant with it. Plus I bought lots of plastic spiders and spread them around the front door.

I dressed up in black and white and wore a large floppy purple witches hat that I bought for $9 at a party shop.

Lots of children visited our house in groups with their parents. One boy said ours was the best house :o) I think that may have been because I let the children have a spider ring as well as sweets! 

One child asked if he could have a big spider, so I said yes, and he put his sweets back in the basket and took a spider lol. I tried to tell him that he could also keep his sweets, but he was too excited about the big spider. It was so cute.

The village that I lived in before didn't have children doing trick or treat because all the houses were on large blocks of land and were spaced far apart down long driveways. Instead they held a party at the local village hall for the children each Halloween.

This is the first time that I have experienced trick or treat at Halloween. Mum and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, I think as much, if not more, than the children.

Do you do anything at Halloween?

See you again soon.

Hugs, Rose

When life gives you delicious lemons…

Plenty of lemons!

Lemon meringue pie was the first thing that came to mind when I saw how many lemons were ripening on our lemon tree. I have never seen a tree so full. 

Lemon meringue pie...delicious, fluffy, sweet meringue, with a tangy lemon filling, in a crisp sweet pastry crust. Yummy!

This was the first time that I have ever attempted to make lemon meringue pie, I just had to give it a go. 

I was doubtful about using our oven at first because the temperature markings on the oven dials have all rubbed off. (I don't know how the previous owner managed, maybe that was why they moved house lol). 

After about 15 minutes of fiddling with an oven thermometer and turning the dial this way and that, I managed to heat the oven to the correct temperature. 

Using a Kenwood food processor to make pastry

I decided to make the pastry using our Kenwood food processor, which we have had for many years and had never used before. Luckily, we hadn't lost the manual for it during our house move. 

On my first attempt, the pastry didn't form into a ball, per the instructions. Then I realised my mistake, I was using the sharp chopping blade instead of the blunt blade! Within a few seconds of correcting this mistake, the pastry worked and formed a ball.

Baked pastry case with lemon filling

I used Deliah Smith's sweet pastry recipe that she uses for her lemon tart. Then, for the lemon filling and meringue I used an old Good Housekeeping recipe that my sister uses all the time.

Baked lemon meringue pie

The pie behaved as it should in the oven, and it looked and smelt delicious. Then I had to wait and wait for it to cool down before I could serve it.

My mouth was watering. I resisted all attempts to "taste test" the meringue and pie crust. 

After 3 hours I couldn't wait any longer to serve the lemon meringue pie. The sides of the pie dish were cold. The bottom of the dish was only slightly tepid.

Lemon meringue pie ready to eat?

I should have waited longer...the filling wasn't quite set. But at least I managed to slice the pie and serve it and it did taste delicious 😋

The next thing on my to-do-list is to try making lemon curd!

Have you ever tried making lemon meringue pie and/or lemon curd?

See you again soon.

Hugs, Rose x

My cat Otto is up to mischief with jigsaw puzzles!

My cat Otto has taken to helping me with solving jigsaw puzzles. He knows the moment I start working on a puzzle and appears, on the table, from wherever he is in the house within seconds! I am sure that he has a built-in radar that senses the slightest movement I make around the dining table where I do my puzzling.

The funny thing is that when mum and dad work on a jigsaw puzzle, Otto isn't the least bit interested in it. It's only when I have a go that Otto has an irresistible urge to jump on the table and "help". I have tried to creep silently into the dining room when Otto is fast asleep, somewhere in the house, but to no avail. Otto is guaranteed to appear. 

Here are Otto's instructions for the different methods he uses in helping with a jigsaw puzzle:

1) Run across the table and stop abruptly on the jigsaw as it skids across and off the table. It is more fun if the entire puzzle lands on the floor.

2) Sit on a dining chair and paw one puzzle piece until it falls off the table. Repeat as many times as desired.

3) Sit or lie in the jigsaw puzzle box, full of pieces, and one by one pick pieces up and toss them onto the table amongst the pieces that have been sorted.

4) Pretend to sleep in the jigsaw box full of pieces, until Rose, who is also "playing" with the jigsaw, is off-guard, and then pounce onto the jigsaw puzzle.

4) Sit in the box and grab a mouthful of jigsaw pieces and run off with them, dropping the pieces along the way.

5) Lie on the puzzle, as part of quality control, to make sure that all of the jigsaw pieces are lying flat. 

6) If the jigsaw pieces aren't thought to be in the correct place, correct it by rolling over and over on the puzzle. Or bat the pieces around to rearrange them. 

7) The best way to "help" is when Rose is doing a vintage puzzle with all the pieces hidden in a calico bag. Proceed to push the bag around the table until it opens. Once the bag is opened take one, two or three pieces by mouth and chew them, then drop them and get more pieces out of the bag. It is more fun if Rose thinks that the jigsaw piece is going to get swallowed!  (Three steps of this process were caught in the photos above).

Luckily, I always, eventually, find all of the 1000 jigsaw puzzle pieces. So far, they have all been located in the dining room.

And here is Otto posing with his finished jigsaw puzzle. It only took him a couple of weeks to destroy complete!

Dad is now addicted to jigsaw puzzling too. We only have two more puzzles left to do, so mum and I went to the local Op shops (charity shops) today looking for more puzzles. We managed to find five 1000-piece puzzles which we thought dad would like. Most of them cost around $6 and $7 each. So much cheaper than buying them new, especially when we do so many now that we are settled into our new house. They are so absorbing and a good activity to exercise our brains on a rainy day or evening.

When we finish the jigsaw puzzles, we pass most of them on to my sister, who then passes them on to her friends, and they eventually get donated back to the Op shops to be sold again. I keep the Cavallini vintage puzzles, in the cylindrical boxes, as I get quite attached to them and find them hard to part with.

What do you do for fun on a rainy day?

See you again soon.

Hugs, Rose x

Spring treasures in my garden

Blueberry blossom

I had a lot of fun taking close-up Springtime photos of blossoms, buds and leaves using my cell-phone camera this week. I was hoping to photograph the many honeybees on the blueberry blossom, but they were too fast for me, and it was rather windy. I'm surprised my photos didn't come out all blurry! 

I love the pink blush on the blueberry flower petals and their light blue-grey frosted sepals. 

Most of the blueberry blossom has been pollinated now. The flowers are already starting to drop off the bushes, leaving behind tiny, newly-formed berries.

Spring fig leaves

The fig trees are quickly coming to life with gorgeous, fresh green leaves. Such a nice change from seeing bare twigs. The trees are quite prehistoric looking.

Thornless berry blossom

I've yet to discover which type of berry these thornless plants will produce. The blossom looks like it may be blackberry or boysenberry, but I have no idea really. Any guesses?

Dad cut out all the dead and damaged berry canes yesterday and I tied up the new fresh ones along a system of wires and posts. This really should have been done before the new canes sprouted leaves. Hopefully no damage has been done by doing this now.   

  

Yellow cherry guava buds

The yellow cherry guava tree is covered in little flower buds waiting to open. There are also some small cherry guavas on the tree still to ripen from last season.

Naval orange blossom

We finished harvesting the last of the naval oranges for the season a couple of weeks ago. Mum enjoyed eating the last one that was sitting in the fruit bowl today. They were very juicy, full of flavour and smelt delicious.

The orange blossom was opening on the tree while the oranges were ripening. There are hundreds of flowers waiting to be pollinated! It will be almost a year before we'll get more oranges from this tree. 

We need to continue to feed the tree with citrus tree food, and make sure that the soil doesn't dry out over Summer, so that the fruit will be juicy when it's time to pick them.

 

Feijoa buds and new leaves

The feijoa (pineapple guava) tree looks promising, it is full of flower buds waiting to open and there are lots of new leaves. I'm hoping that the tui birds that visit our garden will find the feijoa flowers to pollinate them. Tuis love to drink the nectar that the feijoa flowers produce.

 

Yellow wild strawberry flower

I discovered some wild strawberry clumps growing in the garden near the quince tree. Amazingly they have yellow flowers instead of white. I didn't realise, until I looked it up on the internet, that there are yellow-flowered wild strawberries as well as white ones. 

There was one tiny red strawberry on one plant which had been partly eaten by something. It didn't look appealing at all and hasn't been included in my list of fruit in my garden. I will let the blackbirds enjoy them if that's what they like :)

Plum blossom

The plum blossom is starting to open up and it smells lovely. There are quite a few buds on the tree :) The previous owner said that the tree is a Black Doris plum. We should hopefully get some plums from it around Christmas time.

The plum tree branches are covered in lichen, which I read is a sign of healthy air. I read that lichen doesn't harm the trees that it grows on. However, dad thinks that this tree is dying. I hope not. 

  

New quince leaves

This little cluster of leaves is the only sign of life on the quince tree so far. I'm hoping that there will be a lot more new growth to follow. 

We discovered the quince tree when we were tidying up some overgrown bushes. The tree was right in the middle and looking very sorry for itself. Dad gave the tree some fertilizer and we tidied up the weeds that were growing at its base.

I hope that the tree recovers as I've never tried quinces before, nor have I seen them for sale in the shops.

I'm having fun checking the fruit trees and bushes for new growth. I love the surprises I get each time I go out into our new garden, and there are so many good things to look forward to!

See you again soon. 

Hugs, Rose xxx