the worst four letter word

So today I decided it was time to change my sheets from flanny to cotton. And then because changing the sheets is not enough of a nail-breaker, I thought I would also change the valance. On our KING SIZE LATEX-MATTRESS bed.
Yeah.

I dragged the new linen from the cupboard where it's been hibernating through the winter, and then struggled a few minutes with the very worst four letter word I know.

IRON.

{Sorry, I probably should have prepared you for that.... I'll give you a minute to recover.
... ... ... ...
you OK now? Good. OK. Let's get this over with. }

YES, the valance was crumpled and really, if I was going to go through all the nail-breaking and back-twinging, I should at least make sure the thing was going to look good when it was finished, yes?

So -- out came the ironing board, then I hunted a few minutes for the iron {don't be rolling your eyes like that, we've only been here 5 months and I haven't used it since I unpacked it.}
I plugged it in, and took a deep breath, and began ironing.

The Princess skipped in.

"What are you doing, Mummy? Can I watch?"
Then a gasp.
"I know what that is!" she cried. "That's a IRON! Isn't it, Mum? A IRON! That's what that is!"
Then she sighed happily. "Wow."

You think I need to iron more?

the Ghost of Mining Past

When we lived in Dreary Town, we used to quite often go 'bush-bashing' on weekends. (for my overseas readers {how posh does THAT sound?} that means driving around in the bush, usually in a four wheel drive)





There are probably millions of abandoned mines on the Goldfields, if you count all the shafts etc, and my man loves nothing more than stickybeaking around an old mine.
We took the 'tourist trail' a few times, which is mostly dirt road with some interesting sights along the way.




{This is the Break o Day cricket pitch. Hard to imagine there were cricket games being played every summer weekend once. Now the trees and saltbush are crowding in like excited spectators, and only a small band of volunteers stops the pitch from being swallowed up.}


An old headframe.




An abandoned decline.




This is apparently an air-hoist. Or was.


Look at this timbering.


Life out here was harsh.


This grave is in the middle of no-where, all by itself. There's another grave, a few kilometres away, of a 7 month old baby, which is very sad.

You have to be careful walking around out here, because shafts are everywhere.

You REALLY don't want to become a part of Goldfields history by falling down one!

the sound of silence

I am all by myself.
Oldest Child got an unexpected shift at Maccas today, and the Little Kids are at school, so here I am, all ALONE.
It's awesome.
And if I would stop chortling and muttering to myself about HOW awesome it is, it would also be utterly quiet.

I love being all by myself. {Except in airports and strange cities. That would be bad.}

But days when I don't have to talk to anyone, or listen to the tv, or sort out who breathed on who and who ate whose toast?
Freakin AWESOME.

And I'm lovin' it. "Buh dup buh buh baaaaaah....."

a WEDDING! how excitement!

So they're engaged at last!



I feel ancient. I remember when Wills was born, and his first visit to Australia as a baby. Now he's getting married, and soon to have his own children.

I read an on-line comment this morning about The Ring.



Someone said that he should have bought her a new one. I disagree. I think William and Harry both adored their mum, and for William to give Kate that ring is so symbolic of how much he loves her. It's beautiful.

The papers are saying a spring or summer wedding, so maybe June? Whatever. I will be glued to the telly on the day, and I'm sure I won't be the only person remembering our Fairytale Princess.

kebabs

In keeping with my new mission to pimp my kids on Junior Masterchef teach my kids to cook, I had Mr Nearly9 make lamb kebabs the other night.
He soaked some kebab sticks in lemon juice and water, then ran off to watch Dex Hamilton.
When he got back, he threaded juicy lamb onto the sticks, then sprinkled them with a mix of cumin, ginger and garam masala.
I wasn't watching him for the whole of this, but he knew to turn the kebabs and sprinkle the other side as well.
Then he sloshed on some olive oil, and put them under the griller.
He and The Princess chopped cucumber, grape tomatoes, red capsicum, and celery into a salad, with some fresh basil and parsley from the garden.
And he chopped mint and mixed it with some plain yoghurt. Then he made some Mediterranean couscous (from a packet).
It was a delicious dinner, each step was easy and well within his capabilities.

I still have to talk the whole time, explaining everything. He listens well, though.

And we get to spend some quality time together, while teaching him a valuable skill! Win-win, I reckon.

i can't leave the house

Every month, I have a few days where I can't leave the house.
Seriously.
I can't be more than a few feet from a bathroom.
It's ridiculous.

I want to stab those carefree girls in their white pants. And then eat chocolate.
Bring on menopause, I say.

bloodsport

I've said before that scrapbooking is a bloodsport, definitely not for the faint-hearted.

NO WAIT -- come back -- this post isn't about scrapbooking, honest! Read on and you'll see.

A couple of years I noticed an enormous dent in my thigh, about the size of a matchbox and 1/2 cm deep. I kept an eye on it for a couple of weeks and it didn't go away so I started to get really nervous. What if it was bone cancer or some kind of muscle wasting disease? I Googled 'dent in my leg' and found thousands of other people having the same problem, caused by -- wait for it -- leaning your thigh against your desk or table!
Not. Even. Kidding.
In my case, it was from leaning against my table while scrapbooking. I stopped leaning, the dent went away.

Now yesterday, while making a nativity scene for a local kindy, I knocked my very pointy and very sharp Fiskars scissors off the table to my lap, and in trying to grab them, I drove them point first into my thigh.
They went in like a knife into butter and stuck there.
I had a visitor so I couldn't even investigate the damage right away. I had to hobble away to my bathroom and take off my (new) pants to see the wound, and of course now there was blood running everywhere and my (new) pants have a big hole in them.

The bleeding stopped quickly so I disinfected and slapped a band-aid on and went back to cutting out mangers and Wise Guys, but I told Fabio I should be getting more money for scrapbooking because it is dangerous. (he said but then I would just buy more dangerous stuff with it, and he can't let me do that. Clever, Fabio, clever.)

Flog Your Blog

It's FYB Friday over at Loris'. Want to play along?

I saw a zombie today

Today, I totally saw Zombie Bill Murray in the fruit and veg section at the supermarket.



He's lost a little hair on top and grown a mullet, which is weird because I didn't know zombies could grow their hair (or go bald on top) but there you go, that's your Interesting Fact for the day.
Also, his face wasn't green-tinged like I thought it would be so I think he was wearing makeup. You know, as a disguise.
So, I didn't take a photo because I figured he was just trying to get a little shopping done. Also, he was in the fruit and veg section, so you know, gotta respect the vegan approach rather than the whole 'brains brains' thing.

I didn't even have to use my Zombie Escape Plan, which is basically trip someone else over and then run like hell.
So cool.