Friday, May 9, 2008

Our Secret Garden

We are one of the lucky few in the downtown Sydney area who has a garden, now I would normally call this a backyard-- but when in Rome, right? And garden sounds so much fancier.

We've polluted our garden with a really cheap metal swingset from ToysRus. At first, I was very attracted to the retro look and feel of our new "child entertainment system". The telling part is that the assembly and installation were more expensive than jungle gym thingy itself. And six months after purchasing it, the poor contraption is rusted, missing pieces, and when my kids ride on the see-saw swing, the entire unit violently rocks and squeaks, as though it is seconds from flying out of the ground. Needless to say, the boys have been advised that the only safe thing to use until the piece-of-shit eyesore is removed is the slide. Pardon my French, but really, it is. Notice below the cute 70's-ish-nish of it, and conversely the sadness of the missing handring :( .



Other, more gardeny, things you can find in our little paradise are some pretty pink flowers (no idea what kind they are), a fountain turned into a planter with a gorgeous little terracotta cherub and Spanish tile, and of course more potentially lethal Australian spiders.

I just got a new camera, so I enjoyed some alone time in the garden this morning trying out my expensive and fragile toy-- which I have no clue how to work properly.








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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ooo, I had a swingset like that when I was a kid! The thing was rusted inside and out too, and I remember it rattled so violently that my dad eventually had to cement the legs into the ground. Ah, memories...

Showed your pics to my Sydneysider-native husband, and he says the spider looks like a St. Andrew's Cross. He says they aren't poisonous but their bite really hurts.

Laura said...

You are going to be laughing when I admit that I had no idea that the non-poisonous spider bite...
wow, that is a terrible revelation. Now I have to really take this spider thing seriously. Does your hubby have a verdict on my other spiders-- there is a blog entry about spiders.
I'd love to know.