zefi's blog

desperate measures

2012-02-20T03:24:00.000-08:00

The weekend has come and gone and there have been no calls from the chicken man about the roosters. Maybe he just lost our number. Yeah. That must be it. I'll make excuses for him just like every girl who ever waited for a phone call that never came. Maybe I'll call him. Is it cool to call him when he said he'd call us? Will he think I'm too forward?

Meanwhile, I've resorted to desperate measures. So far its not working. We still have five roosters. On the other hand, no one visits any more. Which could be considered an upside since I'm too busy to entertain.

I'm exhausted tonight. I had two dogs to groom, then I groomed Montana and Romeo. One of the customer dogs was a regular little girl who is impossible when it comes to doing her feet. I really must get my database going so I can make notes like 'Do not attempt to do her nails no matter how long they look' next to dog's names. And what I charge them. Have I mentioned how hopeless I am as a business person?

The other dog was a new boy, a schnauzer who wasn't in a proper trim as his previous groomer didn't know how to do it. Her failing is my gain. I love doing specialty trims.

I really love it.

Of course I do. Why else would I have spent over 10 hours a weekend grooming a standard poodle for the ring? Only someone who loves grooming, scissoring, brushing, the smell of hairspray and creating hair scultpures would do that.

When I work on the computer I sit in my little office and the poodles usually lie around at my feet and behind me. Sometimes one of them will come and sit beside me and I'll reach out my hand and run my fingers through their topknot, as much to show them love and affection as to comfort me. I adore the feel of poodle hair under my hands.

Anyway, last night as I sat here blogging I reached out and this is what I felt:

The crunch of crusty muddy bits on a grimy topknot. I'd have said I have no idea what she was doing, but unfortunately I know. She was out there trying to burrow under the casita to get the damn critters that're living under there. I've piled bits of timber and rocks on the spot but she manages to keep going.

So today, after I'd groomed the two customer dogs, I tossed Montana and Romeo into the bath and gave them a clip and scissor. Took me hours! My own fault. I'd let them run feral for ages and last time I groomed them I hadn't brushed their legs. That means that this time, since I didnt want skinny shaved legs (poodles don't look their best with their long legs clipped short - thats the long and short of it. Ha ha.) I had to spend a long time dematting and brushing out, then drying out those legs.

I am so glad I'm no longer showing a poodle. My wrist and arm were aching after brushing out 8 legs.

But the kids are looking great tonight, and feeling and smelling way better than last night! Really, there's just about nothing else in this world as good as a freshly washed poodle (after its dried and the wet wool jumper smell is gone). A freshly washed poodle in show coat is number one, that long luxurious coat and the smooth shaved butt... but a soft, clean poodle in a pet trim is the next best thing. I get a kind of emotional recharge just by hugging my poodles.

Once I was talking to someone who had a realdoll for emotional bolstering. I think I'll stick to poodles.

Before anyone goes and calls the men in white coats, I'll move onto more 'normal' things. I already mentioned my new addiction to Pinterest. Well, one of the simple crafty things I saw in there which I thought I'd try was a way to make beach glass as inspired by this site. You know, that cloudy blue colour of glass which has been dulled by the ocean.

So, the other day I got out some PVA glue, some blue food colouring and some of the many bottles we seem to have been collecting since Christmas. I had to find some use for them!

First I washed them and peeled off the labels. I couldn't get the label glue off entirely in places and I've run out of eucalyptus oil which is meant to work really well. I did the best I could. Then I used a 60s fruit bowl thing I had to hold the bottles upside down thinking that they'd dry better that way. Nope. The glue just collected on the underside and dripped, leaving a small round blob.

The mix I'd made was very watery, you can see in the photo that the bottles are very pale blue. When I did the next coat I painted the mix on by sticking a finger in the bottle, holding it upside down, then standing it on paper. I almost got a finger stuck in the bottle but managed to get it off without any damage to my finger or the bottle.

When they dried I was really pleased with how they came up. They feel nice and look great. I cant even see where the label glue didn't come off properly. I'm using them as a way to keep/display my bracelets.

They sit on the little cabinet above, which I found in a second hand store a few years ago. It was a bit battered and broken down the bottom as you can see, but I painted it, keeping the original latch, and its been a much loved piece of furniture since. Its been used as a bathroom cabinet, a bedside table and is now a handy little spot to store my fabric bits and pieces.

z

those voices...

2012-02-19T03:49:00.000-08:00

Photo: Wayne's cartoon for a friend's 40th birthday yesterday.

We were invited to Sharon's 40th birthday yesterday and Wayne did one of his wonderful cartoons for her. I matted and framed it. The joke is that her husband is making chairs out of horse shoes and it takes 69 shoes to make one chair. Wayne's work is great isn't it?

It was a pretty good night. They had a band and the music was good. I had a few dances with Leslie, a friend and neighbour from Fentonbury. She loves dancing with me cause I can lead swing and she loves learning new steps. Sometimes I really miss my old dancing days... I used to love dancing so much that when I'd get to a venue and the band was playing I'd have to run in so as not to miss one precious moment of dancing. I wish one of my old dance partners would come visit and I could show people how its really done! sigh...

Meanwhile, its Sunday night and what am I doing? I'm sitting in front of the computer. I just cant help myself. I've become addicted to Pinterest. I thought it was bad enough when I added Facebook and blogging to my computer time, but now I've found Pinterest... Thank you very much Diane! I thought you were my friend!

My eyes are sore. My butt is chair shaped. And still, I cant tear myself away!

Not only that, I cant wait to try the one million, fourty three thousand and fifteen projects, decorating ideas and clever things I see there. I just need a bigger house and a whole lot more time!

I want to redo my kitchen, re-paint the house, landscape the yard, create secret garden spots, cut wine bottles in half, learn to crochet, felt a mouse, make chandeliers out of jars and old fencing wire, build a couch out of used pallets, and thats just the start of it!

I always knew there wasn't enough time in my day, but now its worse!

I can't stop my brain. I lie in bed at night and my brain is buzzing and ticking. Last night I couldn't sleep cause of the voices inside my head, saying things like "I wonder if the cupboard in the bedroom will fit beside the fridge if I move the coats to the mud room once its finished and put the metal suitcase underneath it to hold shoes... and what if I moved the bookcase from one side of the living room to the other or will it be too wide? must measure it... and I still have that felt, I need to make mug warmers out of it, not to mention the rug I want to make out of old tshirts... must remember to go buy more tshirts..."

Its a curse I tell you!

For a minute today I thought I'd lost my notebook - the one I keep ideas in as well as my To Do lists. The thought of having to start a new list of To Do lists boggled my mind. Thankfully I found it. It was under the pile of 'stuff to file' on my desk.

But I've had a productive day. I've managed to cross quite a few things off my To Do lists today.

I say lists, plural, because I have more than one list. I found that having one list was just too hard. The list got too long and unmanageable. I'd look at it and my mind would go blank.

By breaking the list up into segments I'm able to 'see' more clearly what needs to be done. I have the lists sorted by area of the house or type of activity. 'Kitchen' 'Deck' 'Sewing' etc.

Today I tackled the sewing. Finally. The funny thing is that once I actually got started it didn't take that long at all.

A lady who's dogs I groom gave me some alpaca fleece when she had her boys shorn. It was sitting in bags in my workshop for ages. She said that she makes dog beds out of it every year for her dogs and they love it, so I decided I'd do the same.

Montana and Romeo (the poodles) sleep in the living room on the couch or armchairs as they don't shed. Mischa and Barney have their own beds and, thanks to Barney, most of their bedding is in tatters.

Long story: when we first moved here Mischa and Barney were outside dogs. They had beds in the garage, then on the deck. When Wayne went to Adelaide on holiday I made a bed for them in the entrace and they've been sleeping in the house since. In fact we now have to pry Barney out of bed in the morning or to go out and pee at night.

I found a great, big old box at the tip shop. It was like a large drawer, about 3ft wide, 2ft deep and 7in high. It was painted a mauvey colour and was a bit rough. I sanded it back enough to remove most of the old paint but not totally, cleaned it up, then painted it a pale green. In order to give it a more interesting, aged, appearance, I wiped some of the paint off to expose some of the grain, giving it a limed appearance. I then gave it a couple of coats of estapol to seal it and make it easy to wipe clean.

Once it was finished I put it in the entrance, put in some dog beds and Mischa and Barney curled up together at night. Lately however Barney has claimed it as his bed and Mischa has been sleeping on a thin pad in the hallway. She really needed the new dog bed.

I found some old curtains I'd taken down from the dog grooming room in the casita. They're lined fabric in orange. Tasteful. I cut off the tape, sewed them together, stuffed them with alpaca fleece (after picking the odd stick out of it) and voila: dog beds. Oh, I also put another cover on the outside. I stitched that closed as they both have a bad habit of taking covers off things. This way I can remove and change covers when they get dirty without then ruining the actual bed.

This is Barney's bed.

And here is Mischa on her new bed. I am experimenting with a hessian bag I got from the tip shop. She seems to like it and I love the look of it.

It goes with my postal bag come laundry basket! This post bag was going to be thrown out so we gave it a home. Took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do with it but I love it. I put 2 hooks in the bathroom wall and hang it there. When its full I sling it over my shoulder and take it down to the washing machine. (Our bathroom is Ugly with a capital U. One day...)

The sewing extravaganza didn't end there. Last week I went into an outlet store having a huge sale. Jeans for $10. You just cant go wrong at that price. I bought 3 pairs, one short and 2 long. Or they're meant to be long. They're just not quite long enough for me. You know what I mean... I'd have to wear them like those homeboys you see getting around with the top of their shorts (or more) showing and the crotch of their pants somewhere down between their knees. (What is it with that anyway?)

I had some samples of upholstery fabric which I was holding onto to do something with one day. That day came today. I cut it up, stitched a cuff and sewed it onto the bottom of one of the new pairs of jeans. Now I'm looking for another interesting fabric to do the other pair... paisley would be nice. I'll be wearing this pair to work on Tuesday. I'll let you know how it goes. :)

So I got a few things done today. But you see what I mean about crossing one thing off the list and adding another five? The dog beds were on the list. The jean cuffs were a new addition.

We took Ben up to Ashley to have him saddle broken. Or 'backed'. He's had a saddle and bridle on him and we've done plenty of work with him. Neither of us has had the guts to get on him. When he's ready I'll be going down for a few lessons on his back before bringing him home. Wally and Dancer have been unsettled over his absence.

I also rearranged the grooming room and cleaned it. Dog hair gets everywhere! I removed the lino from the toilet floor to allow the floor underneath to dry (if its not already beyond repair). We are now closing the door to the toilet but its almost impossible to get in cause Wayne has hung a tarp over it to keep rain out. And its been raining today. I did some washing and hung it out just in time for it to get wet. Eh. We have good clean rain in Tasmania.

All in all, its been a good day. I feel good. Hopefully the voices will be quiet tonight.

z

Me and hydrangeas

2012-02-17T03:25:00.000-08:00

I've had a busy week. Since when do I not have a busy week? I wish I had 54 hours in each day... Then again, Wayne says that if I did somehow manage to find another 30 hours in each day I'd soon find another 82 things to do which would take at least 41 hours to get through.

Math has never been my strength.

The photo is my first and only white cosmos flower. How was I to know you need a ton of them to produce any kind of display? I bought one little plant from a street side vendor and here it is. A single flower.

Gardening has never been my strength either.

Did I mention the hydrangea fiasco?

After admiring my hydrangeas in their pots for about 3 months and debating the pros and cons of planting them here or there, I finally made a decision. I'd plant them there. There being along the side wall of the small timber shed behind the house. It has a small gravelled area on which I'd been keeping my potted plants, a kind of plant nursery if you will.

So I moved building materials from the side of the house, the perfect spot for the plant nursery to relocate to. I moved pots to the new spot. I moved pebbles to the side. Found weed matting (of course). Cut through that. Then I dug a hole. Plonked in potting mix and hydrangea #1. Repeated the proceedure for hydrangea #2.

At hydrangea #3 I hit a snag.

As I dug there was a sneaky odour of oil. Pebbles seemed a bit sticky. The weed matting darker in colour, heavier.... You got it. I'd struck oil!

I wish.

What I found was the dumping ground for gallons of sump oil.

Who on earth dumps sump oil on the ground right behind their house? The previous owner obviously.

Then he covered it all with weed matting and pebbles, creating an illusion of garden beds to be which a gullible sucker like me would fall for.

I started digging up the oily soil and lugging it out to the area behind the garage where the soil had already been oil soaked. I was soon aching.

I haven't been out there since. The plan was to do a bit of digging and moving pebbles at a time. After a few weeks of small bouts of work I'd have the area dug out, a hole a horse might disappear into, buy new topsoil, filled it up, plant in hydrangea #4 and finally have the garden bed I dreamed of.

Right now I'm wishing I'd put them in large pots.

Other than that I've been well. If you dont count the fact that I'm kinda too scared to eat anything other than toast or chips cause of a dubious tummy. What? They're dry!

I came down with some stomach thing on Wednesday and it isnt entirely settled. Its getting there. Wayne has no sympathy. He has the constitution of an ox. He's probably the only man I know who could go to India and drink the water without getting sick.

On another note, the new chooks are great. We're getting so many eggs now (and me not currently eating eggs) we are getting a build-up of eggs in the fridge. Wayne is 'in love' with his girls.

Speaking of Wayne, he's really been getting into some DIY and craft stuff himself lately. I must take photos of some of the things he's made but here is a gorgeous little bird house he made me out of old tin cans. He hung it on the trellis where, one day, we'll have flowering climbers and a gorgeous nook to sit.

He also made an alien robot to guard the house. It stands in the yard with its laser beam and its knife, ready to challenge any intruders.

I really want to try making some robots. When I have some time...

For now I think I should concentrate on actually finishing the jobs I started last weekend. For instance, put away all the stuff I moved out of the office to make it Zefi-friendly. I still have some boxes in the living room, some on the porch and the vacuum cleaner has been sitting in our ridiculously small bathroom since last weekend.

Before I get on with any more of my projects, whether new or unfinished, I really need to finish the office, clean out the living room and find homes for all the displaced craft items in my workshop. I had gotten a good start on the workshop. Its in the casita (the small old house/shed on our property where I groom dogs) and its my space for my tools and where I'll be doing my bigger, messier craft and DIY projects. Wayne is not allowed near my tools any more. First time he used my circular saw he cut through the power cord and he's never lived it down since.

Better go. I have a big weekend planned.

As usual.

z

The best laid plans

2012-02-12T22:16:00.000-08:00

I had big plans for this weekend... I thought I'd rearrange the office, do some filing, some gardening, mow the lawn, groom some dogs (I had appointments set up for Saturday and Sunday) and then I'd take Monday off (neither Wayne nor I work Mondays) and finish a load of stuff I have to do in the office.

Well, I got some of it done. I mowed the lawn. The only other gardening I did was pick one ripe tomato and re-pot two plants (see pic) and put them on the electrical meter box on the porch.

Oh, I did buy a large glazed planter pot at Mitre 10 where they were on sale for $19.95. How can a girl resist a bargain? I'm going to put my young jasmine in there and train it up the post on the porch. Of course I have to paint the deck first...

I also re-arranged the office. That task took almost all of Saturday. See, when we first moved here we (read I) decided that the back room of the house would make a good office for us to share. I put a long desk under the window for Wayne and put my 2 part desk (meant to be a corner desk) along one wall minus its corner, making into a long desk. I put those wall mounted shelf thingies on the far wall and put up shelves to hold books, binders etc.

That worked great for about 5 minutes. Wayne didn't like the office much. He set himself up in the kitchen. He put his laptop, boxes of pens, his drawing paper, rulers etc, and he'd work there, doing research and creating his weekly cartoon strip.

When it was time to have a meal we had to shove over all the accumulated detritus of his work just to make enough space for our plates.

It got old quickly.

So I set up a desk in the living room for him. A small desk with a small table on the side to provide a bigger work surface. That was fine till I appropriated the small table for the sewing machine. For the last 3 weeks (ok, I haven't finished sewing yet!) Wayne's been taking over the kitchen table again. It was time to take matters into my own hands.

I decided to make the office more Zefi-friendly.

First I had to move all the ~~crap~~ craft stuff I had in there in boxes. It really was hard to move in the office which may be one reason Wayne avoided it... I piled all that into the living room, the bathroom and onto the porch to go to the casita where I plan to keep the craft stuff I dont need on hand. Then I pushed desks and shoved filing cabinets from one side of the room to the other. And vacuumed where they'd sat for a year.

What I ended up with is this:

My computer on the right, sewing machine on the left, books and other officey stuff on the shelves above. I put the smallest desk, a drawer unit and Wayne's filing cabinet along the wall opposite (behind me when I sit there) so he'd have somewhere to pile up paperwork. I added a more or less comfy chair along the left hand side of the room where the window is. Now I can access the window and open it without busting my guts having to lean over the desk to do it. I have kept the small TV with the dvd player on the right hand side on its small table. The theory is that Wayne will sometimes be allowed to watch TV now as I can work in here and watch dvds as I do.

At least thats the theory.

Other than that, I haven't done much at all. My day of relaxing and working on the computer (mutually exclusive, I know) seems to have disappeared. We spent most of the morning driving into Hobart to pick up some new hens. We've added 6 young isa browns to Dennis' harem. Dennis being our black rooster.

Wayne has finished stalag 13 and the 4 roosters (aka Boris) have been relocated. Hopefully they'll be relocating further away soon. The chook man we got the new girls from said he IS interested in roosters (now, why didn't Wayne ask him before we went down there??). I sure hope he comes and gets them soon. Two of them are looking decidedly scraggly as they're starting to pick on eachother. I feel so sorry for them, but we can't let them free range any more. Fingers crossed the chook man does come get them.

And tomorrow is Valentine's Day. I thought I'd share this gorgeous heart Wayne made me last year.

And while I'm at it, I'll share some more photos of stuff I've made or done as promised. Below is a great idea for a bedhead if you're into rustic stuff like we are. I found this old ladder at a tip shop a year or so ago. I've mounted it to the wall and decorated it with all kinds of old horsey things which mostly belong to Wayne. I made the stars for Christmas using sticks and silver wire. The heart and a couple of other items are tied on with raffia. I love raffia!

Below is an old window made into a mirror. I brought this from my house in Fentonbury where it was the bathroom mirror. It now sits on top of my dresser so I can check myself out when I get dressed in the morning. (That's why its up high, I can't see if my bum looks big in it!)

And lastly, I made these little boxes a few years ago using tasmanian oak from old skirting boards from a demolished house. I sanded them back enough to expose the timber, leaving the layers of paint in places. I hinged the lids at the back and now I use them to store jewelry and hair accessories. They add a pretty touch to the bedroom in front of a very old wedding photo of Wayne's uncle.

So there you go. I better get going. I promised I'd make ravioli for dinner tonight so I need to get started.

z

Stalag 13 and other undertakings

2012-02-06T01:52:00.000-08:00

Once again I've been slack in keeping a blog. I used to blog religiously. Then again, I was on holidays back then and everytime something happened, one of my cousins said something funny or I remembered a story from the past, I'd jump on my little netbook and pour my guts out.

But life has changed for me in the last year. Wayne and I got together in a search to buy a property together, we moved in, bought a horse, then another one. Inherited ducks and chooks. Buried ducks and chooks. Lost a dog. Bought new chooks. Learned how to do decking. Found out just how hard it is to maintain pasture where prickles love to grow.

It never ends. Life has become one gigantic 'To Do' list for us.

Over the last few weeks a ton of things have happened. Not all of them good. One of the good ones is that we've decided to relocate the 'boys', aka Boris as they're collectively known, (the light sussex roosters) into more natural, roomier, accommodation. Wayne has been busy building Stalag 13 for them between the casita and the vegie patch. He's been re-using and recycling materials on hand to create fences (see the old sheep grid from the casita, the trellis from the old deck...). Its almost finished now. Some wire to line the fences and the boys can move in. I'm guessing they'll love having a bit more room than a dog run offers and I think they'll love having dirt and grass under their feet.

For our part, we'll love not having roosters crowing right outside the bedroom at 4am.

Did I ever mention that? When the roosters were first moved into their current digs, it was in response to the neighbour who said he never minded the boys visiting his girls, but when they started helping themselves to his vegetable garden he had enough of being Mr Nice Guy. If we didn't put a stop to it, he would. Thus the boys were nabbed and bundled into the dog run. Which has started to smell. Ugh.

So, they first moved in there (always as a temporary measure) it was cause we couldn't bring ourselves to eat them, much less let anyone else eat them. Being confined to a dog run seemed much preferable to being Sunday roast. Not sure they grasped the concept though, as the first night they started crowing every half hour from about 4am onwards. I'd just be falling asleep again when another rooster would start crowing.

I was about to go out there and strangle them with my own two hands by 6am.

However, its amazing what the human mind/ear can get used to. I never hear them any more.

Still, it'll be nice to give them a bit more space. And the shadecloth lined dog run will most likely be converted to a greenhouse if Wayne has anything to say about it. I'm not too sure. We shall see.

As I mentioned, there were other adventures. A couple of weeks ago, when the deck was finished in fact, we had a real doozie of an adventure. Well... Wayne did.

He and Chris had been relaxing and drinking (it was a HOT day). Wayne had found and pulled out his hammock. It was great. What a way to relax! I had a go on it for a while then went off to do something in the paddock with the horses. Chris went and lay in the hammock and RIIIIIP. That was the end of the hammock.

Wayne, being a useful kind of guy, went and got out his eyelet kit to put eyelets into the hammock, strengthening it by doubling it over and all that. He's good with things like that. Then he went and hooked it onto the frame... and RIIIIIIP!

Another man on his ass!

That hammock is history. (Its also good to know it could hold MY weight! LOL)

But the fun and games didn't end there. Wayne went into the paddock to check the sprinkler and tripped over right next to Wally who probably thought another of the horses was muscling in on 'his dad'. Result: Wayne got a wallop of a kick in his arm. It swelled up like a melon and started turning colours.

Being a man, Wayne refused to see a doctor despite having me, Merrill and Chris on his case. Mind you, there had been a fair amount of drinking involved. Remember the photo of Barney with the beer bottles? Do you seriously think he drank them all?

Anyway, suffice it to say, Wayne is still sporting a very impressive hoofprint on his upper arm. He has been to see the doctor and will have a follow up appointment soon. Just in case. I won that round. I have no illusions however. If he wasn't really sore, he wouldn't have gone!

With the deck finished, we now have to enclose the 'mud room' - ie the original old small deck. This will do two things. It'll bring the toilet INTO the house (much more fun in winter!) and it'll give us more room for Wayne's huge collection of coats, jackets, hats and boots.

However, till we get our new guttering (waiting on quotes) and flashing, there's no point in enclosing the room. Naturally, after weeks of sweltering temperatures, this is when the weather decided to change. Cold, windy and wet. Naturally.

The other day the wind and rain was so bad we needed an umbrella just to get into the toilet. And a boat once we got in there. We had niagara falls at the toilet door and rapids around the toilet bowl.

We dried it out, put an extra bit of corregated iron to catch water coming in where the flashing should go, hung a tarp on one side to protect us from rain blown in sideways and put plastic on the floor with some blocks under one end to create a kind of 'ramp' effect so that water going in slides back out.

It should work. In theory anyway. The downside of course is that the ramp interferes with the normal function of the door... therefore we have a toilet with a view. When we sit there we can see over the valley. Lucky none of our neighbours are close enough to get a view of us.

I'm so over this. I want a proper roof over the future mud room and a toilet with a closing door.*

*This is not my first toilet without a door. In my house in Melbourne, my then partner Simon decided to rennovate the bathroom. He ripped out walls, made the tiny bathroom bigger, moved the toilet from the behind the laundry into the new improved bathroom... but failed to put a door on it for about a year. Which was unfortunate cause the new bathroom/toilet was directly off the living room. I lived in a house I couldn't invite friends to cause for one year I had a sheet hanging over the bathroom door.

When I told Simon it was over, I was over him, pack up and leave, he made a last ditch effort to win me back. I came home from work one day to find he'd cleaned the house (as much as you can when you have exposed beams where walls used to be, tiles sitting over holes in the floor where (again) walls used to be), moved furniture to create a proper dining room, had take away on the table and a lit candle... and TA DA! a door on the bathroom!

I was bowled over.

But perhaps its a failing on my part that at that point in time the first thing that came to my mind to say was "That wasn't too hard, was it?"

Not, "Oh honey, all is forgiven". Nope. Not me. Is there something wrong with me as a human being? Am I missing some integral part which makes me better at relationships?

Meanwhile, it seems my blog is more than simply a place to share events and vent about things. I am now also going to share stuff I do and make. I've found over the last couple of years, that I love making stuff. I love learning new things and trying new things. My only regret is not having enough time to do it all!

I've always drawn and done some crafty stuff, but lately I have become obsessed. So this is where you close the window if you're not interested in hearing about my latest accomplishments cause I'm about to share!

I've discovered www.pinterest.com and I love it. I spend an unhealthy amount of time on there just browsing and getting ideas for things I want to do/make/try. I love it.

One of the things I found was that if you cut old T-shirts into strips you can make them curl into a kind of string. A couple of weeks ago at work I took one of my clients (a lady I work one on one with once a week) to an op shop and bought some cheap T-shirts. I cut them up using one of the pinterest ideas to make a couple of vests for her. I decorated one of them with T-shirt flowers as well (another pinterest idea). If I can I'll take photos to share when I see her next.

I had an extra couple of T-shirts... so I decided to try making a headband for myself. I took the brown singlet I'd bought and cut off the bottom hem, split it up one side seam and proceeded to cut it into strips.

I discovered that there are some T-shirts that wont curl. This was one of them. Its more a knit than a Tshirt. Oops.

I then cut up a few strands of purple T-shirt, which DID curl. I tied up the ends of the strips at the size I wanted for my head. I wrapped and stitched the knots into a neater looking sausage shape, and voila. Headband!

Other things I've made recently after being inspired to use my downtime to create all kinds of interesting useful things, is a diary cover.

Basically, I couldn't find a diary I liked more than my filofax, but I wanted to try a day to a page so I thought I'd get a cheap diary and make a cover for it to hold a pen. This is what I came up with. I made the cover using felt and covering the diary pretty much as I used to cover schoolbooks when I was in grade school, only I sewed rather than taped. I decorated it by stitching on the monster with its pen holding loop/hand. I used a hairband as the elasticated closer.

I kind of stuffed up so I had to put the button on the back. So I added another smaller monster there. :) Its a bit wonky having to close the diary at the back, but it works!

Another thing I made was a spot to put the mobile phones while they're charging. Up till now they've sat on top of the two old tins I have decorating my counter top. What I did was get some cardboard (every self respecting crafter has bits of that lying around). I cut it to the shape I wanted, made a pocket using glue and bits of cardboard to give it the depth I wanted. I reinforced the middle with an extra sliver of cardboard, creating two separate pockets for our two phones.

First I covered it in some craft paper I had lying around but I hated it. So I recovered it using some scraps of fabric. Then I loved it.

The only problem with this amazingly handy little contraption is that now I forget to take my phone to work cause its 'in its place' rather than on the counter!

Lastly (for this blog anyway, you're never going to safe again) is a gift box I gave Wayne for his birthday last month. I'd seen something which gave me the idea in a book. It was a tiny memory box thing. What I created for Wayne was a 'home box' - a box with special memories and bits of home so that he can always have a bit of home with him wherever he goes.

First I bought a small craft box and created the message 'home is where the heart is' using the age-old blackmail letter technique. I then filled it with all kinds of goodies. Three horse hair locks from each of the horses. Tiny photos of me and the dogs. A feather from Boris (and by extension, all the chickens). The wire 'W' I'd made as a gift tag for his first Christmas present at the farm. Tiny bags with dirt from our land. A knot of leather. Some rusty nails from the old shed/now stable. All little things which are part of this place, or symbolize home. It lives on his bedside table. :)

Well, enough for today. I've been on here long enough!

z

Missing in action

2012-01-28T15:27:00.000-08:00

Yes, its been a while. Things have been rather hectic at Wind Dancer Farm. Christmas was a time of friends, family, over-eating, fun, frivolity and WORK. I haven't written much (at all) in a while cause the days are so lovely and long, yet somehow not long enough!

We've been getting up later than normal (which is 6am for me, earlier for Wayne) and going to bed later and later. The days are sometimes perfect, sometimes too hot. The late afternoons are lovely and so long that instead of winding down, we gear up and do more. Its easier to get going once the heat of the day subsides.

Dinners have sneaked down to 8pm, watering the garden often after dinner, then some relaxing and catching up on movies late into the night. I've been working on a new photobook for our first year on the farm, it'll be our anniversary gift, so I have to have that finished in the next two weeks so I can get it printed in time. I'm about halfway there. Its actually great to look back and see how things have changed in just one year.

The paddocks are really dry looking now so Wayne has figured out the sprinkler system and has been watering areas to keep the grass growing for the horses. We had a call from the original owners of the place (they want a dog groomed!) and they came over to visit and see the changes we're making. They're really nice people and I look forward to getting to know them. Their daughter rides in a local riding club so I'm interested in finding out more about that. Anyway, they showed Wayne where pipes were (to hopefully avoid further "digging = holes in pipes" episodes) and how the irrigation system works.

Man... I must learn all this too!

Meanwhile Chris has been coming and staying for a week or two at a time and the 'boys' have been building our new deck while I've been spoiling Chris by cooking food and making desserts he loves. Its really an extension of the old deck (kind of joining the two smaller ones we had) and giving the old deck a new railing to match the new one and prettify it. We're also enclosing the original old front deck to make a mud room and bring the toilet inside. Which is a nice thing to have really. Don't get me wrong... I like getting fresh cold air when I go to the toilet late at night or early in the morning in winter, but an indoor toilet is considered to be quite the thing these days.

We love our new improved deck! Its made the ugly little house look a million times better even though its still not painted. I plan to stain the deck grey and will repaint the house a warm grey colour called White Pepper. The trims will all be Antique White USA. So far all I've done is undercoat the window frames.

Interesting story which proves that being brave/brash/brazen pays off. I'd been driving around dangerously for a long time, looking at houses as I drove to find the colour I wanted to paint our house. There's this gorgeous place near where I work which is a colour I adore. Of course, the house is also beautiful, something ours is definitely not. So, one day after work I put a note in their letterbox asking what the colours were. They send me an email with the names, I got sample pots and I'm ready to go!

So with the deck finsihed its a matter of waiting for the timber to dry out and I can get to painting. This the house before, with the awful blue window trims, yellow walls, sink and other paraphenalia:

And this is after with the extended deck (or as its become known around here, 'Wayne's Big Deck'):

So, as you can see, we haven't been slacking off around here. The guys have been flat out building and resting and going through an insane amount of beer in the good ol' aussie way. And I've been working on all kinds of odds and ends and grooming dogs.

I've made a sign for down near our front gate so grooming customers know they have the right house. I used a poodle cut out a friend gave me as a gift a few years ago. It seemed appropriate. Looks kinda funny in the australian bush setting...

I made a lead hanger for my grooming customers as I'm always forgetting which lead goes with which dog. I took 2 offcuts of decking from the growing pile on our front lawn, and joined them together to make an L shape so I would have a small shelf. I then painted them using sample pots I had on hand - a dark grey and a pale green. Very retro colours.

I think got out my collection of old knobs which I've been picking up at tip shops* or anywhere. These aren't antique knobs, just mismatched knobs. I used glue to stick them onto the timber as most of them were broken (hence why they were at the tip shop). I had to drill holes into the timber for some of them to sit in properly.

Once dry I screwed the shelf onto the wall between the hydrobath room and the grooming room, clearly visible and in easy reach.

I then found an old piece of coreflute sign which I'd kept for some obscure yet very handy reason. In the spirit of recycling materials on hand I undercoated it with prepcoat and then painted it with chalkboard paint... which turns out to be oil based. Sheesh. I wish I'd read the tin before I bought it. Another brush bites the dust.

However, the result is one I'm really happy with. A handy spot for customer dog leads, a place to put business cards so customers see them, and a little poodle figurine which I rescued from the throw out pile at one tip shop. I like it.

*Tip shops are recycle/reclaim centres where things other people throw away are sold. One person's junk is another's treasure.

z

Eat and be merry

2012-01-09T03:23:00.000-08:00

Things really have been busy around here lately. We are now 2 weeks down of our 3 week holiday and I'm trying hard not to think too much about work looming closer by the day. That'll ruin your holiday every time.

For the last 2 weeks we've pretty much had a full house. Wayne's friend Chris has been up here helping with the stable and with the deck rennovation, and his daughter Caitlin is over visiting. The guys have been working their butts off - I can hear Wayne swearing all over the place when things don't go the way he wants them to. Chris says Wayne's nickname should be Breaky or Smashy cause those seem to be his strengths.

Still, things are getting done. Today I got to use the nail gun to put down some decking. My first time with a nail gun (and this is nail gun 3.0*. I'm already looking for other things to nail down... Hm... If it moves and it shouldn't, nail it there. One of these days Wayne will come home and find I put his boots 'in their place' and nailed them there.

The saga of the nail gun

Wayne bought me a nail gun pack for my birthday. Basically, brad nailers of different sizes. All very well till we tried to buy nails for them. Apparently Bunnings sells these home quality nail guns but you can't get nails for them to do real jobs. So I took it back and exchanged it for another nail gun, a coil gun this time - not a pack and for more money, and once again... guess what? Bunnings doesn't sell nails for it! So I drove around town looking for a specialist store who would sell the nails I needed. Found them. Great! Get home and guess what? The nail gun will take the nails but they don't work! So this morning I chose to withdraw from the adventure. I sent the guys into town on the 'great nail gun' search. They returned the gun to Bunnings (again) and went to Mitre 10 where they found a nail gun which fit the nails AND (would you believe it?) actually nailed them!

I've been cooking up a storm too. For the first time in my life I understand how people gain weight on holidays! Normally I'm too busy to eat too much, but with guests food is a bit more important. We've had scones with cream and jam. Cheesecake. Chocolate cake. Thai green curry. Fettucine with mushroom cream sauce. Lasagne.Pasta Amatriciana. Home made pizza. Heaps of salads. Home made pickled beetroot from our garden.

Which brings me back to the garden. Its going well. Too well! Even the eggplants seem to have bounced back from being chewed on by bugs. The lettuces are ready now and I've discovered something about myself: I prefer my vegies clean and bug free, preferably wrapped in plastic.

I'm also learning lessons about how far apart to plant some things, never to plant anything close to the brocoli or it will be completely overwhelmed by its huge leaves, and not to plant things I don't know how to cook cause they just grow and grow and I have to kill them.

We've been out and about a few times too. Took Caitlin to Salamanca Market and to see the yachts from the Sydney to Hobart race.

And the gorgeous sculptures at Constitution Dock.

I took her to visit Cascade and to the tip shops cause I thought she needed to be exposed to the bountiful possibilities of tip shopping.

I introduced her to Banjo's house cakes (a Tasmanian institution) and gave her dog grooming lessons.

(Tip shops are recycling centres for things people throw away.)

I'm exhausted!

z

Goodbye bandicoot

2012-01-09T01:14:00.000-08:00

On the way to Cadbury's yesterday I decided to take the scenic route just 'because'. I spotted a tiny creature on the road and pulled over the minute I saw what it was. A bandicoot.

These little creatures are nocturnal so this little fellow should not have been out on the road during the day. And he was moving very slowly. I jumped out of the car and grabbed him before the truck barrelling towards me got too close.

The poor little thing was breathing heavily, its heart beating rapidly. It didn't look hurt on the outside but something was definitely wrong with it. I asked Caitlin to hold it in her jumper (to keep it quiet in the dark) and I headed towards the closest vet.

On the way there I asked how it was going, had it settled down.

It was dead.

I can't describe how devastated I felt. I adore bandicoots, like so many native animals. And this little guy was so cute... I really wanted to save him. He was tiny, fully grown but still a youngster. He fit in my hand easily.

But when he was dead, he was so... dead. No other way to put it. He wasn't limp and dead, he was almost immediately stiff and dead. He seemed to lose all his flexibility, his little legs just stuck out. It was just so sad to see him lose the spark of life.

It made me think about all my loved pets who I've lost. I was there to hold Billy and Scooter when they crossed over. I wasn't there for Timmy or Pagan. Someone else was there for them. With Billy and Scooter they were gone and suddenly they were limp, heavier somehow. With the bandicoot it was different. I dont know why. Maybe it was my imagination and not reality, but with them it was like they just left their bodies, surrendered them and left them with me as they crossed over.

I dread to think of losing my poodles. When I think of the day I'll have to say goodbye to them, or to Barney and Mischa, or the horses, I don't think I can face it. I tell them every day how much I love them. I hope its enough.

z

Why I need to start drinking

2012-01-07T21:12:00.000-08:00

Today is a day I'll never get back. It started innocently enough. Caitlin and I went to the Cadbury factory in Claremont to see the end of the marathon and to visit the chocolate shop. A real non-event. Since they stopped doing factory tours (I mean, who doesn't want to see huge vats of liquid chocolate?) there seems no point in visiting Cadbury's. We wandered in, looked around and left. We then visited the Glenorchy Sunday Market at the showgrounds... just another market, therefore nothing special.

So we then decided we'd visit MONA, the Tasmanian Museum of Old and New Art.

Hmph. Maybe MOANa is a better name.

Its a very interesting looking building on the bank of the Derwent River just inside the Moorilla Estate Vineyards. The vineyards are gorgeous, as are the surrounds, the buildings and the views.

There was a sewery smell on the air which seemed an omen of what was to come, cause let me tell you, it was crap. Literally. One of the exhibits was a panel of monitors showing various videos on loop. One was a worm's eye view of someone taking a big dump.

Nice.

It was one of the first things we saw when we entered the catacombs of the building ("Go straight to the bottom floor and work your way up" we were told by the helpful staff who gave us an ipad to guide us through the museum.

I know why they want you to start at the bottom. So you can't just simply walk out! I thought I'd never find my way out of there at one stage.

The other art and installations included such intriguing items as:

Pig skins with tattoos on them, accompanied by video of the tattooed pigs in their pens while still alive.

A sculpture of a man, hung upside down with what looked like his skin melting/peeling off.

An installation of a group of male mannequins who'd been castrated, hung upside down and dismembered.

Videos of all sorts of things which defy description.

A sculpture of a dead horse, hung from a rope around its middle.

My personal favourite - letterhead paper with what looked like, at first glance, kisses in lipstick, but upon closer inspection proved to be the puckered lips of an entirely different part of the human anatomy. Tasteful.

An entire room of x-rays of rats, including one crucified rat with onlookers.

Hundreds of plaster casts of womens' genitalia. That one really gets me. Did this guy (woman?) have sex with all these women or did he actually just approach them and say 'Hey, I'm an artist and I'd really like to take a plaster cast of your pussy'.

Seriously. This is art? There were some beautiful items in amongst all the disgusting, disturbing, gratuitously shocking crap, but for the most part it was unadulterated crap.

No, really Zefi, tell us how you really feel. Don't hold back now!

I have a real problem with "Its art cause I call myself an artist and I say its art"....

If I'm offending people (like the artists, after all, they have feelings too), then so be it., though I doubt it. I'm sure this is the reaction they want. I just cannot understand how videos of someone stabbing himself so his guts fall out, or someone urinating and defecating can be art.

Leonardo is turning over in his grave as we speak!

This is why I have a real problem with being an ARTIST, why I will now go ahead and believe the idiot art lecturer that told me, at art school, that I would never amount to anything cause I had no 'theory' (ie bullshit) behind my work*. If that's so, fine. I'd rather be someone who can produce beautiful pieces of work than someone who smears excrement on photos of vaginas and amputated penises then spews forth theories of my work and what it all means.

*The particular lecturer raved on and on about the work of a fellow student who's bland, murky, tonal abstracts "showed the futility of living in an urban landscape and people's struggle to come to terms with their life in the inner city, blah blah". Then turned to me and asked what my work was about. I said "This is a leather jacket, this is noodles, this is licorice and this is a fish". I could have given him a lot of crap about focusing in on small objects and blowing things up to the point where the object almost unrecognisable - the images were about the light and dark, shapes, curves, more like landscapes than a jacket, noodles, licorce or fish. But I didn't. My work is what it is. Like it or lump it. I shouldn't have to explain or justify my work. If that makes me less of an artist than the guy who put lipstick on his asshole and pressed it to letterhead, then GREAT.

xxxx

A work in progress

2011-12-30T20:59:00.000-08:00

Wayne's been working flat out on the stable for the last few days. I think I'll take you for a small stroll through the history of the stable thus far.

This is what it looked like when we first saw the farm. It was an old shed, housing a tractor and many bits and pieces of rusty engine parts, broken plowing implements, trucks, boat bits, drums of oil and a truck parked next to it. The roof was being held in place by spit and a collection of old tractor wheel hubs and besser blocks.

Before we moved in the previous owner took away everything he wanted to keep. Most of the truck parts, boats and tractors went. All that was left was a falling down shed and a whole lot of rubbish. Really. A ton of rubbish that we are still coming to terms with.

So Wayne started looking at it, considering how to go about converting it into a stable for 2 horses. We only had Wally at the time but were planning to get a horse for me. He found that the roof needed replacing entirely, that the low ceiling on one end of the shed was too low for horses, and that one post wasn't holding up the wall let alone the roof. It wasn't even in the ground.

Slowly, over the next few months, Wayne started to rip the old shed apart. He dug holes and put in posts to hold up a new roof for the 'extension'... only to find the irrigation pipes. Twice. Seems like every single hole that Wayne dug for a few weeks had a pipe going through it. I think we spent more on mending pipes than on anything else during that period.

One weekend our friend Chris came up and together the guys put the first half of the roof on. By then we'd already had Ben join our family so the two bays were perfect for the two boys. Of course, now we also have Dancer which means that the work is far from finished. We need another bay, so Wayne is considering a 'lean-to' bay added to the side of the current structure.

I suggest he builds another, similar structure at a right angle to the one we have now - another 2 bays.... Cause you never know when you may need another stable... :)

Before and after

2011-12-28T23:14:00.000-08:00

This is the before photo of the vegie patch. Not before-before. When it was 4 beds of weeds. About halfway through the weeding process, 2.5 beds done, 1.5 to go.

This is the vegie patch a couple of weeks ago, overgrown with growing things that we actually planted on purpose. Well, minus a few that were either eaten by bugs or threw the towel in on their own. The corn is currently almost as tall as I am and the runner beans have grown up the trellis and are sporting red flowers. Who knew.

I've just been feeling so lazy lately... I have a ton of things I need to or want to get done over the holidays, but I just can't motivate myself to do anything at all. Maybe I just need a rest for a few days, then I'll get back into it.

...That's what I'm telling myself.

Wayne's daughter Caitlin is visiting us and its nice to get to know her. So far Wayne's taught her how to drive the 4x4 up on the hill, we plan to put her on Ben for his first time being ridden and I think he's planning to get her to chop down a tree after that, then stock us up with firewood for winter.

Ok. Only joking. Caitlin can't ride, and though we'd love to get someone onto Ben who's lighter than us (Wayne suggested I buy a clydesdale!) I don't think it'd be fair to use Caitlin as a guinea pig. As for the chainsaw, I don't think anyone can prize that baby out of Wayne's hands...

I'm actually really looking forward to getting back to working with the horses today. It's been weeks. And I have a new saddle to play with. We bought a hybrid - that's a confused saddle, not quite Australian stock, not quite western. Its a Wintec so its as light as a feather (compared to Wayne's western). I'm hoping Ben will like it. I believe my butt will like it fine.

I really can't wait to start riding Ben. And Wally sure needs the exercise. All the horses are round as a whole number thanks to the shortage of grass around here. A visitor thought Wally was pregnant! Besides the grass and the hard feed they all get (cut down to one meal a day now), Wally scoffs the best bits out of his feed bin, then runs up and eats the chook feed too. Its a miracle he isn't laying eggs with the amount of layer pellets he's eating!

We could use the eggs.

So, they could use the exercise. As could we... Seems like lately we mark time between one meal and the next. Right now I have scones in the oven... with strawberry jam and that double thick cream you can stand a knife up in. YUM.

And tonight is pizza and movie night. I'm making pizza and we got dvds in New Norfolk. Wayne got 3 movies about centurions, romans, swords and heads being chopped off. I got Red Dog and Water for Elephants. You know which I'll be angling to watch tonight.

Let's hope the scone are edible. First time I ever made scones they were hard as rocks. This time I'm making them using a Country Women's packet. Just add water it said. Easy as pie. We'll see.

Better go check the oven.

z

Boots and all

2011-12-27T03:54:00.000-08:00

Its been a busy few days. Firstly there was the crazy build-up to Christmas, then somehow instead of collapsing in a heap, we found ourselves doing MORE.

Christmas was fantastic. We had 3 friends come up from Cygnet to stay, and another two good friends who came up for the day with their gorgeous dog, Harvey. Montana and Harvey have the kind of relationship where there's nothing they wouldn't do for each other - so they spend their time together doing nothing for each other.

First time they met was at a park near my house in Fentonbury. I thought it was wiser to introduce them on neutral turf given he was visiting us for the first time. They met, sniffed and basically ignored eachother in perfect harmony. Then we all drove to my place and soon as we arrived Montana turned into Ms Protector. She rushed up to Harvey as he bounced out of his car. Harvey turned on her and gave her as good as he got. Montana turned around and jumped back into our car and stayed there till 'that nasty Harvey character' had gone home. Ever since then, every time Harvey comes over I just open the back of the car and Montana spends his visit in there.

That's where Montana spent Christmas day.

She kept an eye on things from afar, making sure 'that Harvey' didn't get up to anything.

Romeo on the other hand kept a closer eye on Harvey. He never let him out of his sight. When the rain started and we went inside Romeo was there, watching, while Montana stayed in the car in the carport.

At one stage Romeo just couldn't contain himself any longer. He snuck up behind Harvey and tried to nip him on the butt. Harvey (who is wise to Romeo's butt-nipping tactics) whirled around like a flash causing Romeo to virtually spring over the coffee table backwards, narrowly missing the coffee cups.

Yes, I did mention rain. Rain is too mild a word for the downpour. Firstly, let me mention that I've been in Tasmania for 8 Christmases now. And not a single one of them has been good weather. Once it even snowed. And before you ask, yes, its summer here.

This Christmas was almost an exception. The day was hot and still. I'd put up the gazebo but made the executive decision to eat inside cause it was actually cooler in there with fans on. Lucky too. I was outside picking fresh raspberries for dessert when the wind picked up and the rain started. I tried to brazen it out a while, but the raindrops started coming down hard and I had to make a run for it. I got everyone galvanised to help take down the gazebo cover before it became airborne, take in the chairs, rescue one umbrella as it sailed off down the road.

We sat inside and watched the rain come down in sheets and turn to hail. Then we watched in horror as the footpath turned into a mini tsunami that washed down the steps and into the casita, through the laundry and the workshop area, then down a crack in the floor, at which point it disappeared from sight. (I sure am glad Wayne isn't a great carpenter and that he left a small gap between the old floor and the new!)

Wayne and I both waded out to make sure tools and other stuff was safe from the path of the water. It was coming in through the walls in some places.

In all the excitement we forgot that all the windows in the house were opened (it HAD been hot!). All the bedrooms are on the back side of the house - and the rain was coming down from that direction... straight into the bedrooms, soaking the single bed in the tiny room, the carpet in the main bedroom and guest room, and the office desk. ugh.

Anyway, no real harm done. Things have dried, things have been washed, and all seems ok.

So Christmas was exciting.

When everyone had gone the next day and 575 dishes washed, Wayne and I looked at the garden. The new deck will be going up soon and a couple of shrubs needed to be moved. A salvia and a hebe, both flowering gorgeously till we attacked them.

See, they were right in the path of the new deck. They had to go. So, going by what I'd been told, I cut them right back and Wayne dug them up. I figured they were going to die anyway, we could at least try to transplant them... nothing to lose right?

Well, turns out the salvia wasn't too hard to get out, though it came out in 2 pieces. I potted one up for a friend and planted the other. The hebe though wasn't going to go peacefully.

Wayne dug and prodded and heaved with the crow bar. Nothing doing. So he got out a chain, wrapped one end around the bush and hooked the other end to the towbar on the ute. I watched as he accelerated slowly, carefully... and obliterated the bush, breaking it off at the base.

So much for transplanting the hebe!

I took cuttings from both bushes. Maybe I'll get lucky and a couple of them will take.

We never claimed to be great gardeners. In fact we have a vegie patch which is growing in leaps and bounds and we have no idea what to do with the stuff in it! We don't know when things are ready to pick or how to cook some of the stuff in there (the packet said 'asian greens' and it seemed like a good idea at the time! Now I have a patch of overgrown asian greens I have no idea what to do with!).

I put in about 15 silverbeet plants. Not my fault. That's how many the punnet had in it! Wayne watched me plant them all. Then our neighbour gave us another 3 plants. When they were ready to pick Wayne told me he hates silverbeet. What on earth am I going to do with half an acre of silverbeet? sigh.

Luckily for me 1/3 of the stuff I put in died, or we'd be totally sunk. I think I may have to be more sensible next year. Put in less of some plants. Like the lettuce for instance. You can't cook or freeze lettuce. What on earth am I to do with 613 lettuces?

I need rabbits...

So. Once we'd pulled out the bushes, we had to put them in somewhere right? We'd prepared an area above the driveway, a bit of a slope. I'd bought some topsoil in anticipation of putting in a garden bed in that area. My idea was to create 'steppes' out of some cement blocks we inherited with the property.

This is what the area looked like originally - the tarps were my way of passively killing the weeds. It didn't work, they were still alive, but they did have a bit of a headache.

Wayne dug holes, we shovelled dirt, mixed in some horse poop and finally we were able to put the plants in. I put in 2 different daisies, a lavender, some seeds and a plant called Cherry Pie... Fingers crossed they grow. The dirt in that area is poor and I'm not sure we had enough topsoil. My theory is that if I feed them regularly they'll be ok. If I'm wrong I'll know soon enough.

It was hot too, though overcast. Wayne worked topless, and though he was all for me immitating him, I opted for the midriff look - tucking my T-shirt up into my bra at the sleeves and above my waist. We're both sunburned. Wayne is lobster red all over his back. Me, I look like a belted galloway in negative.

What's a belted galloway?

Meanwhile, Wayne saw his first snake the other day. He was walking through the bottom paddock, which looks like this:

He's let the horses into the bottom paddock now so he had to set up water for them. While out there Barney apparently warned him about the snake he was about to step on. Damn lucky too, cause all he had on his was a hanky to beat it to death with.

So, life has been exciting here at Wind Dancer.

What goes around

2011-12-22T13:28:00.000-08:00

They say that if you do good things, good things will happen to you. I've always been amazed by how this works... All my life I've had good things happen to me in the most unexpected ways. Then again, I do good things for others too.

Its never a quid pro quo arrangement. I don't do something good for someone who's done something good for me. For instance, I give things away to people who need them, I rarely sell things I no longer need. Then, when I need something, someone else will give me something to help me out.

Its really quite cool how that works.

Many years ago, I lived in Melbourne and used to dance rock'n'roll about 4-5 times a week, going to pubs to follow bands. One of the most popular places to go on a Sunday afternoon to watch a band and dance had changed hands and was no longer doing rockabilly on Sundays. I missed it. So, when I bumped into an old classmate from art school who he told me his family had bought the pub, I instantly asked him to consider bringing back rockabilly. I gave him the phone numbers of the bands I knew, I recommended good bands which would draw a crowd and gave him advice on how to run it.

A few weeks later, rockabilly was back on the menu on Sunday afternoons.

It never occured to me to ask for anything in return. I gave my advice cause I wanted somewhere to dance again on a Sunday (selfish!), but also to help out a friend who said that their Sundays were quiet. He was happy, I was happy. I went there every Sunday and paid a cover charge just like everyone else. Until another friend of mine pointed out to the owner that he owed the Sunday success to me. From that point on I got in for free (a saving of $5), but I already had what I wanted. I felt good.

I asked a friend of mine at the time if she could give me the phone number of another band she knew well, so I could pass that on and they could be booked to play on the occasional Sunday. She wanted to know what was in it for her. Getting the band a gig and having somewhere to go to enjoy their music wasn't enough for her. She wanted a spotters fee.

I never understood that mentality. When you do something for someone, you do it cause you want to, otherwise don't do it at all. A friend will help you paint a room or move house cause that's what friends do. Sure, I've offered to pay friends to do jobs for me, but in most cases its cause I wanted more help than they were able to give me on their own terms. When I was getting my house in Melbourne ready to sell, a good friend helped me repaint it. We didn't get enough done on the weekend so I paid her to stay a couple of extra days. She was a student and needed the earnings from her job to make ends meet. I couldn't ask her to miss work for nothing in return.

When I broke my ankle a few years ago and was laid up in my house, in a new state and knew only one neighbour, I got the most unexpected gift. Someone I'd only ever heard of from a discussion group called the local store and sent them some money for my groceries. I'm amazed that someone would do that for a stranger.

People can be so surprising. Especially when you don't expect it.

On the other hand, I'm also a great believer in asking. I figure there's no point in being shy or afraid to ask. The worst that can happen is you get a no. My ego can take that.

Yesterday when I went to pick up the work van I noticed a trailer load of rough timber boxes on the back of a trailer behind the business next door to work. There was a man working in the garden. I asked if the boxes were going to be thrown out, and if so, could I have them. He asked if I wanted them as planter boxes cause that's what he'd thought of using them for, offered me some of them, then said I may as well take them all (9) and save him carting them around. I now have a stack of boxes in my drive waiting for a new home and plants!

Wayne was like 'What's that? More stuff!' and this morning he was 'I like those boxes, I may steal some...'

But the best was a phone call I received yesterday afternoon. On Sunday, when I picked up Merrill to take her to the airport, she pointed out a stack of underlay and carpet in the neighbour's carport. The house has recently sold and they're obviously rennovating and the old carpet is in the carport, most likely to go to the tip. She suggested I take it for the casita. I said I couldn't go into someone's yard without permission to take something which may or may not be destined for the tip. Different if its on the nature strip. Then its first come best dressed. For all I knew the guy had another use for it. So I went in and left a note on the stuff.

Yesterday afternoon I got a call from a man who was so thrilled that I left a note. He said he thought it was nice of me and cool to find the note, and that I'm welcome to take as much of it as I want. He was planning to take it to the tip on Saturday. He also asked me to stop by and introduce myself if he's there next time I see someone in the house.

I made his day and that makes me feel nice. Plus I get new (old) carpet and underlay for the studio area of the casita and the grooming room! :) Win win.

Well, the pre Christmas stuff won't get done by me sitting here writing blogs. Better get off my butt and get started.

z

There's a reason they call it the silly season

2011-12-22T00:52:00.000-08:00

Christmas is sneaking up on us and things are going slightly crazy. People seem to have run out of patience for work, have shorter fuses and every day is a struggle to keep up.

Everyone says 'Its the end of the year. We're all tired.' But what I don't get about that argument is that the 'end of the year' is just a date on the calendar. Its just another day like the day before and the day after. Sure, some of us have holidays around Christmas time, but why is it that everyone seems to wind down as the end of the year approaches? I haven't noticed people winding down before a holiday at any other time of the year.... It must be psychological: the year behind weighs down on us, exhausting us... then a new year begins and we feel lighter, ready to tackle anything. Maybe its just the hope that the new year will be better than the last.

Things in my world have been a bit wierd lately, in keeping with the spirit of the season. On Tuesday, while crossing the road with a client, I suddenly got a stabbing pain in my right hip. A pinched sciatic nerve apparently. I stumbled through the day, holding my butt-cheek for the majority of it (good look) then drove home in agony and booked a treatment with a friend who does deep tissue massage. She came over next morning and after she was finished I felt like a new person... albeit one who'd had a severe asskicking! My butt cheeks are black and blue.

That woman has strong fingers!

So, since I was at home resting and recouperating, I decided to finish the little Christmas tree I was making for a centre piece for Christmas day. Its made of sticks I collected in the paddock. I used my glue gun to put it together, and topped it off with a star decorated with beads.

No idea what happened here... This photo was saved as portrait. Please tilt your head to see it!

I also made a few stars from sticks to decorate the room. I used wire to tie the sticks together in star shapes and then hung beads on wire from the bottom point.

I feel quite proud of my Christmas decoration experiments.

Meanwhile Fred and his friends all got noses. I made another friend for him and realized none of them had a nose. So now they all do.

Christmas is going to be busy here. We're having it here to celebrate the first year on the farm. We've decided to forgo tradition and make it a grazing day: cold ham, cold turkey, cold chicken, salads, dips, cheese, crackers, lots to drink and lots of sweets. And all day to consume them!

Hopefully the day will be good to us, but despite the weather bureau's long term forecast about a hot day with afternoon showers, I'm not optimistic. Ever since I've lived in Tasmania Christmas day has been COLD.

So I'm planning to set up the gazebo for an outside setting, and bring in trestles and a door to set up an inside table as well. Better safe than sorry I say.

I'm also planning to wash and clip dogs. Can't have grimy dogs around here at Christmas! Barney is quite happily going through his days, completely unaware that his fuzzy face is soon going to shaved off and the accumulation of grime and smelliness is about to washed off. Mischa's too. Well, she wont be clipped, but she'll be washed. Her whites will be white again!

My two will go from a greyish white to pure white again. And I'll be able to see their gorgeous faces again. Its been too long since they were last done. And they love it. They love being farm dogs! In fact, thats one of the best things about living here instead of Fentonbury. In Fentonbury they were locked up all day when I was at work, here they get to spend the days in the yard and they love it.

Ben is gorgeous. He's definitely my horse, comes to the fence to say hello and get a face rub and comes to me all the time. I love it. Then Wally comes over and pushes him away in case I have carrots.

Wally meanwhile has been scoffing down his food as quick as he can, then rushing over to where Wayne feeds the ducks and chooks so he can clean up the wheat and layer pellets. With the amount of chickenfeed he's getting, its a miracle he isn't laying eggs!

Dancer is being a real girl., playing one boy off the other. Poor Ben is the one getting picked on I think. Maybe I made a mistake encouraging Wayne to get her... Poor Benjamin... I may separate him a while. We haven't had time to work with him at all lately. I'm really hoping we can get back to it soon. I'm eager to ride him.

z

Sniff butt

2011-12-15T23:26:00.000-08:00

Dancer, in the front yard.

Check that out Ben! Its a girl!

She sure is pretty Wally. She smells nice...

You boys can sniff my butt!

EWWWW. Girl butt!

Dancer is coming along nicely. She's learning to trust us, particularly Wayne cause he works with her the most. He's been working on her giving her feet so that we can trim her hooves, she's coming to us when we arrive home from work and seems to enjoy our company, pats and carrots.

She's filling out too. Her butt has a nice roundness to it that it lacked before. She's still skittish about some things, but she is coming along. For instance, when we got her you could never be sure if she was going to kick, but now she'll come up and back up to you to have her butt scratched. And she was really reluctant to let anyone touch her head. We've been working on that and most of the time now she'll let you touch her head and run your fingers through her forelock even though she still doesn't like it much.

With Christmas coming up and all the stuff that seem to happen around this time of year, its been hard to find the time to work with the horses. All last week we had meetings, training and dinners after work, so every night was a late one. Hopefully next week will be a bit easier as we only have one meeting and then we have a 3 week break for summer holidays.

I am so looking forward to my holiday! Not that I see myself really relaxing... I have a To Do list a mile long! Things I'd like to get done while i have a few days at home.

Like finish the brushcutting I started last weekend. About 4 hours of it. I tackled the deep grass and weeds growing around the dam and the pussy willow stems I stuck in the ground around there. I put in about 9 pussy willow stems. I think 6 have made it. There may be more... I have to finish the job and find them in the weeds.

Once that's done I have to tackle the other side of the fence, around the water tanks. Another 4-5 hours...

Then, about 3 weeks later, repeat above steps.

I also have plants to put in the ground (over 20) and seedlings to separate and pot up...
Those are just the outside jobs! It never ends. I wonder what on earth possessed us to buy a farm? One and a quarter acres was more than enough outside work for me... Don't they say be careful what you wish for, you might get it? I always wished to live on a farm and Ta Da! Here I am!

I do love it, though, so I can't complain. I just wish that I had more time to enjoy it. More time to spend doing things at home, on the farm. More money to do them with. Less need to work.

A lotto win would come in handy right now! Failing that, selling my house in Fentonbury would help a hell of a lot.

So people out there looking for a beautiful, comfy house, in a gorgeous landscape, for a country life, look no further. I have the house for you!

Till then, I work at work, I work at home, I work in the garden, I groom dogs, I paint. The time I have left over I play with poodles and horses and enjoy the view.

z

Did you hear about Fred?

2011-12-15T22:26:00.000-08:00

Hey! Did you hear about Fred?

Shh! Here he comes!

Hey Fred!

Hey guys...

So, what did happen to Fred? Fred is a pipe cleaner and pom pom poodle I made last week as a prototype/experiment for Christmas ornaments. I made Fred late one night while watching TV and when he was done I left him on the coffee table to dry and went to bed.

In the morning I went to show Fred to Wayne and he was nowhere to be found.

OH NO! Romeo got him! I knew it.

And sure enough, I looked outside and there was Fred, lying in the middle of the footpath.

I was able to resuscitate him, but he'll never be the same. The hair on his tail will probably grow back, but he'd lost an eye, had a broken hip and will never be able to walk without a limp again.

The above photo does no justice to the flatness of Fred.

z

Note: One PC&PP poodle was harmed in the making of this blog entry.

Bats in my belfry and possums in my hen house

2011-12-04T00:32:00.001-08:00

Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE living on a farm? I love having animals around me. Sure, I hate it when some animals (or birds) kill the other animals (or birds), and I could do without the rats and mice, thankyouverymuch, but I love having animals around me even though sometimes I have no idea what I'm doing.

When we got the 3 new isa brown hens a while back we locked them, the black leftover hen and the rooster in the hen house to bond. Then we let them all out a while and after a couple of weeks I found one of the red hens dead. Looking back now I think her head was missing (I saw a mess and didn't want to look too closely) which lead me to believe it was the work of a quoll... At least I've heard that quolls will kill chickens.

I love quolls. They're gorgeous and its a tragedy that most of their species is extinct everywhere in Australia but Tasmania.

But I digress.

While the chooks were locked up they made a nest in some long weeds at the back of the pen and we didn't know it was there. By the time I found it there were 13 eggs in there! Wayne thought they were holding out on us.

Needless to say, despite the lesson I learned from my mother early in life, I took all the eggs and the chooks stopped laying there.

"When you have free range hens and you find where they're laying, always leave an egg so they return to that nest." Wise woman my mother!

So for a while we didn't get many eggs. Then one day I found 3 eggs in a nest on the floor of the hen house. Being a bit wiser this time, I left one egg there as a 'seed' egg. We marked it with an X and various threats to the life of the person who takes it, and left it there to encourage the girls to return.

A couple of days ago Wayne found the seed egg cracked open and sucked dry. We know the 'egg sucking dogs' didn't do it cause they can't get into the hen house. We blamed the theoretical quoll, but really we have no proof that quoll even exists.

Which brings me back to today. I spent some time out in the paddock with Wayne and the filly, Dancer, working with her, picking up her feet and just getting her used to me handling her. Then we messed around with the boys a while so they didn't feel left out. Before heading inside to make dinner I checked the hen house, checking for eggs and to see if they were roosting in there or up the tree.

I looked, found two eggs, no chickens on the roost. But wait, there was the black hen in one of the nests, I could see her big black eyes and her pink nose...

Pink. Nose....???

That's not a hen!!! That's a black possum!

It was curled up and looking very snug and comfortable in the nest. I'm wondering if it was the possum who ate the egg... do they even eat eggs?

Its so darn cute. Wayne had to drag me out before I tried to make friends with it. That could be very dangerous... Those thinks have claws like Freddy Krueger.

Maybe its a female and she's chosen to have her babies in the hen house! Maybe the hens moved out cause the possum moved in? Who knows.

What I do know is that my poodles are now eating like normal dogs. I mean, Montana has always been a fussy eater. She'd eat her chicken frames, loved disgusting canned food if she ever got it, would graze on dry food. But give her leftovers and she'd inevitably leave the vegies and eat the meat and pasta or rice. Romeo was still a pup when we moved in and growing, and just like any young male, he's always hungry.

These days everyone eats their dinner and no one leaves anything behind. Even Montana is now eating like a dog, only a little bit more ladylike. She eats it all but takes a bit longer than the others who scoff it down like there's a deadline.

I've never had dogs that ate like this before! When I ran out of chicken frames this last week and didn't have time to go buy more, I had to resort to giving them all dry food mixed with whatever I could find, preferrably not canned dog food cause *PIEUWWWWEEEE!* I can't stand the smell of that stuff coming out of the can or coming out of the dog!

I'd mix up dry food with canned fish or chicken soup and toss in some leftovers and YUM. Nice and disgusting. Just the way they like it.

Not the way I like it. I've had to pooperscoop about 8 times the normal volume in the last couple of days. Soon as I can I'm buying more chicken frames. I'd much rather the firmer, smaller poop which results from the raw chicken frame diet.

Yes, I am discussing dog poop. You'd have to scoop it up to appreciate these things. And while I'm on the subject I may as well add that Ben's poop is finally solid.

Ah, its the simple things in life which make me happy...

z

Memories of home

2011-12-03T03:36:00.001-08:00

As you know, I have put my house in Fentonbury on the market. Its been a big decision for me cause I love that house, I love the position and the area. I love the yard and the openess. But home is here now, with Wayne and the dogs, the horses, the chickens, the ducks and the grass. So its time to let go of the past and move forward in this next chapter of my life.

Fentonbury holds so many memories, I thought I'd share some of them with you.

I bought the house in Fentonbury in 2003 and surprised almost everyone I knew. I'd been living in Melbourne for over 20 years but dreaming of living in the country and threatening to pick up and move to Tasmania one day. I'd never been to Tasmania so I came down for a weekend, saw 3 houses and made an offer on the third. I went back to Melbourne, handed in my resignation at work, put my house on the market, set 4 open days and an auction and I was gone.

The house on Gully Road was my first country home and I lived there alone for a long time. I knew nothing about living in the country and had to learn about the sounds wallabies made when they thumped through the yard in the dark. Its where I learned to stock a pantry when the supermarket isn't just down the road. Its where I learned that poodles are real dogs that can (and will) kill small animals. Its where I had my first litter, and my second, third and fourth. Its where Montana was born, Bonnard and Romeo. Its where I buried the one puppy I lost and planted a tree over its grave. Its where Scooter met his new family and where Pagan met Louise and chose to go live with her.

Its where Billy was living when he started losing his hair and was diagnosed with hypothyroidism and where his immune system started to lose the fight and started the cycle that ended in him leaving me.

The house in Gully Road was a mess when I bought it - the previous owner had not loved it, had never unpacked and had cats who left messes. She'd lost her keys and broken windows to get in. I fumigated it, I stripped dirty carpets, repainted walls, put up dado rails and timber lining on walls. I put in a new bathroom floor and a new bathroom suite. I updated the kitchen and put a rail around the deck and a ramp to replace the rickety steps. I built a garage and moved the clothes line to the back yard. I got rid of rabbit hutches and bantam cages and cubby houses and old vegie patches. I put up new fences and gates and planted trees. I got the roof painted - it was half pale blue and half unpainted.

Its where I learned to chop wood and to light a wood heater and keep it going all night. I bought my first lawnmower and my first brushcutter (a big REAL brushcutter, not some pansy one) and my ride on mower. I bought firewood by the truckload. I learned to drive a tractor and pick hops and pack cherries. I got my first pair of blundstone boots, rain gear and fluoro safety clothes.

The house in Fentonbury wasn't the first house I'd rennovated and made home, but it was the one I was in the longest (so far). It was home for me and my family (my poodles) for a long time, and I loved it.

Here is Billy, standing on the ramp... Billy was my baby, my shadow. Billy is in almost all the photos I've taken of the yard, I couldn't go anywhere without him following me. This photo was taken not long before we moved, the house was freshly painted and Wayne and I were already looking for a larger property.

When I bought the house it was a pale yellowish colour and the trims were all blue. I hate blue trims. I love the new colour, a dusty pale green with Antique White USA trims. I'd seen the green and admired it on other houses but as always, I waited too long to paint it so now someone else is enjoying it.

The bedroom I first slept in when I moved there. It was the first room I did up when I moved in. This room had an old carpet which I lifted before my stuff arrived from Melbourne, finding old lino and then rough floorboards which I sanded by hand. I love the look of the old floorboards. I painted the walls in suede paint and created a bedroom I felt cocooned and safe in. This room is where Montana was born, between the bed and the fireplace, with me in the whelping box with Pagan and the phone on hands free with a friend giving me advice and instructions.

Later on I moved into a front room and made this room the dog's bedroom. They had their own room, their own beds and their own TV. The paintings above the fireplace were 2 of the first poodle portraits I'd ever done - of Pagan as a puppy.

The special door I brought with me all the way from Melbourne... it was the dog room door in my house in Melbourne. I'd found an old gate on the side of the road and got a good friend to cut a panel out of the door and set the gate into it, making it perfect for the dogs' room. They could see out, I could see in, they couldn't get out if I wanted them locked up but they could get the heat or air conditioned air from the next room. When I sold my house in Melbourne I took that door with me, replacing it with a new door. When we moved here I took the door with me again, replacing it with the door that was there when I bought the house.

The living room had a grimy carpet, not improved by years of muddy pawprints. The living room is an addition to the house and didn't match the old part so I got timber lining and dado rails put on to give it more character. I replaced the old carpet with good quality vinyl flooring, easy to clean and practical. I spend many nights curled up on the couch watching TV with poodles draped all over me in that room.

The grooming room was the back porch. I hired a local handyman to help me enclose it using decking and windows and a door I bought second hand. I got a plumber to put in a hot and cold water tap for my hydrobath and ran it into the same drain as the kitchen sink. This photo was taken after I'd packed up the hydrobath and grooming tables. The sink replaced the dog bath, making it more a gardening room than a grooming room. It wasn't the biggest grooming room in the world but it was big enough for me to groom 3 poodles for the show ring. I spent many hours brushing and drying hair in there...

The hallway... so wide I actually put my desk in there and used it as an office for quite a while. I had the lining and dado extended into the hallway to give it more character, and I added the decorative corner thingies where the roofline is lower. Why is the roofline lower you ask? It used to be where the house ended but a previous owner enclosed it and added the office/fourth bedroom. I love that wide hallway.

The guest room... the room where I totally stuffed up my colour choices and gave up. I thought the green would be a good colour but it just didn't work. Maybe if I hadn't given up and finished it, painting the trims antique white, it would have looked better. Maybe just changing curtains and putting in another light fitting... As it is I didn't finish it. This is where Bonnard was born. I put the whelping box in the nook beside the built-in wardrobe and slept in that room for the first two weeks of his life.

The fourth bedroom, the one I used as my studio and sometimes as my office. I never got around to painting the trims white but I did paint the walls. I painted the window box which used to hold a cushion where Pagan would sit and watch birds on the trees outside. Its where Scooter would lie to sleep in the sun and, later, where Montana would lie resting her chin on the windowsill.

My bedroom... I loved the old fashioned swirl carpet which reminded me of the houses I lived in as a kid. I whelped my second litter in there, next to my bed. This is the room I slept in when I'd broken my ankle, I had the TV moved in there so I didn't have to go up a step into the living room and so I could look outside to the gate. This room was full of light, cheerful and peaceful.

The bathroom was a mess when I bought the house. It had different colours of corregate iron (colourbond) on the walls, a clawfoot tub and a sagging floor. I removed the clawfoot tub and replaced it with a bigger new tub which fit against the wall. I replaced the floor with a new, non-sagging one. I had mini-orb put on the walls to give it a more modern look. I put in a hand rail cause, having had a broken ankle, I know how important it is to have something to hang on to. I replaced the old sliding door with a solid timber shed door which I sanded and painted. I added timber lining and a dado rail, and I adapted an old bookcase as a cupboard to hold towels and to give the toilet some privacy.

Best of all, I love the kitchen... When I bought it, it was all pine. Dark and gloomy despite having a skylight. I painted the kitchen walls antique white. I put doors on the 2 cupboards which didn't have doors. I moved the breakfast bar up so it was bar stool height. I put up 2 restored bathroom cabinets as spice cabinets, I put up my Tony Curtis film poster and my collections of old bits and pieces. I love the old ceramic double sink with its depth... and I changed the old tap to a more practical gooseneck. It wasn't the country kitchen with a table in the middle which I still dream of, but its a spacious and very practical kitchen. Pretty too...

All in all, its a great house. I really hope someone finds it as pretty as I do,buys it and is happy there. I've done a lot to improve it over the years I lived there but there's still some things to be done. There's plenty of opportunity for someone to move in and make further improvements. Lets not forget the green room which is crying out for another colour. Carpets could be lifted to show off floorboards, thats something I had planned to do but never go around to.

Whatever, its a great house and has a great yard. I'm sure someone will fall in love with it the way I did. I just hope someone falls in love with it soon! The tenants in there now are great, they're looking after the garden better than I ever did myself, but I would like to not have to worry about it. I don't think I'm cut out to be a landlord. I think I'd much rather move forward and concentrate on making this house my home in every way.

So, send good vibes and send the right person our way. I'm sure they will be as happy as I was in that house.

z

Down by 14, remaining steady on 3 and 4

2011-11-28T23:05:00.001-08:00

It seems our excitement about 14 new mouths to feed was premature.... Our ducklings are all gone! One day they were here, then they were gone.

Wayne had seen them waddle up to the 'feeding area' with the parents one day and then they were never seen again. We thought they might have moved away cause the mothers were out of sight as well. But then the mothers returned... without ducklings.

Wayne saw one little guy swimming on the dam, right up against the reeds. We figure now he was trying to stay invisible. The general consensus around here is that the crows or hawks got the ducklings.

We're devastated.

On a positive note, everyone else is doing fine. The crows haven't got them!

Dancer is turning into a very affectionate little girl. She comes up to greet us when we get home after work and always wants a pat and her butt scratched. Incidentally, that butt is getting bigger!

The boys are both hanging around for attention in the afternoons too. Ben seems to be recognising me as his person now, unless there's food involved, in which case he'll just follow the closest bucket. We spend a bit of time together most afternoons, either just hanging out in the paddock giving eachother kisses (ok, ok, I confess, its mostly me giving him kisses!) or working together in the half-done round yard or at the box.

Did I mention I have box in the middle of the paddock? Its my 'mounting block' and my job has been to get him used to it so that when the time comes to use it to mount him he wont freak out. So I take out a brush and stand on the box and brush him, leaning over his back, walk up to and over the box, jump off it in front of him, make noise on it, etc. I think he's come to think of that box as his safe place! Yesterday he got away from Wayne when they were working without a rope and he headed off to the box where he stopped and looked at me as if to say "Mommy, come save me!"

Turns out I'm good at handling, loving up and desensitising animals to things. After all, I'm good at grooming reluctant dogs. What I'm not good at is handling rope, whips or getting a horse to lunge. I'm forever getting tangled up in rope (trying Wayne's patience) and Ben is forever testing me out cause he just doesn't seem to take me seriously when its time to work.

The dogs are all great. Montana and Romeo look incredible in their short trims, more like twins than mother and son. I love looking at them. Barney is a little brat, he's through a door before you even know he's in the vicinity. Sometimes he's so fast going through any open door that he ends up locked up in sheds. Stupid dog. Mischa is still hesitating at the door. "Are you sure I can come in? Really?"

Other than that, all is going well. Wayne's finished the floor in the casita. We can walk across it now without having to balance on joists. Now I think it needs a coat of primer/undercoat and a topcoat of something water resistant. I can't wait to clean out and deck out my workshop part of the casita. I have so many projects in my head I want to get on with.

The garden is starting to come together. Not so much the actual garden... rather my potted plants. I've repotted the 21 lavenders into larger pots till I have the ground ready for them to go in. I have started the spots for the hydrangeas but according to advice, I need to put them a bit further from the wall of the house than I'd originally planned. So it will be a couple of weeks till I have the time to prepare a wider bed for them.

I've chosen the colour I want to paint the house. I saw a house in the city which I just love. Mind you, the style of house is gorgeous where ours is a plain farmhouse, but the colour is just what I wanted for here. So I put a note in their letterbox asking what colour they'd used and they emailed me. How great is that? I now have sample pots of those colours and another I saw when I was searching. I just need to find the time to paint one window frame in Antique White USA and then paint sample swatches around it to make a choice on the timber colour. Then I'm all set to paint the house! :) Just don't hold your breath. Its a BIG job.

Its all a matter of slowly working on things and one day this place will be gorgeous. I mean, its already home and we love it, but one day it will be pretty to look at as well!

Its been a very long, hot and tiring day. I'm glad I'm home, surrounded by my family. Now if only the TV would work properly...

z

Snot rags

2011-11-21T02:33:00.001-08:00

Whatis it with country blokes and their hankies?*

(Translationfor you non-aussies out there: What is it with country men andtheir handkerchiefs?)

Imean really... What is it about a bloke that makes him want to keephis snot, carrying it in his pocket with him everywhere?

Dothey have a good blow, look at it and think "Ooh, thats a goodie.Think I'll hold on to that one"?

Ok...I do understand that a guy working out in the fields can't carry awhole box of tissues with him and that livestock might laugh athim if he carried a man-bag. But how about stuffing all availablepockets with handfuls of tissues and keeping a box (or five) in the ute (truck)for extra snot requirements?

Somepeople say its like cloth nappies (diapers)... its good forthe environment to recycle stuff. I say bollocks (bullsh#t).Tissuesare, from what I know, veritably biodegradable, so littering thecountryside with them won't really harm the environment in a lastingway the way beer cans and cigarette butts do... and quite a few blokes have no trouble tossing them out. So why notuse tissues?

I've heard the arguement (won't say where, but the name begins with 'W' and ends with 'ayne') that tissues fall apart and you end up sticking your fingers into the mess.

Well, theymake tougher 'man sized' tissues these days. Tough enough to handle amanly amount of snot.

Ithink the whole idea of the hankie is disgusting. I go to do a washand find bunched up, crunchy snot rags in pockets. I pull them out bythe teeniest corner, careful not to touch the things any more than Ineed to, then toss them in the wash.

ThenI think "Ewww. I dont want to wash my clothes with snot" so I divide the washing into delicates, whites, coloureds and filthies.You can guess where the hankies go!

Fluffballs!

2011-11-20T12:43:00.001-08:00

We have ducklings! On Saturday morning Wayne went onto the front porch to drink his coffee (he loves sitting there looking over the dam and the view) and he rushed back inside to get me. There was a flotilla of ducklings on the dam! They're tiny cute little fluffballs. A few dark ones and a few light ones.

We were thinking they were all part of one batch given that we knew one duck was sitting on eggs near the dam. However yesterday I went out to have another look and there were 8 ducklings in the dam with one duck and another 6 on the embankment with another duck!

There are currently12 new additions to the dam population.

I know you cant really see them in the photo, without a good zoom its hard to get up close enough to them to get decent photos. They are the specks in the water.

Things have been quiet at WindDancer Farm.

The boys are doing well. Wally is now officially fat. Wayne's at a loss. He's had horses all his life, but being in South Australia, he's never had the problem of TOO MUCH grass. He's always had to worry about hard feeding horses cause there was no grass.

Ben has gained weight too, losing the ribby look he had when we got him. He's also rounding off a bit around his butt which was all angles. When you look at Wally and Ben in the paddock, trotting side by side, its incredible how different they look. They're put together entirely differently. Wally is a quarter horse x thoroughbred and is pretty well rounded at the rear. Ben has the square butt of a standardbred and a shorter back.

Here we have grass up to our eyeballs. We're more concerned about the horses getting too much green and foundering. A totally new concept for a South Australian.

I've been working with Ben almost every day. Mostly its a mix of things like round yard work, lifting his legs (for my benefit, not his), messing around with his nose which he doesn't like much, grooming him and teaching him small things like 'stand' and 'come up' and stuff like that.

The saddle's been in to be fixed. When Wayne took it off a couple of weeks ago he didn't have to undo the girth. The points had snapped on one side. It now has all new points, stock double points. (Thats the straps which are on the saddle to which you buckle the girth - thats the strap that goes around the horse's stomach. I can see Diane going cross-eyed at this point).

Anyway, we got the saddle back, bought a 30in girth and got home all excited... And the girth was too small! Since the guy we got the girth from (a saddler) didn't have any bigger girths he's making us one. Thats put a stop to working on backing Ben. (putting weight on his back for you non-horse people).

All I can say is I'm glad I wasn't on Ben's back when the point snapped!

I've been getting Ben used to walking up to and standing next to a big box in the paddock. Its there for 2 reasons: to allow us to stand up alongside Ben and lean over him, to allow us to get onto him first time without bouncing around on the stirrups, and to allow me to get onto a horse I have to look up to.

He sure feels bigger now, the closer I get to getting onto his back!

I always wanted a big horse, didn't I? Don't they say be careful what you wish for or you might get it?

Dancer is going well. She came up to me the other day and nuzzled me and let me touch her for quite a while. She's so pretty, very elegant on the move.

Isn't it funny... I realised the other day that my posts are now more about horses than about poodles! The poodles are still a HUGE part of my life. I clipped Montana and Romeo this weekend and gave them a wash and I love them clean and bright white. I love the look of two white standard poodles together. They are such beautiful dogs. I can't get enough of watching them, looking at them and touching them. When I sit down I feel like my hands seek them out, its like a security blanket or a sensory addiction.

So, though I may write about chickens, horses, ducks and pumps, trust me. The poodles are the centre of my universe.

z

Thistle breath does it again

2011-11-14T01:06:00.001-08:00

We've had a pretty action-packed week. It all started when I went to water the vegie patch and found the taps were dry.

Now, let me explain. We're on rainwater here, but we're lucky enough (or unlucky enough, depending on which way you look at it) to be sitting on top of an underground spring. Our dam is spring fed so it never runs dry, we have a bore to pump water into a tank for watering stock and plants, and our lawn never entirely dries out cause the spring seems to run directly underneath it.

So, when the bore water tank turned out to be dry my first thought was that Wayne had forgotten to fill it up on the weekend (long story... among all the pump/water challenges we've had, the bore water tank stop valve was malfunctioning so we decided to over-ride it and fill the tank by turning it on manually).

Anyway... naturally, being the caring sharing partner that I am, I instantly lay the blame on Wayne. Of course he swore he had filled the tank the day before. So where did all the water go?

He suggested it was Wally's fault. Ever since we got Dancer and put her in the paddock opposite, the boys have started to hang around near the water trough like any teenage boys hanging out on a corner trying to look cool. Other than staring longingly at the new girl, there's not much to do over there. They munch a bit of grass, they gnaw on some old bits of wood, posture trying to look tough, and they play with the float in the water trough.

I scoffed. No way could Wally's bouncing the float cause the entire tank to run dry!

So we filled it again and sure enough, next day it was dry again.

Grrrr.

We filled it again, turned the tank tap off and checked next day. Yep, still full.

Ok. Time to get down to business.

Wayne got into CSI mode and went out to look at the tank. The float had taken a bashing but was still working. However, as he investigated things started to look bad. Very bad.

Somehow (and I blame Wally, Ben is entirely innocent) the horses had kicked the pipe going into the trough and broken it so that it no longer connected with the wall. In other words, water was going into the tank to replace the water the horses slopped over the edge when they splashed around... but it was also running down the outside and seeping into the soil. So it was pouring out in a steady stream.

Wayne locked the boys out of that paddock and was soon up to his shoulder in trough water, up to his knees in mud (again) and up to his neck with the whole pump/water/trough/horse ownership thing.

He worked on that thing all day on Saturday. The result is a tank that actually has water in it for longer than 24 hours, a trough which could give Alcatraz a run for its money, and two very confused horses who's toy has been taken away.

Two boys who were back in that paddock without either of us opening the gate. SOMEONE has learned to open gates...

Meanwhile, Dancer is coming along nicely. She still won't come to me and she's a bit too free and easy with her back legs for me to force my company on her. She'll come to me and sniff but won't stay if I reach out. So I don't reach out. I want her to want me to touch her.

Yesterday Wayne and I were looking at her tiny paddock thinking its time to give her a bit more space. An hour later she was in the big paddock.Turns out Wally and Ben aren't the hoodinis round here!

Ben is doing great. He's lunging well on both reins now, better for Wayne than for me of course. I just feel useless at times, but I persevere. Wayne's been building a round yard so things will be easier... I hope!

Yesterday was an eventful training session. We lunged him for a while, him testing me out and seeing what he could get away with with me and behaving well for Wayne. Then Wayne stood on an old barrel and I led Ben up to him so we could mess around with him in a different way.

Wayne swears he told me to 'step aside' cause he was going to jump off and Ben would no doubt startle... I heard 'step to his side'...

I stepped to Ben's side.

Wayne jumped.

Ben jumped.

Onto my foot.

I landed in a mass of thistles.

I had a bruised foot and thistles on my butt.

I put ice on my foot and indulged in some self pity, but I'm fine today. At least the foot's fine. Bruised and a bit sore to touch, but working as you'd expect a foot to work.

Ah. The joys of horse ownership!

z

The new girl on the block

2011-11-12T03:09:00.000-08:00

Our family is growing.

On Monday morning a new girl arrived at Wind Dancer Farm!

She's a 2 year old warmblood x anglo arab filly. She came with the name Dash but we've named her Dancer in honour of Darby, Wayne's heart horse. Hopefully she will win Wayne's heart in the same way Darby did.

Dancer has had a lot of bad luck in her short life. Her previous owner (Miss Nice) bought her from someone as a yearling. She was neglected and thin. Miss Nice loved her and cared for her, planning to train her as a jumper, but circumstances changed and she decided to sell her to someone who would give her love and training she'd need to reach her full potential. A friend of hers from work wanted to buy Dancer so she went there to live. Money didn't change hands at the time, but 6 months later when Miss Nice asked for payment, the friend said she'd changed her mind. She didn't want her any more.

Meanwhile Dancer had been neglected. Again. She had lice, she'd lost condition, she was spooked by children jumping at her, making her shy and nervous. It was heartbreaking to Miss Nice and to us. We went to see her anyway as Wayne was taken by the idea of her. He'd always said he wasn't interested in bringing along a new horse, but for the right one he'd consider it. I think Dancer is the right one.

When we went to see Dancer, Wayne worked with her a bit and I could see her respond to him. In my gut I believed we should have her. I think Wayne felt the same but wanted my support to commit to such a big, long term project.

Dancer is gorgeous. She's only small at the moment, more like a yearling than a 2yr old. She travelled well and arrived with a minimum of stress. She's currently in a small (very green) paddock and a small yard. She and the boys are spending all their time looking at each other over the fence.

Speaking of the boys... grrr. Yesterday afternoon Wayne went out to work Ben. I was at work till late. Well, he called the boys over, they came about halfway then turned around and went back to where they could see Dancer.

Come feeding time they ignored Wayne again. No dinner last night.

No breakfast this morning.

Its not like they'll starve. I think our paddocks could feed a herd of buffalo for a year right now. But its the principle of the thing! We need the boys to pay attention to US, not just moon over Dancer. Ben is still in training and he needs to be worked. We cant have him slacking off like this!

I'm glad we've got Dancer. I feel she home now, we'll love her and care for her and give her stability and discipline and teach her to be a companion, friend and good horse.

But I also wonder at why we can't leave well enough alone. Wally and Ben were going well, coming when called, doing their work... I was bonding with Ben, teaching him what I would and wouldn't put up with. Things were starting to fall into place. Routines were set.

Then we go and introduce a new horse. Another horse to work, another one to care for. Are we insane? Do we really need MORE to do?