Just a Random Post

A rainbow in my coffee on Tuesday morning as I waited for our car to have it's airconditioning compressor replaced.

 My favourite breakfast from Jamaica Blue....vegetarian breakfast with fried haloumi and poached eggs with pesto.  I never need lunch after eating this as it is generous but not as gargantuan as this image makes out.

What I read while drinking rainbow coffee and eating breaky.....you have got to be kidding me.  What ever happened with looking out the window or up at the sky and using your own brain and senses to monitor the clothes on the good ol' hill's hoyst??  Seriously!

 I loved the colours of the fish at the pet shop and took a ridiculous amount of photographs.  I shall spare you the rest!

Seeing tanks full of fish had NOTHING to do with me cooking fish for dinner - that was preplanned.  Basa fillet with couscous and veg and handful of mixed green salad leaves for dinner.  Little bowl of sweet grapes for afters.  I love how the small plate made the meal look enormous.

Getting Crafty

I've struggle for some time now to get back into the studio and get painting and in doing so I have denied myself permission to just play with creativity.  So, I gave myself permission to just play and enjoy myself and not constantly focus on 'having to produce fine art'.  With this in mind I took a voucher for crafty supplies (birthday gift from my sister - thank you Susan), and went shopping for inspiration....

I came home with some fimo for sculpting. I've never used this before and have a few little, easy ideas in mind to attempt with this.

Some replacement gouache.  I'm going to put together a little plein air kit and as we enter this time of glorious weather in our part of the world I hope to get out and about and painting.  I can always play at home with these too.  Easier to clean up than my acrylics.

I found ELMER'S glue which features in a whole heap of things I want to try that I have pinned on Pinterest - glitter slime and the like.  Because afterall what grown up doesn't need to be making glitter slime! Ha.  A new printing block to make some stamps out of line drawings I have done in my old sketchbook.

Here is something I actually made....Shrinky Dinks.  I  had the supplies for these in my cupboard in my school holiday box (bits and bobs to do with the kids and their friends). The kids were completely disinterested in them and so this weekend I dragged the kit out and got playing.  I only did a couple as an experiment.  Basically you draw a design onto this hard plastic, colour it and then bake it in the oven.  As the designs cook they shrink.  I found it all to be completely exciting and amazing, proving yet again that I am easily entertained.  Now I want to do a heap of these little birds and perch them on some twigs in a pot.

A Lovely Day Out

Today, my friends Katya and Roslyn took me out for a belated birthday celebration.  I do not remember a time in my life when I didn't know these girls.  We grew up on farms in a small rural location, attended kindy together from age 3, so we've been part of each other's lives in some way for 44 years.  Incredible. Here they are....

Roslyn suggested that we go to 'The Garden' at Maleny.  We go here each Tuesday night for meditation (in an outbuilding at the back), so we'd not seen it in the daylight.  We were amazed at how big it was.  The premises are very deceptive when seen at night!  It's a combination nursery, gift shop and cafe/coffee shop.

There is a cottagy type feel to the front garden by the entrance.

 I loved these rusty floral decorations. 

 Seeing rosellas in fruit reminded me that I'd forgotten to plant any this year so I'll not be making jam.  I suppose I could go back and buy a bush becasue a cupboard without rosella jam is a sad cupboard indeed.

 After walking around the yard we entered the cafe section of the building and all gasped with delight when we saw this ENORMOUS (it looks smaller in the photo) fire place.  We decided we'd have to head up the hill in winter to enjoy coffee by the fire.  We enjoyed good coffee and Ros had a yummy looking piece of cake.  Then Katya suggested we head off to check out a nursery recently opened by a friend of ours from high school.  Oh, it was wonderful.  Spencer and I had been such good friends at high school and through my years at university.  Then I went bush teaching and with numerous moves between us we lost contact.  We'd run into each other a few times over the years and today I sat with him and chatted in the shade while the girls shopped for plants.  It was beyond lovely to see him. Lovely to see him successful and happy.  I am just so happy to have seen him and promise myself to go and visiit him more often. 

We finished our morning by lunching at a local Thai restaurant.  We only ordered entrees which was a good move as they were very generous in size.  A main meal would have been too much for us, particularly on a hot day.  Although when my sister and I were in Thailand it was hot and we NEVER let that interfere with our eating!  We ate our way around Thailand. The food and menu's were incredible.

I'm home now, crashed on the couch.  Ready to rest once I finish sharing my day with you.  What a special day.  How luck I am.....

Waiting

For the past few days I seem to have been handcuffed to the house waiting.  Waiting for tradies to ring, turn up  and give us quotes on replacing our guttering.  Waiting for a courier to turn up with parts for our ride on mower.  I could allow myself to become frustrated and cranky by the lack of 'turning up' but instead I've used the time to take steps to catch up, to make plans and to get ahead in some areas. 

Herbs have been planted to fill out spots in sparsely planted pots on the back patio.  The area under the tree has been raked and tidied.  I've manually skimmed the pool as we woke this morning to find it covered in the creamy white blossom from the palm overhead.  It looks like it exploded in the night...  Bags of bits and bobs that have been hanging around to take to the op shop have finally been taken out to the car and I will take them to the charity bins when I next go out.  I'm ahead with the ironing!  I've read the draft copy of a friend's book, just need to add comments and edit.

I've done heaps more crochet so the boys blankets are progressing.  I reward myself by watching Escape to the Country or Escape to the Continent to keep myself on the job! :)

This morning I did some baking.  A plain vanilla cake that I've yet to ice. It's still cooling, and a batch of cheese scones.  These scones are so quick and easy to make and can be eaten as a stand alone snack or with soup which is how we tend to eat them.  They freeze and reheat well and taste just as good cold. 

Last night while our roast was in the oven I busied myself in the kitchen and made rice and vegetables for the dogs.  Yet another fruit salad as the first bowl vanished.  I cut up some veggies for snacks.  Then I cut up a heap of mixed fruit that had spots, was cheap or needed using fast.  Pear, plums, apples and cut up a bunch of rhubarb and added to it.  I think I had half a kilo in all.  I added a slurp of vanilla, a dash of water and stewed it.  When finished I froze one container then had to try some with ice-cream for dessert - yum.  I really cooked it to have with my yoghurt and nuts for breakfast. 

 

I so enjoy busy days where you actually can see the results of your productivity.  It feels good. Of course I've done heaps of other things but I'm not about to do a blog post on cleaning the bathroom!

I really want to clean the windows as they are filthy, but I'm dragging the chain there. Every time I clean them we have multiple birds flying into them and committing suicide or being injured.  It just upsets me so much.  Poor things.  I really don't know what to do about it.  It's not that I dislike doing the window.  The actual cleaning of windows doesn't bother me at all but I feel sick to my bones each time we have a big thud on the window.  Maybe I just need to suck it up and hope that this time will be different.

Enjoying time in the Garden

I took some time to just sit in the garden beneath our beautiful tree as the day drew to a close yesterday.  I lit my fire and just sat and enjoyed the evening, the sounds, the smell of the fire burning and the smell of something heavy and sweet and unidentified that was entered my senses on occassion.

The mosquitoes eventually invaded and forced my hasty retreat back indoors.  It was lovely while it lasted though.  I do love my fire pit.

Today is Sunday and I usually do a few things to prepare me for my coming week to make things flow more easily.  This is all I managed to do today.

I boiled some eggs to be added to salads or grabbed as a snack during the day.  I made a fruit salad to have for breakfast with greek yoghurt and my seed and nut mix sprinkled over, or eaten for dessert or a snack.  A greek salad, yes there is cucumber in there it is just not mixed very well! Oh, but I have forgotten the olives. What a ditz.

I make these to make my days easier, particularly if I'm not feeling great or am busy.  I can just grab something and eat it without having to go through meal prep really.  For lunch I often throw a mixed assortment of leafy greens into a bowl, spoon over some greek salad, then add an egg or tuna or leftover meat to the dish.  Other times I simply add avocado.  I usually make one more salad, typically based around leafy greens but I ran out of energy.  I can always do this tomorrow.  On days when I'm tired I often simply put the salads on the table for dinner and quickly cook a protein of some type and dinner is done.  Easy and healthy.   I also intended to stew some fruit to have warm with my yoghurt and nut mix for breakfast.  Warm fruit can be a welcome treat now the mornings are cooling down.  That is now on my list for tomorrow.  I'll make enough to freeze some in portion sizes I think.

Another job I usually do today is to make sure I am caught up on the ironing for the coming week.  I'm afraid it has rather piled up this week as unusually I've been out a lot.  Jeff did some earlier, but the rest is on my list for tomorrw.  Now I'm letting it sit up and watch TV with me.  Kind aren't I!

That's quite a pile in that poor basket.....  Something to look forward to for tomorrow! Ha!