'Tis The Season...

For dry river beds awash with wild flowers, like these california poppies in the Makerikeri River.

For early Christmas trees.

To check that there hasn't been a cool change in the weather since you dressed for the party.

For farmers and small holders to make hay...




... in hope.

For farewells: Tanja Grzeta - too young at 45 to leave us, but she motivated and inspired everyone around her.   
                                                                                          

For end of year school ceremonies and graduation occasions: Alys, the youngest of another generation of my family left primary school this year and the Ashley School leavers, in grand tradition, went out for dinner together.

Ao Tawhiti Unlimited Discovery also bade goodbye to a layer of students including a good friend of both Bryony and Kitty, Feroze Brailsford, who's looking forward to a career in constitutional law and international human rights. He's a pretty good actor too.

In an eloquent speech he remembered his first three weeks at the school's central city site, and how that ended there with the February 2011 earthquake and Tanja Grzeta's masterful command of the situation and her students.

'Tis a time for Mid Summer Playing, for Harvest, for Celebration... for Reflection.




California poppy Eschscholzia californica