Looking back and some life lessons...

This is our Auckland garden, mid house sale. It was also the middle of July so while everything is looking uncharacteristically neat it's also clearly in need of sunshine and a warm burst of spring weather.   It had just had a much too vigorous clip and shape when we decided to put it on the market... I'm sure it looks a delight now.

You can see a paint brush on the arm of one of the benches... I think I was probably touching up the walls (again) while no doubt praying that the fence behind wouldn't fall down under the weight of our neighbour's awful towering palm trees - at least not before auction day.

You may remember the garden had more hedging which after much agonising I eventually pulled out.  The old hedges had started to die one by one and removing them was the best thing I could have done.  It really opened up the space and we all used the top level so much more... lots of mini soccer matches and lounging on the bench with a glass of something good as the sun went down.

So what have I learned from my last garden (apart from the fact that I still have a lot more to learn about gardening)?

I don't like too much green on green and would much rather have a colourful, productive space -  more fruit and flowers next time. The pink roses around our new house make me smile each time I catch a glimpse.

I do like the back hedging, a combination of pittosporum (the lighter slightly grey leaved plant) and griselinia - a glossy green hedge plant that thrives in Auckland and would no doubt hate life in dry old Melbourne.

I do love the colour of the brickwork. Before the previous owners painted it was a mess of sandy coloured bricks and sandstone and hideous grey blockwork. The colour is Resene's Fuscous Gray and I will use it again.

I was going to say something clever about the idiocy of paint colour names and then looked up the meaning of fuscous... after two years of sniggering whenever I heard it today I find out it means 'dark brownish grey'.  Another lesson learned. 

Blue days...

Spring is a delight this year. After living with an ordered, green, hedged garden in Auckland I'm so enjoying the daily surprises in our new patch of Melbourne. We have a sea of blue irises that have grown from mere shoots in just two months. I'm busily deadheading forty spent flowers a day to keep them blooming as long as possible.

I'm also drinking in the colourful gardens of our suburb. Not the green on green, slightly austere gardens so favoured by designers and property developers. These are proper gardens grown over years and years with a wonderful array of plants all very happy the drought has broken for now.

Spring blossom in pinks and whites (the crabtree's my favourite). Billowing creamy roses in soft pastels that you simply have to cross the road to smell, wisteria, lime green hellebores in the shady spots, delicate seaside daisies springing from cracks in the pathways and a backdrop of rich fresh spring green.

You can almost taste it, it smells so good.  To hell with the hayfever.

Breakfast at...

Armadale's Coin Laundry... sun, eggs, fritters, roesti and a rather good hot chocolate.

So Melbourne. Soon he'll be wanting a skinny double shot latte.

Book thoughts...

Have I mentioned yet that I love Melbourne? It has an indefinable something that just makes me feel quite happy to be living here. It's not stunning like Sydney or filled with beautiful buildings and oozing history and charm like many European cities, it's not even easy like other smaller cities. There are too many cars, rather average beaches and it's pretty darn flat but it has a really great feel, really great food and really great shops. 

God that's shallow... See? Undefinable.  I'll work on that and come up with a better reason or perhaps a list one day.  

One place I do love is our local Readings Bookshop. This is the sort of place that make you want to forget that Book Depository exists. The walls are lined with an amazing array of books, their kids selection is good, the staff know their stuff and it's alive with shoppers and browsers. It doesn't feel like a bookshop that's dying a slow retail death.

I popped in today and spotted these. Handbag queen Orla Kiely is now doing kid's books for uber cool mid century styled up bambinos. 

Pop into your local bookshop and have a flick through the beautifully muted pages.

While you're there stay awhile, buy something, we need them to stay open. This week we learnt that an entire swathe of Melbourne's South East (population 140,000) has no access to a local bookshop after the demise of the big book chains, Borders and Angus and Robertson.  I don't like the idea of a suburb without a book store. I also don't like to pay too much for a paperback so perhaps I'll order online and buy some locally too and enjoy the experience.

It did occur to me that if you cut these Kiely books up they would make the most fabulous nursery wall art. I know, a thought like that could get me banned from bookshops.

Hello again...

I'm back. Back that is sitting at my own desk in front of my own computer. It's only taken a record 8 weeks (and I don't mean a great Guiness Book of Records type record).  Luckily for you, dear reader, you have been spared the ranting and raving, sighing and slumping that has characterised my approach to moving this time.

But we're here, fresh start and a new life to sort out. And many, many thoughts to share. I have quite missed writing and although now there is no villa there is still a life and lots of small thoughts zinging around in my head looking for a home on a page. So My Villa Life shall remain. The serial mover tag must go. I need a new blurb 'About Me' and I really must update my reading list. There is a list longer than my arm for all the rooms and cupboards in this house too.

Do bear with me.

(And yes you may have guessed by the picture that I now have an iPhone (friends have already branded me a hypocrite and so they should but hey, I'm human). And of course hipstamatic was the second app I bought.  Nice pictures and surely less time wasting than Angry Birds.

Friday feeling...

Friday and time for an Auckland villa door.... I think this appeals because what I'd really like to do for the next month is plant myself on that bench and watch the world walk past... or the rain thunder down. Auckland has been doing what it does best this week - pouring rain one minute and sunshine the next. Not the best weather to be without the car we sold yesterday.

I am feeling very mixed up this week. On one hand I am looking forward to the new chapter back in Australia, on the other I am dreading leaving the life we have here, my home, my community and my friends. That mixed up feeling deserves a post of its own when I have time to think and write.

My son finished school today with a lovely final assembly and some very kind words from his teacher and principal. I have had coffees and lunches with friends and am getting ready for a very casual get together with kids and mums and dads tomorrow. Oh yes and I have made lists and lists and ticked off lots of necessary but rather tedious things - that is why that bench beckons...  

Taking flight....

In between all the boring stuff we have been making the most of our last few weeks in Auckland. Now we only have a few days left and a list as long as my arm to get through... annoying, dull little jobs that I won't bore you with here. 

Instead, something pretty. Auckland on a shining winter's day, a backdrop to the Matariki Kite Festival. 

Matariki was the name given by ancient Maori to a small cluster of stars. They believed the appearance of Matariki signified the end of one year and the beginning of another. 

Kites have an ancient link to Matariki - Maori believed they connected heaven and earth. On a day like this I quite believed it too. 

Heaven for small boys and kite geeks alike and there were plenty of both...