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A better use for a kitchen bench...

This weekend I discovered that our kitchen bench makes a great cutting bench for my sewing and art work!!


Last weekend the same bench was turned into a felting worktable...

Being an island bench means I can work from all sides and it's the perfect height for cutting. The tile surrounds mean that clean up of threads, interfacing and even soapy felting mess, is easy!

Of course I do enjoy cooking at my kitchen bench as well like the Mexican spread of Fajita's, Nachos, guacomole and salad of last night, or the Italian cooking class that I gave my family as a Christmas gift...



...anyway that you look at it, this kitchen is destined for great things!!

It glows...

This is our house yesterday as the sun was setting... I really love how the bricks light up in the late afternoon sun!!

I wasn't too excited about the limited range of bricks that we had to choose from (limited in that we had decided not to upgrade on bricks). All of the bricks that I really liked were from category 5 and 6 and I didn't dare ask what it would cost to upgrade... In the end it came down to two choices, both were reddish, and we made an 'on-the-spot' decision to go with the Red-Gum (from Austral). I liked the choice well enough, but didn't expect them to look as good as they do.

I can't wait for the garden to grow a bit more to hide the great big windows though... (I have been wondering if getting them tinted might make them look better.)

Patio Improvements and more...

Yesterday I decided to dress up the patio with some hanging pots...

We'd been out to watch a dog show and dropped into a big garden shop on the way home. Inspired by the gorgeous flowers that were out I decided that some hanging pots on our patio fence would dress up the area nicely. However I wasn't inspired by that shops high prices and instead went to Bunnings when we got home.

I came back (after more than an hour and a half of picking up a plant, putting it in my trolley, walking around with it, putting it back, picking something else up... It takes quite some time to shop in this fashion) and set to work to create this...





Can't remember what these are but I think they are a type of petunia (much smaller flower though...)


Fuscias...


Red petunias... (not my first choice but I wanted colour without cost...)


This morning I potted a few more plants (there are still about 10 plants left that need to be planted either in pots or the ground very soon) into ceramic and terracotta pots that have been taking up space in the garage. They need some pot feet to raise them off the concrete and maybe a few rocks in the top (like the one to the front which has been in that pot for a while - and is finally growing back after getting covered in concrete dust from the neighbours brickies) but I think that this little corner looks great!










While I was shopping and working on the patio yesterday, Bryan was creating this out the front...


It's the narrow strip to the left (north) of our driveway - the rest is the neighbours land. He's been trying to get this bit done before the landscapers for the neighbours block came in to do the front. It really finishes off the front and works in really well.







Now I'm going to have a late breakfast on my lovely patio... :)

Landscaping progress...

I haven't updated for quite some time and so we have some significant progress to show...

• Our front yard now has it's rock mulch installed
• Our side path is completed
• the narrow garden on the north fence beside the patio is finished
• the vegie garden is done;
• we've solved a drainage problem along the back fence; and
• we now have a clothesline.

So enough words and onto the pictures...

The front yard has gone from this...


To this...




















The narrow side...






The patio area...




The vegie garden (bricked by my Dad and I)...










And the back fence...






There's still a long way to go... and eventually I want to be able to remove the 'dog-keep-out' fences from around the vegie garden and the back fence strip but it's so good to see some progress!!! And I must admit that getting out there watering in the mornings inspires me to do more.

Progress...

Dodgy pics from my phone but pics none-the-less...

Work has started!....

The pergola is being installed as I type! The parts were delivered just after 7 this morning and the guys arrived shortly after and have started work shifting the bits inside and digging holes for the posts and the plumbing.

I must find my camera so that I can show pics of the progress...

Good people...

You hear so many people talking about society today and how it's such a bad place to be... Today, within the space of an hour I had two expereinces that confirmed that there are 'good people' around.

The first were the guys who turned up to fix our windows which we reported on our 3-month maintenance report. We had one broken lock, one sticky lock and a loose window that we wanted fixed. When they arrived they told me what it was that their job-sheet showed and then asked me to check every window and let them know if there were any other problems at all because they wanted to make sure that everything was working properly - which I was impressed with to start with (most people come to do a job and that's it). Then as one of the guys was fixing the lock he mentioned something about changing it to a side lock instead of the centre lock and I asked if that was easy to do - side locks/catches would be much easier with the roman blinds than the centre locks (don't need to open the blind to open the window) - I asked if he could change the bedroom lock over and they ended up changing every lock in the house to the side opening ones!! They were great guys - really friendly - and even cleaned up after themselves... but the best thing... one of them commented on my roman blinds and how good they looked (he used to make them commercially so that made me feel pretty good!!)

Within half an hour of the window guys leaving, I had another knock at the door... it was the maintenance guy who had been watering the gardens at the displays up at the top of the estate. He said he had some water left in the tank and wanted to know if he could water our garden - ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!! We got more than half of it watered before he ran out. Apparently he'd asked someone else and they'd said 'no' because they thought his water was contaminated - it might be dirty and not drinking quality but it's more than good enough for my very thirsty plants!

So you see - there are some good people around!

In other news in our estate... work has started on stage 2 (and maybe 3 as well) and we now have houses on both sides of us and yesterday there appeared a port-a-loo on the block across the road. We met the neighbour from across the road (behind the block with the loo) last week and they moved in over the weekend. Our little block is starting to feel a bit like a neighbourhood. We haven't met everybody, but there are now quite a few houses with people living in them.

Not long now....

I had a phone call yesterday telling me that the pergola is due to arrive from Adelaide on Wednesday of next week!! They're going to get back to me with the actual construction dates but it looks like it will be done in the next 2 weeks!

I Love it!!

The concretors arrived at 5.30 this morning as promised and have been working hard all morning making our patio look GREAT!!! I reckon it's worth the wait and I've already forgotten the hassles (as Uncle Don suggested - Thanks Don!). And even better is that it's all done in time for by the time Dad arrives next week.

Some pics...

First truck arrived just before 6.00am and the barrows were lined up in the garage at the ready (I didn't get a photo...)








Spraying back...






Finished product - still wet. I don't know what the mix is called - it's just #5 from Werribee Mini-Mix...




Back step at the laundry door...


...and look what has appeared over our fence...


Yesterday it was just walls, today the roof trusses have been put up and the roof tiles have just been delivered. The same has happened on the next block over as well (both the same builder).