Are you compelled yet?

Bliss... tucked into bed with a cup of tea and my iPad. Kids in bed, and hubby out helping to deplete the country of feral animals. As I made my tea and automatically reached for "my" cup, I wondered, does everyone have a cup the tea just tastes better out of? And why does it?

This is mine...

Sean's...

Even Harry has one. He has Standards. He prefers Wedgwood...

And that, my friends, is compelling blogging.

Today was cleaning cleaning cleaning. Not overly compelling at ALL. Tomorrow...more of the same. Hurrah. Note: I am dripping with sarcasm! On the upside, I will have a lovely clean house at the other end.

The super big clock arrived today.

Harry: "Miss Mum, Miss Mum" - his name for me at the moment, I don't know why - "That's a Very Big clock! Daddy will love it!" Bless his 2 year old self... Daddy loves watches, so of course he'll love this superbig clock...

Sean: "Sweetie... that's a Big Clock. I don't think I've ever seen one that big. It's going where?"

Me: "unprintable"

It's awesome. And did I mention big? A picture on a website and a description mentioning 91cm doesn't really convey the size. And the depth has got to be at least 15 cm. It's Biiiiiig.

Thanks so much, lovely ladies of blogland, for your kind welcomes. I have loved meeting you all, and it's been great knowing you're all out there. Unfortunately we're not all face-to-face, because I would love to offer these... but they're pretty to look at, anyway. And by the way, I promise not to blog about teacups again.

 

 

 

 

Cherry-licious

Beautiful and simple... I would do white with red heart though, for my bedroom. Seen here on Etsy.

 

 

 

 

Delicious rich cherry red is hard to go past, especially with a deep blue and crisp glossy white. Oh wait...I just described my bedroom. White on the bottom half, deep blue on the top, and a cherry red chandelier. Now on the hunt for the perfect red lamp shades to go in there. Bedside tables would be nice too, we are still Making Do.

A dresser like this could be good, or are we getting into "Too Much" territory?

The bedroom still needs its finishing touches...more art, the afore-mentioned bedsides and lamps. Also the adjoining walk-in robe needs to be built (I'm thinking doors like this). Loving the distressed white floors, too.

The ensuite will adjoin the walk in robe. Currently its functional. Just. It will have a total revamp. Oh and mum is making a terrific quilt (one day... ha ha)... No pressure ;)

I'm taking the kids to brisbane this weekend to see "Gran & Pa", and to hold a market stall at Caboolture. We were going to eBay it all, but frankly... Too much effort! A market stall will be fun, quick, and will potentially provide opportunity to pick up a bargain or two. Oh wait... I'm meant to be offloading, right? Looking forward to a good catch up, along with civilisation of course. Gran is very lucky, not every grandmother is serenaded on the loo by a little fella singing "Thomas the Tank Engine" at her, and I do wonder if Vicki will give her the same passionate kisses as last time? I'm predicting yes.

 

You Know You Live In The Country When...

You have a frog on your toilet paper roll.

Frogs in the loo.

More frogs in the shower.

An owl in the kitchen.

Chickens in your lounge room.

Kangaroos on your lawn.

 

Yes. All of these this weekend. You become surprisingly blasé about it.

 

Girl's Got Style

Vicki had a wonderful time with my little Louis Vuitton bag today... Always knew she'd be a girl of discerning taste. Could you possibly choose a better way to accessorise a nappy? No? I didn't think so.

 

Sunny days

Having a quiet day on the couch today after last night's shenanigans ... Unfortunately 6 month old babies don't really care that you were up till 3am, if they want to wake up at 6am, then that's what they do. Feel like making a cake. Actually, more accurately, I feel like eating cake. Carb day is not till tomorrow though, so wait it out I must.

Yellow is the colour du jour I think. Love these...

When I grow up I want to upcycle furniure like this. I guess to sell, but it could get difficult parting with them. Of course the other option would be to have lots of houses. A much better option. Need to start collecting crappy old furniture to make into masterpieces. Oh. And need more houses...

 

Bushfire!

That feeling you get when you take a look out into the night from your veranda and see big long flickering line of flames is, well, frightening, to say the least. All I could manage was "Ok what do we do? What do we do? I better get dressed!" Obviously that was of utmost importance and would be an integral part of fighting the fire. Fortunately for us, the Rural Fire Brigade were there almost before we were, and we only had to travel half a km! I should add, I didn't personally fight the fire. I had 2 kids tucked up in bed to go back to but I was still very important you know, I was the drinks lady, after all! Fortunately there was only a light breeze and its not a very treed area, mainly grasses which have been well pruned by sheep. They were able to bring it under control quite easily and are now off fighting another fire. My hats go off to these guys, they give so much time and effort, and it's all volunteered.

A power pole was burnt in the process and came toppling down, so we are now without power - essential energy were here very fast though, so we shouldn't be powerless for long. There are now 2 other fires which sound like they're much bigger on nearby properties, so hubby is off to help fight them. Not much sleep tonight for lots of folks, I'd imagine!

I can't imagine how it must feel for those that watch their houses burning down... Just devastating. Definitely planning to make a grab bag of essentials for near the door, and a list of treasured things to grab if time allows it. These guys will top the list, of course.

 

And now for a lovely cheery image before bed... I collect pastel china such as the meakin and Johnson bros sets, they go beautifully with my "every day" crockery, which is Wedgwood "Queens Plain". I think I need to recreate this display somewhere. It's gorgeous. But where? That is the question...

 

 

 

Some very professional DIY...

Well, we've had some busy days lately...you know the ones where you rush around all day but aren't quite sure what you achieved at the end? Harry started Childcare yesterday... "Playing with the kids", we call it. It's important for him, as we are fairly isolated and he has very little opportunity to socialise. Bit like his mum! We anticipated tears when we dropped him off, but all we got was a cheeky smile and an excited poke out of the tongue as he sat down at the water play table. He loves it, and gave his teacher a big hug when he left. We were so proud when she made comment about his wonderful manners. However a trip in to the ridge and back home twice a day does seem to take a big chunk out of the day... It's worth it to see him enjoying it so much though.

Another occasion to be proud of our little man... He fell into our pool while we were cleaning it... It happened so easily, a quick slip and straight into the deep end. It gave him a big fright, but despite that he remembered to tread water, keep his face out, then paddle to the side and hold on to the edge. Not bad at all for a two year old! He does love the water so much.

 

The days are heating right up again... I've been quoting the "official" temperature of 47.2 as being the hottest, but the reports around here suggest it was more like between 51 and 52 degrees in the shade... I'd believe it, too. My husband decideded enough was enough the day before that super-hot day and we decided it was time for some DIY.

We started with this wall:

 

Made this (yes, our tree was still up...)

Harry wore these (he hates noise)

 

And we ended up with this!

 

Ok so it's not the prettiest installation about. But all we had was a hammer, an angle grinder, and that's about it. And it's on a wall that will come down in a couple of years anyway so hey, who cares? We're cool!

 

Ok... We interrupt this blog to go fight a fire about 6-700 metres from our house. Eek...

 

Cool change!

What a relief today was! Yesterday was 47 degrees....today more like 34. I actually had goosebumps walking over to the chicken coop this morning, and after the last few days they were very welcome. Thanks to last night's blackout, sleeping inside was insufferable, so we set up camp on the deck, with all the spare mattresses we could find crammed together... I could just imagine little harry rolling off his and straight down the steps. Happily the power came on at about 1am, and we were able to come back in and cuddle our blessed air conditioners again. The cool change this morning was just lovely.

I am excited. I have finally decided just how I am going to finish off the kitchen. The one we pulled out had had its day, to say the least. Its two best features were its size, and the old rayburn wood stove - we kept both of these and had a grand old time demolishing the rest. I will post pictures later of the full before and after... After we finish it to "after" stage, that is. I love so many things about our new kitchen - the farmers kitchen doors, the wood stove, two butlers sinks, the Perrin &Rowe provincial style taps, the chimney breast... It's all amazing. But I've just been mulling over the final touches, and the extra details that punch you in the face when you walk into the room. I can just see my hubby rolling his eyes... A slap of white paint and polished floorboards would certainly do the trick. But I'm thinking... Something more.

Pinterest... Pinterest came to the rescue. I should probably add, I'm addicted to Pinterest. So many fabulous ideas in one place, what's not to love?

Here's the plan.

Wallpaper in all the glass fronted cupboards:

Perhaps something like this if I can find it:

Match the blue in the damask wallpaper to some paint, and paint the mostly blank wall in it.

Hang this huge 91cm clock on the blue wall. I had planned to put our old butcher block under the clock on that wall, but I think it will be too big, so possibly something else.

Finally, replace the table we have down the centre of the room (which I love, by the way, and will certainly use somewhere) with a big, long and rustic 12 seater table. We added a temporary extension recently while we had more guests than table places, and the longer table looked great.

With the exception of the table, which will wait awhile unless eBay produces the goods at an appropriate price, it's all affordable and achievable. Brilliant!

 

Fanfare please!

So finally! I have my blog...countless attempts later. Numerous times I have come up with a brilliant, witty and original title, only to discover that 36 other people were equally brilliant, witty and original. This time I didn't look. Better, yes? And background/template... Well we won't even go there. Lets just say mine's a work in progress, if I wait till that's perfect I'll never write a thing!

So a purpose for this blog? For now it's for jotting down ideas for renovations, interior decorating, and any other bits and pieces that come to mind - mindless chatter included. I'm often finding I need somewhere to store my thoughts and ideas and inspirations...this will be it.