Easter April 2012

Arrived in somewhat of a flap on Thursday night with Fraser.  Helen had been gently hassling me to leave as early as possible as she was keen to get there on Thursday night also.  I didn't want to brave the pre Easter traffic.  I wanted to have some dinner and a sit down first - and leave Melbourne after 6.30 - so that the worst of the traffic snarls would be over.  However Helen called not once, but twice to hurry me along.  Eventually left around 7.15pm, and the traffic was fine.  Also appreciated driving behind other cars once in the country - so the road ahead was also lit by their head lights - made it less "stressful".  Also very pleased that we didn't see any kangaroos.

Arirved about 9.15 - and Helen & kids were waiting out the front in the car.

Went in, organised beds, and Helen and kids disappeared, F & I stayed up a bit later.  I made up a loaf of bread - which incidentally didn't turn out that well - I don't think that the mixer part of the bread machine was inserted properly - and therefore the bread didn't mix/knead properly, and the bread turned out quite dense, cake like, and not all that good.

Also set up the solar bud lights in the bathroom (had got J to charge them up earlier).  Looked quite nice - and we can now clean our teeth by bud light, didn't necessarily need the lantern

Fraser had worn the neck pillow in the car, and continued to wear it inside while checking something on his computer

engrossed

Unfortunately didn't sleep that well - pesky mosquito, but still go up early.  Also heard Xavier quite a few times during the night.

Mum arrived mid morning, and I got down to stripping the wallpaper in the top right upstairs room

bit of a posed shot with Michaela



posed shot #2




close up of the wallpaper



hmm, not such a good photo

showing the top edging wallpaper 

Fraser even  got in on the act and helped a little bit

Fraser assisting

It was quite hot and dusty/gritty work - as the wallpaper sometimes came down with a bit of plaster dust/grit etc.  It was also quite a warm sunny day.

Saw (and heard) that they were setting up for a Good Friday fish bbq at the town hall opposite.  A band (501) had set up and were playing country, blues old pop songs etc - just perfect to strip wallpaper by.  Went down around 12.30, Mum and Helen and a lot of other people were already there - having some lunch and enjoying themselves.  Just wandered over in my work overalls looking decidedly unglamourous, chatted with Kevin, Don, and some others.  Free Easter eggs were also handed out, much to Michaela's delight. 

From memory, that was it for me  and the wallpaper stripping for the day.  Went up on the veranda and read the paper afterwards.

Justin & Mad arrived around 4pm - with the king single bed from Alex, a small desk, the shower screen, and some other bits and pieces - including the little red plastic car from Jan's which had serviced all of the Lewis cousins - and was now being beqeathed to Michaela.  She was thrilled - Xavier also liked the car

By this stage it was the cocktail hour :- so, given Mum's new fondness for gin and tonics  we had one on the veranda

And given that it was Good Friday after all, we had to have fish for dinner - I had smoked some salmon in Frank's fish smoker (in Glen Iris)and we had that with fettucine, rocket, cream cheese and capers -delicious!

Ate by multiple candle light in the dining room


My dinner plate

Fraser striking a pose at dinner

Mum, Helen and I enjoyed a post prandial game of scrabble.  (Helen won)

winners are grinners

and Justin played the guitar



our guitar hero

 Given that I hadn't slept well the night before - I had an early night, and slept well on the Friday night - was woken up a few times by Xavier though.  We had moved Helen into the "garden room" above the kitchen given that I was stripping the wallpaper in the top room.  I had naively thought that I could complete it in one, maybe two days, but as always everything takes 3 times longer than anticipated.....  I had also thought that she could have stayed in the room while Iwas doing it - but J had luckily recommended  against that.  It was just too messy.


I had organised for a garden designer to come and see us on Saturday morning at 9am.  Kevin Walsh from Castlemaine

Kevin - from his website

He wandered around the garden with us, and identified the large tree as a Hoop Pine

hoop pine photo from the internet

, and the sickly looking one that I thought was a monkey puzzle as a bunya bunya. (native to QLD). He was going to recommend an arborist to us to see if our one should stay or go.

bunya bunya photo from the internet

Kevin also identified a number of other plants - including a flower that I had thought was a clivia.  However it was a hippeastrum

in the garden

 Mum then pointed out that I have this same flower on the doona cover upstairs.  I thought that very clever and observant of her

in the bedroom

Had already written out a wish list of what I wanted in the garden (have been thinking about it for ages) - I would like a rose garden, a succulent area, "orangerie" or at least lots of citrus, an orchard, grape vines (our own mini vineyard), a pergola, "olive grove", perhaps a reflecting pool (I've been watching Don Monty's Italian gardens on the abc),  maybe a "wisteria walk",  maybe a bamboo thicket, a pomegranate tree, & a quince tree, of course our vegie boxes, and various spots to sit and admire the garden, read a book, have a meal etc.  And this all to be joined up by gravel paths, and a set of "rooms" while of course being relatively water wise, and relatively maintenance free.  Don't want much do I?  Anyway, Kevin said to email my wish list to him, and he can work out what best to do.  He stayed a couple of hours and also took lots of photos in the garden and had a look at it from various rooms in the house.  I'd told him that I wanted to screen away David's sheds - and make it a more pleasant vista from the "garden room" He'd suggested the olive trees long the fence line there as an option

Anyway, while Kevin was taking photos in the garden I changed into my work overalls, and got back into the stripping, and even managed to strip from the top of the ladder.  Was a little nervous on Friday as to going the whole way up - to the ceiling - as it's at least 3 metres high, and I had an irrational fear that I could fall and that the steamer paddle would then fall on and burn my face during the fall.  This did not in fact happen - thank goodness, but I did  have the occasional wobble, and also exhausted arms from stretching upwards.  I did learn to be ambidextrous - and steam with one hand while scraping away another section with my other hand.  And then swapping over.  Would have been good to have at least 3 hands.  Also made sure that I didn't lean too far away from the ladder, or try and steady myself with a hand on the slippery wall (from the steamed wallpaper paste).  I was very surprised that the walls were just bare underneath - ie they had never been painted.  I also kept an eye out for old pound notes, stocks and bonds that could have been pasted under the wallpaper for a rainy day.  Unfortunately none was found.  Oh well there are more rooms to strip...

I also forgot to mention that they had wallpapered the ceiling also - I'm not up to doing that at the moment - had suggested that Justin just paint over it - it's so high up who would know.  But he was dubious...


 

No, I'm not wearing a fat suit...

see it is pretty high

Only did a little bit, as Nin, Clare, family and Clare's cousin Lisa and her 4 kids were coming to visit for afternoon tea

They brought us a lovely feast - bun, biscuits and vanilla slice - we ate outside in the garden

Afternoon Tea #1

Afternoon Tea #2

Xavier enjoying some bun

This was followed by a game of backyard cricket.  Fraser and Rory were quite competitive

And lastly, extended  family portraits on the verandah.  As you can see, it was a glorious afternoon

They left late afternoon, and we settled in for dinner - Mum had brought some Kransky sausages from home, and we cooked them up on the wood stove in the kitchen with some potatoes and salad etc

Saturday dinner

Actually, some time earlier, Helen had been searching high and  low for her car keys.  She'd seen Xavier playing with them earlier, and just couldn't find them.

Well, as I said we had the sausages on the wood stove, so I cleaned out the ash tray ( I don't do this every time). I was emptying the ash in the garden, and was very surprised to see a vw emblem, and then some keys. Yes Helen's car (and house) keys.  Xavier the little scamp had posted them into the ash tray - so we were very lucky that I found them - it could have taken weeks if not months for me to empty to tray, and even then I could have just chucked the ash away, without really checking through it. Anyway, all's well that ends well!

Saturday dinner

Stupidly got up stupidly early - thought it was getting on to 6am, as I could make out the silhouettes of the town hall through our bed room window.  So I got up, got dressed and went into the kitchen, as I thought I could make some gluten free bread for Helen in my bread maker. (She'd bought a packet at IGA) However it wasn't 6am.  Justin got up soon afterwards to see what I was doing and to ask what the time was.  I told him I thought about 6am - I hadn't put my watch on.  Well, it wasn't 6am, it was actually 3am!! So made the bread, and then went back to bed....Well at least the bread maker wasn't going to be on while I wanted to have the wall paper stripper on!  Don't want too many electrics on at once and shorting out !

Oh and by the way the gluten free bread turned out really well (at least on the 1st day).  Helen says that no gluten free bread is good on the 2nd day!


Back up again around 6.30 or so (really this time) on  Sunday morning - and it was Easter Egg time. Hid the eggs while Helen and kids had gone for an early walk


 Much excitement during the hunt afterwards

nice pink Easter egg basket

1st Easter for some

quite a few

a good haul

Monty inspecting the rabbits

inscrutable Fraser

Given our abundance of Easter eggs Helen and the kids went and distributed a few spares around the town, leaving some for Monty's kids, and also a few for David on his electric car seat.  We saw David the next day, and Fraser wanted me to ask him if the Easter Bunny had been.  David then delivered us a dozen eggs and another pail of goat milk which was very nice of him.  I had the goat milk in my coffee and with cereal etc.  So did Mum, although the others were a bit dubious given that it wasn't pasteurised


I did yet some more wall paper stripping, and also planted the lime and orange trees from Andrew & Cheryl.  Hopefully they'll do better here than in their Glen Iris garden

Justin had some work to do, so christened the desk upstairs, while Madeleine cocooned in bed (she was actually reading)

A study in contrasts :- relaxing and hard at work

Mum, Helen & Fraser had also been out foraging.  They had discovered a bountiful pomegranate tree in a nearby lane way

the best ones are up the top....

  And had also taken some wind fallen apples from a tree planted on a dirt track.  They didn't actually pick any of these off the tree. Mum made stewed apples from them

tasted like pink ladies

Mum peeling the apples 

Michaela posing with a 1/2 pomegranate

Anyway, off to the pub for dinner

waiting for dinner on the red couch

Michaela looks pained

manoeuvring into the high chair with some help from Ros

Good dinner as always (unfortunately no pumpkin for Mum), and then back home for some shots on the stairs

and first there was one

and then there were 2

and 3....

And Maddie makes 4

Given the success with the Gluten free bread, and my failure with the previous normal bread, I prepared some more normal bread on the Sunday night , making sure that I clicked the mixer piece in properly.  Programmed for it to be ready at 7am on Monday morning, and I'm happy to report that it was successful!

Easter Monday was the day of the Rheola Show - which we'd seen advertised around town. We all went  and had a good time.

Saw wood chopping contests (I love watching these at the Royal Melbourne Show ) and was amazed that they only wore dunlop volleys for shoes as opposed to steel capped boots.

wood chop #1

wood chop #2

Sheep dog trials - with very clever dogs :-

sheep dog trial #1

sheep dog trial #2

Vintage tractor pulls :-

tractor pull

Old cars display

some old beauties

Curious steam engine what nots:-

who knows what this is?

Enjoyed a light as air sponge cake

delicious

And we bought Mad 24 x Agatha Christie books for 20c each - I generously told them to keep the change when I proffered a $5 note!

photo from the internet

I enjoyed the show a lot, unfortunately the kids piked out and didn't want to go in the running races, Michaela wanted to go in the Miss Rheola under 6, but we didn't wait around until then.  The weather was a little changeable, quite windy and rainy at times - so it was a bit cool.  Sarah and her boys met us there,and then we went back to the house

Sarah helped me with a bit of yes, you guessed it wall paper stripping....as I needed to get the room ready for Sarah to sleep in

nearly finished now

picking up the bits

Unfortunately as I'd been doing this for a few days now, some of the previously wet bits of wallpaper that had fallen to the floor had now become stuck to the floor like papier mache, so I had to mop the whole floor and scrape them off again.  won't make that mistake again.

Luckily, I had some help tidying up from a young nephew :-

Later on, the older boys were providing us with some entertainment value as they unpacked Sarah's car. She'd brought up some rolled up mattresses,which Zac, Curtis and Fraser took turns at inserting themselves into, and then bouncing off each other. We were watching all of this from up on the veranda.

Baked ham for dinner, and fireside chats afterwards

The boys watched a dvd upstairs

And Mad mucked around in another room

On wedensday, Sarah helped me in the garden out the back attacking stubborn weeds with the shovel.  She like us was also suprised by the huge number of bricks that had been delivered for the laundry chimney.  Six courses - she estimated close to 5000 bricks! Seems an awful lot for a chimney and a small floor.  Anyway we'll see as the brickie is supposed to start work on it on the 20/4 - so we should see the finished result next time we're up - unless there is yet another delay

Justin left for home in the late morning, and Sarah & Mum  left after lunch ( I think)

Given that I had finished the wall paper stripping in the front bedroom, I hung up my steamer and went back out into the garden for what I do best - weeding and watering.

Tuesday night was also the Inglewood Historical Society's monthly meeting - so I went along with original titles that I'd spoken to Kevin about.  I showed them to him briefly while he was setting up, and then to the group at large when we went around the room and were invited to make any comments re the last meeting etc  I was thinking of saying something like how much we enjoy coming up to Inglewood, how welcome we feel etc, but then thought it might be a bit naff, so decided on saying nothing.  However, that was thrown out the window, as Kevin passed a note to the chair woman who announced to the group at large that I was there from Tivey House, and that I had the titles with me. So I asked the group if they were interested in having a look - they were, so I passed the titles around - like show and tell at school.  Note, these titles are now just historical documents, they have no legal standing - they're just great to have a look at




front of one of the old titles



and back

And after/during my show and tell, I did end up telling them how much I/we enjoyed coming up, and made to feel welcome, how we enjoyed the Fish BBQ, the Rheola Show etc.  They reciprocated by saying what a good job we were doing on the house etc  Lovely!

After this we were shown a couple of locally produced dvds, - one a series of recollections buy elder Inglewood residents reminsicing about growing up in Inglewood pre WW2 etc,  And this was followed by a dvd of a few court room re-enactments

Finished up with tea and biscuits, and a  few of us stayed back and chatted a bit longer.  Got talking to Joy and Alex who were interested in coming to have a look at the house.  So, extended an invitation to them.  Frank the prospector was also there, he'd told me about some relics that he'd dug up on this trip, I was interested in seeing them, so we organised for him to come at 10am  

Got home around 10pm or so - had walked there (to the court house), and was walking back, but Kevin stopped and gave me a lift ( was getting a little bit cool)

Given that Zoe's shift at Coles had ended at 9pm, Karen & Z arrived after 11.30pm.  Zoe pretty much went straight to bed, while Karen and I stayed up for what turned out to be an extended night cap - and we got to bed after 2am... We always have fun together!  Karen also came bearing numerous gifts - an electric fan for summer, some glasswear, and 3 huge bags of clothes for Mad that Z had grown out of.  It was like Christmas!
Unfortunately I was still up bright and early, so felt a bit woozy/sleepy during the day

As promised, Frank came at 10 and showed us his treasures

Various brass pieces, what he thought was a lady's bracelet, but we thought more possibly a curtain ring - given the small ring on the end of the larger circle, potentially a bandage clip, a silver? brooch, and an old  live bullet.  Incidentally, this must have rolled off the table, as he came back on Thursday morning, as he couldn't find the bullet anywhere.  Luckily looked under the table and there it was.  Would have given Gordon a nasty fright if it had gone off while he was cutting the grass!

 Given that I was tired I also had a nice nana nap afterwards- was lovely.

Helen and kids left after lunch

I also had some more random photos of that little scamp Xavier  :- who knocked down the lamp that J had just brought up - and broke the light shade.  H & F came to "break" it to me with the old "we've got some good news and some bad news" I immediately asked what they had broken, so F cut to the chase and told me.  The good news had been that no one was hurt

Alex and Joy came over at 3.30 and I showed them around

And then Karen and I went for wander down the main street. 

Dropped in on Jill at Bendigo Bank to pick her brains re how many vines to plant for a dozen bottles of wine, what types of grapes etc.  She gave us a few ideas.

Then saw Jamie at Nevins, except it wasn't Jamie, it was Luke the self professed best looking twin.  Had a chat, and then Jamie turned up.  They told us about the "ghost(s)" in the house.  Said that during the open for inspection, one elderly lady who had played there as a child had felt someone/thing tugging at her leg not wanting her to go up the stairs, and then another lady saw an older (ghost) couple in the garden room  and they said they weren't happy at all of these people traipsing around the house - as there had been 1200 people all up.  I thought it was good for a story, but when I told Helen she reminded me that she'd said she'd heard someone going down the stairs in the middle of the night.  So she 1/2 believes, and is volunteering one of her friends to come and "ask" the ghosts to leave. 

Anway, after the ghosts, Jamie had suggested that we have open days at the house, ie gold coin donation.  Karen suggested Justin and Mark to man the BBQ.  I thought it a fun, good idea, but when I told Justin afterwards he thought it was 1/2 baked, and what was the point for $50 or so.  Karen had also come to the rescue and suggested that Mark & J fix up the back veranda that is now falling off.  Said Mark had done a number of pergolas, and that it wasn't that different.  J was happier with that idea.

Anyway, back home for nibbles on the veranda, and then dinner at the pub

Enzo was particularly charming, told me that he'd be able to get us grape vine cuttings for our proposed orchard, gave us a generous 1/2 glass of red to sample to see if we liked it (Connor Park durif) and finally a baileys on ice each on the house.  And given that we'd bought Mcguigans wine - he also gave us a twin box of stemless Mcguigans wine glasses each - as this was a promotion and he had heaps of these glasses

stemless wine glass from the internet

Back home after dinner we had a fire in the dining room.  The kids watched a dvd, K and I sat and chatted
The fire surprisingly still had some glowing embers in the morning, despite the fuel (wood) being all gone.  Mad surprised me around lunch time when she said that the dining room was full of smoke... some of the ashes which I had well assumed to have been out by then had fallen into the hearth and caused the smoke .  Luckily this was still all contained by the fire screen.  So I shovelled the ashes back under the chimney flue, and we opened the windows to air the rooms.  Goes to show you that you should ALWAYS have a fire screen in front of the fire.

Anyway,  I did a bit more in the garden, got the girls to help a bit - I had wanted to clear up the back as more weeds had come up, and also get rid of the rubbish and odd bits of wood

getting rid of the rubbish....

Whilst I was doing this I had also uncovered a brick path./edging, but I had to move some of the bricks to get rid of the stumps/roots.  I'll attempt to put them back properly later on

garden edging?

And, given that I had finished off the top upstairs room, I started a little more wall paper stripping in the upstairs hall, to see if it looked lighter without the paper..  Karen also helped

Once again there were a few different wallpapers :- faux marble block wallpaper on the wall

Grecian? type plasterwork wallpaper for a cornice:-

And ornate patterns for the ceiling

Didn't quite get as much done as I'd have liked, as the kids were keen to go, and there were other things to do to tidy up ie water the new plants, do the dishes, pack up etc.  I also wanted to pick my big outside the fence pumpkin

And lastly a photo of Mad with Monty our adopted cat demonstrating how good she is with animals.  She's suggested kidnapping Monty and bringing home back to Glen Iris, but I didn't think his owners would appreciate that