Spring has sprung!

But only just. We're two days into spring and Melburnians are already getting a mean sunburn. Sunday topped 25ºC here and by Wednesday we're heading for 26. If you think I'm a little obsessed with the weather, you'd be wrong. Not just a little. It's the first thing I check in the morning, and the last site I read before bed. I've been watching the days grow longer by minutes, day after excruciating day.

With spring, our world has turned technicolour. I've been craving shades other than dull oranges and browns for months and all of a sudden, they've hit. Pinks, greens, yellows, reds and purples have all popped out of nowhere and taken over our garden. I picked up some bulbs from Tesselaar online and threw them in the ground a few months ago. They were late in, but still managed to liven up the place when spring hit.

My intention with gardening is always to plant one or two shrubs and walk away. The trouble is, I see the colour and start scheming my next steps: colours that compliment or shapes to fill in the gaps. My 'easy-to-maintain' garden has just become bigger than Ben Hur.

I've popped in some jonquils, a couple of types of daffodils, snapdragons, tulips, cornflowers and others. When I say "and others" I mean they looked pretty on the website and I paid good money for them and now cannot, for the life of me, remember their names or how to care for them. I figure all plants like a good soak of seaweed and fish solution every so often, right? (Please tell me I'm right.)

So while I've been unable to cook anything other than rice over the last week (yes, for realsies, this stomach bug is still kicking my butt, both literally and figuratively, 7 days later) my new focus has been my garden. I can potter for 10 minutes or so before I need to retire to the couch to watch an episode of Ellen that's at least 12 months old. Or watch the back of my eyelids. Or, in my cases, both.

I'm figuring over the next week I'll focus on things other than food. You don't need a recipe for baked potatoes and it'll force me to broaden my creative horizons. Let's fancy up this one trick pony.