House - frame

It's been a very busy few weeks for us.  There's been a stream of selections and orders and payments and deliveries.  We've been looking at windows, doors, flooring and wallpaper and we have piles of timber everywhere!  Mick is thoroughly enjoying himself with building this house.  The frame has popped up in no time at all.  We were just saying today that it's 20 years since we last built a brand new house.  It's so different to renovating.

We have settled in to our temporary living quarters.  It is now well into Winter and it's been really cold.  There have been many icy mornings but in true Aussie style the sky is quickly blue.  The only danger with these below zero nights is our water pipes freezing.  They aren't domestic ones and not insulated.  It's a bitter night tonight so we will see if we have water in the morning.

Klara has settled in well too and it seems she now considers it her place.  She has begun barking when a strange car comes in the driveway which we are glad about.  We are very pleased that all the hard work in her puppyhood is paying off.  She's such a good girl.  The front gate can be left open now and she doesn't wander out, plus we seem to have resolved the "pulling on the lead problem".  She trots along nicely on her walks.

We did have one small hiccup since our weekend in Melbourne at Vic's place.  Klara saw the other dogs on the sofa and although she didn't follow them up there at Vic's place, she did decide it was worth a try at home.  I opened the living room door to find this!  She quickly learned it wasn't an option at our house.

House - A big day concreting

The first of them arrived at 7am this morning.  It was all hands on deck with a crew of half a dozen and a  fleet of concrete trucks arriving one after the other.

By the end of the day the driveway was a mess of mud, water and concrete dregs.

  

 

 

A very doggy weekend

My friend Vic and I planned a girlie weekend.... two old school friends.... two teenage girls.... and not two, but three girl dogs!  We'd had a lovely games night a few months ago while Vic's boys were away so decided to do it all again this weekend.  One of Vic's past guide dog pups was back for dog sitting while her owners are away.  April is the only one of Vic's pups that I never got to meet as she had her while we were in the UK so it was lovely to see her.  The dogs had an absolute ball running around and wrestling together.  Klara was in doggy heaven.  Paige spent ages trying to get them to all sit or lie down at once so we could take a photo of them. We played card games and board games and laughed and yelled and argued.  What a fun night.  It really felt no different to when we played cards in our dressing gowns more than 30 years ago!!

This week has been the coldest start to Winter in 20 years according the news reports.  Thursday was absolutely freezing, only reaching about 7 degrees where I work.  There have been a few very English looking mornings.

On another subject.... today we have been back in Australia for 12 months.  That's flown by.

 

 

 

Living in a huge shed

We've had a huge couple of weeks with moving house yet again.  So now we are back to living in a small space..... we've had a bit of practice at that.

We even had our first overnight guests!  Friday night my brother, Anthony, and his wife, Leanne, came up after work to stay overnight.  It was the first couple of hours drive of their month long drip driving to Darwin and back.  Luckily they will be camping on their trip so didn't bat an eyelid at having to set up their camp stretcher out in the shed.  And, luckily it wasn't a terribly cold night.

Mick is happy as a lark to be out here.  He keeps saying how much he loves it and how happy he is. He had an impromptu first building inspection in the dark last night after the building inspector called to say he had a funeral to attend so had to re-schedule his inspections.  Unfortunately when you have concrete coming the inspection has to be done!

So here's our work in progress and current living quarters.  The kitchen, bathroom and laundry are at one end of the shed and the bedroom and living room at the other.  It can be a rather cold walk from one to the other.