Its his turn

"Mum! Would you rather live in a house with hundreds of rooms or in our bum house"....I look at our bum house, with its avante-guard wall joins, impulsive add-ons and hobbit height ceilings.

To the typical Mr and Mrs Jones types, our little illegitimate shed babies would look like pimples on the landscape, but to me, it is our home.

I am proud of our place, the way i imagine rich men like to skite about their investment portfolios, properties and conquests, I skite about our cheap and dodgy aquisitions. Walls made from pallets lying on the berm, Deck wood free off neighbourly, Fertiliser scooped from the neighbouring paddock in the form of cow dung for free, fire place unable to be consented by our neighbor, therefore given to us for free, the list of conquests go on.

( Just between you and me, If i were with a group of fellow, semi stingy, semi hippie, semi cool, semi uncool folk, I think my haul would take the expired dump dived cake.)

We have been here for over a year and a half now and last winter, I was on a mission to 'seasonal affective disorder proof' our place.

Despite Tui's 'Bear Grylls' philosophy of, "in winter, we need to feel the cold" mentality, i insisted we enclose the deck This has become our lounge. We finally had a place that was warm and big enough for us all to hang out.

I bulldozed the idea through to get our solar upgraded to

*Avoid spending half of our food budget on candles again (ps; candlelight is not so romantic after a week)

* read a book in bed without eating carrots,...although why is our hair is still curly?

*charge our laptop at home instead of going to McDs to win the record for the 'slowest frozen coke slurp while surreptitiously plugging in our laptop to charge' race.

We organised getting a bigger water tank, which during summer, ran out of water. Serendipitously, the neighboring paddock had treated town water pouring of the pipes. This apparently has to run out to get rid of the air in the pipes. So with a long garden hose, we were able to fill our tank up within 2 days!

I like to be surrounded by things i see as beautiful. Tui doesnt quite get the point of aesthetics and i think he sees my taste as strange and a bit of a waste of money. I mean, why would you pay money to buy a table that looks 100 years old when you can by a cheaper one that looks new.

The other day i went to Mitre 10 and spent 18 dollars on two test pots and painted the interior of our lounge, painting straight over the unsanded plaster. (more impatience than effect). My explanation for not sanding was that I love the rough look, calling it rustic, yet he calls it a 'bad job''

I love the garden and i love working in it. Tui calls me obsessed and like my mother. Every time i go to Auckland i raid the garden clearance section ( and our bank account) to rescue sick looking flora going for a '' it would be a crime if you don't buy it at that " price to lay them to rest happily at Amuarangi.

This saving however has been thwarted by the recent influx of unsavoury blue dressed, red lipped, leggy gypsies whose apathetic behavior toward uprooting desirables is very offensive

Every weekend, I expectantly wait for Tui to say those sweet words "Darling, what do you want me to do" but it hardly happens. Instead i humpf noisily around doing what i want him to do until he concedes. We have done alot, planted many trees, and garden beds and have recently put in a high security vege garden with more to come. (this is funilly enough more secure than our house)

For me, Amuarangi in its physicality has become a vision realised. It has the elements that make it functional, beautiful and liveable.

I am proud of what we have done on our land.

But at what cost.

I am a visionary, i like to make things happen sometimes at the detriment of other things. This year, has outwardly been productive but has also had its ups and downs.

In relationship with my husband, one learns that not all dreams and values are shared. Not all interests are interesting to the other and that there are different perspectives, opinions and ways of doing things.

My husband has been gracious enough to allow this vision to happen for me. Alot of it is shared but some are not. Some of his dreams are different to mine and my test is to show the same patience and grace for his that he has shown me.

So the year ahead is to help his dreams come true too. more on that to come :)

And to answer your question Ariana. "I would choose our bum house".