Too busy to write blogs!

I have finally put pen to paper, or in this case, fingers to keyboard.    This is after procrastinating for quite a few hours.    But the weather today is bitterly cold, raining and very windy, and a perfect day for sitting under a rug, with a laptop on my knee.  

We have been out and about, with Walter attending exercise classes at the community centre, plus going back to the bowling club again, and I have been continuing with my bike rides on Monday mornings and walks on Thursday mornings.   Also last Thursday I joined the U3A board games afternoon, which I found out was a lot of fun and not very serious.

One Saturday we went wine tasting at McLaren Vale.   Only one winery, namely Shingleback Wine, but it had heaps of atmosphere as it was in an old barn, with a wood fire going, and pleasant staff.   We also shared a cheese and cold meat platter, and it was here that I discovered the yuppy nibbles, namely Dukkah.   I think it originated in Egypt or somewhere in that vicinity.

Now for the uninformed, like me, Dukkah can be made out of many types of nuts, seeds, herbs and spices, which are crushed and blended together as a dry mixture.   It can be then used to coat meat or used as a dip, which is how it was used at the winery.    First one gets a piece of crusty bread (or any type of flat bread), and dips it into olive oil, then into the Dukkah mixture.   Quite delicious really.

We had a lovely time at the winery.    And the wine was pretty good too.

Isabel had a bit of a mishap during the last school holidays.   She went on a picnic with her friends, and managed to cut her finger with a blunt knife.   This entailed a visit to the local hospital, where she received three stitches.   The staff were brilliant, I might add, and Isabel was very brave. 

There have been lots of walks with Piper, and it is great to let her off in the parks, without worrying about snakes and kangaroos.   She is obsessed with chasing the tennis ball, which runs off her excess energy.   We have upped her training routine, which she has responded to, brilliantly.   This involved teaching her not to bark at the huge dogs which were cooped up behind high fences, or at any large vehicle that passed us. Plus not to bark madly at our window, whenever she heard someone walk past.   It has only taken a few days to stop this sort of behaviour.   Why did we put up with it beforehand!

The main distraction for me, has been the garden.   Almost an obsession really, at the moment.  Of course I am keen to get all the planting done before summer, and the dry weather makes planting more difficult.

A couple of newsworthy items. 

Our tax returns have been submitted to the taxation office, thanks to the accountant.   Hurrah.    And we found out that even with the income from the flats, we were still low income earners and did not have to pay any tax!    Well Walter did not have to pay any tax, but I still paid tax in the UK, which was taken into account on the tax return, and I had to pay a Medicare Levy, which amounted to $1200.   But this was all so much better than expected, so we were very happy with the result.    Now I am going to apply to see if I can get a little bit of a pension from the Australian Government.    And now that I am a recognised resident of Australian, tax wise, I can start sorting out this double taxation problem with the UK, and stop the bank from charging us non resident tax withholding fees on interest and deposits.   Happy people.

And on the UK front.   I have decided that I do not live in the country so therefore like all other people living outside the country, I can just be astounded by the situation the country has got itself into.  This is much better than the angst that I felt towards the neverending crisis.  So no more comments.   I am currently so relieved that I no longer live in Britain.

However, it is not all a bed of roses regarding the government in Australia, either, but certainly preferable to living in Britain.

Now back to the more mundane matters, namely of the garden.

The plant in the photograph below, is quite a mystery.   It first appeared as a cluster of upright red flowers, and then the tough dark green leaves appeared out of the soil.   Whoever bought these, gave a plant to two other neighbours in the street.   A very mysterious plant.

I was given a recipe for homemade organic weedkiller.   I ended up with white paving slabs and stones.   It did kill the weeds, but I have not used it again.    Luckily the white coating washed off.   The main ingredient was Soda Ash, which is also used in the swimming pool, I found out.  I had heaps of it in the shed.  I have now bought a commercial organic weed killer, and a new sprayer.

A huge pile of stones that I threw out of this garden bed.   I think Steve is going to use them to make a rockery at his house.   Nice stones too, but not in our garden.

First I had to finish cutting back the overgrown trees.   Darren and I became too cold and tired to finish off the last part of the garden last May.

The hibiscus behind the gazebo has been cut right back.

Walter and I finally managed to dig out this overgrown and stripy succulent.   It took two of us to lift it into the green bin.  So pleased to see it gone.

Walter shredding the twigs and small branches.

We also pulled out the small hibiscus, as it was looking very pale.   No wonder, as the roots were on the surface only.   I have poisoned the roots of the other hibiscus with bleach!   This part of the garden has been planted with small hebes.  That is a kangaroo paw on the right, but it has been moved elsewhere.   There are so many varieties of cultivated kangaroo paw now, also proteas too.   I have put a protea in the garden and four varieties of kangaroo paw.   I must say that generally there are now many plants that will grow in seaside areas, which is very exciting.

I have put in two succulents beside the yukka.   And two Jasmine plants behind the yukka.

We now have plenty of bare fences, so the fence line looks very boring but time will change that, hopefully.

Two hardenbergias, a purple one and a white one, to cover the back fence.   

In my small veggie garden area behind the shed I have a little nursery.   At the moment a variety of succulents are there, hopefully growing roots so that they can be planted in the garden or in pots.  I will, however, make sure that they do not grow to be gigantic plants.   The planter box on the left has garlic bulbs planted in it.

 

The veggie gardens, or what will be veggie gardens.   There is now green trellis against the fence and in the gap to the left.

My lovely steel kookaburra, back again on a tree, a variety of Norfolk pine.   The kookaburra, a present from Aaron and Kylie, was removed from the tree in the UK, cleaned and then oiled, before being shipped to Australia.

Darren gave me some clivia plants, and behind them I have planted agapanthus plants, which had been growing in a clump behind the lavender bushes.   A watering system and plenty of compost should help all the plants flower beautifully.   It is a very dry area in summer.

The Australian pine tree, cut back drastically due to branches breaking off.   I will keep it as a small bushy shrub from now on.   No Christmas trees this year.

In Adelaide, getting rid of rubbish is quite a problem.   It is also very expensive to take rubbish to the tip, which is fair enough.   And surprisingly there is not much fly tipping (illegal dumping of rubbish) here either.

In the UK, Dartford Council had a very convenient tip, which was free, and not far from us, where we put all our rubbish into the appropriate containers.   We never thought much about what happened to it afterwards, we just presumed most of it was recycled somehow.   But perhaps not.

But it is a different matter here.   Onkaparinga Council only pick up the green bins once a month, although I believe this will be increased to two bins a month in January.   We have applied to drop off green waste at council sites but it will be limited to a few times a year.   The council shreds the green waste and then sells it as compost, so they are making double money on it. 

There are two pickups of waste material per house per year, but they do not collect everything, and will leave waste material behind if it is on their 'black list' of items they do not pick up.

So we have had to think about how to dispose of rubbish that cannot be put in our weekly rubbish bin, or recyclable bin, or green bin, or be put out for our twice yearly pickup.  So we have found that  small batteries go to Aldi, electrical items to Bunnings, the hardware store, thin plastic to the supermarkets, anything metal to our local scrap merchant (we received $7 for our old dishwasher), bottles and cans to the same scrap merchant (for more money) and cardboard to them also (no money for us there).   Anything that can be used by someone else gets left outside houses. 

We have put the timber left from the back pergola on convenient hooks on the side of the garage, to be reused later.   The round posts are behind the shed.   Darren used some of the heavier planks to make a garden bed.  And we have a compost bin.  However, saying all this, it did not resolve the problem of disposing of the small pieces of treated wood, as it is infused with arsenic.   The council left it behind when they collected the rest of the rubbish on the pickup day..   We have cut it into even smaller pieces.  So do we sneak it into our rubbish bins or what?   Not resolved yet.

This was the Australian pine tree before I cut it back drastically.

 

The beginning of a fern garden.   The staghorn fern, given to me by a neighbour, really loves this spot.  The empty pot is for a hydrangea shrub, my only concession to the wrong type of plant for a dry seaside garden.

The pile of green waste, all ready to be put on a trailer and taken to the council.

I have cut up all the branches ready for burning in our fire pit next autumn.   They will dry nicely in the cupboards in our barbeque area. 

Other developments!   We now have a motor on our front roller door.   Such luxury.   And we keep the car in the garage.   No excuses now.

This may sound like a wimpy and silly purchase.   When we lived in Australia we always had a laundry trolley.   When we returned last year, I could not find one anywhere: charity shops, department stores, supermarkets.   Nowhere to be seen.   Then Aldi put them out for sale a short while ago.   I was at the store when it opened, not that there was a queue for laundry trolleys.   Perhaps people have strong backs now.   Such luxury not to have to bend over to get washing out of the basket.

Our dishwasher leaked water over the floor.   It took us a few months to realise this so the floor is now damaged so will have to try and replace the boards.   Darren pulled the dishwasher out and found that the seals had gone in the door.

Walter went out and bought another dishwasher, and Darren very kindly installed it straight away.  Darren came for coffee and spent another four hours at our house sorting out dishwasher problems.   So much appreciated.

We had ten people for dinner one night.   Thank goodness we have a table that could be extended by two lengths.   

And finally, our new curtains in the large bathroom, which Walter hemmed up today.   The curtains are to add some ambiance, and privacy of course, to an otherwise very bland environment.  The toilet and our bathroom have new blinds, in order to preserve everyone's modesty.  Previously, if the lights were on in these rooms, one could see through the glass in the windows.   

And so it goes on.   Hopefully the sun will shine soon and I will be able to take photographs of the finished garden!

I have supported the economy of our local garden centres.