Christmas has arrived late ...

Well, finally, it's time to unwrap and assemble our Christmas present. It came flat-packed in two monster cardboard boxes. They've been stored leaning against the garage wall all through the winter.



Unpacking the boxes revealed a giant 3D child's wooden jigsaw puzzle. A quick look at the instructions and hey, away I went ...



the first "A" frame assembly complete

Both "A" frame assemblies complete. The sharp eyed among you may notice that there is a very minor, but significant, difference between the assemblies. This minor difference resulted in me having to take the top section apart and re-assemble it. About an hour after this photo was taken (you'll notice that there's a shortage of photo's between the next one and the final assembly ...).





The seat all assembled, and looking very smart.





Of course, it would never have gone as smoothly had squeak not supervised ...



So, the final product in place, and a glass of G&T to celebrate it's completion.

I think a couple of things to note here. First - it's my photography that's at an angle, not the seat. Second - the slabs went down very roughly, being placed directly on the soil, as a place to store the final assembly and are not the finished job. Laying them like this also gave us chance to ensure the final position is right for the garden - we think there will be a minor adjustment but we're really quite happy with the swing.





The view from the swing. These two photo's should be joined and when (if!) I get the hang of the photo editing software that came with the camera then i'll give it a go.

Pictures will resume.

Guess who received a fabulous camera for his brithday. It's able to take quite high- resolution photographs (up to 7.2 megapixels). Updating tem to the blog would take forever so i'll only be posting the 1 megapixel photographs.

Of course, the downside is that the photographer can no longer blame his equipment for the poor quality images ...



The Clematis Armandii ... from our bedroom window (Full 3x Optical zoom and 2x Digital zoom to get this close...). It's giving a wonderful display this year!


This is the Camellia at the front of the house - using the camera's close-up (macro) feature.



The Magnolia Stellata. Another great present. the light was fading so the camera flash operated. the early flowers have been touched by last week's frost but it still looks lovely




Daffodils in the front garden.



The coral-bark Acer (you'll have to ask Janet for its proper name). The flash and the Phormium behind combine to make it glow ... It'll be specatcular once it's grown a little.





These, whatever they are, have survived all sorts of mis-treatment. And they're really rather sweet.




A Pieris ... Janet said she'll have to look up the name of this one ... It's another fabulous plant (despite pink flowers) that has given this show of flowers for quite some while now, with no sign of abating.




March 24th and it looks really quite lush from this angle... The garden, on the whole, is looking good for this time of year.


A bamboo with an untypable name ...