Sunday Scribblings "Manifesto"

G'Day,
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Best wishes to all. That is my manifesto to you. Grin. Hug. Smooch on the cheek.
Sunday Scribblings prompt this week sure is a biggie isn't it. I googled the word and came up with a list as long as ............. well bloody long anyway.
Then I took a few side trips around the web and found this...

http://www.wellbeingmanifesto.net/

It looked like a government propaganda site at first, but really, I did think it was pretty good and covered lots of stuff that we need to strive for to achieve our own personal well being. I don't usually like to copy others stuff and always think it is best to do my own writing but I do want to share this one.
In my life I have experienced people with depression. I do know how it feels to not have a healthy sense of well being. Anyway I hope some of you that find my Sunday Scribblings prompt this week might go along and have a look at the well being manifesto. Have a read and comment back to me on what you find there.
Sometimes you are the one who gets kicked, sometimes you are the one holding the bandages. That is what women do for the ones they love.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "December"

G'day,
Here is my entry into this weeks "Sunday Scribblings"prompt. The word we will be writing about this week is "December". If you would like to have a look see at what other participants have written go to my side bar and click on the link.
Anyway, here goes..........
December brings expectations that I sometimes like, and sometimes not. I remember the saddest thing I ever saw at Christmas. I was parked in the main street.It was in the days when the phone box was placed on the footpath outside the post office. A drunk man was in the phone box sobbing and begging his wife (i suppose) could he come and see his children. She was very obviously opposed to the idea. So sad.
Our December expectations. Tradition, family, nostalgia for Christmas past, present and future. The way the media and movies and of course the way we envision it should all be. The reality is sometimes different isn't it.
Yesterday I went back to Wagga to visit my two youngest children as I won't be able to see them ion Christmas day, for the first time since they were born. That's OK, I guess I can be proud that doing my job as a Mummy has lead them to independence and their own lives and contacts. Though I am a bit disappointed. I know there will be many other Christmases to follow when we will be together.
I thought I would write about that.
My son Mike, my hubby Pete and I drove to Wagga on Saturday. It is a three hour drive from here and quite pretty no matter what time of year the route is traveled, but especially so just now as we have had lots of rain, courtesy of La Nina. It is usual for the countryside to be browning off at this time of year and harvest to be finished. Nope, not this year. due to all the rain and recent flooding in the area all the crops were still in the paddocks, unstripped and spoiled, not worth the hours usually spent to work the fields. After many years of drought the farmers were watching their crops grow beautifully then be spoilt by drought breaking rains. Around Jugiong and Gundagi, in fact all the way to Wagga, you could see the many places where the water levels had been high and debris was left hanging in the fences.
We took the back road across to Junee from Gundagi, just to sticky beak. My eyes and my mind were full of well loved memories along that road. The road runs beside the Murrumbidgee river until near Nangus, a few weeks ago I could have just about walked across it without wetting my belly button. Now I was looking at long grasses swept flat in the direction of the waters flow. Two years ago there wasn't even much grass left at all. At Nangus I passed the little garage/ store/ grog shop, where I ran out of petrol late one night. I knocked on the door and found a lady, Lorna, I knew from years ago whom I used to work with. Her hubby had to go around to the bus depot at a local farm and raid me some petrol from there to get me home to Junee. Strange coincidence.
Then towards Junee and past a property called Pine Point. A friend from the Wagga potter's club lived there for years. She moved to Canberra too, but died of cancer last year, Poor Rita, I treasure the pots that I have which she made. A few minutes further down the road you come to Eurongilly. Barely a village with a hall, a tennis court a couple of houses and not much else. Eurongilly has its own memories. I thought of the people I knew who came from this area, and the driving lessons I took my children on along the back farm roads there. Then a left hand turn towards Junee.
That corner there is Heffernan's farm, I remember I took my Mum and Dad mushrooming in that paddock and my poor old dad had trouble getting back over the fence.
There on the right is Brabin's road. She taught my children at the local high school, and her daughter Sarah was in my daughter's class at school all the way through. I wonder what Sarah is doing now.
If you go down that road to the end and turn left again you come out near the farm where my son had his first job.
Just down here and on the right again is the road to a friends farm. Brian is a bush woodworker and I went to a workshop one day out there. I really enjoyed that and came away with a hobby horse that I made which served me as a coffee table beside the swing in my back yard for many years. He was such a nice man, he used to come up to the hospital where I worked and he played his ukulele and sang to the oldies each week. He came to my farewell and sang to me. I hung my head to hold myself together then.
The trees all around here still bear the scars of the big fires which swept through the area a few years ago and caused havoc, they burned for miles and miles. They were started by someone throwing a cigarette butt out the window of their car along the Olympic way, on new years day. It was one of those impossibly hot, tinder dry summer's days that you get in inland Australia with a vicious drying wind to sweep the flames along. I will never forget that day.
The hill above our old house was called Rocky hill, not much to imaging what it looks like. As you round it into the town of Junee, there is a house on a few acres,we should have bought that house. Our old house is just below the lookout there. The trees have grown, the chook yards are still standing, but otherwise I though the yard was looking in need of some t.l.c. I know the lady who bought it, she is not a gardener. Oh, so many memories here. The house where my children grew up and where we lived for 14 years.
Down Hill street and half way up the other side of the hill we stopped at Ali's house. I know all her family, little towns are great like that. She had been ill and as she was sleeping I left her there, I will catch up with her again later. Down the hill, to the right is the main street, across the intersection is the swimming pool ans skate park and the old pub where they have the poker run. So many more stories, so many.
Then left at the end of the street and on to the Bomen road which leads you into Wagga, the black wattle trees along the sides of the road are lush and green but finished flowering months ago.
I was born in Wagga. Spent quite a bit of my life there, on and off over the years. I still consider it my home town. The water is still high in the river from the floods last week and you can see where the high water levels came up to. North Wagga was evacuated during the floods but it is open again now, the water didn't enter many of the houses. My friend Fran's house is just down there in that street on the right, she was evacuated. I hope her house and pottery studio isn't damaged.
The old Hampton bridge is sure dilapidated now, enclosed with wire to keep people off the unsafe decking and railings, she stood strong during this flood though. Good bones underneath the crumbling wood. Down river to the right of the bridge is my beloved Wirradjiri reserve, I have written about it in my blog before.
The lower part of the main street was underwater, not so much from the river but from the torrential rain that fell.
We went straight past the main street and turned left into Trail street. That house on the corner is a beautiful old federation style home. Over the years I have seen it go from almost destroyed , returned to its former glory again, but now it is a shame to see the lovely woodwork details dried out and peeling again.
On past the Wollundry lagoon the water level has dropped back almost to it's former levels and you would not believe that just a week ago it was flooding. The park is green and beautiful and the lagoon is adorned with water lilies in flower, pink, yellow and white floating peacefully on its surface.
Just across the road there is an old cannon, I climbed on that when I was a kid. Down that street there,The Esplanade, is a semi detached house my sister rented for a while. Traveling down into Best street on the left is that nice house I went to for a meeting about starting up an r.s.p.c.a. branch in Wagga when I was about 17 years old.
On the other side of the road is Mrs Graham's old house where I went each day to clean and look after her. Dear Mrs Graham, she had alzhiemers and would send me to the shop down the road each day I went there, to get 1/2 a billy can of milk. She did accept when I came back that it came in cartons nowadays though.
A few blocks further on down Best street and there is the house where my daughter lived when she first moved out of home, oh, it looks good now and has been all renovated. Over the road on the corner is Mr Grentall's house and across the other side of the traffic lights is Vic and Dragitsa's house.
Then up over that railway bridge into Edmondson street, past Mount Erin school where my niece went and then on the left Wagga high school. Into Mitchelmore street.
Oh there is Betty's house, another pottery friend. She is gone now too. Such a feisty old chook, but I loved her.
It is all the one street, from Trail street right through to Northcott parade, almost one side of Wagga to the other.
That house over there is where I got the flowers for my wedding bouquet.
Next block down is Saint John's, where I used to go to church in my teens. I knew that place well and down into Fernleigh road is Turvey Tops, the local shopping center.
But back in Mitchelmore street a few blocks down is Beltana Ave. Where I lived as a 2 year old, a 7 year old and again as a 15 year old, then until my wedding.My very earliest memories lie here. Still my Mum's house, old now but still a family home. My daughter and son live there now.
An exchange of Christmas presents and a romp with Ruby my son's beloved Staffie dog, then off the the RSL club bistro for a quasi Christmas lunch.
We left Wagga around 4.00 as planned and got back to Canberra about 7.00.
So that was my December trip with reminiscences. The closest to a Christmas trip I will be doing this December.
Enough?
Ok. Bye.
Merry Christmas All.
Enjoy your Christmas break,
no matter what your personal beliefs.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Antidote"

G'Day,
I have been reading around some of the other participants work this week. Oh aren't we such a gang of romantics, finding love the antidote to woes, or even just a friendly caring face.
I thought I might try a different tack. I don't like to follow the crowd, never did.
Anyway I thought I would write about my beloved Uncle Wally. Every child should have an Uncle Wally in their lives. He is such a sweetie and quite an eccentric in his own right, he does not follow the crowd. I love that about people.
Anyway, my Uncle Wally. He found fun and excitement in things before they became trendy or fashionable. Things like collecting and restoring vintage cars and bikes. He was dubbed the oldest bikie in Griffith by a biker's club. I reckon he had one of the first movie camera around when I was a baby and took movies of interesting stuff long before others could afford them and long before the little hand held camcorders of today were available. He even went skiing up in the snow country when he was in his teens on two homemade skis he made from planks of wood. He is also an example of keeping healthy through exercise and eating home grown organic vegetables and fruits. He walks 4 km each day rain hail or shine. What a great character. He is 82 now I think. He built his own house and can and has done just about anything. And... he is dyslexic, so he never learned to write or read.
Anyway where I was going with this story....
Uncle Wal has been bitten by brown snakes probably 4 times in his life. A few years ago he was bitten again, on the finger. He felt something sting him on the finger when he was moving some timber he had stacked down the back behind the shed. He wasn't sure what it was. After a while he stared feeling not so good and thought maybe it was a snake again so he went up to the hospital which is only a few minutes drive away from his home. He made it to the car park and couldn't make it any further, then he managed to call a passer by who came over to help him and they bought the nursing staff out to help him. He nearly died that time. He had to stay in hospital for a week. Not good, I wasn't there but I can just imagine him champing at the bit to get back outside again and not want to stay in bed. Hahaha. The doctors said next time he is bitten will probably be the last.
Just a note about these snakes. the eastern brown snake is the second most deadly snake in the world and the first one is the inland taipan. Both infamous Aussies. The eastern brown snake is a quite common and wide spread critter and although it is shy and will get out of your way if it possibly can but it will attack if cornered or breeding. They are born with a full dose of venom and can use it from birth, which has been known to trick people who pick up "that cute little baby snake"The antidote can be found in all hospitals, large and small around the state, if you are lucky, hahaha.
I have had lots of encounters with them, but that is another story.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "What a difference a day makes"

G'Day,
I am back for a try at the "Sunday scribblings" prompt this week after several weeks absence. Anyway I was thinking of this weeks prompt laying awake last night. What came to mind was loving hands. Don't ask me why, but here goes.

Loving Hands
A day, a year, a decade, a life time.
I have watched your hands.
The nails, the long straight fingers
as expressive as any face,
in anger, sadness or happiness,
in excited speech,
in work, in loving touch.
A touch of love, sensual, gentle
showing their strength.
Holding our new born baby,
guiding a elderly arm,
soothing towards love, or sleep.
Mistakes forgotten to their touch,
their familiar touch
A day, a year, a decade, a life time.
Together.

Oh my children would cringe. Hahaha. Too embarrassing to have parents that still think like that. Yesterday was my birthday. I am now 51. The pic above was taken at my sister's wedding a few weeks ago.

Bye.
Love Linda.

Ellen's Wedding. Burra open gardens.

G'Day again,
I would like this post to be part of the Friday Fertilizer prompt. You can see our host's name on my side bar. There is a Friday Fertilizer logo there. If you click on the picture it will take you to "Tootsie Time's blog and you can see what other gardeners around the world have to share.
Here are some photos from the Burra open gardens which were held on the first weekend in November. I went out there to have a look, as you read in my last entry...OMG.....bloody fantastic gardens displayed at their best. I tried to put in a link to the pics I put up on my face book account but...well you know all about my computer skills, or lack there of, so I am putting them in a separate post to share with you. OK. the first pic is of one of the many photographs I took of the wonderful Iris in flower at a nursery in Burra. All sizes shapes and colors.
Some more of the iris garden beds.
This is at another of the gardens. How would you like to wake up to this view each morning Mmmm mm-mm.Beautiful
An almost black iris. I have a special interest in black flowers.
A delicate pink iris. Iris, iris, and more iris. I did have a few in pots that were flowering but are nearly finished now. Mine were lovely, but the sheer variety and numbers here put them to shame.
Just look at the flowers.
And again, garden beds at the iris farm.
Pure gold.
Here is a red flowering gum at the second garden I visited. Very pretty and very Australian.
And... my theme flower. Waratah. The telopea. Overlooking the Burra landscape. What a view eh. I made this my flower because it is the state flower emblem from where I was born. New South Wales, and I love red. It is not that easy to grow I wondered if the owners had imported soil . The waratah will only grow in sand stone based soil which comes from around Sydney and the coastal areas around there. Certainly not the soil near Burra which is near Canberra. I know the ones growing in the botanic gardens here are in imported soils.
This is part of the second garden on display which is also run as a nursery. I had lunch here and the lady who owns this also blends tea, so it was a great visit for me and I got to sample some of her blends. It was funny trying to get my tiny little car up the steep hill when she stared to slip on the gravel corrugations but I managed it. Imagine what that driveway would have been like in wet weather, definitely an 4x4 needed.
But OH...just look at that view.
A big blood red Shirley poppy.
Another Shirley poppy. I had some of these growing happily in the last rented house we were in and had to leave them behind before I had the pleasure of seeing them in flower Grrrr. Ah well it wasn't meant to be was it.
Part of the first garden. Well is this beautiful or is this beautiful? I visited 4 of the 6 gardens on display before I ran out of time.

*****************************

OK the rest of this post shows pics of my sister's wedding that I recently attended in Queensland.
The pic above is of my lovely niece Cassie, with her son Ezra 1 year old, and my son David at my sister's wedding.
The pic above is taken during the ceremony and shows beautiful my niece Tatham, her sister Cassie, my sister Ellen, the bride and my brother in law Sandy. Aren't they all beautiful.
(above) Peter and I at the wedding.
Sandy and Ellen, the Bride and Groom. Wed 31st October 2010.
My mob. David, Me, Michael, Annie and Peter.
A picture of the units we stayed in taken from the beach. Yeppoon, Queensland.
The units we stayed in at Yeppoon. It was really cool to watch the tide go in and out each day and see the subtle changes that happened on the beach.
My baby, Annie my youngest.
My great niece Ivory on the beach at Yeppoon. 4 years old.
This was an anagama kiln at a pottery near Yeppoon that my sister took me to see. It is a dragon with eyes etc to decorate it. Anagama kilns climb up a hill and are fueled by wood, they are a Japanese type kiln and need a couple of days constant stoking with wood and attention for the whole time to fire. Lots of hard work , but the end results are really something wonderful.
Before the wedding. Bride and groom. Hahaha.
Bride's daughter, my pretty niece Cassie, blowing me a kiss. Yes that head dress is just what you think it is. Hahaha.
This is the coal fired power station at Biloela where my sister lives. It is inland from Rockhampton about a 2&1/4 hour drive. The main industry for this area is coal mining and beef cattle. Great steaks, I got to sample them.
I took heaps of pics over the last few weeks in my travels, I hope these few I have shared give you a bit of an idea of what I have been up to.
Cheers.
Love Linda.

G'Day,
Is anybody out there anymore, since I have been away from my blog for so long?
Anyway, for my archives and for anyone who may be interested and still remembers me, here is an update on what I have been up to over the past month.
Well, you know if you have read in here before that I was disgruntled at having to move house. We were kicked out of the house we were living in a few weeks ago at short notice because the owners wanted to move back in. That was o.k. it is their house.
The rental market in Canberra is very competitive and each house we inspected, (and there where many,) was also visited by thirty or more other prospective renters, so as you can imagine it is quite hard and stressful to find another house to rent. We applied for seven places and had confirmation that we were accepted by the present real estate place just 3 days before our cut off date to go to Queensland for my big sister's wedding. As you can imagine it was a mad rush and we were absolutely exhausted. But we did it..... we did it. I can be very determined when I need to be and am capable of pushing myself work wise, to a place beyond where it is physically sensible to go, and I pay the price later.
So the new house? It is a small three bedder and we have had some difficulty finding places for our goods and shackles, we even had to find new homes for some or our furniture. I didn't like that but I guess it was time to do that anyway, and we still have too much stuff, I am bad at throwing things away. The house is ok though. When we moved in it smelt terrible, I guess they let their animals rule the house then tried to cover it up by perfuming it with sweet smelling cleaning chemicals, the blend was unbearable but I think it has improved with cleaning and spraying and bi-carb-soda-ing the carpets. My boss Brett came and sprayed the carpet with industrial deodorizer for me. It is funny how we will tolerate our own foibles house keeping wise, but refuse to tolerate other peoples isn't it. I am not a perfect house keeper but I reckon I am not as bad as some. I have sure seen some doozies in my cleaning work, oh boy have I, and am pleased to brag that my home has never and will never stoop to that standard.
Anyway, we have a house to live in, we had to take what we could get and BONUS! It has a great productive garden. Not too many flowers but lots of fruit trees and a vegetable patch which was very over grown but has great looking soil. Pete has been working on his days off and has weeded and replanted it with an assortment of vegetable seeds and seedlings. Part of the vege patch includes a good size and abundant strawberry patch. The fruit has no comparison to the flavorless berries sold in the supermarkets. It is great and full of juice and flavor. We have been going out the back and eating straight from the garden. There is a fig tree, a nectarine, 2 plums, a peach, 3 espaliered pear tress, 3 cherry trees, a lemon, apricot and loquat, and a large grape arbor. The old man who planted them sold this house 6 months ago and was italian, a race who are known to be great fruit and vegetable gardeners. Mushrooms have also been popping up in the back lawn and we have had several feeds of them.
So....... we went away to my sister's wedding with a house hastily jammed full of unpacked boxes and stuff every where. I had to leave my beloved cat and dog at the kennels and you should have seen their poor faces when I left them, we have never had to leave them in a kennel before, poor things. They have been so neurotic and needy since we came back.
We flew to Brisbane and then on to Rockhampton where we were met by my sister, Mum and my neice Tatham and her new beau, Brennan. We were delayed at Brisbane airport between flights for a couple of extra hours at Brisbane airport, so that was pretty annoying. Then they ferried us in two cars, (there were a few of us) a bit over 2 hours inland to the town where my sister El lives and works, Biloela. I think it has a population of around 4,000, quite a nice friendly little place. El has a house up there rent free and a car rent free with her job. Lucky bugger. It is a large house on a 5 acre block, I think the house we are in here would fit into her lounge and family/bar room easily. Haha. I got a tour of the hospital where she works and had a BBQ lunch with her workmates. They were nice people. Bonus of being the boss's little sister I guess, hahaha. We stayed there for 3 nights then moved to the coast to a town east of Rockhamptom called Yeppoon where the wedding was to be held. The place we stayed was in a great spot, right on the beach. The units were smallish but the owner was great too. It was great to sit under the coconut trees and watch the water gently lapping, the children playing, and the tides go in and out. There were lots of shells and tiny crabs all along the beach and I even got in the water and feel the gently waves rocking my body, then on the way home the taxi driver said a crocodile had been sited in the area a few days earlier....if I had known. Hahahaha. We will definitely have to go back there to explore some of the great barrier reef islands, which we didn't get to look at this time around. North Keppel and Great Keppel islands where right in front of us there.
The wedding was great, and I think everyone enjoyed themselves. There were visitors from all up and down the eastern seaboard of Australia. I put some of the photios in my face book page and I will try to put a link in here so anyone who wants can have a look at them. As I said I will try, ha ha.
So back to Canberra and her pleasures. Yep it is a good place to live. The drought has broken and spring is in all her glory after all the rain we have had, beautiful. It has rained again today on and off, we seem to be getting showers every second day lately.
Last weekend after doing a lot of sorting and organizing trying to get everything in the house organized I went out on Sunday afternoon to an open garden display at Burra. Burra is a semi rural area near here. O.M.G. you should have seen those gardens. Just gorgeous. Emerald green countryside, landscaping and flowers every where. I got to see 4 or the 6 gardens before I ran out of time in the afternoon. I was talking to a lady at one of the gardens and we were saying how do people manage to put all of their time into gardens like that to get them up to such a standard to display. Well two of the gardens were run as a sideline to small businesses run by the owners. One lady and her son ran a nursery and tea blending business, another husband and wife team were iris breeders and there were over 7000 named varieties all in flower at just the right time, so spectacular. At the nursery place I was lucky to negotiate the driveway in my tiny car though, she started slipping on a steep hill and the corrugated dirt gravel road, hahaha. But, when I got up there....oh the views! I had lunch there and spent my money before I got to the iris place so couldn't buy any of the plants there, ah well I have other irises and they are in flower now too, though the rain today is probably finishing them off.
Yesterday I got some extra work at the university where they are renovating a big cafeteria, so lots of scraping cement and climbing up and down ladders and mopping plaster dust off floors, but the extra few hours pay will be nice with Christmas fast approaching.
I went shopping today and bought some cloths for the warm weather, two pairs of trousers and two shirts. Nice.
I have also started a course of treatment on my poor old legs. I have been having acupuncture and acupressure massage. The acupressure massage has been quite painful. They seem to know just where to dig their fingers into your legs to cause the most pain, but it seems to have made a difference already. What I have been blaming on being fat for many years on my lower legs is actually fluid from bad circulation and with the treatment the swelling has started to go down. I am interested to follow through and see what results are accomplished. If it works the way I would like it to I will be able to go on long walks and exercise again the way I would like to do without pain and finish a shift at work without hobbling home and out of the car like a drunken person at the end of the day.
O.k. that's about all for the update for now.
Bye .
Love Linda.

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings asks us to write about what is essential to us today but only write what is essential. Mmmm.OK.

Home
Family
Pete
Home
Michael
David
Annie Brat
Home
Earth
Garden
Soil
Water
Plants
Home
Heat
Cool
Food
Home
Work
Money
Shopping
Nourishment
Home.
Entertainment
Friends
Family
Home.
Essential
Home.
Words
Clay
Fire
Home.
Shelter
Home.

Home. because very shortly I may not have one. We are to vacate this house in a few short weeks and have been trying to find another to rent in a very competitive rental market. Every house we inspect there are three dozen others inspecting and applying for the same property. I am feeling so insecure at the moment not knowing where to go. Bloody Canberra. Bloody real estate agents, bloody home owners. Bloody moving and packing. Bloody Bloody people who don't return phone calls.
I hate this. It never rains but it pours. Grrrrrr! Not impressed.

Friday Fertilizer . Floriade

G'Day,
Hope you all are well. I am o.k. here in Oz. It is Friday Fertilizer time again. Click on the logo in my blogs sidebar and go visiting the other participants of this fun prompt site over at Tootsie Time.
It is Sunday here actually but if I don't tell you I am 2 days late, you can pretend it is still Friday................ can't you?
Floriade festival ended here in Canberra today. This years theme was "Imagine". I was there on Friday (my 3rd visit this year), with my Aunty Joan, and my cousin Joan and it was still lovely, even if many of the flowers were finished, floriade has been running for a month, but there were still lots of beautiful flowers to see. The top picture is taken from the top of the ferris wheel, you can see the patterns in the flower beds if you enlarge the pic.
Pic above was taken from the top of the ferris wheel as well.
Ornamental kale in the kitchen garden beds at floriade.
Here are a few of the named varieties of tulips on display, planted in wheel barrows.
This smaller black tulip reminds me of a black artichoke.
Pretty and delicate tulips.
Big rhododendron in flower in the park at Floriade.
Moi. This was taken at the Australian war memorial on Saturday. I played dress ups. Do I look like I am from the 40's war years?

This is a sleepy bearded dragon. They are quite common, this pic was taken at Floriade in a big glass tank where you could pet them. Beautiful isn't it.
This is in the same tank on display at Floriade. He is a frilled neck lizard. You can't see his frilled neck because they only raise the frill when they want to scare you then they take fright and run. I remember seeing lots of these when I was a child but you don't see them anymore in the wild, or, very rarely.
These are little dragons too, but I don't know what kind. They look very similar to the eastern water dragons in the botanic gardens her so maybe they are the same sort as those. Cute, curious little blokes aren't they.
Here are some nice lace monitors. Also known as goannas. I wish my pics showed their beautiful patterns better in here. As you can see each of the three in this pic have different skin patterns. These guys have scratchy claws and have been known to run to the top of the tallest tree if frightened and if you are the closest tall tree.....hahaha. Funny. They can bite to defend themselves but are not venomous, however as they can sometimes be carrion eaters their mouths have lots of bacteria and can cause nasty infections.
Double tulips and pansys. I thought their petals looked like flames.
Big tulip. This was the size of a dinner plate.
Preeeeeety!
More tulips, aren't they beautiful? And.......the last picture below this one is a bed of lovely iris in bloom. Ahhhh, don't you just adore spring.
My visitors went home just before lunchtime today. I will miss their company. They were a treat to have visit.
O.K.
That's all folks.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Love & Flashback"

G'Day,
This week I am doing a bit of back tracking. Last weeks Sunday Scribblings prompt was "Love". In have had a read back through last weeks entries and found some really lovely things there. It ties in with this week's Sunday Scribblings prompt for me, which is 'Flashback".
Why, how so?
Well tomorrow Pete and I have been married for 30 years. Cool eh!
30 years in a world of change and break ups in marriages and families. But we are still together. Still together after quite a few rocky bits and sad bits and lots of happy and funny bits.
Makes me wonder how we managed it all these years. But we have and I am optimistic about our future together, yes we still have one. See holding on through the rough bits is worthwhile if there is still love.
I would have liked to have a photo from our wedding to add here but as we are moving house they have been packed away in a box, and I am not dragging them out again. Maybe another post. The photo of us above, is one I have posted before. It was taken about 2, 1/2 months ago on a weekend trip to Sydney.
Flash back?
30 years ago tomorrow.
I woke early, not sleeping much that night due to nerves and excitement and visitors. I really was against the whole wedding show off thing. I just wanted to get married to my Pete without the fanfare. The fanfare was my Mum and sister's idea, not mine. I didn't want the make up and reception and the presents, just Pete. Just Pete. I did want the ceremony and would have liked it to be in a church, but Pete wasn't into that despite being bought up as a catholic. He said, he would have been a hypocrite marrying in the church.
People started arriving, my aunts and cousins, my dear adopted aunt from across the road. The car. I loved that old car. It was a 1940's something black Buick with doors that opened back the front, a real old gangster car. I can't remember the other car but it was a big black american vintage thing too. My uncles provided them and chauffered for us.
I struggled with my make up and poked myself in the eye with the mascara. My sister stepped in and helped and I cringed at the" not me-ness" of it all. Everyone said I looked beautiful but I certainly didn't feel like it. Photos were taken by the old curtains in Mum's living room, ha. Funny how fashions change. Oh well. Stepping ahead.
My dad drove with me in the back of the car and we didn't know what to say to each other. So we said nothing. I don't know what I was expecting but .....something.
We went to the Botanical gardens in Wagga, my park. The park where I played as a child, and walked to as a teen and got married in and picnicked in and had my children's birthday parties and where they played too. We had chosen a spot under a big graceful gum tree in the native area of the gardens. A table was set up and the crowd was gathering. I walked up on my Dad's arm and there was Pete waiting. He looked so nervous and pale.
I took his hand.
I still have his hand,
he still has my heart.
30 years.
And onwards.

Bye.
Love Linda.

Missy's Garden: Gardening - a Game

These are 2 of the six little candle houses I made for the coming art and craft show. They have not been fired (cooked) yet. The lovely terracotta red color will show up after they are fired.
This is one of the larger lanterns I made. I like the rustic roughness of it and the weird style. It is meant for outdoor use around a BBQ or in the garden. This one has been fired so you can see the final color of the clay. I like to make all the stuff I do individual one of pieces.

Missy's Garden: Gardening - a Game
G'Day , Anybody, whoever, is anybody out there.
Today when I went to my blog I found a comment from Missy, I added her link above. She, or her Mum, have invited me to join in a game.
Well, I had some bad news last night and am a bit grumpy. Maybe that is not quite right I am very put out and feeling down about having to move ...AGAIN!
We have received notification that the owners of the house we have been renting want it back. They have been overseas for a year. Yeah yeah I know it is their house, but it is so inconvenient at the moment. You see I am trying to save to go up to Queensland for my sister's wedding in about 6 weeks time and thought I was doing quite well. I have paid for the accommodation and the plane fares for the whole family and what I can save between then and now was to be spending money. Last nights news absolutely blew my plans out of the water as we have to move in 1 months time. I am going backwards again. We have to find money to move and pay a bond as well as find another house in the next week or so. Arrrrgh. I hate this.
Anyway, back to this game.
Let me do the Pollyanna thing here for a moment and say joining in the game is just what I need to make me look at things in a different light. Thank You for that Missy.
The game requests that I write a list of ten things that I love doing.
Well here goes, let me try.
1. I love playing with clay. I did a bit of that today as I am preparing things to go in an art and craft show. The first one I have gone in since moving to Canberra 2 and a half years ago. I might give me a bit extra cash for Queensland, or....the new house. If my things sell that is. I have so far made 6 little candle houses, 6 small bowls and 9 smaller bowls all decorated with colored liquid clay called slip. Also 5 larger candle lanterns and a rectangular platter that I still have to decorate when it is dry enough.There are a few other odds and bods I can put in too. I have been potting since my eldest son was a baby and he is 28 now. I find lots of reasons I love my clay. Hmm must write more about that in another post.

2. Like Missy's mum I love observing our beautiful Australian wildlife. Canberra has lots of wonderful birds because of the nice urban planning which has left lots of green areas and bush in and around the suburbs. I have magpies and king parrots, sulfur crested cockatoos, Gang gangs, top knot pigeons, pee wees, wattle birds, rosellas, white winged choughs, currawongs, crows, and others I don't know the names of that visit my garden. Arrrgh their garden, not mine. I love them all. The magpies though, they are wonderful, they eat out of my hand and sit on the roof of the BBQ shelter or on the railing by the front door, and warble to me when they want to be fed. We used to have a large blue tongue lizard that shared our yard and the yard behind us but he is sadly no longer, it got run over. I loved to watch it sneak in and out of the rock garden out the front. There is also a snarly brush tail possum that frequents the big oak tree out the side of the house on the nature strip.

3. I love to spend time with my husband and son Mike who live with me. I don't see enough of my other two children they live in another town and are making their own lives but what time I do get to share with them is precious. I am so proud of my three children's achievements. They might not seem so fantastic to others in their achievements, they are not doctors or lawyers or Indian chiefs, but to me they are. I sometimes talk to them on face book. Which leads me to the next number...
4. I love to waste time on this here computer. I must confess that it is my most common form of entertainment these days. I would rather peek into others real lives , or that which they choose to share with me via their blogs and face book than watch anything television. Some of the people I have come to know in here are very special and at times I have leaned on some of them with things that are easier to write than say face to face. When I tire of that I move on to some of the silly games that I have found on face book. Big time wasters but I enjoy them. They are for me my way of vegging out and switching off. I need to do that.

5. I like creating. Whether it be with clay or plants or food or words or sometimes fabric. I have always done that for as long as I can remember. Always had to be making something. I find it very very satisfying to sit quietly and do things like that, maybe it is another way of vegging out or sometimes being able to save money. On Wednesday night I made a lovely batch of strawberry jam. It will last me for ages and was much cheaper than the shop bought produce for the same quantity, it tastes better and has no preservatives in it. But like Missy's mum said in her post , I like to tweak things and not follow the pattern or the recipe, or better still make up my own, it is more fun that way.

6. I enjoy watching people. Imagining who they are, what they do, what is their story, or making up a story about them using my imagination. I love when it runs riot.

7. I love tradition. I have a whole family full of it. I like to sticky beak back through my family tradition memories and bring them out and dust them off and link them together and to me. I wonder when I do, which parts of me came from whom. Who am I like ,what were they like, what made them them, and what makes me , me. I have silly sentimental bits and pieces that I have kept that link me to them. Amongst them books, crockery, photographs, even plants. I have a collection of plants that remind me of the people who gave them to me and I keep them alive even though their original owner is sometimes long gone.

8. I like driving. Big long country drives, the journey and what is seen along the way is more important than the destination. I listen to my old music along the way because it is not popular with the kids if they are with me, and I sing along. I find though that I sound much better if I turn the sound up loud and drown myself out. I used to sound OK when I was younger, but not any more. Haha.

9. Music. I like or can tolerate most styles. I do like my old stuff best though. I can listen to anything from pop music to rock to jazz and blues or folk or classical. I won't quote what I prefer not to listen to here as it is supposed to be about stuff I like doing. I often take my i pod to work with me and listen to it and bop around if nobody is in the building and they have all gone home.

10. I like my hair, I have grown it long now. But it has always been thick and strong. Of all the bits that are me I think I like my hair the best. It is always a bit messy, and gray around the edges, but hey, so what, that is me. Just me.

So, if you would like to join in the game please do. If you click on the link below the heading to this post it will take you to Missy's blog, you can read others or find out more about it than my skills have described here. Enjoy. I am not going to send this meme to anyone, but request you join in the game if it tickles your fancy, like it did mine.
Cheers!
Bye.
Love Linda.