G'Day, mates!
Having a cuppa before I brave the cold and mist to feed the horses, goats, and chickens out there. Everyone is still asleep. It's my turn to stay home from church and watch Chris (he is getting violent in church and hitting us when we require him to sit and be still), so Gina can go. So I have a lazy morning after I get back in. Awwwww, shucks.....LOL
As cold and January-ish as it is, the Erica heather is starting to bloom and it's lovely.
And there is lots to be grateful for. Talking to friends in Australia and they are having the worst drought they have ever had. Temperatures in Adelaide, where Barry is from, are hovering around 40C +, which is horrid (double the number and add 30 and you get the approximate temperature F). I remember from being there one February that the nights do not cool off appreciably, even though you can see the ocean. It's like the top of a pressure cooker is sitting over the area. Pray for rain for them (although their summer is just beginning, miracles can happen...)
We got an absolutely incredible amount of work done yesterday (punctuated by two ping pong 'games'). When we bought this place there was a big storage barn at the end of one driveway. We had an animal barn built (3 1/2 stalls, a medication area, hay storage area, and half-bath -- the 1/2 stall is a chicken area with its own very small 'chicken door' to an outside area dedicated to the chickens only. In California we had chickens and horses all in one area and the horses would step on the chicken's feet while they were all munching stuff from the ground and I got tired of setting chicken legs with popsicle sticks....:tongue3: ). The previous owners had left so much junk in and around this large storage barn (two stories) that last summer we had the largest dumpster available brought out and filled the thing. We also hired a man to haul away some extra at the end of the summer.
Then, because we needed a generator for times when power is cut, Barry bought a rather large model to support both houses and the animal barn and it was sitting in our regular garage until it was installed this past week. Finally that half of the garage was available to us again, and we also had packed up Christmas, and we also had the ping pong table in the storage barn. Our kids had also helped us buy some leather furniture for the living room so we didn't have to keep telling Chris not to sit on the furniture (never know when his diapers are going to overflow). Leather cleans up easily. So the old sofa and love seat were ALSO out in the storage barn.
Yesterday it ALL got cleaned up. A lot of stuff went upstairs on the shelves in the large barn, and we swept and even vacuumed the lower area and then sprayed it for spiders and such (lots of black widows around here). Then the Christmas stuff got stored under the stairs and under one of the workbenches; the other one got cleaned up completely; the sofa and love seat moved back against walls for the kids to sit on, and the ping pong table now has plenty of room. Our garage also got cleaned out, with lots of stuff going either into the animal barn (all the garden stuff) or upstairs in the storage barn, except for the wheelchair we were given for when necessity hits, which is folded downstairs in the barn. Then we swept out our garage and put a few things like the house paints and tool chest along the walls and now two cars can get in there. It's lovely!
That was the last big project from moving in eighteen months ago. And it feels so good! We know where everything is, and there's space for the cars and no extra junk lying about anymore.
That's a long note, and no one may read it, but it feels so good to say that all that is finished. Finally.
Now it's upkeep and keep up, and that we can do without cringing at the thought!
OK, I've put off going outside long enough...LOL...time to feed the beasties.
Love to you all.
Helen
