Australia Day

Two weeks before Christmas, the builder offered me the keys.  No, the house wouldn't be quite finished but he knew how desperate I was to get in.  But apparently, you can't have the keys unless you pay the final bill.  And, that wasn't going to happen either.  So when I asked the builder then, "when might be the day for handover?", I was told, "Australia Day".

Today.

No keys.

House, still not even finished. 

Nevermind. 

We still went out to the land (for some reason, I still refer to it as that!) with the intent to start planting some of the garden.  We found the ground to be very soft as Brisbane has had some intense weather again this January.  And we discovered 2 large spots of subsidence (one possibly bordering on an erosion/landslide).  So our day quickly went from doing to dreaming. 

Talking positively of these dreams of ours, turned out to be quite cathartic.
So .. the plan:

Out the front of the house, here, we plan to run 2 conifers up the front posts of the porch (there's actually downpipes in front of the posts, carefully aligned and colour coordinated with the house, but...)

Then, in front of the butterfly stairs, at either end, I was thinking of a shaped/topiary conifer like buxus. 

We're hoping to run a rather plain picket fence along the front and have a lilly pilly hedge sitting behind (house-side).  I'd also like either lavender or agapanthus running street-side of the fence.  I like some formality in small front gardens.  It won't be a spot for us to spend much time in, so has to be quite low maintenance.  Dear Husband is most worried about my talk of conifers and planting out a mower-patch though!

So, to the back of the house.

It's a blank canvas.  Really blank if you exclude the lantana and singapore daisy which is madly creeping out of the creek.  This pic here, is from our back deck (and don't mind the race track that the neighbours' kids carved out!)

In the foreground, mid-right hand side, dear Husband is planning a pool.  Beyond that, along the right hand side I want a vegetable patch.  A gorgeous, wonderful self-sustaining old fashioned vege patch.  Then further down that side, a fruit orchard, with the top corner finished in a Jacaranda tree.

Can you picture that?  I might even run a series of Jacarandas along the back there.  Come November each year, I'd be looking out onto a purple carpet of flowers *swoon*, my attempts to be distracted of the impending exam period!

Dear Husband fancies a shed on the left hand side, some kind of man-cave thing.  So I plan to put the chicken coup over there too.

Obviously there may be spots of plants, flowers, swings or play equipment, possibly even a garden bench, perhaps a structure covered in vine. I'm not sure what else to be honest, I haven't even mapped out how much room that is likely to take up, not to mention the time its upkeep will consume! That may involve a reality check!  

But I'm going to love every minute of it - my quasi country life!

Happy Australia Day to all. I hope you had a great day, whether it be dreaming or doing :)


Suz x