Winter sun, winter berries

Winter is definitely here.   So little sun today and bad weather approaching.    Freezing cold wind, blackened twiglets but firey red in the Nandina berries.

Autumn past, leaves cast.

The Cotoneaster leaves offered a wide palette of colours while the Nandina offered its scarlet intensity.  The past autumn with its crisp nights, clear sunny and calm days meant a more striking autumn season here in the garden.

Wordless Wednesday

Playing with autumn light and colour

A new “smarty pants” camera means a lot of playing is needed to learn how it works and how to get satisfying results with it.

The Japanese Maple tree has provided me with a great subject to play around with on the camera.  I also love to explore light as I take photographs.

So some of these following images are taken with the sunlight behind me, some with the leaves backlit, others a wonderful example of the sheer beauty this tree has offered to us in the past fortnight.

Fire and Ice

After a long, gentle, mild autumn, winter finally arrived here a week or so ago bringing with it snow on our nearby hills. This is not a common occurrence.

The next night or two saw frosts coat the rooftops, cars and grass. Another relatively uncommon occurrence given how close we live to the Pauatahanui Inlet and its maritime influence that moves or warms the air.

We have a number of flowering cherry trees in and around our garden and they had been very slow to turn into their autumn colours.

This bitter cold snap has seen a dramatic change and some very striking colours emerge.

The nice aspect after a good frost, as seen here along a fence in the garden

 

is the stunning sunny, blue sky day that can often provide a clear backdrop to this firey beauty in the cherry tree leaves.

A garden in Hawkes Bay

We stayed with relatives in Hawkes Bay and in a welcome space of time away from the hospital I wandered about their lovely garden with the camera.

The climate in Hawkes Bay is so very different to our one here in Porirua and gardens grow luxuriantly there. Different plants thrive in the dry, scorching heat of summer and the frosty cold winters.

So here are some of the plants I photographed during my time out in nature. The intense heat and light of mid morning was not the best time for photography but I wanted to capture those extremes.

Pink

In an attempt to search out colour in our constant parade of grey,gusty, damp days here is Pink from my garden.

Tiny pinks with weeds!

Dianthus that first came from my mother’s garden.

“Boiled sweet pink” climbing geranium

Pink Rock Rose, one of a mass of flowers.

First pink climbing rose

Pink climbing rose buds

Frothy pink flowering cherry blossom, always an October bloomer.

Filling the well

It has been a dry season.

Our summer since mid January has been near perfect – hot, dry and calm or breezy with only the occasional deluge of rain.

The outdoor conditions have been mirrored indoors here with one issue and another needing a lot of resourcefulness and resilience.

Today I needed to fill my well.

I needed to play.

And seek treasure.

I needed to see growth and development.

I needed to hear waves breaking.

To look to a wider horizon.

To do some blue sky dreaming.

To witness flow.

To soak up colour and beauty and creativitiy.

To know that “all will be well and all will be well and all will be well.”

A day with heat and colour

By 2pm yesterday it was 26C here. That is a hot day for us. Thanks in part to the heat wave being sent over the Tasman Sea from Australia.

I went out for 20minutes and snapped some “heat and colour” photos.

Rain, colour, light and the sunset

Last night as the sun was setting the sky and house were filled with golden light which attracted my attention.

It was raining heavily and to the east and south there was an impressive rainbow and in fact, to the south a double rainbow, the second one faint and softly hued.

The sky was a real mix of pink and golden tones…….with a purple toning in the mix too.