Saturday, June 24, 2017

Winter Sunshine

I'm sitting here on the veranda of our old Queenslander in Maryborough enjoying the gorgeous sunshine! You wouldn't know it was a winter   fternoon - at 4pm in Bundalong I would be making sure the wood basket was full and the fire stoked up so the house would be warm enough for the evening!  I have my crochet here beside me, I'm working on a cushion cover which will be part of a set for birthday gifts for both son and DIL who have their birthdays a few days apart in August! 
 
It hasn't all been sitting around though ...... Pete has been busy getting the outside drainage enlarged which entailed pulling out the small one ( after we dug out all the dirt it had in it), digging a trench and installing a larger drainage system.  MEantime I've been busy with the timber kitchen bench tops which were extremely sticky in sections!  After discovering sanding didn't work because of a wax covering, I've had to use boiling water, gumption cleaner, a hard scrubbing brush and a lot of "elbow grease".  Can you see how dirty that water is on the bench tops? So the benchtops will be a much lighter colour and covered with a kitchen grade oil ( like can be used on bread boards). I got one cleaned down when we were here at Christmas time and I've cleaned down another 2 today ( well almost - it takes ages!!!), which leaves one long one to go!
 

We haven't had much luck with concreters! We thought we would have underneath done during our first week up here,but it seems we may be lucky to even get the quote done before we leave ☹️ I'm quite disappointed about that as I had tried to get it organised from down south about 5 weeks ago,  but little we can do about it!    So only 1 week left, well about 5 days actually before we have to head back down on the 2 day trek ready for work the following week ........ better enjoy our next few days!
Have a great weekend ........oh, and Scruffy says Hi as well - he has recovered well and just waiting for his facial hair to grow back again - thanks to those who asked after him 😘 
Hugs Sharm 
 

Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Good Morning Maryborough!

How fabulous to wake up in our bed here in Maryborough this morning!  How wonderful it is sitting here on our verandah with the sun just coming up!  Yep, you guessed it, I'm excited and very happy to be here! Boy would it be wonderful to hear the house down there sells while we are away...... 

We  got up here yesterday morning having had a fairly good trip up with only a minor problem with the trailer ( lost a bolt from the spring causing one tyre to turn out), luckily Pete and the NRMA fella were able to get a bolt and pull it back into place for the rest of the trip!  And then spent Sunday arvo and night with our friends in Curra before taking off yesterday morning to get here in time to meet the tradies who we had lined up ....... first off the rank were the guys fitting the split system air con that we had purchased here at the Boxing Day sales. 
 

 
Not far behind them were the guys from Sunjuice who were here to install solar panels to the roof and convert the electric hot water to solar ....... after a few issues they got things sorted out .......in our favour it seems as we are getting more panels with higher pulling power at the same cost! Gotta be happy with that, so instead of the initial 16 we are now getting 22 panels and a lovely big 5kv system!  They will be back today to get the rest of them up and installed!  Last night not having had the chance to head to the shops with all the tradies here, Pete rang the RSL courtesy bus to take us to the club for dinner!  Oh what a treat that was .......having not lived in a town for quite a few years it was a real treat to not have to drive miles to go out for dinner....... and a free courtesy bus to boot right to the front door!!!!
 

Later this morning we have the furniture removalist turning up with the first load of stuff  .............. 
oh, and I forgot to mention - we had some mandarins on the tree ( we ate them straight away), a few oassionfruit on the vine and even some cherry tomatoes waiting for us!  Looks like the grapefruit are almost rip as well.
 

Friday, June 16, 2017

Part 2 - The partial Move

Today we load up the truck with all the stuff we think we can do without until we sell the house here in Bundalong.  We are heading to Maryborough for 2 weeks and decided we may as well move some stuff at the same time! I have yarn ready for the car trip ......... not sure if we will get away today or tomorrow ....... Let this stage take place!
 
 

Thursday, June 8, 2017

Organised Chaos


 

Good Morning to all of you who might be popping in to see if I'm still around!  Thankyou to those lovely ladies who have been so kind in dropping a line to check on me since it's been over a month since I last managed a blog post.  I would say we are in an organised state of chaos around here - work has been super busy for the both of us, and we seem to have had some busy weekends, and a few without any internet access which has resulted with blog posting just not happening!  So let me give you a very quick catch up ....


I managed to get the blanket for grandson Jaxson completed during May!   May is also my birthday, just a few days after Mothers Day. It passed by with Pete getting take away Pizza for the night - being a work night and no other friends or family close by. Stace did her first ever ribbon embroidery - actually embroidery of any kind! She confesses to not actually enjoying the sewing process lol


 Parcels arrived from the kids and grandies which was nice



and Pete bought me a lovely shadow box light and a frame for the house name for the new house (unsure what name will go in yet)



 Pete managed to win yet another radio station competition giving us a double pass to Winton Raceway to see the supercars.


Pete managed to win yet another radio station competition giving us a double pass to Winton Raceway to see the supercars.


He has also been super busy doing some loads of wood and finding some burls he's been having a bit of fun with, (some of the designs inside are amazing ) ......



and also finding a couple of slabs of slate which will get made into garden seating for the new house.  He is going to be keeping himself rathe occupied when we do finally sell here and he retires!  I do love that he will have interests to keep him well and truly occupied.







The Beehive Cabin has become the storeroom for the packed boxes and so the beehive has had to have a temporary move inside. 

 In just 8 days time we have a removalist booked to take half our contents up to Maryborough. We will be heading up there for a 2 week "vacation".  I've been kept busy organising and making bookings to have Solar panels and hot water installed; the split system
which we purchased last time is to be installed; concrete quotes for a section under the house ........ and Dad looks like he will catch the train up from Brisbane for a couple of days to visit with us as well.


Meantime our little Scruffy became unwell ........ dental issues requiring some surgery to have 4 or 5 teeth removed -


unfortunately they went a bit crazy with the shears and shaved his face right up past his eyes which was a bit of a shock and we are not totally happy about - sure hope the fur grows back quickly!

As per usual handwork helps to keep me sane!  Although I've certainly been battling with the sewing on the BOM this past month!!!  I've learnt that I do not particularly enjoy sewing little pieces by machine - which has come close to being thrown out the window a number of times this month!!!  I'm now a little behind on the BOM, still attempting to get 40 houses made up to put into 4 rows ....... I really do want to get these done before we leave as I have the June pattern to get completed as well and it will be July when we return from our holiday!  


All I can say is  - thank goodness for YARN!!!!!  Knitting this shawl (a test knit for Laura Aylor called "So happy together" ) was wonderful therapy and its quite a big shawl for any of you who like to be able to wrap around a few times! Love the edges!
Winter has definitely kicked in the past week and so my walking which had improved has become much less this week - less sunlight before and after work and foggy mornings on days off make for slow starts to the day!  After such a long post catching up I'll leave off here as I have today off work and much to get done! Hope you all have a wonderful day
Hugs Sharm xo

Scruffy is too cold and still recovering - he's decided Bed is the best place this morning.........