Plants are the gifts that keep on giving: OPINION

I'VE BEEN lucky enough (!!) to buy a house that was in dire need of a garden.

Gardening. Picture: Contributed

I'VE BEEN lucky enough (!!) to buy a house that was in dire need of a garden.

When I bought my beachside home a little over a year ago, the owners - who had watched one too many home renovation shows on the telly - had tarted it up for a quick sale.

Garden beds had been filled with river stones, a stark and unfriendly look that I really didn't care for, and the paths were dead straight concrete painted an institutional grey and edged with bossy white lines that for some reason made me think of lining up in the playground of St Monica's Primary School.

Apart from the look, the rocks were squeezing the very life out of the soil, compressing it into an un-dig-able mass.

I've long wanted to design a garden from scratch; I qualified as a horticulturist several years ago and have put the knowledge to good use, but it's always been someone else's layout and choice of plants.

Now I've collected a wide range of all my favourite things to grow; they've been nurtured in pots until I finally bit the bullet a few weeks ago and called in the excavator and human muscle to dig beds and do all the heavy stuff I can no longer do (thanks to that mozzie that gave me Ross River Fever a few years ago).

"The boys" transformed a large patch of useless lawn that did nothing but cost money to maintain into the beginnings of a tropical jungle; it will be spectacular in about 20 years and I hope I'm still around to enjoy it. Kentias- my favourite, with their segmented green trunks and graceful crown - are among the slowest growing of the palm species.

But I can barely wait to be surrounded by the perfume next spring and summer when the fragrant gardenias, wisteria and frangipani bloom.

I also commandeered yet more useless lawn and now have a thriving vegetable garden.

Those first summer tomatoes will taste so sweet.

Since the heavy work was completed, I've continued filling in the gaps with cuttings from the gardens of friends. One has given me dozens; exotic bromeliads and calla lilies, ferns and all manner of lovely green things.

My bestie Rob gave me two frangipanis from his yard, and my favourite cousin donated cuttings from a brugmansia grown from yet more cuttings taken from the wonderful Paddington studio of the late Margaret Olley.

Apart from the obvious advantage of saving money, I'm thrilled to have them all growing outside my back door. It's like having a little piece of each friend in my garden ... but not in a creepy serial-killer kind of way.

I always thought athlete's foot was the gift that keeps on giving. Turns out plants are better.