those voices…

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Photo: Wayne’s cartoon for a friend’s 40th birthday yesterday.

We were invited to Sharon’s 40th birthday yesterday and Wayne did one of his wonderful cartoons for her. I matted and framed it. The joke is that her husband is making chairs out of horse shoes and it takes 69 shoes  to make one chair. Wayne’s work is great isn’t it?

It was a pretty good night. They had a band and the music was good. I had a few dances with Leslie, a friend and neighbour from Fentonbury. She loves dancing with me cause I can lead swing and she loves learning new steps. Sometimes I really miss my old dancing days… I used to love dancing so much that when I’d get to a venue and the band was playing I’d have to run in so as not to miss one precious moment of dancing. I wish one of my old dance partners would come visit and I could show people how its really done! sigh…

Meanwhile, its Sunday night and what am I doing? I’m sitting in front of the computer. I just cant help myself. I’ve become addicted to Pinterest. I thought it was bad enough when I added Facebook and blogging to my computer time, but now I’ve found Pinterest… Thank you very much Diane! I thought you were my friend!

My eyes are sore. My butt is chair shaped. And still, I cant tear myself away!

Not only that, I cant wait to try the one million, fourty three thousand and fifteen projects, decorating ideas and clever things I see there. I just need a bigger house and a whole lot more time!

I want to redo my kitchen, re-paint the house, landscape the yard, create secret garden spots, cut wine bottles in half, learn to crochet, felt a mouse, make chandeliers out of jars and old fencing wire, build a couch out of used pallets, and thats just the start of it!

I always knew there wasn’t enough time in my day, but now its worse!

I can’t stop my brain. I lie in bed at night and my brain is buzzing and ticking. Last night I couldn’t sleep cause of the voices inside my head, saying things like “I wonder if the cupboard in the bedroom will fit beside the fridge if I move the coats to the mud room once its finished and put the metal suitcase underneath it to hold shoes… and what if I moved the bookcase from one side of the living room to the other or will it be too wide? must measure it… and I still have that felt, I need to make mug warmers out of it, not to mention the rug I want to make out of old tshirts… must remember to go buy more tshirts…”

Its a curse I tell you!

For a minute today I thought I’d lost my notebook – the one I keep ideas in as well as my To Do lists. The thought of having to start a new list of To Do lists boggled my mind. Thankfully I found it. It was under the pile of ‘stuff to file’ on my desk.

But I’ve had a productive day. I’ve managed to cross quite a few things off my To Do lists today.

I say lists, plural, because I have more than one list. I found that having one list was just too hard. The list got too long and unmanageable. I’d look at it and my mind would go blank.

By breaking the list up into segments I’m able to ‘see’ more clearly what needs to be done. I have the lists sorted by area of the house or type of activity. ‘Kitchen’ ‘Deck’ ‘Sewing’ etc.

Today I tackled the sewing. Finally. The funny thing is that once I actually got started it didn’t take that long at all.

A lady who’s dogs I groom gave me some alpaca fleece when she had her boys shorn. It was sitting in bags in my workshop for ages. She said that she makes dog beds out of it every year for her dogs and they love it, so I decided I’d do the same.

Montana and Romeo (the poodles) sleep in the living room on the couch or armchairs as they don’t shed. Mischa and Barney have their own beds and, thanks to Barney, most of their bedding is in tatters.

Long story: when we first moved here Mischa and Barney were outside dogs. They had beds in the garage, then on the deck. When Wayne went to Adelaide on holiday I made a bed for them in the entrace and they’ve been sleeping in the house since. In fact we now have to pry Barney out of bed in the morning or to go out and pee at night.

I found a great, big old box at the tip shop. It was like a large drawer, about 3ft wide, 2ft deep and 7in high. It was painted a mauvey colour and was a bit rough. I sanded it back enough to remove most of the old paint but not totally, cleaned it up, then painted it a pale green. In order to give it a more interesting, aged, appearance, I wiped some of the paint off to expose some of the grain, giving it a limed appearance. I then gave it a couple of coats of estapol to seal it and make it easy to wipe clean.

Once it was finished I put it in the entrance, put in some dog beds and Mischa and Barney curled up together at night. Lately however Barney has claimed it as his bed and Mischa has been sleeping on a thin pad in the hallway. She really needed the new dog bed.

I found some old curtains I’d taken down from the dog grooming room in the casita. They’re lined fabric in orange. Tasteful. I cut off the tape, sewed them together, stuffed them with alpaca fleece (after picking the odd stick out of it) and voila: dog beds. Oh, I also put another cover on the outside. I stitched that closed as they both have a bad habit of taking covers off things. This way I can remove and change covers when they get dirty without then ruining the actual bed.

This is Barney’s bed.

 
And here is Mischa on her new bed. I am experimenting with a hessian bag I got from the tip shop. She seems to like it and I love the look of it.

It goes with my postal bag come laundry basket! This post bag was going to be thrown out so we gave it a home. Took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do with it but I love it. I put 2 hooks in the bathroom wall and hang it there. When its full I sling it over my shoulder and take it down to the washing machine. (Our bathroom is Ugly with a capital U. One day…)

The sewing extravaganza didn’t end there. Last week I went into an outlet store having a huge sale. Jeans for $10. You just cant go wrong at that price. I bought 3 pairs, one short and 2 long. Or they’re meant to be long. They’re just not quite long enough for me. You know what I mean… I’d have to wear them like those homeboys you see getting around with the top of their shorts (or more) showing and the crotch of their pants somewhere down between their knees. (What is it with that anyway?)

I had some samples of upholstery fabric which I was holding onto to do something with one day. That day came today. I cut it up, stitched a cuff and sewed it onto the bottom of one of the new pairs of jeans. Now I’m looking for another interesting fabric to do the other pair… paisley would be nice. I’ll be wearing this pair to work on Tuesday. I’ll let you know how it goes. 🙂

So I got a few things done today. But you see what I mean about crossing one thing off the list and adding another five? The dog beds were on the list. The jean cuffs were a new addition.

We took Ben up to Ashley to have him saddle broken. Or ‘backed’. He’s had a saddle and bridle on him and we’ve done plenty of work with him. Neither of us has had the guts to get on him. When he’s ready I’ll be going down for a few lessons on his back before bringing him home. Wally and Dancer have been unsettled over his absence.

I also rearranged the grooming room and cleaned it. Dog hair gets everywhere! I removed the lino from the toilet floor to allow the floor underneath to dry (if its not already beyond repair). We are now closing the door to the toilet but its almost impossible to get in cause Wayne has hung a tarp over it to keep rain out. And its been raining today. I did some washing and hung it out just in time for it to get wet. Eh. We have good clean rain in Tasmania.

All in all, its been a good day. I feel good. Hopefully the voices will be quiet tonight.

z

Me and hydrangeas

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I’ve had a busy week. Since when do I not have a busy week? I wish I had 54 hours in each day… Then again, Wayne says that if I did somehow manage to find another 30 hours in each day I’d soon find another 82 things to do which would take at least 41 hours to get through.

Math has never been my strength.

The photo is my first and only white cosmos flower. How was I to know you need a ton of them to produce any kind of display? I bought one little plant from a street side vendor and here it is. A single flower.

Gardening has never been my strength either.

Did I mention the hydrangea fiasco?

After admiring my hydrangeas in their pots for about 3 months and debating the pros and cons of planting them here or there, I finally made a decision. I’d plant them there. There being along the side wall of the small timber shed behind the house. It has a small gravelled area on which I’d been keeping my potted plants, a kind of plant nursery if you will.

So I moved building materials from the side of the house, the perfect spot for the plant nursery to relocate to. I moved pots to the new spot. I moved pebbles to the side. Found weed matting (of course). Cut through that. Then I dug a hole. Plonked in potting mix and hydrangea #1. Repeated the proceedure for hydrangea #2.

At hydrangea #3 I hit a snag.

As I dug there was a sneaky odour of oil. Pebbles seemed a bit sticky. The weed matting darker in colour, heavier…. You got it. I’d struck oil!

I wish.

What I found was the dumping ground for gallons of sump oil.

Who on earth dumps sump oil on the ground right behind their house? The previous owner obviously.

Then he covered it all with weed matting and pebbles, creating an illusion of garden beds to be which a gullible sucker like me would fall for.

I started digging up the oily soil and lugging it out to the area behind the garage where the soil had already been oil soaked. I was soon aching.

I haven’t been out there since. The plan was to do a bit of digging and moving pebbles at a time. After a few weeks of small bouts of work I’d have the area dug out, a hole a horse might disappear into, buy new topsoil, filled it up, plant in hydrangea #4 and finally have the garden bed I dreamed of.

Right now I’m wishing I’d put them in large pots.

Other than that I’ve been well. If you dont count the fact that I’m kinda too scared to eat anything other than toast or chips cause of a dubious tummy. What? They’re dry!

I came down with some stomach thing on Wednesday and it isnt entirely settled. Its getting there. Wayne has no sympathy. He has the constitution of an ox. He’s probably the only man I know who could go to India and drink the water without getting sick.

On another note, the new chooks are great. We’re getting so many eggs now (and me not currently eating eggs) we are getting a build-up of eggs in the fridge. Wayne is ‘in love’ with his girls.

Speaking of Wayne, he’s really been getting into some DIY and craft stuff himself lately. I must take photos of some of the things he’s made but here is a gorgeous little bird house he made me out of old tin cans. He hung it on the trellis where, one day, we’ll have flowering climbers and a gorgeous nook to sit.

He also made an alien robot to guard the house. It stands in the yard with its laser beam and its knife, ready to challenge any intruders.

I really want to try making some robots. When I have some time…

For now I think I should concentrate on actually finishing the jobs I started last weekend. For instance, put away all the stuff I moved out of the office to make it Zefi-friendly. I still have some boxes in the living room, some on the porch and the vacuum cleaner has been sitting in our ridiculously small bathroom since last weekend.

Before I get on with any more of my projects, whether new or unfinished, I really need to finish the office, clean out the living room and find homes for all the displaced craft items in my workshop. I had gotten a good start on the workshop. Its in the casita (the small old house/shed on our property where I groom dogs) and its my space for my tools and where I’ll be doing my bigger, messier craft and DIY projects. Wayne is not allowed near my tools any more. First time he used my circular saw he cut through the power cord and he’s never lived it down since.

Better go. I have a big weekend planned.

As usual.

z


The best laid plans

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I had big plans for this weekend… I thought I’d rearrange the office, do some filing, some gardening, mow the lawn, groom some dogs (I had appointments set up for Saturday and Sunday) and then I’d take Monday off (neither Wayne nor I work Mondays) and finish a load of stuff I have to do in the office.
Well, I got some of it done. I mowed the lawn. The only other gardening I did was pick one ripe tomato and re-pot two plants (see pic) and put them on the electrical meter box on the porch.
Oh, I did buy a large glazed planter pot at Mitre 10 where they were on sale for $19.95. How can a girl resist a bargain? I’m going to put my young jasmine in there and train it up the post on the porch. Of course I have to paint the deck first…
I also re-arranged the office. That task took almost all of Saturday. See, when we first moved here we (read I) decided that the back room of the house would make a good office for us to share. I put a long desk under the window for Wayne and put my 2 part desk (meant to be a corner desk) along one wall minus its corner, making into a long desk. I put those wall mounted shelf thingies on the far wall and put up shelves to hold books, binders etc.
That worked great for about 5 minutes. Wayne didn’t like the office much. He set himself up in the kitchen. He put his laptop, boxes of pens, his drawing paper, rulers etc, and he’d work there, doing research and creating his weekly cartoon strip.
When it was time to have a meal we had to shove over all the accumulated detritus of his work just to make enough space for our plates. 
It got old quickly.
So I set up a desk in the living room for him. A small desk with a small table on the side to provide a bigger work surface. That was fine till I appropriated the small table for the sewing machine. For the last 3 weeks (ok, I haven’t finished sewing yet!) Wayne’s been taking over the kitchen table again. It was time to take matters into my own hands.
I decided to make the office more Zefi-friendly.
First I had to move all the crap craft stuff I had in there in boxes. It really was hard to move in the office which may be one reason Wayne avoided it… I piled all that into the living room, the bathroom and onto the porch to go to the casita where I plan to keep the craft stuff I dont need on hand. Then I pushed desks and shoved filing cabinets from one side of the room to the other. And vacuumed where they’d sat for a year.
What I ended up with is this:
My computer on the right, sewing machine on the left, books and other officey stuff on the shelves above. I put the smallest desk, a drawer unit and Wayne’s filing cabinet along the wall opposite (behind me when I sit there) so he’d have somewhere to pile up paperwork. I added a more or less comfy chair along the left hand side of the room where the window is. Now I can access the window and open it without busting my guts having to lean over the desk to do it. I have kept the small TV with the dvd player on the right hand side on its small table. The theory is that Wayne will sometimes be allowed to watch TV now as I can work in here and watch dvds as I do. 
At least thats the theory.
Other than that, I haven’t done much at all. My day of relaxing and working on the computer (mutually exclusive, I know) seems to have disappeared. We spent most of the morning driving into Hobart to pick up some new hens. We’ve added 6 young isa browns to Dennis’ harem. Dennis being our black rooster.
Wayne has finished stalag 13 and the 4 roosters (aka Boris) have been relocated. Hopefully they’ll be relocating further away soon. The chook man we got the new girls from said he IS interested in roosters (now, why didn’t Wayne ask him before we went down there??). I sure hope he comes and gets them soon. Two of them are looking decidedly scraggly as they’re starting to pick on eachother. I feel so sorry for them, but we can’t let them free range any more. Fingers crossed the chook man does come get them.
And tomorrow is Valentine’s Day. I thought I’d share this gorgeous heart Wayne made me last year. 
And while I’m at it, I’ll share some more photos of stuff I’ve made or done as promised. Below is a great idea for a bedhead if you’re into rustic stuff like we are. I found this old ladder at a tip shop a year or so ago. I’ve mounted it to the wall and decorated it with all kinds of old horsey things which mostly belong to Wayne. I made the stars for Christmas using sticks and silver wire. The heart and a couple of other items are tied on with raffia. I love raffia!
Below is an old window made into a mirror. I brought this from my house in Fentonbury where it was the bathroom mirror. It now sits on top of my dresser so I can check myself out when I get dressed in the morning. (That’s why its up high, I can’t see if my bum looks big in it!)

And lastly, I made these little boxes a few years ago using tasmanian oak from old skirting boards from a demolished house. I sanded them back enough to expose the timber, leaving the layers of paint in places. I hinged the lids at the back and now I use them to store jewelry and hair accessories. They add a pretty touch to the bedroom in front of a very old wedding photo of Wayne’s uncle.

So there you go. I better get going. I promised I’d make ravioli for dinner tonight so I need to get started.

z

Stalag 13 and other undertakings

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Once again I’ve been slack in keeping a blog. I used to blog religiously. Then again, I was on holidays back then and everytime something happened, one of my cousins said something funny or I remembered a story from the past, I’d jump on my little netbook and pour my guts out.

But life has changed for me in the last year. Wayne and I got together in a search to buy a property together, we moved in, bought a horse, then another one. Inherited ducks and chooks. Buried ducks and chooks. Lost a dog. Bought new chooks. Learned how to do decking. Found out just how hard it is to maintain pasture where prickles love to grow.

It never ends. Life has become one gigantic ‘To Do’ list for us.

Over the last few weeks a ton of things have happened. Not all of them good. One of the good ones is that we’ve decided to relocate the ‘boys’, aka Boris as they’re collectively known, (the light sussex roosters) into more natural, roomier, accommodation. Wayne has been busy building Stalag 13 for them between the casita and the vegie patch. He’s been re-using and recycling materials on hand to create fences (see the old sheep grid from the casita, the trellis from the old deck…). Its almost finished now. Some wire to line the fences and the boys can move in. I’m guessing they’ll love having a bit more room than a dog run offers and I think they’ll love having dirt and grass under their feet.

For our part, we’ll love not having roosters crowing right outside the bedroom at 4am.

Did I ever mention that? When the roosters were first moved into their current digs, it was in response to the neighbour who said he never minded the boys visiting his girls, but when they started helping themselves to his vegetable garden he had enough of being Mr Nice Guy. If we didn’t put a stop to it, he would. Thus the boys were nabbed and bundled into the dog run. Which has started to smell. Ugh.

So, they first moved in there (always as a temporary measure) it was cause we couldn’t bring ourselves to eat them, much less let anyone else eat them. Being confined to a dog run seemed much preferable to being Sunday roast. Not sure they grasped the concept though, as the first night they started crowing every half hour from about 4am onwards. I’d just be falling asleep again when another rooster would start crowing.

I was about to go out there and strangle them with my own two hands by 6am.

However, its amazing what the human mind/ear can get used to. I never hear them any more.

Still, it’ll be nice to give them a bit more space. And the shadecloth lined dog run will most likely be converted to a greenhouse if Wayne has anything to say about it. I’m not too sure. We shall see.

As I mentioned, there were other adventures. A couple of weeks ago, when the deck was finished in fact, we had a real doozie of an adventure. Well… Wayne did.

He and Chris had been relaxing and drinking (it was a HOT day). Wayne had found and pulled out his hammock. It was great. What a way to relax! I had a go on it for a while then went off to do something in the paddock with the horses. Chris went and lay in the hammock and RIIIIIP. That was the end of the hammock.

Wayne, being a useful kind of guy, went and got out his eyelet kit to put eyelets into the hammock, strengthening it by doubling it over and all that. He’s good with things like that. Then he went and hooked it onto the frame… and RIIIIIIP!

Another man on his ass!

That hammock is history. (Its also good to know it could hold MY weight! LOL)

But the fun and games didn’t end there. Wayne went into the paddock to check the sprinkler and tripped over right next to Wally who probably thought another of the horses was muscling in on ‘his dad’. Result: Wayne got a wallop of a kick in his arm. It swelled up like a melon and started turning colours.

Being a man, Wayne refused to see a doctor despite having me, Merrill and Chris on his case. Mind you, there had been a fair amount of drinking involved. Remember the photo of Barney with the beer bottles? Do you seriously think he drank them all?

Anyway, suffice it to say, Wayne is still sporting a very impressive hoofprint on his upper arm. He has been to see the doctor and will have a follow up appointment soon. Just in case. I won that round. I have no illusions however. If he wasn’t really sore, he wouldn’t have gone!

With the deck finished, we now have to enclose the ‘mud room’ – ie the original old small deck. This will do two things. It’ll bring the toilet INTO the house (much more fun in winter!) and it’ll give us more room for Wayne’s huge collection of coats, jackets, hats and boots.

However, till we get our new guttering (waiting on quotes) and flashing, there’s no point in enclosing the room. Naturally, after weeks of sweltering temperatures, this is when the weather decided to change. Cold, windy and wet. Naturally.

The other day the wind and rain was so bad we needed an umbrella just to get into the toilet. And a boat once we got in there. We had niagara falls at the toilet door and rapids around the toilet bowl.

We dried it out, put an extra bit of corregated iron to catch water coming in where the flashing should go, hung a tarp on one side to protect us from rain blown in sideways and put plastic on the floor with some blocks under one end to create a kind of ‘ramp’ effect so that water going in slides back out.

It should work. In theory anyway. The downside of course is that the ramp interferes with the normal function of the door… therefore we have a toilet with a view. When we sit there we can see over the valley. Lucky none of our neighbours are close enough to get a view of us.

I’m so over this. I want a proper roof over the future mud room and a toilet with a closing door.*

*This is not my first toilet without a door. In my house in Melbourne, my then partner Simon decided to rennovate the bathroom. He ripped out walls, made the tiny bathroom bigger, moved the toilet from the behind the laundry into the new improved bathroom… but failed to put a door on it for about a year. Which was unfortunate cause the new bathroom/toilet was directly off the living room. I lived in a house I couldn’t invite friends to cause for one year I had a sheet hanging over the bathroom door.
When I told Simon it was over, I was over him, pack up and leave, he made a last ditch effort to win me back. I came home from work one day to find he’d cleaned the house (as much as you can when you have exposed beams where walls used to be, tiles sitting over holes in the floor where (again) walls used to be), moved furniture to create a proper dining room, had take away on the table and a lit candle… and TA DA! a door on the bathroom!
I was bowled over.
But perhaps its a failing on my part that at that point in time the first thing that came to my mind to say was “That wasn’t too hard, was it?”

Not, “Oh honey, all is forgiven”. Nope. Not me. Is there something wrong with me as a human being? Am I missing some integral part which makes me better at relationships?

Meanwhile, it seems my blog is more than simply a place to share events and vent about things. I am now also going to share stuff I do and make. I’ve found over the last couple of years, that I love making stuff. I love learning new things and trying new things. My only regret is not having enough time to do it all!

I’ve always drawn and done some crafty stuff, but lately I have become obsessed. So this is where you close the window if you’re not interested in hearing about my latest accomplishments cause I’m about to share!

I’ve discovered http://www.pinterest.com and I love it. I spend an unhealthy amount of time on there just browsing and getting ideas for things I want to do/make/try. I love it.

One of the things I found was that if you cut old T-shirts into strips you can make them curl into a kind of string. A couple of weeks ago at work I took one of my clients (a lady I work one on one with once a week) to an op shop and bought some cheap T-shirts. I cut them up using one of the pinterest ideas to make a couple of vests for her. I decorated one of them with T-shirt flowers as well (another pinterest idea). If I can I’ll take photos to share when I see her next.

I had an extra couple of T-shirts… so I decided to try making a headband for myself. I took the brown singlet I’d bought and cut off the bottom hem, split it up one side seam and proceeded to cut it into strips.

I discovered that there are some T-shirts that wont curl. This was one of them. Its more a knit than a Tshirt. Oops.

I then cut up a few strands of purple T-shirt, which DID curl. I tied up the ends of the strips at the size I wanted for my head. I wrapped and stitched the knots into a neater looking sausage shape, and voila. Headband!


Other things I’ve made recently after being inspired to use my downtime to create all kinds of interesting useful things, is a diary cover.

Basically, I couldn’t find a diary I liked more than my filofax, but I wanted to try a day to a page so I thought I’d get a cheap diary and make a cover for it to hold a pen. This is what I came up with. I made the cover using felt and covering the diary pretty much as I used to cover schoolbooks when I was in grade school, only I sewed rather than taped. I decorated it by stitching on the monster with its pen holding loop/hand. I used a hairband as the elasticated closer.

I kind of stuffed up so I had to put the button on the back. So I added another smaller monster there. 🙂 Its a bit wonky having to close the diary at the back, but it works!

Another thing I made was a spot to put the mobile phones while they’re charging. Up till now they’ve sat on top of the two old tins I have decorating my counter top. What I did was get some cardboard (every self respecting crafter has bits of that lying around). I cut it to the shape I wanted, made a pocket using glue and bits of cardboard to give it the depth I wanted. I reinforced the middle with an extra sliver of cardboard, creating two separate pockets for our two phones.

First I covered it in some craft paper I had lying around but I hated it. So I recovered it using some scraps of fabric. Then I loved it.

The only problem with this amazingly handy little contraption is that now I forget to take my phone to work cause its ‘in its place’ rather than on the counter!

Lastly (for this blog anyway, you’re never going to safe again) is a gift box I gave Wayne for his birthday last month. I’d seen something which gave me the idea in a book. It was a tiny memory box thing. What I created for Wayne was a ‘home box’ – a box with special memories and bits of home so that he can always have a bit of home with him wherever he goes.

First I bought a small craft box and created the message ‘home is where the heart is’ using the age-old blackmail letter technique. I then filled it with all kinds of goodies. Three horse hair locks from each of the horses. Tiny photos of me and the dogs. A feather from Boris (and by extension, all the chickens). The wire ‘W’ I’d made as a gift tag for his first Christmas present at the farm. Tiny bags with dirt from our land. A knot of leather. Some rusty nails from the old shed/now stable. All little things which are part of this place, or symbolize home. It lives on his bedside table. 🙂

Well, enough for today. I’ve been on here long enough!

z

Missing in action

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Yes, its been a while. Things have been rather hectic at Wind Dancer Farm. Christmas was a time of friends, family, over-eating, fun, frivolity and WORK. I haven’t written much (at all) in a while cause the days are so lovely and long, yet somehow not long enough!

We’ve been getting up later than normal (which is 6am for me, earlier for Wayne) and going to bed later and later. The days are sometimes perfect, sometimes too hot. The late afternoons are lovely and so long that instead of winding down, we gear up and do more. Its easier to get going once the heat of the day subsides.

Dinners have sneaked down to 8pm, watering the garden often after dinner, then some relaxing and catching up on movies late into the night. I’ve been working on a new photobook for our first year on the farm, it’ll be our anniversary gift, so I have to have that finished in the next two weeks so I can get it printed in time. I’m about halfway there. Its actually great to look back and see how things have changed in just one year.

The paddocks are really dry looking now so Wayne has figured out the sprinkler system and has been watering areas to keep the grass growing for the horses. We had a call from the original owners of the place (they want a dog groomed!) and they came over to visit and see the changes we’re making. They’re really nice people and I look forward to getting to know them. Their daughter rides in a local riding club so I’m interested in finding out more about that. Anyway, they showed Wayne where pipes were (to hopefully avoid further “digging = holes in pipes” episodes) and how the irrigation system works.

Man… I must learn all this too!

Meanwhile Chris has been coming and staying for a week or two at a time and the ‘boys’ have been building our new deck while I’ve been spoiling Chris by cooking food and making desserts he loves. Its really an extension of the old deck (kind of joining the two smaller ones we had) and giving the old deck a new railing to match the new one and prettify it. We’re also enclosing the original old front deck to make a mud room and bring the toilet inside. Which is a nice thing to have really. Don’t get me wrong… I like getting fresh cold air when I go to the toilet late at night or early in the morning in winter, but an indoor toilet is considered to be quite the thing these days.

We love our new improved deck! Its made the ugly little house look a million times better even though its still not painted. I plan to stain the deck grey and will repaint the house a warm grey colour called White Pepper. The trims will all be Antique White USA. So far all I’ve done is undercoat the window frames.

Interesting story which proves that being brave/brash/brazen pays off. I’d been driving around dangerously for a long time, looking at houses as I drove to find the colour I wanted to paint our house. There’s this gorgeous place near where I work which is a colour I adore. Of course, the house is also beautiful, something ours is definitely not. So, one day after work I put a note in their letterbox asking what the colours were. They send me an email with the names, I got sample pots and I’m ready to go!

So with the deck finsihed its a matter of waiting for the timber to dry out and I can get to painting. This the house before, with the awful blue window trims, yellow walls, sink and other paraphenalia:

And this is after with the extended deck (or as its become known around here, ‘Wayne’s Big Deck’):

So, as you can see, we haven’t been slacking off around here. The guys have been flat out building and resting and going through an insane amount of beer in the good ol’ aussie way. And I’ve been working on all kinds of odds and ends and grooming dogs.

I’ve made a sign for down near our front gate so grooming customers know they have the right house. I used a poodle cut out a friend gave me as a gift a few years ago. It seemed appropriate. Looks kinda funny in the australian bush setting…

I made a lead hanger for my grooming customers as I’m always forgetting which lead goes with which dog. I took 2 offcuts of decking from the growing pile on our front lawn, and joined them together to make an L shape so I would have a small shelf. I then painted them using sample pots I had on hand – a dark grey and a pale green. Very retro colours.

I think got out my collection of old knobs which I’ve been picking up at tip shops* or anywhere. These aren’t antique knobs, just mismatched knobs. I used glue to stick them onto the timber as most of them were broken (hence why they were at the tip shop). I had to drill holes into the timber for some of them to sit in properly.

Once dry I screwed the shelf onto the wall between the hydrobath room and the grooming room, clearly visible and in easy reach.

I then found an old piece of coreflute sign which I’d kept for some obscure yet very handy reason. In the spirit of recycling materials on hand I undercoated it with prepcoat and then painted it with chalkboard paint… which turns out to be oil based. Sheesh. I wish I’d read the tin before I bought it. Another brush bites the dust.

However, the result is one I’m really happy with. A handy spot for customer dog leads, a place to put business cards so customers see them, and a little poodle figurine which I rescued from the throw out pile at one tip shop. I like it.

*Tip shops are recycle/reclaim centres where things other people throw away are sold. One person’s junk is another’s treasure.

z

Eat and be merry

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Things really have been busy around here lately. We are now 2 weeks down of our 3 week holiday and I’m trying hard not to think too much about work looming closer by the day. That’ll ruin your holiday every time.

For the last 2 weeks we’ve pretty much had a full house. Wayne’s friend Chris has been up here helping with the stable and with the deck rennovation, and his daughter Caitlin is over visiting. The guys have been working their butts off – I can hear Wayne swearing all over the place when things don’t go the way he wants them to. Chris says Wayne’s nickname should be Breaky or Smashy cause those seem to be his strengths.

Still, things are getting done. Today I got to use the nail gun to put down some decking. My first time with a nail gun (and this is nail gun 3.0*. I’m already looking for other things to nail down… Hm… If it moves and it shouldn’t, nail it there. One of these days Wayne will come home and find I put his boots ‘in their place’ and nailed them there.

The saga of the nail gun

Wayne bought me a nail gun pack for my birthday. Basically, brad nailers of different sizes. All very well till we tried to buy nails for them. Apparently Bunnings sells these home quality nail guns but you can’t get nails for them to do real jobs. So I took it back and exchanged it for another nail gun, a coil gun this time – not a pack and for more money, and once again… guess what? Bunnings doesn’t sell nails for it! So I drove around town looking for a specialist store who would sell the nails I needed. Found them. Great! Get home and guess what? The nail gun will take the nails but they don’t work! So this morning I chose to withdraw from the adventure. I sent the guys into town on the ‘great nail gun’ search. They returned the gun to Bunnings (again) and went to Mitre 10 where they found a nail gun which fit the nails AND (would you believe it?) actually nailed them!

I’ve been cooking up a storm too. For the first time in my life I understand how people gain weight on holidays! Normally I’m too busy to eat too much, but with guests food is a bit more important. We’ve had scones with cream and jam. Cheesecake. Chocolate cake. Thai green curry. Fettucine with mushroom cream sauce. Lasagne.Pasta Amatriciana. Home made pizza. Heaps of salads. Home made pickled beetroot from our garden.

Which brings me back to the garden. Its going well. Too well! Even the eggplants seem to have bounced back from being chewed on by bugs. The lettuces are ready now and I’ve discovered something about myself: I prefer my vegies clean and bug free, preferably wrapped in plastic.

I’m also learning lessons about how far apart to plant some things, never to plant anything close to the brocoli or it will be completely overwhelmed by its huge leaves, and not to plant things I don’t know how to cook cause they just grow and grow and I have to kill them.

We’ve been out and about a few times too. Took Caitlin to Salamanca Market and to see the yachts from the Sydney to Hobart race.

And the gorgeous sculptures at Constitution Dock.

I took her to visit Cascade and to the tip shops cause I thought she needed to be exposed to the bountiful possibilities of tip shopping.

I introduced her to Banjo’s house cakes (a Tasmanian institution) and gave her dog grooming lessons.

(Tip shops are recycling centres for things people throw away.)

I’m exhausted!

z

Goodbye bandicoot

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On the way to Cadbury’s yesterday I decided to take the scenic route just ‘because’. I spotted a tiny creature on the road and pulled over the minute I saw what it was. A bandicoot.

These little creatures are nocturnal so this little fellow should not have been out on the road during the day. And he was moving very slowly. I jumped out of the car and grabbed him before the truck barrelling towards me got too close.

The poor little thing was breathing heavily, its heart beating rapidly. It didn’t look hurt on the outside but something was definitely wrong with it. I asked Caitlin to hold it in her jumper (to keep it quiet in the dark) and I headed towards the closest vet.

On the way there I asked how it was going, had it settled down.

It was dead.

I can’t describe how devastated I felt. I adore bandicoots, like so many native animals. And this little guy was so cute… I really wanted to save him. He was tiny, fully grown but still a youngster. He fit in my hand easily.

But when he was dead, he was so… dead. No other way to put it. He wasn’t limp and dead, he was almost immediately stiff and dead. He seemed to lose all his flexibility, his little legs just stuck out. It was just so sad to see him lose the spark of life.

It made me think about all my loved pets who I’ve lost. I was there to hold Billy and Scooter when they crossed over. I wasn’t there for Timmy or Pagan. Someone else was there for them. With Billy and Scooter they were gone and suddenly they were limp, heavier somehow. With the bandicoot it was different. I dont know why. Maybe it was my imagination and not reality, but with them it was like they just left their bodies, surrendered them and left them with me as they crossed over.

I dread to think of losing my poodles. When I think of the day I’ll have to say goodbye to them, or to Barney and Mischa, or the horses, I don’t think I can face it. I tell them every day how much I love them. I hope its enough.

z

Why I need to start drinking

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Today is a day I’ll never get back. It started innocently enough. Caitlin and I went to the Cadbury factory in Claremont to see the end of the marathon and to visit the chocolate shop. A real non-event. Since they stopped doing factory tours (I mean, who doesn’t want to see huge vats of liquid chocolate?) there seems no point in visiting Cadbury’s. We wandered in, looked around and left. We then visited the Glenorchy Sunday Market at the showgrounds… just another market, therefore nothing special. 
So we then decided we’d visit MONA, the Tasmanian Museum of Old and New Art.
Hmph. Maybe MOANa is a better name.
Its a very interesting looking building on the bank of the Derwent River just inside the Moorilla Estate Vineyards. The vineyards are gorgeous, as are the surrounds, the buildings and the views.
There was a sewery smell on the air which seemed an omen of what was to come, cause let me tell you, it was crap. Literally. One of the exhibits was a panel of monitors showing various videos on loop. One was a worm’s eye view of someone taking a big dump.
Nice.
It was one of the first things we saw when we entered the catacombs of the building (“Go straight to the bottom floor and work your way up” we were told by the helpful staff who gave us an ipad to guide us through the museum.
I know why they want you to start at the bottom. So you can’t just simply walk out! I thought I’d never find my way out of there at one stage.
The other art and installations included such intriguing items as:
Pig skins with tattoos on them, accompanied by video of the tattooed pigs in their pens while still alive.
A sculpture of a man, hung upside down with what looked like his skin melting/peeling off.
An installation of a group of male mannequins who’d been castrated, hung upside down and dismembered.
Videos of all sorts of things which defy description.
A sculpture of a dead horse, hung from a rope around its middle.
 
My personal favourite – letterhead paper with what looked like, at first glance, kisses in lipstick, but upon closer inspection proved to be the puckered lips of an entirely different part of the human anatomy. Tasteful.
An entire room of x-rays of rats, including one crucified rat with onlookers.
Hundreds of plaster casts of womens’ genitalia. That one really gets me. Did this guy (woman?) have sex with all these women or did he actually just approach them and say ‘Hey, I’m an artist and I’d really like to take a plaster cast of your pussy’.
Seriously. This is art? There were some beautiful items in amongst all the disgusting, disturbing, gratuitously shocking crap, but for the most part it was unadulterated crap.
No, really Zefi, tell us how you really feel. Don’t hold back now!
I have a real problem with “Its art cause I call myself an artist and I say its art”….
If I’m offending people (like the artists, after all, they have feelings too), then so be it., though I doubt it. I’m sure this is the reaction they want. I just cannot understand how videos of someone stabbing himself so his guts fall out, or someone urinating and defecating can be art. 
Leonardo is turning over in his grave as we speak!
This is why I have a real problem with being an ARTIST, why I will now go ahead and believe the idiot art lecturer that told me, at art school, that I would never amount to anything cause I had no ‘theory’ (ie bullshit) behind my work*. If that’s so, fine. I’d rather be someone who can produce beautiful pieces of work than someone who smears excrement on photos of vaginas and amputated penises then spews forth theories of my work and what it all means.
*The particular lecturer raved on and on about the work of a fellow student who’s bland, murky, tonal abstracts “showed the futility of living in an urban landscape and people’s struggle to come to terms with their life in the inner city, blah blah”. Then turned to me and asked what my work was about. I said “This is a leather jacket, this is noodles, this is licorice and this is a fish”. I could have given him a lot of crap about focusing in on small objects and blowing things up to the point where the object almost unrecognisable – the images were about the light and dark, shapes, curves, more like landscapes than a jacket, noodles, licorce or fish. But I didn’t. My work is what it is. Like it or lump it. I shouldn’t have to explain or justify my work. If that makes me less of an artist than the guy who put lipstick on his asshole and pressed it to letterhead, then GREAT.
z
xxxx
 


A work in progress

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Wayne’s been working flat out on the stable for the last few days. I think I’ll take you for a small stroll through the history of the stable thus far.

This is what it looked like when we first saw the farm. It was an old shed, housing a tractor and many bits and pieces of rusty engine parts, broken plowing implements, trucks, boat bits, drums of oil and a truck parked next to it. The roof was being held in place by spit and a collection of old tractor wheel hubs and besser blocks.

Before we moved in the previous owner took away everything he wanted to keep. Most of the truck parts, boats and tractors went. All that was left was a falling down shed and a whole lot of rubbish. Really. A ton of rubbish that we are still coming to terms with.
So Wayne started looking at it, considering how to go about converting it into a stable for 2 horses. We only had Wally at the time but were planning to get a horse for me. He found that the roof needed replacing entirely, that the low ceiling on one end of the shed was too low for horses, and that one post wasn’t holding up the wall let alone the roof. It wasn’t even in the ground.
 
Slowly, over the next few months, Wayne started to rip the old shed apart. He dug holes and put in posts to hold up a new roof for the ‘extension’… only to find the irrigation pipes. Twice. Seems like every single hole that Wayne dug for a few weeks had a pipe going through it. I think we spent more on mending pipes than on anything else during that period.
One weekend our friend Chris came up and together the guys put the first half of the roof on. By then we’d already had Ben join our family so the two bays were perfect for the two boys. Of course, now we also have Dancer which means that the work is far from finished. We need another bay, so Wayne is considering a ‘lean-to’ bay added to the side of the current structure.
I suggest he builds another, similar structure at a right angle to the one we have now – another 2 bays…. Cause you never know when you may need another stable… 🙂
 
 
 

 z


Before and after

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This is the before photo of the vegie patch. Not before-before. When it was 4 beds of weeds. About halfway through the weeding process, 2.5 beds done, 1.5 to go.

This is the vegie patch a couple of weeks ago, overgrown with growing things that we actually planted on purpose. Well, minus a few that were either eaten by bugs or threw the towel in on their own. The corn is currently almost as tall as I am and the runner beans have grown up the trellis and are sporting red flowers. Who knew.

 

I’ve just been feeling so lazy lately… I have a ton of things I need to or want to get done over the holidays, but I just can’t motivate myself to do anything at all. Maybe I just need a rest for a few days, then I’ll get back into it.

…That’s what I’m telling myself.

Wayne’s daughter Caitlin is visiting us and its nice to get to know her. So far Wayne’s taught her how to drive the 4×4 up on the hill, we plan to put her on Ben for his first time being ridden and I think he’s planning to get her to chop down a tree after that, then stock us up with firewood for winter.

Ok. Only joking. Caitlin can’t ride, and though we’d love to get someone onto Ben who’s lighter than us (Wayne suggested I buy a clydesdale!) I don’t think it’d be fair to use Caitlin as a guinea pig. As for the chainsaw, I don’t think anyone can prize that baby out of Wayne’s hands…

I’m actually really looking forward to getting back to working with the horses today. It’s been weeks. And I have a new saddle to play with. We bought a hybrid – that’s a confused saddle, not quite Australian stock, not quite western. Its a Wintec so its as light as a feather (compared to Wayne’s western). I’m hoping Ben will like it. I believe my butt will like it fine.

I really can’t wait to start riding Ben. And Wally sure needs the exercise. All the horses are round as a whole number thanks to the shortage of grass around here. A visitor thought Wally was pregnant! Besides the grass and the hard feed they all get (cut down to one meal a day now), Wally scoffs the best bits out of his feed bin, then runs up and eats the chook feed too. Its a miracle he isn’t laying eggs with the amount of layer pellets he’s eating!

We could use the eggs.

So, they could use the exercise. As could we… Seems like lately we mark time between one meal and the next. Right now I have scones in the oven… with strawberry jam and that double thick cream you can stand a knife up in. YUM.

And tonight is pizza and movie night. I’m making pizza and we got dvds in New Norfolk. Wayne got 3 movies about centurions, romans, swords and heads being chopped off. I got Red Dog and Water for Elephants. You know which I’ll be angling to watch tonight.

Let’s hope the scone are edible. First time I ever made scones they were hard as rocks. This time I’m making them using a Country Women’s packet. Just add water it said. Easy as pie. We’ll see.

Better go check the oven.

z