Easter has been on it's way since Christmas ended! I've not fallen into the trap of buying hot cross buns before the actual event, nor chocolate eggs. This is probably because my little family doesn't celebrate Easter like others do. My children don't believe in the magic of the Easter Bunny. The tooth fairy is more of a novelty and i'm happy with that. Also, being pagan means we do our celebrating in the springtime.

The magic was certainly there when i was younger. My granddad and i made easter baskets at his place of work and they were always miraculously filled with eggs on Easter Sunday. My mum always left a candy egg (my favourite for the past 30 years) in all sorts of places for me on the day. We never actually celebrated the day like we do Christmas or birthdays. I guess not following any religion meant we didn't do all sorts of things others may have over the easter period but getting a basketful of chocolate from a never to be seen being made it all fun :)

In saying that though, my little family still do the chocolate egg giving during April. I don't think chocolate of any form would stay put in the cupboard for 5 months waiting for spring to come lol. My children recieve an egg of their choice, most years it's the humpty dumpty egg, aswell as a pair of winter pj's. We also do a little decorating as any reason to do a little creating is right up our ally ;) It’s nice to brighten up the home for different reasons and gives the visitors something new to look at. So yesterday I donned my easter bonnet lol and arranged some easter novelties in a corner of our home. Simple, minimal but bright.

Until next time
Happy Easter, however you and your family celebrate it :)
~x~

We now have solar hot water. The man of the house installed it last weekend and after a few hiccups it's working well.

It's not on the roof of the church. The pitch is a little too steep so it's on the ground tucked away in a corner where the sun hits it mid morning to late arvo.

It's the 1st time in 11 years i've had hot water over the kitchen sink :) No more boiling the kettle or bucketing it from the bathroom.

Will be interesting to see how hot the water gets during the winter months. At the moment it's boiling hot but i suspect come winter we won't need to turn the cold tap on.

Until next time
~x~

Not part of my Australian spotty pottery but spotty and bright all the same :)

My mum gave me this gorgeous teapot, 4 tea cups and saucers and a large jug and bowl for a combined birthday/christmas gift. It's by Maxwell Williams and if i ever get to a store that stocks it, i'll add to it.

Now i just need someone to visit and have a cup of tea with me ;)



Until next time
~x~

Not sure why I’m writing this. I just need to write. We’ll see where it leads shall we :)

My mum and the man that helped conceive me, married when mum was pregnant with me. They divorced not long after. It could have been a year later, perhaps a bit earlier, I’m not sure and I haven’t asked but I do know I was 3 years old when mum married the guy I have called my darling dad for just about forever :)

I didn’t have a great deal of contact with my Father in my younger years, to be honest I can only recall one encounter when I was young, it may have been just after my 10th birthday. The 2nd visit was when I was 18. I do know there was an altercation when I was very young but all came good thanks to some great family :)
I did however have loads of contact with my Aunt T, Uncle D and Grandmother, and I am forever grateful for knowing them and knowing they still accepted my mum and me aswell as my stepdad and my siblings as part of their family. The most special part of being a part of their family is I was born on my Nanna’s birthday :)

My Aunt T and Uncle D made many trips to my hometown to visit us, 2000kms south of their hometown. When I turned 10 my Nanna, aunt, 2 uncles and their partners came to celebrate. When I was 16 and having a party to celebrate my soon to be travels to Germany, Nanna and Aunt T made an appearance. When B3 was born, Uncle D stayed with me for a week. There were many other visits in the space of 25 years but the above were the most memorable. One other memborable visit was from Uncle D. I was younger than 10, still playing with dolls lol and he brought me a baby doll that had a heartbeat. I cherished that doll and still have him, and his heart still beats!

When Uncle D moved overseas we kept in contact via phone. I always wrote handwritten letters to Nanna. One time I sent her a tape recording of me rambling on about my day. I had fun making that :)

As I got older my letters stopped. I sent birthday cards to Nanna, mostly on a regular basis. It wasn’t a birthday I could forget. Life got busy. It’s easy to blame life but it certainly doesn’t sit well. I’ve never been able to travel north to visit them. It’s too far and the finances haven’t been there. I then had my own family and there was absolutely no time or money to make the trip. We were headed there once a couple of years ago but didn’t make it :(

I’ve never once not thought about them all. They were always good to my mum, family and me. Aswell as my own children who Aunt T and Nanna have never met. Not keeping in constant contact as I got older, is I guess, my fault. Perhaps it was my mum who was always on my back to write to Nanna but looking back, I don’t think so. I quite enjoyed writing and telling her about the happenings in my life. I didn’t receive long letters back from Nanna, but a few quick words in a card always came back with love.

Late last year I was blessed to have made contact with my 16 year old stepsister, my father’s daughter, through facebook of all places lol. I’d always known about her. I’d met her on that 2nd visit, she was aged 2. We are slowly getting to know each other. It’s strange knowing I lived 35 minutes away from her 2 years ago. I always thought I saw my Father at the local farmers market one Saturday in their home town but I had no desire to go up to him and make conversation. Perhaps if I did, Em and I would have known each other longer than the 6 months we do now. Anyways it’s no use what if’ing, everything happens for a reason. I do have a stepbrother, Em’s brother. He’s the same age as my B3. I’ve also been told my father had a child to another woman before he met my mum....

Like I said at the beginning of this post, I don’t know where I’m going with this but I now feel I’m done. It seems I’ve started and ended with no rhyme or reason but I just had an urge to write and now feel better for it.

Normal blogging will resume soon :)

Until next time
~x~

Say hello to our loveable,grunting Pigsy :) Before i go on, she is a pet only, not for fattening up ;) We may breed her but for the moment she is digging around my vegie paddock cleaning the weeds out and turning the soil over.

We welcomed Pigsy into our paddock on New Years Eve. She travelled 300km from her old home to us on a hot dusty day but she travelled well and was extremely happy when she found a muddy wallowing hole to squirm around in.

Pigsy is now 1 year old and HUGE. If she had her way she would eat all day. A normal meal for her consists of apples, potatoes, green leaves and barley. Every so often when i can get to the bakery she gets old cakes and slices and once a fortnight she gets a big box of vegie scraps from the local greengrocer. She won't eat mushrooms or capsicum and isn't fussed on carrots. Fussy pig lol. I'm trying to grow vegies for her to make life easier for all. There will be a nice crop of corn in the next month or two. Hopefully the pumpkins produce more then we can eat and i've a few plots of potatoes growing strong. We were lucky to get a freezer full of apples from trees off the side of the roads and the neighbours are always throwing her their scraps. She can't complain when it comes to variety.

I'm not sure what breed she is. She's red/brown in colour and has very coarse hair. You know when she's happy because her tail is cute and curly. When she's sad or not well the tail is straight. We had a slight illness scare where she dropped a lot of weight in a 48 hour period but a dose of penicilian perked her up and she's been great ever since.

Until next time
~x~

Happening soon ;)

The man of the house had this past week off paid work lol not from around the house work though ;) His 1st mission was to complete the swimming pool. We've built it from recyclable materials. I think we only had to purchase some of the steel posts but the rest came from scrap bins and what we already had laying around the place.

It has a deep end (took some effort to dig out!) and a shallow end and is long enough to swim a lap or two.

It's not quite finished. Work still be be done is some timber decking around the top so you can sit and dangle your feet in the cool water, some plants around the base to make it look inviting, a screen along the back and side fence to screen out the neighbours and a proper fence to enclose it all and make it council approved. And at B3's request, a lot of pool toys!

I can just see the kids having a blast with their friends over the summer holidays :)

Until next time
~x~

Howdy It’s been awhile. The school holidays are mostly to blame. I can’t think straight when the munchkins are running around terrorising each other lol

The munchkins have now returned of school. B1 is in grade 6, the last year of primary school in Victoria. B2’s in grade 5 and B3 is in grade 1. They all excelled last year so here’s hoping this year is just as good and loads of fun for them.

We celebrated Christmas quietly. It’s the 1st time in 11 years we have spent the entire day at home. Unfortunately that meant not seeing any of our family as they live near on 3 hours away but it was lovely to just relax and laze the day away. We did have a couple of neighbours join us for lunch and drinks which was entertaining.

New Years was even quieter. We were up extra early to take a trip to collect a pet pig, the day was horridly hot and by the time we got home, settled the pig in and done a few other things we didn't have the energy to party. Quiet drinks in front of the telly was all we managed. The munchkins tried their best to stay awake to watch the fireworks on the telly but fell asleep one after the other.

Not a lot has been happening around the church. The man is working hard out on the roads during the week and the weekends seem to slip by in a blur. Hopefully when the harvest run settles down and some well earned holidays are taken, then some work on the home will happen.

We have some new additions to the animal family. A big fat pigsy and 2 gorgeous guniea pigs. Buffy the dog is growing at a rate of a weed lol She’s still boisterous but learning slowly.

We’ve had an airconditioner installed. *Sigh* it’s bliss. We had a weeklong run of high 30’s – low 40 degree days and the church just wasn’t coping, or should I say we weren’t lol. It was even too hot to jump in the swimming pool so we bit the bullet and invested in a cooling system. And in true Mother Nature style, the weather is now cool and dull lol.

The garden is coming along. I planted a few packets of seeds in seed raising mix and within 4 days everything had germinated! 3 weeks later I’ve planted them out in the garden. If all goes well we will have mountains of watermelon, rockmelon, squash, zucchini and cucumbers. Not only am I trying to feed my family but I have to pig to feed to. She truly is a pig lol

There you go, a quick run down of the happenings since my last post many moons ago. I shall elaborate on a few things I’ve mentioned in following posts.

Until next time,
~x~