One year

G'day all!

This date, one year ago, we moved into our (the bank's) house. Yep. Settlement was on the 16th and we were IN! This is our first anniversary of living here. Gosh the year has gone fast, and no, I don't want it back again cos this has been a mongrel of a year.



Our house a year ago.


Our house now.

I've been quiet this week cos we had a hmm-hmm load of work to do around the house before our housewarming yesterday (I figured that it was in the first year of us moving in, so it is All Good as the banana-benders say), plus I am knitting Christmas presents. We got most of the house looking somewhere between OK to good. People love our in-wall bookshelves (alas, alack, I can't get good photos cos the hall is only a metre wide and that is not enough for the camera to show more than two shelves and a bit of "fancy" plasterwork). Thank you to everyone who came - I hope you had a good time cos I enjoyed it :-)

Do I have pictures of knitting for you today? Umm, no. I have been knitting more Fetchings - I am currently on number 5.8. I realised that knitting Fetchings for me (the 0.8 Fetching) didn't help me knit the ones for my sister, so I broke open the dyed, ready to sell stash and started using some of my best yarn. Pics later, like another day when it isn't dark. LOL


(Cheshire on the back fence, for once being graceful though she looks a lot porkier than she really is)

I went to a knitting sit in at a magazine shop in the city on Thursday night. Yarn set it up. It was fun and anyone who bought the mag on the night got a pressie. We found more people who are not on the SnB list there! Plus to top off a great night it actually *rained* on me on the way home! The cats were most distressed - it has rained so little in the last two months that they can't remember what it is. Nutmeg in fact fluffed her tail up like a dunny brush as she examined the wetness of the ground.


(Nutmeg looking very porky indeed, after I've spent a lot of time trying to get weight off her, and asking if I wanna make anything of it)




Today we went up to Glenburn, which is about hmm, 60km north of where we live. You would think that it would only take maybe an hour, but it took an hour to clear the city. Once out of the city it gets fun cos you have to wind along the edge of a valley and then up the side of a mountain (ok, a very small mountain called Mount Slide) to a pass and the road is all wiggly and pretty and really great fun to drive along unless you get stuck behind a B-double (a prime mover with two trailers on the back). We went to Glenburn, which is pastoral and also drought afflicted, to get some native fish for Nathan to stick in his woo-tank (a 5000L fish pond made out of plywood with suitable iron reinforcing). Two of the photos in this blog post are from the trip.



I am feeling rather fussed. We have, I kid you not, about 1000 plants in pots. The idea was that they would go in the ground during last autumn and this spring, only the rains never came. We have had 4.5mm of rain so far this month against an average of 59mm. Melbourne tends to get about 60mm of rain a month from historical records (what SF movie featured historical records?) over the entire year, but these last six months we've averaged no more than half of that. Now we are about to go onto stage three restrictions, the toughest we've had in 20 years. I understand that people in the country have been on stage four restrictions for some time - no water used outside the house (except presumably greywater) - but we Melburnians supposedly have a 5 or 10 year water supply. Only problem is that we have had a drought that has now lasted for pretty much 10 years, with the year being the worst on record. We are using greywater in the garden. We are going to get as many plants into the ground before restrictions go up on January 1 cos the plants in the ground are looking better than the ones in pots. But it is all a hassle and sad too. We are going to lose a lot of plants that we've taken years to collect.



On a different note, Nathan has been using a bag of pebbles (affectionately called "the scrotum" for its interesting ahem shape) on a string as a counterbalance for the garage side-door. Alas it fell off the other day... but was beautifully modelled by the man himself :-)

Time for a walk then a few days of work. Blah, but it helps pay the bills!

anon!

Comments

  1. Congratulations on your anniversary :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Congrats on the 1-year house anniversary! Such a shame about the drought (and the fires aren't helping I guess), hope you can rescue most of the plants. Fetchings are addictive aren't they, made my second pair recently (well first for me the other was a gift), I'm sure I'll make more!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Congrats on your house anniversary! Lovely house. Hee hee - I love that photo of Nutmeg!! That's just a bad angle for cats. I'm sure she's quite svelte and doesn't need to be on food restrictions. (You can stop biting me now, Chaos, I've typed it!)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous2:46 pm

    Oh, Happy House Anniversary, it doesn't seem like a year at all!! Hmmm, do the cats see your blog??? I hope not!!! You might be off their Christmas Card list!!!
    The drought is awful. People tgink Tasmania has missed it, but we have has=d record low rain for a few years now. Everything is bone dry, or burning. Good luck with the planting out.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Congrats on the anniversary.
    You will grow to love 'grey water and buckets',
    I'm in Geelong and we've been on stage4 restrictions for 3 weeks.
    it's a little time consuming, but worth it to save your precious plants,
    if in doubt get more buckets!

    ReplyDelete
  6. I hope you get rain and lots of it soon. Water restrictions must really suck. Poor plants. Try adding a layer of bark, leaves or small stones over the ground around them after you plant to help keep the water in the ground a bit longer.

    Congrats on playing house with the bank for a year. It's a good feeling to have your own house.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Its nice to have your little humpy!!!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Anonymous3:02 am

    I admit it: I clicked on the scrotum picture.

    Happy anniversary!

    ReplyDelete
  9. i love your pix...esp. the potbelied kitty.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

I enjoy getting comments but if I don't have your email address, I may not be able to reply 8-\

Popular posts from this blog

Your monthly blog post

Competition time!

Seattle Six