Winter Vacation

Life has been extremely busy and I'm taking a tiny bit of time-out from my dinner-cooking for our guests tonight to post this. I'm cooking up a storm - it's going to be great, and I'll need to bake a birthday cake as well. Looks like another busy day ahead of me. There has been rain everyday intermittently still, fortunately rain here seldom goes for days on end, there's always "dry patches" in between, which makes it easier for living, even though "experts" say we do need more. I took my three kids to gymnastics on Monday afternoon around 5.30, it was quite an experience driving while waters were pouring out of the heavens, literally. I could barely see ahead of me with the curtain of rain pelting down hard on the windscreen while I was trying to "inch" the car forward on the road. Many mothers admitted they wouldn't have bothered to take their kids to gymnastics on that day if it wasn't for the "all-important" (to the kids) colour-award day when the kids would get assessed for their level and progress onto the next level according to gym standards. We stayed in the car to wait for the heavy downpour to pass when we got there, as we knew there would be no use in trying to hold our umbrellas up in this storm. Sure enough, after about five minutes, everything was calm again and we could get out of our car and stay dry without an umbrella. That night hail was forcasted, but I didn't get to see it. During this rainy and windy stretch, I also noticed the tree roses (Standard Roses) in front of this particular house in our neighbourhood which we pass by everyday have bent over in all directions and the weight of the "mop-top" keeps pulling them loose from their stakes. One good look at the stakes and I realised they are a bit too short for the height of the tree roses. I cringed as I was watching the wind beating on the skinny stems, almost praying for them that they wouldn't snap and for the owner to quickly secure them back. This is a classic example of not laying the good foundation right from the beginning. Often people want to save money and so they opt for the shorter stakes, but in doing that you end up spending more in the long run. These tree roses are not cheap, it would be a pity if they snapped. However, I know sometimes it is because we didn't know from the start what we needed to do, we make mistakes and learn from them, and some of these mistakes cost us. Either way, I hope these tree roses will survive. They are "Fragrant Plum" roses if I'm not mistaken, gorgeous and distinctive colour! Below are some photos of more roses. They are all David Austin Roses. The top two pictures are of Radio Times . The first one I took in Oct (Spring) last year and the second one, yesterday. The interesting thing is apart from the difference in the intensity of the colours, they almost look like two different kinds of roses, well, just about. Have to admit the roses in the second picture had been battered in the rain and wind, in both cases, they are still beautiful, but just different. So beware when you pick your roses just by looking at Catalogue pictures. These two pictures above were taken in January this year, the one below was taken yesterday, all of them are of Tamora, a very floriferous apricot beauty, they look different at different times of the year.