Just a little Sewing Time.

It has been such a busy weekend I had little time to sew but by mid afternoon yesterday I was exhausted and had to give in and sit and sew for a while. Following some mind jogging by Digital Gran who made some felt lavender hearts, I set about making some little lavender bags from an old treasured throw over.

I think I have enough lavender to fill 6 small bags. They will be all different sizes as I had to use the still sounds parts of the fabric and try and incorporate part of the embroidery on each ( I didn't do the embroidery but  did not want to throw it away. ) Sewing that fine fabric was a nightmare, but it lets the perfume through so that is what I was aiming for.

An up date on my selvage blocks shows I have finished blue, green, black and purple blocks.

I am currently working on a fawn and brown block. I have taken to reading all the selvage messages carefully - there is quite a bit of humour to be found.
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 Thank you Molly, Thimbleanna, Jennifer and Isabelle for your concern over our kiwifruit problem in NZ. On relooking in the daily newspaper on Friday evening I see the number of infected orchards is far larger than I said -  almost double!
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 In the night our 21 beehives arrived.( they are transported at night to make sure the majority of the bees are inside the hive ( asleep? )  at the time it is moved. ) This morning is one of the windiest we have had so that makes their first day with us very difficult. It takes them far more energy to fly against the wind and they can be seen being buffeted about. It is sunny so lets hope the wind drops.
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The very first green peas are ready - just enough to steal for on a salad or eat out of the pod where you stand. My beans are also nearly there but because Polly Peacock dug so many out there will not be enough for a feed. I have since purchased some wire netting cloches to protect my subsequent plantings. I found Miss Polly lurking at my little extra garden late last evening - my she can fly well when chased! Yesterday I also wheelbarrowed compost to my garden and added sheep pellets to give things a boost.
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 Today keeping the washing on the line is a challenge. The row of socks is River
Dancing really fast. Every thing else is twisting madly..... good drying day, but tough on things.

Plenty of Company!

Yesterday afternoon while I was working on the Kiwifruit vines a bee buzzed by my face and I flicked it away....only to be followed by another and another. I then realised a swarm of bees was moving in beside me. As a precaution I moved a few vines away. After about 10 minutes most of the bees settled into a male vine at the end of the row, where they stayed for the afternoon without worrying me.

We rang our bee keeper who happened to be working over here in the BOP with his hives so at 10.30pm he came and collected the swarm. They probably weren't his bees - but it is very hard to tell, as all swarms look alike.
At the moment as there is so much to do I am trying to do appointments ( with the podiatrist ) housework; P and Q work, office work in the mornings so I can spend all afternoon till 5.30 working on the kiwifruit vines.
 As well as removing old clips and spent stems I am now thinning buds.
We are aiming to have 7 buds left on the biggest strong shoots.

 Here is one before I remove the triples.  

The first thing I do is take off the ones that will turn into flat fruit. ( I can tell by the shape of the bud ) Then space the others and pick the most vigorous.
 There can be over 1000  buds left in just one bay, so that's lots of thinning. I will never run oput of work!

The Tree and the Bees.

It's been wet.( In November we only had 22.75mm of rain. ( very dry )) Already in December we have had 80.75mm ( 3  1/4 inches ) of much needed rain.  Yesterday it was cold as well as wet so we decided to light the fire to warm the damp feeling in the house. That was when the BEES ( you remember the ones who wanted to live with us ) got their revenge ( for us killing some of them )Actually killing a lot more of them than we knew at the time.......... The fire would only smoke - the chimney was blocked with these!....

How awful we feel that they all died - they are now fertilizing the vege garden. All their other relations who have been working so hard at pollinating our fruit are still here as it has been too wet for the bee truck to come and take them home. They have been hiding in the hives during all the rain, but are out back looking for flowers again today which so far is fine. No kiwfruit flowers left now they are all little fruit but there is lots else out for them to find including Feijoas Pam!

Now the tree. I wasn't happy with my fabric tree so have redecorated it and it now looks like this.

It needed a little green and yellow.

While the rain has spoilt some flowering things ( like my sweetpeas ) there is brightness still on my wonderful Kalmia bush.

There are some  happy yellow Gerbra faces in a pot near the back door.

With all the wet we are way behind with the Kiwifruit work BUT I have done shopping ,made Christmas cakes and am working on some presents so actually I don't mind...but the work still awaits. In an hour or so I am off to lend a hand manning the Waipuna Hospice Christmas tree  at a supermarket in Tauranga, for a couple of hours.Will try and take a photo and explain tomorrow.( girls from our P & Q group help each year, and it has to be manned every day in December - we just do today. )

Have a busy weekend friends - how could you have any other sort at this time of the year.

Time in the Garden

I cut back / dead headed lots of roses and picked some pink ones for the coffee table, on Staurday evening in the cool. Yesterday was overcaste and much cooler so I spent a good part of it weeding, watering, tidying and admiring. Bumble bees fought each other for the spikey Echinops heads ( globe thistle ). I noted the contrast between those spikey heads and leaves and the smooth round leaves of the Ligustrum hedge.

Although I thought I was being careful one of the tiger lilies put pollen on my trou - it stains.

About a month ago the Alstroemeria almost dried off, with the dry, so I gave it extra water for 2 or 3 nights and it has rewarded by covering itself in those lovely red blooms again.

The strange berry / flower is on a NZ native Astelia silver spears.