The Garden in July

Well, the year is past its half-way point.  And I am left wondering how it could possibly have gone this quickly.  Evenings are already starting to lengthen again, and there are bright pink blossoms in bloom along our walkway.  They are always early, but it feels like they must be especially so this year!  The tui have been visiting our garden on and off, dipping their beaks into a red camelia, then a pink one.  Now they are heading down to the walkway, to savour the pink blossoms. 

The Big Garden saw a bit of activity this past month.  My dad requested, and was duly presented with a Reed avocado tree for his birthday back in April.  It now has a home in the garden, complete with a square frost cloth frame to protect it while it is still small.  The feijoa tree is probably rueing the day it ever heard the word "avocado."  It had a prune.  The mass of aged branches has been culled to allow light to reach the small avocado now nestled in front of it.  (Don't tell the feijoa, but it is on numbered days: once that avocado is big enough to block the view through to the neighbour's house, it is bye-bye feijoa!).  Munchkin and I watched proceedings from a safe distance, until he decided the noise of the chainsaw was getting to be a bit much and we retired into the house to play with the magnets on the fridge! 

I do love the beauty of these gnarled branches.  Not a very good photo to share with you as it was taken just before dark, but I hope you can see how beautiful the shape of each branch is.  Practicality and aesthetics all rolled into one.  What more could we ask for?!

The babaco are still holding a lot of fruit, despite the colder weather (they are frost sensitive so lose their leaves every winter).  Munchkin and I have been eating stewed babaco on our porridge and it is YUM.

A self-sown borage obviously doesn't realise it is winter, nestled happily in beside the celery and broccoli (which, incidentally don't seem to realise it is winter either - they are starting to form heads!).

I just LOVE these gorgeous hot pink geraniums along the front of the raspberry bed.  The flowers are starting to look a little bedraggled now, but even in their nearly-past-it state, they are a flush of vibrant colour on even the most dreary day.  They are so bright, you can see the small heads from inside my parents dining room.

And my favourite thing right now about it being July?  Daphne.  One of our neighbours has a prolific plant and the scent wafts across the footpath every time I go out for a walk.  Yes, I have been known to stop and hang my head over their fence and inhale deeply!  This bush is at my parents, tucked between house and concrete wall.  There is now a flower in a vase on our toilet windowsill.  Perfect.  Delicious.  I only wish I could eat them (I wonder if they would taste how they smell?).  Daphne is such a divine scent.  For me though, it also holds so many memories.  My Granny always had a daphne bush.  When we buy a house again, I am going to have one too.

We are still harvesting mandarins, although I'm getting to the point of needing a ladder soon!  There are lemons galore.  Lemon honey (lemon curd) perhaps?  Delectably delicious, but oh, so bad for the figure!  The early broccoli are still offering tender side shoots, and the celery has had a new lease of life, perhaps since having some blood and bone applied a few weeks back.  Spinach, pak choy, and lettuce round up our regular harvests.  Not bad at all for a garden that is practically human-free most days at present!

What's been happening in your garden lately?
Amy