Golden Sheens

I did not sleep well last night. The winds were horrendously beating the bushes and trees outside my window and the rains fell intermittently. I was seriously thinking about my Pittosporum golden sheens. These two days' winds reached 55km/h and I wondered if any golden sheen had already been snapped into twos. I wondered if we had chosen a bad time to plant them.

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When Samuel was at kinder, my friend Pascale and I visited the golden sheens. Thank God they were still standing in place but several had slanted sideways. I quickly took out the stakes and garden twine I had just bought and tied the golden sheens into place. Hopefully this will help with standing against the strong winds till they pass today.

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I had planned to water the golden sheens with my collected rainwater and seasol today but with the rain, I wont need to.

Speedy Winds

The wind speeds today can reach 60km/h and I prayed that none of my new golden sheens would be snapped down. Yesterday morning I discovered that my mosquito plant/citronella geranium had been snapped into two. It has a woody stem and is growing rather tall for its light pot. The previous day it was blown over as well. It was already budding to flower soon. Sigh, I snipped off the broken part and hope it will regrow again :

I trimmed off my thyme as I noticed that they seemed to be budding as well :

The cayenne pepper still doesnt look so good even after feeding of charlie carp or seasol or time-release fertiliser :

A Time for Flowers at our New House!

Actually today is my Hubby's birthday but haiz...we had to be out at the new house doing work as we could not reach a common date with the tradesmen and pittosporum supplier. Here's the tag from our Pittosporum Golden Sheen : Some daffodils have sprouted at the patch next to the garage :

This tiny stretch of fence will not have any Pittosporum Golden Sheen. It has some arum lily bush growing. We had relocated some arum lily from another part as it interfered with pittosporum planting (the one on the left was a relocation. Hope it survives replanting) :

Another clump. The middle one was original where else those two on its left and right are relocations :

I have let this rose shrub go haha...I have uprooted all other rose shrubs except this lucky one. I have pruned its long branches this morning without much knowledge. See if it will produce some beautiful blooms for me :

This is the plum blossoms from our plum tree. It is white instead of pink and smells mild :

My immediate neighbour has a camelia which is flowering. I really dont mind admiring hers because I have pulled up mine to make way for fruit trees :

A neighbour further away has a Magnolia tree. Beautiful tree with beautiful blossoms for ornamental purposes. I am not going to have one since it has only lovely flowers and is very expensive, so I will be content with admiring that nearby tree this time every year.

I sought the tradesman's help with identifying this succulent plant. He mentioned it was a Jade plant and this plant is grown for good luck and prosperity. Whatever, it is pretty and have lovely flowers and I will keep them where they are. I have three growing at the side of the house :

I cut a bunch of lavendars from the bush. Did that before pruning the bush :

The bush is growing well :

That's the same bush after pruning :

Another bush after pruning :

Pittosporum Golden Sheens are Up!

It rained almost the whole day yesterday. I had hoped it would not today as work was scheduled at our new house. Samuel was also having a bad cold for a few days, nose running like a tap and I could not find any childminding for him while Paul and I were going to be on site. Thankfully, the weather today was gorgeous! Sunny and clear and best of all, the soil was soft to work on. And another thanksgiving point was that Samuel recovered from his bad cold almost suddenly after a nap yesterday afternoon. No more running out of tissue paper at home! The first thing the tradesmen did was to dig holes for the two conifers to be planted at both sides of the small gate. It used to be rose shrubs. These two conifers are not cheap, costly us $70 a pot : Samuel was well enough but we decided to enclose him in the car as he would probably create some minor havoc in the garden and interfered with the work. He bothered us a little but was able to spend some time 'camping' in the car and doing 'handstands' and 'somersaults' from backseat to boot :

Our 24 pots of Pittosporum Golden Sheen have arrived. One of the pots looked a little run-down but well, I shall see how it grows :

One of the tradesmen started his work pruning my flowering plum tree :

He has pruned off quite a fair bit :

Here's the final look. May not get much plums this year but pruning was necessary :

The Golden Sheens were spaced out. 24 pots, just enough! :

This is after the plants have been planted in and given some black gold which is a type of garden compost with pig manure :

Now the tradesman work on the camelia stump and removed the concrete ring. This space will have a new tree which I have not decided what it would be :

And work went on to dig a trench around the oleander stump. Wow it was seriously massive and they mentioned they had to return with some grinder/machine to dig it out. It was too much using manual strength. And I have to clear all the sawdust produced before any possible future planting can be done because oleander is poisonous :

Signs of Life

Although it is still winter, the fruit trees in the backyard are showing that they are not so dormant after all. A lot is actually going on and here are just three : One of the plum trees, which produced just a few maroonish tiny and round but sweet plums this year, is already putting forth its beautiful white-pink plum blossoms. Scent-wise is mild.

The rest of the plum trees are also putting on buds. This is another type of plum tree and I am not sure by the time I move out, if I am able to see the beautiful blooms. It would be spectacular like what I witnessed end of last year from my living room window.

The pear tree is also having its spurs I think. It is a pity I only had a bite of one of its pears this year, the rest being eaten by feathered looters.