HAPPY NEW YEAR

Well the year is coming to a close and when I look back on it WOW!!! what a busy year we had. My new job keeps me busy and I find I just don't have enough time to keep up with all my blogging pages. But my New Year Resolution is to ensure I resume active blogging again. We'll see.

This afternoon we are heading off for Sorrento and spending New Years Eve at Gail's villa with the rest of the mob. No doubt we will be drinking and eating throughout the night. It is going to be a warm night 43 degrees. Yuk!!! I hope Gail has air conditioning. Unfortunately Ang is on afternoon shift tomorrow so we will return around lunch time. Hopefully to the open arms of our lovely children. Hmmm! don't think so.

Anyway - Happy New Year Everyone!!!!!

Veggie Garden

At last Ang has been able to grow a veggie garden. He abandoned his garden when we had the drought because it was too difficult to maintain and get water to it. At the moment he is growing lettuce, peas, broccoli and silverbeat. He will attempt to put some tomatoes in soon. At the moment the weather is just gorgeous but I haven't noticed much rain over the last 2 weeks. October is suppose to be our month for the rain so let's hope.

Family Gathering

We had a family gathering on Sunday. Our nephew wa s celebrating his recent engagement and our niece was saying goodbye to the famuly as she will be going soon to work in the USA. It was a lovely sunny day and we had lunch at my sister's place out on the verandah. My brother in law took this great picture of me with my siters and younger brother. As you can see by the smiles on my face, we had a fantastic day.
It is always good when we get together.

LOG SPLITTER INCIDENT!!!!

I thought it would be a great idea if we got a log splitter to cut up our wood for the winter. Up to now Ang always has to go out and spend hours chopping the wood up. Our wood fire heater is our main heating for the house. The Winter nights lately have been a bit chilly. We have a lot of wood collected fro trees being felled and trees falling over naturally from storms. We hired the splitter on Friday and started that night. It was fantastic. It split the wood like a hot knife slicing through butter. We did a large amount that night. But as I was busy on Saturday Ang asked Jacob to come down and assit.

We were all plowing though the wood when I took these photos.

I left to see a good friend of mine recovering from an operation when I got the call from Maroondah hospital. It was Jacob telling me that dad had crushed his finger in the wood splitter and that they were at the hospital awaiting the doctor. .

As it turned out Ang ended up staying most of the night undergoing an operation to repair his index finger. At present he has his hand plastered until Friday and will need regular check ups to ensure the finger repairs. Looks like having around 4 weeks off work

We managed to get a quarter of the wood cut. We only put a dent in the pile but it was amazing how much wood we ended up with.

What a day!

We had an amazing night last night. It will be Ang's birthday on Monday so we decided to spend the night in the city at the RACV club. As it was also Ang's sister's birthday last week, so we invited them to join us, along with Paul and Elizabeth, in the Members dining room. RACV had a guest chef from Western Australia cooking that night. All six courses along with the various wines were a showcase of culinary fare from WA. We had a great night and got to chat with guest chef Shane Keighley and his assistant. The food was great though Gianni would had preferred a larger helping.
Ang and I went to the club around 2pm and spent the afternoon in the gym. We had a go at the equipment, swam a little in the pool and finished with a sauna and a spa.

I thought it would be good to work up an appetite ready for the big meal.

Happy Birthday Ang & Maria!

Mother's Day

It's been a while since I've down loaded any pics. But here we are celebrating Mother's Day at the Red Olive Restaurant.. It was a little noisy in the restaurant as it was chokkas with people celebrating how wonderful their mother's are.

I'm tryng out a new thing today from Jigzone I hope it works.
This is a fab picture of me visiting my son at Singleton in NSW. It was only a short visit but we had a great time.
Click on the picture and it will go to a puzzle for you.

We have been renovating our back garden. We have put brand new steps and paving. We have increased our garden beds to make them larger and have attempted to add lawn. However we were advised against putting the turf down until September because that is the best growing season. So in the photos you will notice patches of bare dirt well that's where the lawn will be going. We were very please with the final look and now all we have to do is plant. Unfortuantely we need to wait for the rains to come. Hope they come soon!

Gardening

Well it's been such a long time since I've added to this post. That's because I have been so busy with work and everything. At Vittorio Park we have commenced our next major landscaping renovation. We had 5 trees pulled down that were around the house and now we are planting same trees further away. 25 in fact. You can see the last remaining logs of the big tree that was in the centre of the old holding paddock.

. In this photo you can see I've planted a stand of candlebark trees with native grass as companions. At the moment I am having to hand water them using a bucket. Hopefully the rain will come and give me a break. Once they start growing I'm sure they'll look lovely from the verandah. Next month we will be paving the top area of the block

. This is the view from the verandah. Soon hopfully to be improved.

Cherries galore

Look at Angie's lovely cherries arn't they fantastic. We picked them off the tree today. Ang managed to get at least 2Kg, which is pretty good if you knew how small the tree is. Ang was worried the birds would get them.

Open Garden Scheme

Yesterday my friends and I decided to have a day out and visit some of the open gardens. The first place we visited was Powers Court, in Donvale. Quite a beautiful garden full of lovely roses and some gorgeous camellias. They had a fantastic yellow lobelia sitting amongst the shrubs. The block that the house and garden was sitting on was quite steep so it was quite remarkable that they had such a lovely garden it it. It must be painstakingly difficult to weed the garden beds.
The second house was in Park Orchards. It was on a acre and I thinks what struck me at first was the lovely neat box hedging that welcomed you in and guided the visitor to the front door. They had an enormous vegie patch which I think Ang would love to have.
Next stop was Kuranga Native Nursery where we stopped to have lunch at the Candlebark Cafe before going on. The weather wasn't all that crash hot. In fact it was quite cold and wet. We decided to eat indoors as it was warmer. After lunch we wondered through the nursery and purchased a few plants.
After that we travelled to Wandin where we went to visit a native garden. At first I didn't like the garden as it looked messy, bare and unkempt. But as we went round the corner lo and behold was a more established garden with some beautiful trees, shrubs and wonderful flowers. I gained a lot of ideas for our block while I was wondering around. I think the garden was set on at least 4 acres of land. Mostly all native except when you came closer to the house where there were more exotic plants displayed. So tomorrow I will commence planting my own expantive native garden. ( or plan one anyway) I will start with the 6 tube stock I bought at Kuranga.

I planted 6 natives in the paddock

Do you like my rose?

Our Son Returns

The day we left for Darwin Luke rang from Townsville to say he has come home from East Timor safe and sound. He was waiting for a connecting flight to Sydney. He sounded very tired and said that he and a few other men were the only ones in the airport. Luke had been away for around 5 months. We can't wait to see him. In the meantime there are these pics that some of his friends took. Doesn't he look handsome in his army gear!!!!

I created a Slide Show! Check it out!

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Katherine and Mataranka

Us in the Power River

Well after Yellow River went traveled south towards Katherine. We stopped at Pine Creek. Pine Creek was once a mining town. It was surprising to find so many people who stopped to rest at the cafe next to the pub. They had great vanilla slices that we tried to purchase when went passed through again on our way to Litchfield but they had sold out. It was quite warm when we went to Katherine but we stopped to look at the bridge that Ron had built in his youth. Surprising it is still standing and takes the majority of traffic back and forth. On the second day at Katherine we went to Mataranka's hot springs where we had a great time meeting and making new friends. Mataranka is famous for the story "We of the Never Never' Charmaine brought the book after visiting the homestead where the film was shot. After the hot springs went went to the Power river and swam there. It was gorgeous scenary and we were the only soles around. Early next morning we got up at day break and made our way to Katherine Gorge where we travelled up through two gorges while eating breakfast. The scenery here was breathtaking. I took a great shot of Ang in front of the 2nd Gorge

Yellow River

We went on the yellow river cruise and saw lots of crocs. Have a look! Besides the crocs there were beautiful birds, brumbies and of course the scenery was just fabulous.

More Pictures

More Pictures of us at Kakadu. Firstly Ang and I in front of a termite mound. then Ang and I on the Mary River looking for crocs.

Ang taking a long look over the Ubirr. We went there to watch the sunset go down.
And below is an aboriginal Rock painting found at Ubirr. Namondjok, a Creation Ancestor, and to his right Namarrgon, the Lightning Man, responsible for the violent lightning storms that occur every wet season.

Trekking Around The Top End

Shopping and watching the sunset at Mindill Market.

Well what an exciting 10 days I have had. Charmaine,Ron, Ang and I flew to Darwin on September 16th. It was quite a late flight and we arrived 2am Sunday morning. The first thing to hit me was the heat and humidity but eventually I got use to it. We stayed in Darwin for 2 days then set off for Kakadu. Our first stop was at Mary River where we stayed in cabins. Our Host Jonno was fantastic and a lot of fun. We went 4 wheel driving over the flood plains that night. The next day we went on a boat along the Mary River looking for crocs. We spied a few on the banks sunning themselves. After Mary River went went to Jabaru where we explored cave paintings, watched the sunset from Ubirr and went flying over Kakadu National Park. Next stop was Cooinda a lovely desert resort and we stayed there a while swimming in their pool and checking out the local scene. We went for a boat ride on the Yellow River where we saw lots of crocodiles. I recommend the Yellow River Boat Cruise to anyone who goes there. After Cooinda was Katherine. We stayed at Katherine for 2 days stopping off at Edith Falls where Ron and Charmaine braved the croc warning signs and had a swim. While we were staying at Katherine we drove down to Mataranka to the hotsprings there and swam out little hearts out. In the afternoon we found a lovely spot on the Power River and had a dip there also. That was great because we were the only ones there and the river was crystal clear and a perfect temperature. We wanted to go th the Jim Jim Falls but we needed a 4 wheel drive for that one and we didn't have one. On the last day at Katherine we went on a breakfast tour of the Katherine Gorge. We got to go through 2 gorges, they were breathtaking and I'm sorry now we didn't sign up for the 8 hour journey where you get to travel through 5 of the 16 gorges.We also stopped of at Pine Creek which although a small town is rich in history. After Katherine we travelled to Litchfield National Park where we stayed in a hotel at Bachelor. Litchfield is known for it's fantastic waterfalls and waterholes. We had a great time over 2 days exploring the various waterholes and hiking. I wasn't too pleased about the hotel there, it needed a big makeover. The air conditioner sounded like a truck was going through your room. Crickets were leaping everywhere and the tap had a continuing drip coming from it. As I said earlier the temperature was extremely hot so we hardly slept. After Litchfield we travelled back to Darwin where we stayed at the ritzy Saville Hotel where we made up for our lack of sleep the previous night. Even though we explored the Darwin sights when we first arrived there was still plenty to see and do. On the last night we went sailing on a pearl ship around Darwin's harbour and watched the sunset while sipping champas. As our flight didn't leave till 2am the next day we headed off to Darwin's casino where there was fab entertainment until it was time to depart for home. We had a great time in the Northern Territory and I recommend it to everybody.