There, on a Wikipedia page, she found a story about government surveyor Samuel Hewlings, who had planted a tōtara tree in front of his bark hut to commemorate the birth of his daughter with his wife, Nga Hei.
As time moved on, the hut disappeared and Geraldine’s main street was built up around the tree.
When Mrs Wethey got to town, she found the tōtara tree sandwiched between the Harcourts building and PGG Wrightson.
While there was a plaque to inform passers-by of the historical importance of the tree, she was surprised how many locals did not know about it.
She spent time looking at the area around it and sketching it out before approaching the building owner to see if it would be possible to attach an artwork to the wall.
When she finally approached Jan Finlayson (as part of the Geraldine Community Board) she found out there were already plans in place to beautify the area.
The mural was Mrs Wethey’s second in the area, her first popping up on the RSA wall to commemorate Anzac day in the first Covid-19 lockdown.
Although born and raised in the North Island, Geraldine "was home", she said.
She could trace back at least five generations in the area.
"My great-grandmother was a Patrick."
Those ancestors had come from Scotland, she said.
While she had a garage to paint in, she had been forced to paint the mural inside her house as the canvas was too tall to fit in the garage.
Luckily their home, an old cottage, had a high stud that it could be attached to.
"It just fit in."
As she painted the picture depicting the totara’s planting, she wondered what the couple would have thought of it.
In a case of life imitating art, the painting was "98% finished" when she gave birth.
Baby Mabel was seven weeks old at installation.
"It’s always hard to say when is a painting ‘done’. There wasn’t much left to do once the baby was born."
If anyone had ideas of what could be painted next, they could reach out to her on aminnear@pm.me
