Surviving..

Don't get excited - nothing significant to report from around here. The weather is warming up though, and what is left of our garden is going crazy. I braved the potentially unsafe backyard to search for any remnants of my vege patch and was pleasantly surprised.


Some tarragon made it through:


And quite a few clumps of chives are thriving:





The lemon sage is going nuts, but I hate that stuff - it's just a glorified weed. But down in the bottom right of the photo you can spot a few small tufts of chervil:


And bizarrely, in the middle of the 'lawn', some parsley is springing up.


We have decided to start attacking the ivy which has consumed the plants on our path:


It's hard going, but satisfying, and it's nice to be doing something towards tidying things up around here.

My pessimism pays off..

Did I say we were being re-zoned? Oh, I'm sorry - I meant to say that pretty much every single property surrounding us has been re-zoned to green. We are still white. Technically white means they are still assessing us, but a very small and very pessimistic part of me is getting very slightly worried that we may in fact be told we can no longer live here because of land issues.

Could that actually happen?

Sheesh - nearly a whole months between posts.

Things are certainly slow around here, we are gradually settling into life back here - things have been dull and quiet for a while, but the past week has heralded two pieces of good news.

Firstly, we met with our landscape architect to look over his plans for the section - he thought these out before the big quake, but they are still relevant - we might just have to wait a couple of years until we can start.


I won't talk you through it - except to say we think it's awesome, and it made us excited about the house in a way we haven't been for a good twelve months.

The second piece of good news came tonight - it looks like we are being re-zoned from white to green and we all know what green means: Go!

I'm still very pessimistic though, and doubt it will really alter the snail's pace of things around here. Let's see.

Plumen.

Sorry for the unexpected hiatus - a minor hiccup on the family front. But back in action now.

The lighting situation at our place has become rather comic - all of our lampshades and lights seem to be beautiful, but useless. The ones in the living room are the worst, but the dining area and our bedroom were also pretty silly in terms of being dim (both had Poulson PH 5 shades - lovely, but pointless if you actually want to shed light on anything). Come sunset, we have been squirreling round like a couple of blind moles, in light not even bright enough to read a book in.

It got a lot worse after the earthquake, as we lost both of our table lamps.

So when we visited this lovely shop last weekend, we couldn't resist picking up something new. A Plumen bulb. They are pretty fun to look at, and as they don't need a shade should be reasonably bright. They are eco-bulbs though, which do tend to be a bit on the dim side.


Oh, and they are stupidly difficult to photograph. See better pictures here.

Let it snow...

Yes, a record dumping of snow fell yesterday. We are warm-ish. The underfloor heating is on, but I suspect we lose quite a bit through those plywood walls upstairs. This morning is sunny and clear, but the snow isn't budging yet...

FAQ: Warren & Mahoney colours.

Every now and again we're asked "what are the Warren & Mahoney colours?"

So here they are:

Blockwork - pure white inside and out

Opening window / door sashes - Hairy Heath (rust)

Window / door frames and trims - Mongoose (tan)

Warren & Mahoney used these colours almost exclusively during the 60s and 70s and the rust color was known as "Warren Tan" in the office at the time. No idea where the scheme originated, but it was applied almost without exception throughout the 60s and 70s and replaced an early, short-lived fondness for sage green trim and unpainted blockwork.

These are the Resene versions mentioned above, but you could mix up any brand to match. And the rust / tan were always applied nice and glossy, rich and wet-looking.

Miles had a fondness for orange which he used in the W&M logo and frequently for formica bench tops. Also a grey-ish blue, often used to paint concrete window lintels, chimneys and foundations.

Other things

We had a meeting with our builder and a project supervisor from Fletchers today. Looks like things are still on hold indefinitely until they sort this shizz out with the White Zone.

In light of this, and the likelihood that nothing is going to change around here anytime soon, I have decided to branch out slightly and talk about a bit of other stuff. Still modern. Like modern-y things and modern-y stuff. I will blog about the house if and when things get moving. Okay? Okay.


To kick things off.... today's Google logo. Commemorating Alexander Calder's 116th birthday. No idea who he is, but the logo is a mobile, which swings gently, and using your mouse you can spin it round. Super fun.

ps - check out what's on our Trade Me watchlist (over on the right) - if you live in Wellington and have $800 000 to spare, I'd go have a look.