Was woken up in the night by a couple of people yelling, not sure where they were, but it woke J up too. Fell back asleep eventually
Got up around 7 and went to the IGA for the Age and a couple of other supplies. And yes it was cold in the morning, had my big jumper on.
Came back and camped on the couch in the dining room, wrote up yesterday. Unfortunately couldn’t get an internet connection, so I’m writing all of this in Word, and will transfer onto the net (with photos) when we get back to Glen Iris.
J got up after a while, and we had breakfast, cereal with yogurt and a cup of coffee. The kids slept in till 9.30-10am and only appeared to wake up because one of Madeleine’s friends had called her on her mobile phone.
Gave them some yogurt and they then disappeared outside to play yet more totem tennis.
Took them around to Becky’s around 11 or so – as I had volunteered them to do some work there with the donkeys – told them to come back for lunch if they wanted to.
Meanwhile, J and I worked away (and by this stage it had also warmed up – so back to t-shirt weather) J continued on the front door, gave it an undercoat of white – in preparation of a skim coat to completely smooth out the surface, prior to the painting it properly.
He also cleaned out the cellar some more, removed the last puddle of stinky water, cleaned out the shelves, and planned how to put the wine racks in.
I set to on the cottoneaster by the front fence, it had to go, this was my hardest stump yet, as it was near the bluestone foundations of the fence, also had to sacrifice a euphorbia (but I’ll give it to Becky, - they seem as tough as old nails) I also whacked myself hard on my right foot with the mattock, really hurt, luckily I was wearing the steeI capped work boots, and luckily I didn’t hit myself with the blade, or it could have been nasty.
It was tiring work, swinging the mattock, and I stopped for frequent rests, as the stump didn’t seem to be getting any looser, although I had dug all around it, and partly underneath. J came to inspect my work, and took a few swings, and much to my surprise he quickly despatched that stump. So I guess we’re the stump king and queen. I dug out the remnants.
By this stage, the kids had wandered back – and they had already had lunch – Becky had given them some money, and they had bought a pie and drink each. (found out that they didn’t really do any work for Becky, just played with the donkeys) J and I had a wrap each and a well deserved cold beer.
Then back to our work, I removed the rose bush near the bay window, as it would have become a casualty of the pest exterminator - as he needed 2 metre clear access to get the scissor lift under the eaves to get up to the bee nest. Hopefully the rose will survive. Also found a small one under the cottoneaster, and replanted that one too.
Then took the kids yabbying again, this time went past Maxwell’s Gold Mine, and saw the Inglewood water supply reservoir. Elise said the place that she had been successfully yabbying with her friend was down there. It was a dirt road, but pretty rough, although her friend’s dad had driven down there. I elected not to, and the kids thought I was pretty soft for not doing so. My poor city passat would never have forgiven me. Anyway, it didn’t take long, and we arrived at a small dam, which Elise confirmed was the one she had been to previously. In fact, the sticks they had used to tie the string to were still stuck in the mud at the water’s edge. We started preparing ourselves, and then stalemated as we discovered that the string had been left behind in the car and no one wanted to walk back for it. Anyway, after much fingerpointing, we all walked back for it. Set up #2 and waited for those yabbies to start coming in. I had bought some pet bones from the supermarket with some meat still attached, and Elsie had said that’s what they had used before also. Was the right place, right bait, - it was surely a shoo in, the only thing remained as to how to cook up all of these yabbies, and what to do with all of the leftovers. Well, despite promising bubbles, we didn’t have one tug on the string, so packed up empty handed after about an hour. Elise thought that it was maybe too cold, as despite the fact that we were in short sleeves and that it was sunny and warm, the nights were certainly getting colder.
Returned to the house, and got changed to go and see Jill at Passing Clouds. The girls elected to stay at home and play yet more totem tennis – so J, F and I went.
After a few false starts, deserted winery, wrong house, we made it to Jill’s house and we chatted and had a glass of wine with her. F had soft drink. She also showed us around her garden, beautiful pomegranate tree (she invited us back in winter to come and get a small self sown one to plant in our garden , a bountiful vegie garden, quinces, a feature cactus/succulent garden etc. We left with a pomegranate (which Fraser was enjoying eating) a couple of butternut pumpkins and a couple of quinces.
Came back and made a one pot tuna pasta dish which the kids all liked. It was getting pretty cold by this stage, - both inside the house and out. Becky came by after we’d finished dinner and picked up Elise – more guitar playing in the kitchen (too cold for the veranda)
We went to bed soon after they left – 9ish as it was too cold to stay up...we’d better have the chimneys checked out soon to have open fires.
No comments:
Post a Comment