Joy with my new garden

I've been wanting to write about my little garden for a while now. What's been stopping me? I've concluded that it's because it is not perfect, several aren't doing that wel! But that's a terrible excuse. Not all the plants are at their best, but it is winter time here, getting down to zero at nighttime, not the best time for plants! And because most of them are new to me and the conditions in this new apartment are also new to me, so I've been making lots of little adjustments: to plant placement (light and temperature variation), how much I water them.

These last five months has been a rebuilding time for my little potted garden. I got back some of the plants that I gave to others to take care of for the year we were away. Not all the plants made it through the transition to different locations and caretakers, so there was a fair bit of natural attrition. But as I got back some "old friends", I also got some new plants from the ladies who were looking after my plants, which was a surprise. On top of that I bought some new plants too. So now I have 21 pots with plants in them. Some are enjoying the bay window in our living room, two are in the dining/multipurpose area, and the rest are out on our tiny balcony, sharing space with laundry some days.

Parlor Palm

I felt very happy when my new garden was largely assembled. Why? Apparently there are many benefits to having indoor plants in your life (see this Time article, which, amongst other things cites an experiment where people who spent five to ten minutes in a room with a few houseplants felt happier than those in a plant-free room!) They are generally good for your mental health, though obviously not if plants are dying on you, which is why I always advise people to start with easy plants like geraniums, which are super hard to kill in moderate climates (mine survived being snowed on in Tokyo but didn't survive a year in a higher altitude when temperatures are much lower than here)! 

I particularly enjoy plants that I can nurture and see grow, rather than those you can buy fully grown and just water. There is also a lot of satisfaction in making changes so that a plant starts to thrive again. The Parlor Palm we have started out as a tiny little thing I bought for 100 yen (about a dollar)! It's now quite tall.

My sick maidenhair. I moved it outside
because I was concerned the fungus 
might jump ship to other plants, so I 
guess it's in isolation!

The maidenhair fern also started quite small and the second one (pictured) is a baby of the larger one. They've both been through some rough times. I think I'll have to wait till the weather warms us to see how they go. The latest drama with the little one seems to be a fungus of some sort.

Miniature rose

My miniature rose was a gift from David five years ago and it also has survived a few different crises. When we got it back this year it was just sticks and very dry, thankfully regular watering has revived some of the "sticks" and I'm hoping for good things come spring.

On either side of the rose you can see my efforts at a little bit of vegetable growing, but haven't had much success yet: my lettuces are still sprouts and I'm really not sure about the plants I thought were spring onions.

Baby hydrangeas. I don't know why they still 
have leaves...but I hope they flower in June!

The plants with the best story, though, are the two hydrangeas. Last year when we were moving out of our house in Tokyo I posted a photo of the two large hydrangeas in our backyard just as they were in full bloom, noting that I'd miss them. My mum suggested I take a cutting and someone else suggested that I ask a friend to look after the cuttings. I thought it was quite a long shot, but also realised I had nothing to lose. I Googled the topic, did the deed, then gave the fragile little cuttings to a Japanese friend (who also takes care of her parents' farm) and she gave them back to me in September this year looking magnificent. I'm so glad for the suggestion from my mum and friend, and for my Japanese friend who nurtured them! The parent plants are no longer in existence because the whole house and garden was demolished the week we moved in to our new place. But I've still got these little reminders of the place where we lived for 13 years!

The chrysanthemum is flowering quite nicely, with
many more buds forming, the Gerbera will probably
not flower again till it gets warm, and the Japanese Grape Leaf
Anemone looks a bit ill, but again, hopefully it will limp
along until we get to spring.

One of the surprises: another kind of geranium,
but I don't think it is well, it's also in iso.

The beautiful geranium flowered just in time for Christmas.

On the edge here is my lavendar: first time
trying to grow this plant. It's also not
looking great, but I'm hopeful.

My Aluminum Plant. I've shifted it
around a few times trying to find 
the right light and temperature combos,
it seems to be thriving in this spot 
where it gets light for a short period most
mornings.

I'm so glad to be settled in a place where I can have a garden again. I enjoy watering it and tinkering with it. It's a very small hobby that takes little time and not much money, but brings joy and colour into our lives.

Retirement planning!

January is turning into quite a social month, as many people have a little more free time before school and many other activities start in a week or so. I’ve struggled to find time to write this week, but do have a post I started before Christmas that didn’t seem quite festive enough at the time. So here it is:

We've been working on longer-term financial planning these last few months. We do short-term financial planning each year as our mission requires us to put together a budget, which gives a set support figure to judge how our support is going. This is a complex, but helpful process that means we're using our resources responsibly, and anticipating future (near) needs as best we can, for example the need to fly to home assignment, or to go to a conference, or buy “new” furniture or a car after home assignment, or replace our aging computer. All these things are budgeted for well in advance. Australia is more expensive than Japan these days, so we budget for our living expenses over several years preceding each home assignment.

We don’t have much of a garden: in
many ways this is a blessing because
it doesn’t take much of our time, so
we’re freed up to devote ourselves to
other things. We do get to enjoy gardens
that other people maintain, though, also 
known as parks!

But as we've both entered our 50s this last term, we decided it would be good to talk to a financial planner about the longer-term future. We wanted an expert's opinion on how are things looking for a retirement in Australia sometime before we hit 70.

Well, we've been very encouraged. We found a Christian who has given us a significant discount for his assistance. And he's given us reassurance that, from what he can see and what he knows, from a worldly perspective, we'll be okay. Of course we have no idea what God will provide, but look forward to seeing that too!

It's at this point that we're very thankful that God led us to be part of a mission organisation that takes long-term member care seriously. And also that we live in a country where financial planning for the future is also taken seriously. So, both of us have had the organisations we've worked for contributing to our superannuation funds (US readers: similar to 401(k)) since we started working in our early 20s, yes, even when we've been working overseas, and these funds are adding up.

This part of life not something missionaries talk about very much. Most people only hear about finance from missionaries when they are in need of more financial support for the immediate future.

But also, in mission circles there is also an understanding that God provides in amazing ways that you can't anticipate. He has been providing for us for the last 23 years, why wouldn't he provide for us in the future, and into retirement too?

It's pretty obvious to us, as we come back each time, that most of our peers are doing things like buying houses, some even getting to the point of finishing paying off their mortgage. We don't own any property. The biggest thing we own is a car. We can't afford to buy real estate in Australia, partly because most of the time we can't live in a house we'd buy in Australia. But we also shy away from the anxieties that arise from owning property in a country where you don't live and from the stress of a mortgage. We've seen the stress that that can cause missionaries (maintenance issues, complex financial affairs that are hard to deal with remotely, tenant issue, etc.).

It’s easy to start to rely on the figures on a spreadsheet though, to trust in that, instead of our Heavenly Father. God has ways of reminding of us of that. But the best thing to do, when we’re distracted by all the dialogue around us (in the media as well as in conversation with friends) about real estate, mortgages, money, banks, stuff to buy, etc, is to go back to God’s word. One of the places Jesus directly addressed these things is in Matthew 6 where he said:

So do not worry, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?”  For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

We’re grateful we don’t have much stuff to take up a lot of our time to maintain, but it’s in the mental zone that we need to fight the battle not to worry (at least it is for me).

Farewells to precious things and places

If I were a poet, I’d be able to write some odes this week as I say some goodbyes to things. But as I’m not, a blog post will have to do. 

Oven

The first one would be my Japanese gas oven. Most Australian homes come with ovens and stove tops, that’s not the case here. In fact installed ovens are rare. More common are small convection microwave ovens that you plug in and can use both as a microwave and a conventional oven. When we moved into this house in 2010 there was a giant, old American gas oven in the kitchen. Obviously it had been imported by a former American tenant (there had been several prior to us taking over tenancy). It was old, however, and you practically had to lie on the floor to light the oven.

Five years after we moved into the house the oven started leaking gas and we had to dispose of it. I’ve written before about that drama and the decision to buy a (not cheap) Japanese gas oven. It’s not common for missionaries here to buy an oven to install in their homes, but I’m glad we did. I use this oven a lot. It’s brought me much joy and many people have been blessed by what we’ve been able to cook in it.

Because we own it we are responsible to get it uninstalled (not something we can do on our own), but also have the potential to take it to our new place next year. However, it remains to be seen if the owners of our next place will allow us to have this installed there. 

So we’ll put this in storage on Monday and wait to see if we’ll ever be able to use it again. I really hope so as I love cooking and this is the best oven I’ve ever used (yep, it beats anything I’ve used in Australia).

Plants

The second things I’d write about saying goodbye to are my plants, which have almost all gone now. This time, instead of asking just one person to look after more than a dozen plants, I asked local FB friends if they’d like to nominate one or more that they’d like to take care of. As a result about six people have taken plants for the year. I’m sad that my house is looking empty and I don’t have plants to look at and enjoy, but also glad that I haven’t had to throw them all out. 

I’m not really a gardener, but I have grown to love a few pot plants (yes, that's really what Australians call plants in pots) in my house. The bay window halfway up our stairs and just outside the bathroom has been a great place to put them, and probably the thing that most started me down this path. Keeping plants there made them easy to take care of and provided a great shelf of green (and sometimes other colours, when they flowered) to look at. The plants overflowed from this shelf and we've had plants in other places, including the narrow platform outside our tatami lounge room (maybe called an engawa) and a shelf outside our dining room. These locations also made plants easy to take care of and were visible from our living areas. 

I probably won’t have any plants in Australia, one year is just too short, unless I get a couple with the intention of gifting them to others at the end of our stay. We’re happy that the garden in this new house is almost non-existent (we’ve had the opposite and struggled with the responsibilities). But the great thing about this new house in Ipswich is that it’s close to lots of parkland with many, many plants that I don’t have to take care of, just enjoy!

Bike and park (rides)

Third thing to say goodbye to is my bike, and that is closely linked with the park I’ve ridden to numerous times in the last eight years.

This bike has done many kilometres. It’s my workhorse, I've used it it on my twice weekly shopping trips where both baskets are usually fully loaded. It’s rarely let me down and has needed minimal maintenance. I’m giving this bike away next week, and will likely get a new/er one next year.

The bike has also given me the opportunity to ride to the big park south of us (about 5 km). This park-ride, as you might know if you’ve been following this blog for a while, is a destination that I love to go to. It’s not just that it’s a great destination, it’s the anticipation, the “hope” that that can give me after a busy stretch at work that has been incredibly valuable.

Here is my first post about riding to the park in October 2015, it mentions a resolution to ride there every week or two, but that simply hasn't been possible. I haven't kept a track of how many times I've ridden there, but it would be unusual to ride more than twice a month and sometimes several months went past without going.

I rode here on Wednesday this week to say my goodbyes and sat for a while thinking of many of the visits I’ve made. I was able to get there during the pandemic and did a personal retreat there one day in 2020, when I’d been cooped up in my house for months with the rest of the family as they did school, and then a long summer holiday at home. I’ve visited on my birthday, enjoyed the cherry blossoms and the many other flowers that bloom through the year. It's been fun to visit in all seasons and see how it changes. I've met friends there, and eaten many a picnic in this park. 

Our first encounter with this park was when the boys were young as it’s got a lovely big playground and bike rental place (we used to drive when we were taking the family). I’ve got memories of those times too. One particular car trip stands out, when I had a car load of kids (ours plus one extra) telling really bad jokes…for the whole trip (about half an hour, but felt like an eternity).

These days the park has become “mine”. A place to retreat to, to enjoy peace and quiet, and the exercise getting to and from has been good too, when I could get there.

But alas it’s goodbye for now to this place too. As I’ve already written, there are many green areas close to our new home, so I’m looking forward to them too, but I’ll miss Koganei Koen (park).

House

And soon it will be goodbye to this house too. We stop living here on Sunday evening and will hand the keys over next Friday (14th). It's the end of an era, one that started when our youngest began kindergarten and ended when he graduated from high school! That might not seem to remarkable to you, but to most missionaries that is an unusual stretch of time living in the same house. 

So we're thankful and know that it's time to move on. Next July, we hope to be moving to somewhere smaller that's easier to keep cool in summer and keep warm in winter, and also easier to keep clean! Hopefully it will also be a place I can keep pot plants, can ride to this park, and can continue cooking with my oven!

Adjusting to more spacious schedule

Strangely, I'm still trying to adjust to no longer being in a period with no margin. The first two months of this year were really a bit too much on top of a lengthy period over the last couple of years where I've felt powerless in certain areas of my life and unable to make plans. I am gradually recovering, but emotionally dealing with the changes that have come in the last few weeks is harder than I expected.

At work I've been coming to grips with needing to do some things that aren't exciting or urgent (for example, updating the magazine's style guide!), but are important. That requires a little less adrenaline and a bit more grit. But I am celebrating with my team as we put finished another magazine (print) issue this afternoon. I look forward to seeing the Spring issue in print in a couple of weeks.

This week, with a bit more of a spacious work schedule and the knowledge that our trip to Australia in June is coming up quickly, I've once again become the family-communication point-person for international transition (or at least parts of it).

Good news is that we've got our organisation's approval to come to Australia, and for me to work from there for a while after David and our youngest son come back in early August to start school. Yes, we did need their permission because we don't want to get in trouble with anyone for a "misuse of charitable funds"! 

I'll stay longer in Australia with our middle son to do some reconnaissance for his future. He's still deciding about what his next steps are, and I hope that an un-hurried period in Australia as a young adult will help him consider what he might like to do next. Last time he was there he was 16, and in a period of high anxiety and stress at school, so it's really hard for him to imagine what life in an English speaking country might be like as an independent adult. 

Oh, and we want to spend time with our 22 y.o. son, who we won't have seen for three years! I imagine those first hugs will be a bit emotional. A lot has happened in three years.

But we'll still only be there for three months, so a bit of pre-planning is required. I've been looking at leads on accommodation and cars, corresponding with service providers, and various OMF people. If you know of a car we could use, or a place with three bedrooms that we could stay in that's not too far from the Indooroopilly area in Brisbane, please let us know.

And just to be clear, we're not doing any home assignment time this year—so we won't be speaking at churches or making a concerted effort to catch up with many people. That will have to wait until after June 2023.

We are enjoying a break from the cold Tokyo winter weather. These last several days have seen temperatures in the high teens and low to mid 20s (Celsius). After three months of temperatures in single digits or slightly above, it's a welcome break. Tomorrow is supposed to be back down to 11, Saturday 18, Sunday and Monday 13/14, and next Tuesday 8! But that's spring here for you.

Last week, to celebrate the change of seasons, I bought a 100 yen flowering plant and finally got to do some repotting this afternoon after lunch (in line with the "more spacious work schedule"). Hopefully it will do well and cheer our spirits as we move up and down the stairs. I also replaced the hanging plant that looked like a sopping-wet rag and was clearly on its way out. In the midst of that, found a couple of maidenhair fern offspring that had taken root alongside another plant, so I gave them their own tiny pots. We'll see how this little bit of "sprucing up" of my window garden will go now that the temperatures are rising.

My new plant: Sweet Alyssum. First time I've
tried this one, my app says it's perfect for 
gardeners with brown thumbs, which sounds 
great to me.

My baby maidenhair fern.

Spring in my garden

I got an article through my Facebook feed today saying that the cherry blossom season has been declared open today, one day earlier than predicted. I haven't been out and about today, but I can say spring is happening in my own scrappy little garden.

Here's proof.

Can anyone tell me what this is? I presume it's a bulb, it's come up of its own accord.

Our hydrangea is getting all "leafed up".

And my wonderful, hardy geraniums. This one is outside and there's one upstairs on our only sunny windowsill.

We've got birds moving into our birdhouse and the Dogwood tree that it's hanging on is getting ready to sprout leaves too. I'm no gardener, but I'm happy to appreciate God's handiwork and the work of others more talented. 

This is our little garden, it's scrappy, but we love it all the same.

Fusion of Japan and Australia

Yesterday I met a close friend for lunch. That was super special. We have the kind of friendship that I don't have to waste time on the superficial, but can dive right in and know that there's not going to be any issues with that!

After that soul-refreshing time I went for a short walk around a nearby Japanese garden with my camera. The idea of a Japanese garden in Australia is quite interesting to me, after having lived in Japan and spent time in some of their very old gardens. Japan really takes gardens to another level! (Here's one of their top three gardens that we visited a couple of years ago. Here's an inner city one I visited on my own last year.)

Anyway, I haven't been to a Japanese garden in Australia for a long time. Here's what I found: a fusion of Japan and Australia.

The garden is called "Nerima Garden", a celebration of a sister relationship between Ipswich (where we are living in Australia) and the city of Nerima (which is only about 2 km from our house in Tokyo).

Our house is at the "pin" and you can see Nerima marked between there
and Tokyo city central.

But actually it is only about 2km between our place and the western border of
the city of Nerima.

This is quite a typical looking Japanese garden scene. It looks quite different to Australia in general, especially because it is so green and Australia really is very brown and dusty at present as we experience a significant drought.

They have a traditional tea house, which of course was locked up, but by getting close to the glass, I managed something of a photo of the inside. The floor is just like the floor in our  bedroom and lounge rooms in Tokyo. I'm sure the smell would have cast me into homesickness!

This method of paving paths is very much a Japanese style.

The fusion: this isn't a plant usually seen in a Japanese garden! I believe it's a member of the Xanthorrhoea genus and is pretty common in Australia.

In the middle of this Japanese garden were some huge eucalyptus trees. Something you'd never see in Japan. However it was surprisingly hard to get a photo angle that showed both Japanese and Australian elements (possibly would have been better in the morning or on a cloudy day).

Here you can see a gum tree and bamboo.

The gum tree (eucalyptus) with the Japanese-shaped bushes and the tea house.

Back to Japan, here's the tea house with some bushes shaped very much like they would be in Japan. I found the Australian sun is very strong, even on a spring day, it made photos with strong contrast between shade and sun difficult to take well. This year is the first time I've used a "fancy" camera in Australia.

And then a couple of Aussie lizards were sunning themselves, they're pretty flighty, though, so I only got one or two photos of this one.

Azaleas were out. These you see in Japan and Australia. They are used as hedges in our city in Tokyo.

A different angle on the pond and "lantern feature". 

The garden was walled, just like many Japanese gardens are. 

Just outside I found the gorgeous bottle brush. Also had fun trying to figure out the right manual settings to use, but I was happy with the result in the end.

This is bougainvillea, a prolific non-native in Australia (from South America, I believe). We once had one right next to our driveway and it needed constant trimming, because it not only grows fast, it's got nasty thorns. But in the right place it is a gorgeous plant. 

I've had little time to go wandering with my camera in nature, so this half-hour was a delight. I hope you've enjoyed this little excursion too.

Kids newsletter March '18

My quarterly kids newsletter for your use.

Tokyo's unexpected green tinge

In this huge metropolis that's one and half times the population of my home country, it amazes me how much green there is. There seems to be a compulsion to grow stuff in the smallest of places. Tiny garden beds seem to be regularly included on the side of houses or built into property walls these days (not so much in the older buildings like our house). 

Here's a house we've driven past quite a lot on the way back from cross-country meets these last few weeks. They've got a tree growing in that tiny garden! Plus something that looks like it could be a bonsai plant on the other side of the front door.

Of course not everyone has a green thumb (for example, yours truly, who mostly only grows geraniums because they are really hard to kill). Some of the garden beds seem to be wishful thinking: put in at entrances that are on the northern side of a building, and hence get almost no sun except in mid-summer. One building near us must have had pine trees planted there when it was built, on the north side of the building. We've watched them gradually die and finally, fall over into the street.

I passed this house on the way to Costco a couple of weeks ago. No one's grabbed the opportunity of that garden bed, but at least it's not overflowing with weeds.

I found this small ornamental chilli bush in full "bloom" on my way to the doctor last month. I passed it again yesterday and it wasn't looking so healthy. But I want to include the photo as an example of the little bits of nature that lie all around us here. This bush is in a long raised garden bed in, essentially, the central business area of our suburb. In the background you can see another one (which had mostly weeds at the time). These public areas are generally looked after by local citizen groups, who often have work days where they get out and tidy up, often planting annuals.

It's not what fits my mind's eye with what a big city will look like. 

My garden shelf

Despite growing up with a green-thumbed mum, I didn't inherit her talent for or love of gardening. I did, however, inherit a love for green spaces and beautiful plants. So basically looking at the results of other people's gardening efforts!

However I have had a little success with a few pot plants on a sunny shelf halfway up our stairs. It's right next to the place where we clean our teeth, so it's easy to pay them a bit of attention and remember to water them. I also have a couple of hardy geraniums just outside our dining room glass door. I'm not so good at remembering to water them but they are amazingly hardy and prolific flowers to boot: my perfect plants. 

They are a small, but wonderful pleasure in my day! I'm trying my hand at a succulent and also so moss I scrapped off our little balcony.

 This little guy is cute too. I've  planted my succulent in him. Only trouble is he has nothing to collect excess water so I have him currently sitting in a shell.