Did I hear someone holler 'play'?

In another place, I am having a discussion about 'play' and how it differs now from when I was a child in the early '50s. I guess we look at our own upbringing with rose-coloured glasses to some extent, and we may also forget some of the things we did and why. I cannot remember back to when I was 18 months old, as Alannah is. However, I do have strong memories from when I was 5 until I was, let's use 10. For some of that time I lived in Hornsby, and for some of that time I lived on a farm outside Denman in the Upper Hunter Valley.

I had neither play-dough nor a sand pit, but I did Matchbox cars, and I did have a dirt patch in which to play.


This week, playing at Ma's, we introduced play-dough. I have no idea whether Alannah has used play-dough much before. She was hesitant on the Monday, but by the Wednesday she took to it with alacrity. For her, it has a very physical proponent. She like the feel of it, and the fact that she can mould it and pull it to bits. She is learning to roll it in her hands, and by next week maybe a ball will result. On Wednesday, I made her a Daddy and I made her a Mummy. We made balls, and snakes, and stars.

We have played with a sand-pit all year. We have play with small cars and trucks for longer than this year. But for the first time on Wednesday, we combined the two. We also used our collection of rocks, and shells, and leaves, to decorate the castle in the middle of our sand-pit, while the trucks brrrrmmmed around in the moat. I suspect this game with be expanded this coming week.

Metamorphosis

It had to happen, of course. That my courtyard garden change into a toddler's playground. Oh, the plants are all still there. They are still growing, and being infested, and flowering, or not. The veggies were a one-season wonder. I get more pleasure from the annuals and the succulents. And they have fewer bugs.


But now that I have a toddler over to play twice a week, THAT is the focus of my courtyard. So, I have decided to transfer the stories about our play-dates from 'Plumbing' to 'Dolwendee'. Back in the years 1982 to 1985 I ran a Family Day Care in my garden in St Ives. The house there was transformed, too. Down on side, there was a go-cart track, with tyres, and planks and a skid pattern into the wall at the bottom. I guess you could say that I have form.

Anyways, look at the difference between these images of Alannah painting, and the shots last week of her first foray (at Ma's place) into painting. For starters, we ditched the smock. Mainly because Alannah insisted 'No more'. Then we got proper artists brushes rather than brushes used by house-painters. And and and ... I put loads my paint into the pots, which caused her to grunt with pleasure.

*Hand on heart* ... this was all Alannah's work, this painting. I did not guide the brush in any way. She would look at me in that way that says 'are you nuts?'

The solace of sweeping

There is a certain calmative effect engendered by the rhythmic sweeping of a courtyard.

See that massive tree towering over my courtyard, resplendent in its summer livery? Hiding within that livery lurk spots of bright orange, thousands of tiny seeds. Circular seeds. Hard seeds. Seeds that are now, in this fading summer that never-was, falling inexorably onto the bitumen and courtyard below. Just yesterday, I heard the first crunch-crunch as the passing traffic squashed them into oblivion. Noisily into oblivion.

Those that fall into my courtyard, do so silently, but nevertheless messily.

Following that denuding. comes the autumnal falling of leaves, and leaves, and leaves. For months on end. Seemingly until the lime shoots find their way through the branches with the turn into the spring. But before they sprout into incipient leaves, we have the floating of 'fluff'.

A spawning if you will ... a mess of a spawning.

A cycle that encompasses the year. A year of messes, which require sweeping. And sweeping is such sweet solace.

Saving grace

Every time that I move my place of abode, and it has been fairly frequent in the last 15 years, I declaim in my over-the-top way, that I must have dirt. I need to be rooted. Where I am at the moment is fairly expensive (and getting moreso with each contract), but the size of the outside is nearly as big as the size of the inside, and this suits me just fine. Not only does it sustain the inner me, but it also enables me to play host for play-dates with my grand-daughter, Alannah.


There have been, and continue to be, so many wild'n'wooly things happening in my 'greater' life in the last 12 months, that my daughter and I have agreed that it is time to move onto the next phase. We have agreed to find housing that suits her young family, and includes me as well. We are giving ourselves this calendar year to sort it out, and to find a property. They are all horribly expensive, and there is a specific layout that we are after. We have found one, but it is on the market now and we are not ready to action anything just yet. What we do know is that neither of us want to be involved with residental care for me, if we can sort an alternative.

But it will have a garden, and she is more than happy, nay overjoyed, if I were to take that on as my own personal fiefdom!

Virtual world of zombied friends

On 'Sydney Eye' durng this week gone, I made a crack about the younger generation and their penchant for mindless computer games and electronic gadetry. And I did not twig that what is good for the goose, is good for the gander. Being someone who spends an inordinate amount of time in a virtual blogging world, does that make me, and those with whom I am in touch, zombies. Well, to reassure folks, that would be a definite 'non'! And this little parcel from Ararat which arrived late Thursday, is proof of that particular pudding.


Inside the parcel - to open I did not beat around the bush, but went straight to the Stanley Knife - was a cornucopia of goodies: two jars of home-made jam; two brown paper bags of purple potatoes; and, a handwritten note. What joy! I even put the parcel into my caddee and took it out to MUH to walk Kirsten through it. She was entranced. The fact that she threw up nearly immediately, was by-the-by.


All through yesterday morning as my 'baby girl' underwent yet another round of surgery (the 5th in twelve months), I slaved around my courtyard moving anything that was heavy. Actually, everything that was heavy. I wanted the taller things to provide afternoon shade, and I wanted more space for child's play. And there is another issue. I have been losing plants of late. Not meaning they disappear over the fence. No, they simply cark it! Why? Why? Why? I ask myself. Out loud.

Too much rain? Not enough sun? Not enough watering? Or ... eerie music ... Is my upstairs neighbour doing nefarious things when I am not looking? I lost a large Lavender. I lost my Wollemi Pine. My Lemon tree is sickly (now I ask you, who could kill a lemon tree?) And that Gardenia Augusta up near the gate looks out for the count.

Ah, well, what the heck! Look what I just had for brekkie ...

Staple of the Great Depression - Rhubarb

I thought to start by listing the staple Australian foods of The Great Depression. However, upon reflection, maybe I should specify which Depression! I mean, of course, the depression from 1929 to about 1935. The one where everyone was so scared of losing their money, they all stopped spending, and started saving. All at the same time. Meaning not enough people were buying to keep companies liquid, which resulted in lay-offs. And so the circle goes around.

I think the staples of that era were things one could grow oneself, or find in laneways or up in the town common: rabbits, chokos, rhubarb, lemons, passionfruit, apple cueys, iceberg lettuce, Grosse Lisse Tomatoes, offal (cheap from the back-door of the butchers - especially tripe).


My rhubarb is growing well - better than anything else I have planted. See what the back of the packet says: 'Start harvesting when the leaves have some colour'. But don't eat the leaves as they are toxic. Only take a few outside stems during the first year.

It has been a strange old summer. I have pulled the lettuce and the baby pumpkin, as they both succumbed to mould. I squash about 10 green grubs each morning from assorted plants. A runner on my strawberry has rooted, and is sending up shoots.

As Kirsten and her family are down the South Coast for a few days, I went over and re-organised her balcony pots this morning. Need to find a punnet of Sweet Williams before Wednesday. Somewhere ... on a bus route.

Three steps empty and two steps full

It is all very confusing and disheartening at the moment. It could be the weather. It could be me. More likely a combination of the two. I am losing plants more than I like at the moment, and I cannot figure out why. I lost a Redwing Azalea. I lost a French Lavender. I lost a lime, and my lemon is not firing on all cyclinders. Now my Wollemi Pine has curvature of the spine. I also have an influx of pests. More snails than normal. White butterflies chasing the tomatoes that I have and the guy in the flat above me has. Because I spray my tomatoes, the WB lays on nearly everything else. I have to be assiduous in looking under leaves for green caterpillars. I also have an invasion of sucking midges, which are keen on my 'erbs. Trials and tribulations.


Anyway, here are some Rockmelons I am growing from seed using the 'market forces' philosophy. Give them a chance to prove their mettle, and then weed out the runts of the litter. I shall weed down to perhaps four, and then see how that goes. Neither the pumpkin nor the zucchini is overwhelming me with produce. They don't seem to be able to carry fruit to term.

Here is an afternoon shot of my courtyard. I wonder if I do not get enough direct sunlight to be successful with a veggie garden.