If I had walked in my backyard in Kuna and taken 30 pictures and written a blog post about it I would have felt ridiculously self-important. I still feel a little silly – but I know there are people who are interested. And two years from now, five, ten years from now these pictures and this post will be valuable to ME.
So without further ado, our garden!
We quickly learned during house hunting that you don’t refer to the space behind your residence as a “yard.” When the British hear “yard” they think more along the lines of a courtyard; something brick and concrete. “Green spaces” as HHI likes to refer to them, are most often referred to here as a garden. (Not like a produce or flower garden, although most of my neighbors have both.)
We REALLY wanted a garden of some sort and we turned down a really amazing house in the heart of Greenwich because it had no garden. (And it was on a busy road and a bit out of our price range, but Richard would have had about a 10 minute, really inexpensive commute!)
There are two compost bins in the garden that are utterly disgusting. Suggestions? They are infested with mold and insects and I have no idea what to do with them!
I thought the shed would be perfect for storing the suitcases but then I got all creeped out about spiders so I’m not sure what I’ll do with it. It has a lawn mower and a set of golf clubs and a few other things in there. It’s not a lawn mower like you are thinking, it’s a small lawn trimmer that looks straight out of the 50’s, but it’s practically brand new. And the golf clubs are bonus, they are actually quite nice and Richard didn’t ship his.
Our giant pear tree. Unfortunately all the pears are in the top third of the tree, probably totally inaccesible. Unless I get my tree-climber on…
From the upstairs windows I can see down into my neighbors gardens (go ahead and call me Mrs. Kravitz) and I’ve noticed that my neighbors on one side eat on their patio whenever weather will permit. It always looks so pleasant. So maybe we’ll invest in some patio furniture. *Sigh.* More funiture.
I know there are disadvantages to living in such close proximity to other people, you can hear their conversations if you listen closely. But I kind of love the community feel. I met one of my neighbors the other day and she invited me in immediately and went to make tea straightaway, but I told her I couldn’t stay because I’d left my kids at home.
Coming from a house made of the cheapest materials possible, plywood and vinyl siding, I can’t get enough of the brick. It’s so NOT uniform, NOT new, NOT plastic. The trees are huge and the six or seven gardens I can see from upstairs are all so different and full of character. Looking out the windows has become a favorite pastime of mine.
The back of the house on the right side. The window above the door is Cameron and Eli’s room. You can see at the top that we share a wall on one side with our neighbors, whose house is painted white.
The back of the house on the left side. The top window is Miriam and Simon’s room and the bottom window is the downstairs WC, which makes using the toilet a little awkward if you don’t bother to close the blinds. The white gate goes to a small alley-space between our house and the next one, where we store the rubbish and recycle bins.
The bamboo that is threatening a take-over of the garden.
The lawn, also known as the football pitch.
Coming from our spacious backyard in Kuna to this small green space would have been a tough pill to swallow, so I’m grateful that we had three weeks with only a patio for the kids to play on. No one has complained so far, and the nice thing about mild summers here is that when it’s not raining the kids are so happy to be out there.
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Just Your Average Jo 
I love your garden. It’s everything I imagined after watching so many BBC shows.
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