Norlane’s Carolyn Slevin has won the Best Small Enclosed Garden award as part of the Victoria in Bloom social housing gardeners’ competition. Jena Carr spoke with her about what she loves about gardening and being creative.
When her husband died more than 20 years ago, Carolyne Slevin started living in rentals after giving the house to her children.
It was a choice they made together.
Carolyn decided to start the social housing application process after a friend suggested she look at some places in Norlane, which saw her moving into her current home after a year.
“It’s been really good, I’ve loved being here,” she said.
“I didn’t like living in the area when I first came here. It was not good, and I wondered what I had done, but I loved the home.
“It has cleaned up a lot and it’s no worse, probably better than some places now.”
There were only two geraniums in the garden and a lot of empty space when Carolyn moved in, but over time, her yard had exploded with plants and art pieces she had created.
“I think it’s very good for you to work in the garden. It’s healthy and outdoors,” she said.
“It’s very satisfying, and I think you come home, walk up the path, and it’s just pleasant. It’s something positive and pretty and gives me something to do.
“People sometimes say, ‘what do you do all that for its, not your house’. Well, I know it’s not, but it is while I’m here, and whoever comes next, if they don’t want it, they don’t have to keep it.
“While I’m here, I want it, and I just think it’s appreciative of me getting one of these homes. I’ve always felt that I’m very blessed to have got it, and I want to improve it.
“I treat it like its mine and that’s what I like. I come home to it, I’m in it and it makes me happy.”
Carolyn said she had won the Best Small Enclosed Garden award close to nine times now but still felt honoured to have her work recognised.
“It’s very surprising because I think it’s really amazing that they do that,” she said.
“The garden is the way I like it and if I make something new, I just hang it up and judges take it next year as something different.”
Carolyn likes to try new art methods when she’s not gardening with her daughter-in-law and 17-year-old granddaughter. They had recently tried making resin jewellery and candle decorating.
“My daughter-in-law loves her garden too. She’s absolutely lovely and helps me with mine,” she said.
“Then, with all her garden snaps that she’s taking on her camera, she does scrapbooking, and so she puts them all into her scrapbook and does pages of scrapbooking of my garden.
“We do things like that together as well. All sorts of things and try something different every time we get together.”
Carolyn said she had been a creative person all her life and enjoyed creating something new that she could add to her home and garden.
“I started off making things, and mending things because you had to in those days and then I just enjoy it, I think it’s relaxing,” she said.
“I love all my little quirky bits because I have fun making them.”
She is currently doing painting classes with a Thursday morning group that allows her to get together with other creative ladies, enjoy a cup of tea, and socialise. She also loves to go camping.
“I think it’s just going and it’s free, have a little campfire when it’s not summertime and I think I just enjoy the freedom of being able to do it and grateful that I can do it,” she said.
“It does my mental health good just to be there looking over a lake, watching the sunset, having your fire, and chatting with everyone.
“I’m just not one to sit on the couch, so it gets me out of here. So that that is probably my biggest happy thing other than my garden.”
Carolyn said she could not work in the garden as much as she wanted due to her back but would continue doing what she could.
“If I do something, I’ll come in, give it a little rest, and then do something else,” she said.
“I think you can either let it get to you or you can think no, it’s not going to get to me and carry on the best I can.”
She said her favourite part of her garden was the big green arch in her front yard, and she loved the years of work she had put into making her house feel like a home.
“I do love my garden. I love looking at it, working in it and people commenting on it too as they walk past,” she said.
