Letters from Wetville

It was the 1970s. A concrete building in Stoke, where we traipsed in, children of a long tradition of religious adherence. Our parents, or mothers if only one, had listened through the Latin Mass, attended Catholic schools, married nice boys (or girls) and carried on the faith. Of course it would be tempting to think that this concrete building, perhaps a contender for the least aesthetically beautiful church in town (particularly when you consider that beauty is allowed in Roman Catholicism), represented a challenge to those used to something more gorgeous. Yet in New Zealand, many many people worshipped in shanties and small wooden buildings unless they were in the centre of the larger cities, and I struggle to imagine the nineteenth century churches of rural and working class Ireland as places of physical grandeur. The old timers talk of the beauty of the Latin Mass. Nobody talks about the buildings that I have noticed. The tradition was of belief through word and ritual, of faith a...

Looking down on Woodstock, Westland 2009. Hoki Bridge & River. On the beach, Hokitika. On the beach with Batman, in my new skirt. Seeing red. Sunflowers climbing up slowly. Large gaps in the punga raised bed ready for some more planting.

again. This time it is my computer, an aged and temperamental piece of plastic which we nurture and endure because there are no funds for a replacement and so many other things on the funds list ahead of it that it isn't really on the list. Last week it accepted my camera no problem. Yesterday and today, no way. So that's a bugger because I wanted to show pictures of our new red hot fence which Favourite Handyman painted on Christmas Day afternoon while I had a sleep. [yes. I agree. Very very very wonderful. I am keeping him on. Forever.] And a bugger because I wanted to show a picture of my new skirt which I finished yesterday. I've worked out how to have my sewing machine set up so I can flip between computer and sewing machine with ease and that has speeded up sewing progress quite a bit. What has really whoompahed it up though is FH looking after the children while I sew in daylight hours. I'm half way through turning an op-shop skirt made of floral cotto...

Never mind the lurgy, or Fionn's asthma, or not going camping for Christmas after all due to points a and b. Today I bought a pail of 'Resene Red Hot' paint which is going to light up the fence in our side garden like a fireworks sparkle. I have coveted a truly, deeply, intensely red fence or wall for some time and now I have a husband ready to make it happen. YAHOO!! Time to go to bed and kick the last vestiges of lurgy. I have a husband who is going to make me eggs and hollandaise for breakfast and the lounge is full of presents for the children and Favourite Handyman also made us a wonderful headboard out of rimu and macrocarpa (entirely recycled from gifted wood as friends have left town) AND I'm getting a red fence. Must be Christmas or something equally wonderful. Hope you all find something to love in tomorrow.

It's rained for a huge part of December. The humidity and sudden changes in temperature have wrought their toll on my boy and we are on the second night of asthma watch. Tenting on Tuesday is looking distinctly less likely. The vegetables seem to cope with the rain much better than the fruit. Below is my celery gone to seed and now so heavy it has toppled over. The cabbages nearby are testament to one big learning this season - it doesn't matter how cabbages we grow, we still don't actually eat much cabbage. I've thought of making sauerkraut but haven't done anything with that thought. You can see the marigolds just in bud if you look closely at the foreground. I think this second photo might be evidence of the cottage garden potager look I fancied from the organic magazines when I first started creating my garden three years ago. The strawberries have survived from last year so strongly I haven't the heart to pull them out. I found two lovely lush rip...

I remember vividly many revelations as I got 'into' feminism in my student days. I remember learning about how the closer teaching got to mothering, the less it was paid. At that time, secondary school teachers got paid more than primary school teachers and the pay in under five centres was pitiful. I knew women who really wanted to work in the preschool sector but trained for teaching older children because the pay wasn't really liveable. Not to support a family anyway. I've read journalism probing some of the issues around educated middle class women employing someone else to clean their toilet. I cleaned myself as a student for a good employer and appreciated the work. I babysat for various families from 14 onwards and in my twenties pulled out of working for one family who wanted extensive day care for two very small children in their home for two thirds of the then minimum wage. I don't have to pay for my friend C to clean. I don't have to pay for her...

The punga raised bed today. I kept the photo side on because I like the slightly surreal effect. Lovely healthy kale here whereas seedlings planted at the same time elsewhere are quite scrawny still. My jerusalem artichokes heading skywards. I would love to know the name of this flower, if anyone can help. Nasturtiums scrambling over the fence. I would like things scrambling over fences rioting with colour everywhere. Apart from convulvulus that is.