More wallpaper and Kingower Music Night 7-9 October

Left for Inglewood on Friday night, and as it wasn't a long weekend - the traffic was ok

But there was a LOT of water around - it wasn't raining, but it certainly had been - when we passed Bul Bul Creek just before Inglewood it was almost "lake like" - and it's normally dry

We were looking forward to getting there and having a look at Ron's wallpapering and paint work.  We had finally got him back to finish off wallpapering the dining room, and then also the ceiling in the hallway, given that Vic had stripped the wallpaper there (without our permission, made me a bit mad as I had really liked that wallpaper and had wanted to keep it)

Anyway, Justin and I then had to try and find a replacement wallpaper and border - literally took months.  Justin found this great American website with traditional Victorian wallpapers and borders, but the borders he liked were too wide in my opinion - 30 - 40cm, and I wanted a width of 15cm or less. Anyway this negotiation took some time.,...and we finally agreed 

Ron sent us some photos of his progress

He painted the quad in the dining room, (we were going to have the terracotta colour, but he recommended the mustard colour) and also put the rest of the wallpaper  up in the dining room

Alex came up early on the Friday again - and took some further photos of Ron at work

 

Ron also re-painted the cornice in the hallway, as with the new beautiful wallpaper, we wanted it to look good  

And Alex hunted down a smell in his room - dead mouse under the bed

Anyway, as I said, we arrived on Friday night, and had our now traditional toasted sandwich with Alex for dinner with a glass of wine.

Saturday morning, and not much of a sleep in, as I was due at Terry's at 9am to help with the cooking for the Music night

Started with a good coffee first though

Terry was making the green curry, while Arleen, Chrissy and I prepared the fish cakes, fish cake sauce, and toppings for the crostini

I was tickled pink by what turned out to be an antique olive pitter - and it worked very well.  He also had a modern one- but that didn't work properly if the olive pips were large 

Justin and Alex came over for lunch - Terry's famous sausage rolls, and then we went back home.

I weeded and trimmed the garden, was horrified by how many snails I found in the wheelbarrow

 But thrilled by a gorgeous deep purple iris 

While weeding I found some puny self seeded rocket plants - so put them in the vegie garden.  With luck they'll survive (with all this rain)

I was also surprised at how close a little blackbird was coming to me while I was weeding. It doesn't look that close in the photo, but it was very close

While I was doing this - the boys were practising upstairs (Chris had arrived)

 

Off to Kingower around 6pm - Alex kindly drove - making 2 x trips 

Not that many people there this time - only about 20 - but it was a good night, and the food was good. Didn't take too long to organise this time either, because rather than a dessert we had a cheese platter

And once again I was tickled pink - as Terry had reserved a table for us (not that there was any need to do so)

The boys set up

We had our delicious dinner

And then there was the music - the usual suspects. Justin, Chris, Alex & Penny, David and Mark, and Dermott

There was even a bit of dancing at times 

Stayed til around midnight, and then stayed up a bit at home, so bed around 1am.

 
Had organised that breakfast would be at 9.30 - bacon, eggs, tomatoes, avocado etc. 

We ate in the dining room, and it was delicious

The others left before lunch, and I went up to Kingower to find some morel mushrooms with Terry

Sadly, we couldn't find any.  Terry thought that it was maybe too late in the season, 

There were lots of small wild flowers though

Although when I mentioned it yesterday Arleen seemed to think we'd find some  (as it had been a wet Spring so far).  Oh well, no mushrooms - so we went to find some asparagus instead - and were successful there - yay

We also passed by the old Kingower Hotel - and as it was open for inspection - had a bit of a look around. Some old dollies caught my eye

  

Then dropped Terry off, and back to the house.

Took photos of the back, side walls and garden room for the engineer to see if we actually needed the tie rods

He unfortunately said yes, we still do need them (had hoped that with the underpinning that we wouldn't need it anymore)

Got Justin to take a photo of Bul Bul Creek on the way back to Melbourne - but a lot of the water had dissipated - there was still a lot, but no where near what it had been (its normally a dry creek bed)