Goings on at my place.

 I have now been working for 3 weeks and even though it is an hour there and back, I am really enjoying it. Of course it helps that my boss is probably the nicest boss you could possibly have and everyone that works there are really easy to get on with. Being two days a week for now is a good way to get me back into the routine of working too.I have also taken on a 3 hour a week (in theory) volunteer coordinator position with the local health service helping to establish a new volunteer home visiting program in our town. In between I have been just trying to keep my gardens alive during the terrible heat we have been having and even with all the water I have been pouring on my plants I have managed to lose one or two things. On Friday we had over 40 ml of rain so my plants are quite happy for a few days until the weather heats up again at the end of the week. It was perfect timing because I put more bean and corn seeds in the vegie garden on Thursday.
This weekend I am just pottering around in the garden and the house and quietly thinking about whether I should go up to the sewing room and have a play. My eldest son came home for the day yesterday but headed off home with my resident middle son in the afternoon and youngest son made a brief appearance to borrow camping stuff before heading off to the river for the weekend with his mates. I am sure I will see him again tomorrow when he brings everything back. (well what he hasn't lost or just left behind)
Nicky arrived late yesterday for the night which was nice. She headed off early this morning to run out to the farm where her father lives, which is about 12km. I went back to bed when she left, exhausted just thinking about it!

She has found herself a new baby, the funniest little thing you have ever seen. This is Min. She is never going to replace Atticus but she is nice company for Poe and it turns out she is actually Poe's half sister.

Oh, and over the weekend I am babysitting Dixie, my brother's Australian terrier. She is a nice little dog but very energetic. Machicho my sweet baby, who never gets angry at anything snaps and growls at poor Dixie whenever she comes near her, and Dixie only wants to play.  Dixie has had a big learning curve this weekend because she has never had a thing to do with cats and it has taken her a day or two to get up the nerve to go near my two. Funniest thing I have seen for a long time when she first confronted our cat, Fred.
Maybe I will sew tomorrow cause I think I feel a Nanna nap coming on this afternoon. It's Sunday after all and that is supposedly a day of rest?
Happy Australia day everyone. I hope you are having a wonderful long weekend break.

In my garden today

Absolutely stinking hot weather here at the minute so venturing outside is only when we jump in the pool or I hunt the little dog out for the necessaries.

I had just convinced her to go out this afternoon when something buzzed around her head and sent her racing inside, tail between her legs. ( Yes she is a big scaredy cat.dog)  This is what buzzed in her ear and scared the life out of her. I've never seen one in my garden before and after a little bit of research 

www.ozanimals.com tells me:

Identification
The Fiddler Beetle or Rose Chafer is a dark brown scarab beetle with distinctive green or yellow markings in a violin shape. The abdomen is banded black and yellow or green. They are strong fliers and move from tree to tree to feed on nectar. They are harmless to humans.

Other Names
Rose Chafer

Size
length 15mm to 18mm

Habitat
eucalypt woodland, heathland, suburban parks and gardens.

Food
feeds on nectar from eucalypt flowers and other flowering trees, also feeds on plant secretions

Breeding
The Fiddler Beetle lays eggs in rotting logs, or in the soil. The larvae fed on rotting wood and pupate within the wood. Adult beetles emerge in early summer.

Range
Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and south eastern South Australia

Have you had colourful visitors to your garden this week?

What's in the box????

Just out side my back door I have a few old wooden boxes and other stuff on an old tea trolley. I have been walking around the boxes for ages wondering what I would do with them. Eventually I think they will hold pot plants but someone had another idea as to what the box could be used for.

The weather is really warming up here (as it is every where else) and the pets are looking for a cool place to sleep. So what's in the box?

Cato!!!!!

A healthy rural lifestyle

When you choose to live in a rural community you imagine clean air, peace and quiet and a generally healthy lifestyle. When a seed processing plant chooses to operate near your home (without any consultation!) all those reasons for living where you do are shot to hell.

On a good day you are looking at this.

On a not so good day you see this. It is the dust emitted when the plant is processing seed.

You go outside and find it hard to breathe, your eyes water and you wonder how much of that dust has settled on the creek from which you pump your drinking water. And if your an asthmatic don't bother coming to visit because you won't be able to stay for very long.

An obscured view and dust all over the inside and outside of the house is probably the least of the problems the dust causes. 

On top of all that we have the constant squeal of the conveyor belt, revving and reverse beep of the forklift and constant banging of the huge metal seed bins as they are moved around.

No quiet in this little rural spot. Did I mention that the seed plant runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for at least 6 to 8 months of the year, mainly over the warmer months when you would like to be outside doing stuff? You can forget having your windows open on a hot summer night to hopefully catch any breeze that might be around cause even if you manage to sleep through the noise you will eventually wake up coughing or not being able to breathe properly because your nose is blocked up. The factory has been operating for a lot of years now and complaints to the manager and the EPA have proven pointless.  I am having another go with the EPA and have submitted two complaints this afternoon, I will let you know how I go. 

'Don't fall into the booby-trap, be breast aware!'

Samuel Johnson’s sister Connie is dying of Breast Cancer so he’s  riding around Australia on a unicycle!

It’s all about keeping his promise to Connie:

1. Raise a million dollars for Breast Cancer research
2. Raise awareness of the disease that’s killing her
3. Break the Guinness World Record for the longest journey on a unicycle. 15,000km

So far he has ridden over 13,431 km  and raised over $1,173,000 and plans to be finished by February 13.

Today he rode from Khancoban to Tallangatta, 109 km. There was a meet and greet organised at the Tallangatta boat ramp.  I drove to Tallangatta and went along with my son Ben who lives just up the road from the Boat Ramp even though sometime in the morning he had ridden past my house and I was oblivious!

Sam had ridden the unicycle all day and I can guarantee the road is pretty awful even in a car, But he still took the time to talk to everyone.

Have his photo taken and sign autographs.

Let curious little boys climb up on the Unicycle for a try.

And even have a go in the Bravehearts Dragon boat.

 In a quiet moment when no one was around he quietly slipped into the Lake to cool down.

He never stopped smiling, never said no to a request and is a genuinely lovely man.

Their message is simple: 'Don't fall into the booby-trap, be breast aware!'

If the face is familiar but your not quite sure who he is, remember back about 13 years ago and the Australian TV series 'The Secret Life of Us' He was Evan.

If you want to donate to this cause you can do so here. Love your Sister

The money raised from donations and sales of merchandise goes to the Garvan Research Foundation which I am sure will someday find a cure for this terrible disease. I'd like to think that one day women won't have to go through what they do now when they have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Many, like my sister have positive outcomes but unfortunately some don't. 

January 1st, 2014

So here we are starting another year. I have been thinking about all that has has happened in the last year at my place.There have been  many changes (good and bad), large and small things happening and places visited , many that I have told you about and some that didn't get onto the pages of The Back Shed.
There have been visitors  that have left lovely comments here and there. Some are regular visitors and others just pop in now and then when they have a minute and it is nice to hear from all of them.
I can only hope that friendships that have been made on these pages will continue and I look forward to the possibility that more friendships will be made in the coming year.

So how did I start my first morning of 2014? Crying through the last chapters of The Book Thief. Yes I cry when I watch sad and happy movies or TV shows , or read books with good and bad bits in them. It really doesn't take much and it isn't hormones either........I have always done it.
So I ended the old year with tears and have begun the new one with more tears, doesn't look hopeful does it?
I have lots of new things to look forward to in the coming year, some I know about and some are still to be revealed to me as the year unfolds.
As the first day of the year progresses it is getting quite cool and is trying to rain which is preferable to the heat we get here in the Summer.

 I went out and took a few photos of my garden and the paddocks around the house just to show you what it is like here on the first day of our new year. 

I stayed out there as long as I could until clouds of these pesky insects drove me inside. 

Happy New Year.

I hope that 2014 will be a happy adventure for us all.