Day 341 - State of the garden

Things are blooming or promising to. The stephanotis is bursting with buds.

Look how big it's grown. Sorry about the sun-bleached photo but I couldn't block out the setting sun.

Both buddleia are blooming - the purple and the white. The white one is competing for space with the crab apple.

And that's it from our garden segment this week. How is your garden growing?

Day 327 - Back to the garden

When there's no photo at the end of the day, and nothing much will happen - you know it - it's back to the garden. Here's one of my recent additions to the Scorched Summer Garden. I think (not absolutely sure) that this succulent will tolerate heat better than the camelia which used to be in this north-facing, open spot.

Otherwise, nothing new. At work I spent most of the day shelf-reading, which to library plebs, means you start at one end of your shelves and put all the books in order. Easy enough, you think, but once you get more than six numbers after the decimal point, not to mention the first three letters of the author's surname, the brain gets a bit fried. If you do it most of the day.

Day 324 - Relief after a very hot day

Sometime during the afternoon of an extremely hot day (lucky us in the library with air conditioning), we heard the rumble of thunder and waited for the welcome sound of rain. Instead the fire siren sounded and we walked, grumbling, into large but sparse drops of rain and - finally - a coolish breeze. Three fire trucks later, pointing to the dust storm as the cause of the alert, we returned to work. Driving home, it was good to wind down the windows and feel the cool air rushing in.

After dinner, I could smell the wet greenness through the open windows, so I decided to go for a walk to check out garden casualties.

Spring growth has added size to trees.

This is the only rose on the bush; the others have already bloomed and dried out. I'm happy to see the kangaroo paws starting to flower (pictured above).

Day 225 - Winter garden

The winter garden is surprisingly colourful. I took some photos in the late afternoon, with the sky darkening to an intensity which precedes heavy rain. Then I sat inside and watched the sheets of rain drench the grateful plants.

Day 203 - Helleboris

I love Helleboris and the way it adds colour to the Winter landscape. This white one is so white! Amongst other favourites in the garden, I really like the deep purple one.

Day 148 - Home sick

At home with an inner ear thing. It's better not to move the head much. Thought I'd snap the last of these Stephanotis blooms. Soon everything will bare itself in the garden.

Day 139 - Ballet

The Australian Ballet School is celebrating its 45th anniversary with a couple of concerts. Fortunately my day off coincided with one of the daytime performances. I'd forgotten how exquisite ballet was, and how it transported the viewer into an entirely different zone. The students performed Swan Lake Act II; Matya's Dance with music by John Williams - gypsy-like, I thought; Songs of Light with music by Radiohead; and Graduation Waltz with music by Glazunov. An hour in a different world. I should do this more often.
In the afternoon, I returned to the garden to do some replanting. The trees are almost bare with snatches of yellow and red, soon to be a memory.

Day 129 - Flower clock

As far as I can remember, this clock in the gardens on St Kilda Road, across the road from the Gallery of Victoria, has been an ever-changing flower display. At the moment, it's in between plantings, but I've always enjoyed looking at the different, coloured designs.

Day 66 - Rose pink

Just when I'm ready to pull these tired old rose bushes out, the roses appear and interrupt the cull. Well, I can't pull them out just now, can I?

Day 31 - Heat damage in the garden

After several days well over 40 degrees celcius, some of the plants in my garden have been burnt to a crisp. Just as I was thinking the camellias have never looked so green and bushy, one day of 46 has finished them off. The robinia, a favourite of mine with its giant ball-shaped greenery - has lost all its leaves and created a crackly carpet on the grass underneath it. Today we have a drop in temperature, but in my area it's still going to be 39 degrees. I suppose that's better than 46 but the next few days will be in the mid-to-low 30s which is an improvement.