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I thought that given the inordinate amount of rain we have had in the first half of this year we needed to talk about gardening when it rains 5 days out of 7! Water is generally essential for growing anything and yet a surfeit of water makes it difficult to grow anything.

I am very, very excited, spring bulbs have arrived at Newtons! I have been waiting for the arrival of these little nuggets of joy for the longest of times and now they are finally here. We have four varieties available - Tulips, Hyacinths, Narcissi (Daffodils) and Muscari.

The recent cyclone and flooding has made a couple of things a bit clearer to me, the first is how lucky we have been to live in a country for so long that is able to produce so much of its own food. And secondly, just how much we have undervalued many of our food producers.

Lesson learned from summer gardening - do not attempt to remove hedge with a shovel in the middle of the hottest day of the year with no protection from the sun. It took me days to recover. There will be no such attempts at martyrdom this coming Anniversary Weekend as the recent run of golden weather comes to an end and my garden gets some much needed rain.

Christmas is almost here and a welcome end to what has been a very hard year for most of us. So it’s important to use this holiday well and celebrate what we have in the here and now! Right now it's summer and all the glorious things that it brings. Long hot days, luscious summer fruit and a rest from the hustle and bustle of modern life.