Rick, Nicky and Claire in NZ

It’s been mixed metaphor week at Tiramaroa. The majority of the excitement happened on Thursday afternoon. Having given up on Simon and crew (who erected the fencing) giving us a quote for a concrete patio in the garden and a path to connect it to the driveway, we contacted another contractor some weeks ago. We knew he was busy but hadn’t had any response from him, so I had come to the conclusion that we would construct said patio and path ourselves with decking. The first step would be to put some drainage down the side of the drive to manage the runoff when it rains. A quick click and collect order with Mitre 10 saw me driving home with three 3m “conduits” sticking out of the front passenger window and some flexible hose to implement the plan. While I was out, our additional kitchen shelves arrived, and then on Friday the concrete contractor phoned and is coming for a site visit on Monday! We had ordered three additional shelves to expand the storage in two of the kitchen cupboards....

 We have had another week of gluttonous enjoyment and high octane entertainment. Life is hard at times. We had organised some neighbourhood folks to come for dinner on Wednesday evening, namely Frances (Mrs Egg from up the road), Jacqui (from the caravan next door), and Elaine and Mike (the new owners of 414, on our eastern side). It seemed like a good opportunity to test a new cookery book, The Australian Women’s Weekly “The Joy of Christmas”. Clem and Pat gave this to us as a house warming gift, when they visited earlier in the year. Some of you will know I have a test for cookery books: pick three recipes almost at random, make them, and see how they turn out. If all three are good, then it’s reasonable to assume the rest in the book are also. So, for Wednesday night I suggested a number of recipes to Nicky and we picked four, and used one other as inspiration. The inspiration (smoked salmon on walnut soda bread with aioli) was good and went well with the dried fruit and nuts...

We have been enjoying hot sunny weather this week, which would have made doing the laundry a breeze if it were not for the bonfires. Our new neighbours have started getting things ready for planting their heritage beans, so while they were at it they took down a diseased orange tree and burned it, and a large pile of debris left by the previous owners. As a result, we put the sun to good use at the front of the house and dried the washing on the racks. It didn’t take long! Our neighbours have put up poles and wire for growing the beans: As a result of the sunshine I have been in shorts all week. Even when the rain came this weekend the temperature has been warm. The summer quilt is now on the bed, and the shower room underfloor heating switched off. Nature had lost its grip on sensibility however. The flax at the front seems to be sprouting a seed stem every day, and I think it has almost doubled in size in the last year. I can see us having to take it in hand. The pair of blackbird...

The Covid response lights have officially been switched off this week. Back in “the big lockdown of ’20” we were encouraged to put teddy bears in our windows to entertain folks walking by, getting what exercise they could. In “the big lockdown of ’21” we were encouraged to put our fairy lights up for the entertainment and cheering of passers-by, and we did. The white indoor ones went up in the roof of the car port, and the new outdoor multicoloured ones were draped along the front fence. I was going to turn them off when we got back to level one, but as we may go straight from level two to red, amber or green, thus not passing through level one (and not collecting £200 as we do so) the plan has changed. They have been turned off this week, the multicolour ones to the front garden, and they will be turned on again when they can be used as Christmas lights (there may be consultation required to agree when this is). Nicky likes them lit from the first Sunday in Advent, and not turned off ...