I was standing in the middle of my parent's garage, on top of our upside-down dining room table, surveying my entire life packed in around me. While I was searching for something to wear to work the next morning, all I could think was it wasn't meant to be like this.

My husband and I recently became empty-nesters. Our daughter's wedding was in April. It's a strange new reality for us, organising a life that was previously built around family and adult children at home, into a completely different scenario.

Have you ever been totally invested in something really, shall we say, unusual? For me this past couple of years it has been our frangipani tree. Invested, obsessed... same same. The first year we lived in our rental was also the first time I had ever had a frangipani tree.