One of the things I really do miss about living in Australia is the backyard barbeques we always had throughout the year. Fortunately the weather in Sydney, where I lived, was suitable for bbq’s pretty much all year round except for certain times at the height of summer – that’s when you get the total fire bans issued and you can’t strike a match anywhere outside let alone light a barbie.

Aussie homes have as much Outdoor furniture as they do indoor furniture and if you have a swimming pool, as many homes there do, there is usually a couple of sundeck chairs around the pool area as well. When I was a child my sister and I were never indoors during the hot weather; we’d get up first thing in the morning and have a swim, get dressed for school and when we got home it would be straight back into the pool again until Mum called us for dinner. More often than not though Mum would set up the Patio furniture and we would eat dinner outside under ‘the back porch’. Nobody sits inside in the summer…

Those were the days for sure. Now I’m planning to turn our smallish backyard here in Northern Ireland into something that we can sit out in next summer; the evenings here can get quite balmy and of course it is daylight until almost 11pm so sitting inside seems a waste of all that. I rather like the look that Wicker furniture gives an area, especially outside, and it is unlikely to get damaged by the heat here (no chance of that in fact…). We are (fingers crossed) getting a conservatory built on the back of the house before Xmas and I have already chosen some similar furnishings for that so I would like to continue the style and take it outdoors as well. Okay, so we don’t have any room for a swimming pool but I am still going to do my best to create my own little piece of Oz in a quiet corner of Belfast – and minus the flies too!

So here’s looking at throwing a shrimp on our new barbie in June 2010!