Paradise pre Federal Election (photos)

September 5, 2013 by Gabrielle Bryden ♥ 14 Comments

The race is on Australia

There is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – so there!

But the spring strawberries are ripening just fine 🙂

The cumquat, lavender, bayleaf and rosemary patch is coming along sweet

cumquat may

life goes on

Buttons the calf will chew on the issues and ponderate the cruel nature inherent in life itself

The alpacas are more concerned about the state of their hair on a windy day

Merlin is getting very nervous with the approaching weekend.

Saturday is the annual shear for our alpacas, so get ready to say goodbye to the long locks (oh, and it’s the election #eek)

photo from googles images

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Citrus Fiesta (Gabrielle Bryden and Selma in the City)

January 28, 2012 by Gabrielle Bryden ♥ 26 Comments

michaels photo — Photo by Michael Bryden 'great gardener'

Twisted Lemon

Please release me
from my glazed
confinement.

I’ve done my time
in this teacup excuse
for a residence.

There’s no room to move
my roots are convoluting
and indecently squeezing.

I’m over capacity
losing ferocity
my potential is capped.

Lacking in water supplies
gravely under fertilized
cracking up to boot.

I’m looking worn and weedy
the bugs are taking advantage.
I’m a twisted lemon with
the pot bound blues.

Set me free.

I’ll repay you generously
with flower, fruit and scent
and a thorny embrace.

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Here is a poem I wrote a while back which some of you may remember – I was inspired by my very potbound lemon tree which I ‘released’ into the citrus garden.

Michael took the photo of me and added the caption ‘great gardener’ – hahaha – he loves his Mum 🙂

Now if you want to read one of the funniest short stories about the dangers of too many things lemon, pop over to the wonderfully talented Selma in the City (Selma Sargent). She wrote the story especially for the Citrus Fiesta.

Thanks Selma 🙂

Having fun with photos

August 2, 2011August 3, 2011 by Gabrielle Bryden ♥ 15 Comments

My ten year old son Michael loves to use his camera, and this is a photo he took of me in the citrus/chook garden area of our backyard. He likes to use the ‘frames’ that come with the camera and I think they look great too.

He labelled the photo of me ‘great gardener’. Isn’t he a sweety!

I wish it was true, but I have been a bit slack in the gardening department in the last year. I plan to get stuck into it soon – promise ;).

I am trying to get Michael to be systematic with his photography, which includes downloading the images onto the computer and creating some sort of filing system for each download (eg., folder labels). He got a bit carried away one day and labelled individual photos.

I am only telling you this because it was so funny when I heard Michael mumbling under his breath about what a pain it was to label each photo. He’d taken some photos of discarded finch boxes and was getting sick of trying to work out new labels for each one. In the end he got down to ‘another old nest’ and ‘I’m getting sick of this’ – haha.