I’ve got about five lavender plants in a row at the front door of my house. You have to walk past them to get inside.

I love walking past them, brushing my hand over their foliage and having the smell on my hands for hours afterwards.

Lavender and their scent are one of my favourite flowers and thankfully they’re very hardy as everyone that knows me well, knows that gardening isn’t my forte!

These beauties are flourishing with all the rain we’ve had and their flowers are in abundance!

Going ‘back home’ is always great fun. I miss the huge trees and deep creek lines that cris-cross the countryside, the red dirt and funny purply coloured roads that I was thought were normal until I left the mid-north of SA!
 
In April, Rochelle, Hayden and I were excited to be heading home for my Dad’s 60th. Anthony was frantic with heifers calving and that’s the price farming families pay — animals don’t wait and need to be looked after no matter what! What a privilege!
 
It was a huge country bash with friends that we hadn’t seen in years, family we hadn’t seen months and people we’d seen yesterday!

So many people came to wish Dad well, said wonderful things about a man whose integrity, honesty and business reputation goes before him.
 
It was also a great time to re-immerse myself in the land that Red Dust was written about. These photos are taken around the mid-north area and the I hope the starkness of the countryside is revealed in my writing. 

Of course mum and dad’s area are deep in drought and have been for many years now. But what fabulous timeless country!