Coming home in 2008 with lots of projects on the drawing board had worked really well, so I did the same thing again this year.

The lovely friends who’d kept my house ‘warm’ while I’d been away had suffered, like so many other people in New Zealand, from one of the coldest winters on record.  They asked me whether I’d ever thought of insulating my garage ceiling and walls.

I’d never even noticed that it wasn’t insulated, so that was the first job.  I used a local company who recycled polystyerene packaging, compressed it and then turned it into blocks. It wasn’t long before they’d packed these blocks into every spare inch of the walls and ceiling below the house.

What I hadn’t realised, however, was that little bits would keep ‘weeping’ out of the nooks and crannies – like a permanent snow storm.  So I decided to ‘go the whole hog’ so to speak, and asked the wonderful ‘Jon the builder’ to clad the whole area.

This job took some funds that had been earmarked for other projects, so I realised that I’d have to go a little more slowly with the other plans.

One of the first jobs I wanted to do was to fit out my new ‘laundry’ cupboard with shelves.  I’d had to stop short in April 2009 because I run out of pennies. 

It was an exciting adventure, planning every shelf for a reason and making sure that everything would fit.

And it all did and it all looks wonderful.

With my plans for the interior finished, it was time to get into the garden.  When I left, the fencing on the north and east hadn’t been touched and nothing had been planted in the new beds.

The fencing was ruining the overall effect.

So something had to be done.  And Jon had the solution.

He took to the fence on the eastern boundary and matched it to the fences he’d built on the west and south. 

He even matched the northern gate with the entrance gate on the south.  And he covered up the nasty concrete wall behind the shed by doing some lovely trellis timber work to match the larger fencing boards. 

And he took the back door off the shed and replaced it with timber. Even though the timber boards are wider these days than they were when the shed was built, it looks great. 

So we celebrated the end of all his wonderful work for the year. I'm sure I’ll think of something more that needs doing in the future - because he’s so lovely to work with! 

Now was the time to start on all the work I could do by myself.

First of all, I thought I’d make the shed look completely finished by paining the new bits 

And then it was time to plant out the beds, knowing that the backdrop looked beautiful. 

First of all, I planted out the back bed, using some of the plants that had been in the garden for some time. They grew from this in September to look like this by December. 

Then I planted out the bed nearest to the house with new plants, using lots of different colours and shapes and sizes and smells.  They grew beautifully from this in September 

to look like this by December. 

Then it was time to get the summer vegies on their way, even though the ground was still very cold and I was a bit behind with the planting. 

Despite the delay they grew wonderfully well and have produced my very first crop.  The strawberries, inside the wooden cage that John built for me, were plentiful and delicious and looked very much like the ones in the shops!

Outside my back door is a little bed, just the right size for a herb garden.  Rather than plant the herbs in the garden, I decided to keep them in their pots and bury the pots into the garden. To save on the weeding work, I covered the ground with newspaper and small pebbles that I collected from the beach (under cover of darkness)!

Then I bought a clematis and a jasmine and started to train them up the fence opposite the kitchen window, loving the scent that the jasmine gives, especially in the rain or when it's watered.

While all this garden work was going on, Suzi arrived for a two week holiday which was a real treat. She used me as her base and I think she managed to see all but two of her friends which was a great pleasure for her.

Half way through her stay, we set off together for Auckland so that we could both catch up with our friends. We stopped off in Feilding to see Patsy and Rob. Rob had been President of Feilding Rotary when I was President of Plimmerton and our club had enjoyed a ‘country weekend’ with them.  I’d stayed with Rob and Patsy and we’d been friends ever since.

In Turangi we stopped off for the night with Jude and Tone who’ve settled in well to what was once their bach but is now converted into a beautiful home. Tony’s garden was a joy to see and judging from the number of runner beans he was planting while we were there, he was expecting to feed the whole neighbourhood.

The next morning we set off again and stopped off in Pukekohe with Alex and Jenny. They’d billeted me in 2008 when I was playing in the Pukekohe Open, had proved to be the most wonderful coaches both then and later and it’s great to keep in touch with them. 

We spent a few days with Bob in Greenhithe, and he took me for a lovely outing to Puhoi, a nearby settlement which boasts a wonderful cheese factory.

Staying with Bob wouldn't be 'normal' without the inevitable visit to a military band of some sort. He took me to watch a small contingent of the Air Force Band playing at an old people’s Christmas party while Suzi took my car and caught up with her friends who’d moved up there since she left two years ago.

We slipped in a lovely visit to Kate’s sister-in-law, Michele, her new baby, Millie. To our delight, Bruce and Cheryl managed to be there too.  It was such a happy reunion.

On the way home, we stopped off in Rotorua and treated ourselves to a ride up in the luge, and checked out Rotorua generally to get as much information as possible for the visit of the Sherborne team in March 2010.  We popped our noses into the Hidden Valley and Orakei Korako, a less visited spectacle than other thermal attractions. We wished we had time to walk around but unfortunately we'd left it too late in the day.

Home again, Suzi took off for a few days in Nelson while I returned to normal. She had such a lovely holiday back home in New Zealand and has thoughts of returning home before too much longer.  Meanwhile, she very happily returned to her micro-biology job in Kent, the family and her English friends.

By the time she left, Christmas was coming and I was happy in the knowledge that everyone in the family was going to be together with Kate and Bret in London. I, meanwhile, was lucky enough to be invited by my good friend, Eric, to join him at his son and family's home for Christmas in Miramar.  We had such a happy day, with four generations enjoying the sumptuous food and excellent company.

Back home again I watered the garden, and spoke to everyone in London for a couple of hours and felt as if I was enjoying their day with them. It was a lovely family day in so many ways.

So I spent Christmas being royally entertained and spoilt rotten and then, suddenly, the year had come to an end and 2010 had begun.

And, after being entertained so well, it was now my turn to entertain my friends.  My birthday falls on 3 January and I decided that I’d have two parties (because my house is little). One the day before my birthday for all my croquet friends, and one on my birthday itself for everyone else.

And both parties were fabulous fun. Once or twice I wondered if we’d disturb the neighbours with all the noise we were making, but as they were lunch time parties, I didn’t think it would worry them too much.

The weather wasn’t kind so we stayed inside, which was a pity considering how much I’d hoped people would be able to stroll around the lovely new landscaped garden!

And talking of birthdays, it was great to celebrate a special birthday with Noel at their home and with Eric down at the croquet club 

And with Phil at a very special concert event at Old St Paul's in Wellington.

And to have the chance to entertain visitors!

Arising out of the Rotary GSE team visit the previous year, I'd met a lovely couple called Jackie and Laurence Cadorel. Jackie was the Team Leader. They rang me to say that the daughter of a friend of theirs in Brittany had been involved in a nasty car accident in Auckland. And so it was that Kelly with her friend, Ludivine, came to stay for a few days for some gentle R&R. 

An old school friend, Jane Naylor, whom I’d met at the Gaudy in the summer and who was on a whistle stop tour of New Zealand, managed to spare a whole day to catch up. 

Emily Onley, niece of my very good friend  from Perth, Di Sanderson, and two of her friends, came for a visit that passed by in which can only be described as hurricane speed.

 And, following on from the wonderful hospitality Pauline and I had received in Budleigh Salterton the previous August, Jackie came for a visit in February. Pauline came down from Paraparaumu and Jackie managed to spend a couple of days with her too.

She played in the WCA Veterans Tournament at Plimmerton and did very well. Because so many members remembered her from her previous visit, we had a party at my house and she really enjoyed catching up.  Chris and Garry decided to show off their legs as they relaxed and enjoyed themselves! 

But there was still more work to be done in the garden before the Sherborne team arrived.  

With everything in the beds looking so good, I thought it would be a good idea to do something about the lawn. I was extremely fortunate to be put in touch with a very knowledgeable man called Brian Gundesen who spends hours tending the Tawa Bowling Club lawns. He paid me a visit and gave me all sorts of excellent advice.  He soon saw how bad my soil was, how full of weeds the lawn was, and he had lots of advice to offer.  

He sold me his own wonderful invention - a lawn aerator, which pumps water deep into the sub-soil. He very kindly poisoned some broad leaf weeds for me and told me to apply slow release fertilizer. What's more, he checked up on me every week or so to ask how things were going.

As a result of all his tender loving care, the lawn transformed from this, when I started, to this.  And it gets better every day. I’ve got more weeds to dig up and a few bare patches to water but the overall effect is miraculous.

And then I had to resist the urge to spend even more time in the garden and with friends and concentrate on my book. 

After spending several days in France last year, putting what I thought were the finishing touches to the first draft of my book I decided that the time had come to get it printed.

It’ll be ready for sale before the end of the year so I don’t want to spend too much time talking about it here.  You’ll be able to read it for yourself.

But I’m very excited, and it feels as if I’ve got a new member of the family.

My good friend Pamela introduced me to someone who could edit, design and print the book and we’re working closely together.

During the process, I’ve been getting great feedback from a number of friends to whom I’ve entrusted the draft and, naturally, I’m making heaps of changes.

Anne and I plan to complete the printing just in time for my return in October.  We’ll organise a function in Porirua and then I’ll see who will be interested in buying it.  I’m very surprised how much I love it.  I sort of expected to be bored with it by now. 

I'll organise a way to sell it from my web site which means that internet sales are taken care of.  It’ll be up to me to market and promote it and, no doubt, look for speaking engagements wherever I can find them so that I can talk about it.

If I come to a place near you, I hope you’ll buy it and enjoy reading it as much as I’ve enjoyed producing it.