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The weather – especially the wind – was pretty crazy today! We went out anyway – the kids are only here for a week so we don’t have the luxury of ‘waiting for a better day’ to do things.

We drove over to Stanley, which is about 40 minutes west of us. Its a gorgeous little township with ‘The Nut’ the dominant feature.
Its a hell of a walk up to the top, but a really excellent walk around the top – once you have stopped hyperventilating from the intense climb!

Its hard to take a photo of ‘wind’ but all the vegetation was bent sideways. The rain came in squalls and also sideways.

The wind was literally howling through those railings. The noise was intense as it hit the railings – kind of sounded like something you would hear in a horror movie 🙂

There was a brief respite as we walked into the wooded area. A lot more shelter and we could walk along as if we were sober, as opposed to the previous drunken reeling (sans alcohol because I am a Responsible Aunt)

There was quite a group of pademelons in this area casually grazing.

Jeff (who woosed out of the climb) stayed behind in the cafe and met the captain of this tall ship. They were stuck here due to weather for a while

I really enjoy the changing views on the walk around the top of the Nut.

Feeling somewhat battered, we made it back to the bottom and indulged in some Valhalla Ice cream (Always a treat when we go to Stanley) and meandered home to cook up a Japanese style dinner – complete with fresh salads of course – and relax.

Here’s hoping the weather will be a LOT kinder tomorrow!

Hope your weekends are going wonderfully!

Cheers

Well… today did not go as planned! My niece Emma and her boyfriend Alisdair were travelling to Tasmania today to stay a week. A 4.30am start for them (and my sister) only to have the airline encounter some kind of staffing blunder which resulted in a FIVE HOUR delay!!
Clearly, they were not going to make it down here in time to catch the bus.
So I finished what house work I could in rather a rush and drove up to pick them up (4 hour round trip!!)
Luckily my lifestyle is mega flexible, so it was really no worries and lovely to be in the car for a couple of hours with the kids catching up and chatting.

While I finished preparing their rooms and making dinner, I sent them both into the raspberry patch to do the picking for me. Despite a LOT of raspberries eaten as they picked, they still managed to bring back 2.5kgs (5.5lb) to the house! Impressive!

Hopefully tomorrow its off to visit Ruby for a cuppa then we will choose a beach!!

Bedtime for me… feeling a bit weary now!

Cheers!

Hello – How is the start of your new week going??
Last night Jeff and I went out to see the new Star Wars film! We very much enjoyed ourselves! It has been a while since we went to the movies!

Yesterday I spent a little time in the hothouse tying back the jungle

Its now a little easier to walk around in there and the tomatoes aren’t lying in the dirt!

Today I donned my GP’s for the first time in many years and took them for a walk

Jeff and I did the Anniversary Bay walk and came back over the hills – that nice big circuit takes us about 2 and a half hours.

We actually have a goal for early 2017, which is to do the 6 day hike across Cradle Mt and finish up at Lake St Claire.

(Check here if you want a quick refresher on my previous post on Cradle Mt National Park)

From all reports that I have heard, it is a magnificent walk. You carry all your gear – food, tents etc and hoof it across the mountains.
Hence a bit of concentrated work on our fitness levels!!
We are hoping to be organised to do this sometime in March.
We are gathering our gear – seeing what we have and what we need. I want to try to make some dehydrated meals and practice cooking them on the gas burners that we will take with us.
Going to be quite the adventure!

Todays walk was quite crowded! We met four people (four!!!) walking and there were about half a dozen young people skinny dipping on the beach!! We were actually walking a fair distance away from them, when a loud and proud male voice shouted out “We are all naked!!!”
Hilarious! So I shouted out “Whoo Hoo” and gave them the thumbs up, while Jeff amused himself by considering calling out “SHARK!!” just to see what would happen! lol
Ahhhh – if you’ve never been skinny dipping out in nature, put it on your bucket list. Very liberating feeling 😀

It was a beautiful afternoon for a walk. Soon we will get out the big packs and start putting some weight in them to see how we go!

Hope everyone had a fabulous weekend and a great start to the new week

Cheers!

Hello!

I am pleased to report that each of my ice cream flavours tasted great! I did strawberry, raspberry & plum. The raspberry was my favourite.
I got them all out of the freezer this afternoon when Jeff woke up, got a couple of spoons and we spent some happy moments taste testing.

I also ate my beetroot with tonights salad and am relieved to report that it also tasted great (possibly not in the same league as the raspberry ice cream but hey…) It was fantastic to add another element to the salads. I think tomorrow the first tomato may be ready to use, so I can’t wait for that!!

I made a few more additions to my Texas Fund today. I friend popped over and bought $15 worth of berries and other vegies. I also went into the local handcraft shop where my calendars were being sold and picked up my earnings there.
So – seems like in total I am comfortably over a thousand dollars so far in the kitty to get myself to the States!! Not bad!

Thats all from me tonight! Hope everyone’s week is going along splendidly!

Cheers

Hello!
Not too much exciting to report from Norwich House today…  we did get back across town to a friends place to relieve him of a nice big pile of bricks! It took three trips (one had been done a couple of weeks ago) and today we went twice to finish the job. Poor little trailer was huffing and puffing.
Still – free is good and I reckon we will be able to make use of these in the part of the yard that we are (very slowly) landscaping.
It was a bit agonising though – driving past all the awesome beach and river swimming spots seeing people out everywhere enjoying a dip or a paddle – thinking why are we hauling bricks when today feels like summer??? 😀

So – who makes new year resolutions or goals?? I am pretty bad at it. By the time I think of something good its usually June and by then my momentum has gone.
I figured trying to fund myself to Texas and then both myself and Jeff to Japan this year all on $$ from my vegetable garden was challenge enough without adding more goals.
Then I read Mavis’s list from One Hundred Dollars a Month and I felt a bit slack (Actually truth be told I needed a little lie-down after reading her ambitions!!) hee hee
Anyway, so I thought I should rethink the whole 2017 goal list and see if I can come up with some more interesting things! It will probably do me good. I am a terrible procrastinator (or very good – depends on your viewpoint) and I am a classic for getting into about 15 projects, start each one and then “oooooo – look at that shiny thing over there” and get embroiled in something else to not finish.
I’ll work on it 🙂

Not that the terrible late night kitchen lighting helps make this look appetising, but maybe tomorrow when they are frozen properly and in proper light they will look more scrumptious!

Anyway -short and sweet. Trying to curb my nocturnal habits a little. We were so late with dinner tonight (9pm!!)
Easy to stay out late in the garden when the weather is nice!

Hope your day is grand!
Cheers!

Right – I am about 34 minutes from 2017! Jeff has gone to bed and I have no intentions of going out and living it up somewhere!! (sooooo boring huh? lol)
Never mind.
Apart from the excessive rain, I think I have rather enjoyed 2016. I just went back through a few thousand photographs to realise we had quite a busy, fun and productive year.
So – because I did nothing of note to share today I thought I would post a bit of a 12 month round-up.
I must say first – thank-you all so very much for following my blog. It has been a lot of fun to write and share little adventures and images from our lives here in North West Tasmania, Australia.
For those of you that have had time to write notes, comments & advice – I thank you very much for doing so. I enjoy the interaction and I enjoy learning the things people have taken time to share with me.

So, if you are partying tonight – have a heap of fun and stay safe! If you are snugged up at home like me – enjoy the peace!
Have an absolutely staggeringly amazing 2017 everyone

xxx

Well… its been raining non-stop since last night and is it ever soggy out there!! The chickens are bedraggled but at least all the garden is getting a good soaking! Its not so cold though … bonus!

Nothing to do particularly today – bit of a sleep in again. Funny thing was, Jeff got up earlier, fed the chooks some brekkie then came back to bed. Didn’t bother locking the door.
Quite the opposite from having someone sneak in and steal the telly – someone popped in and left turkey and ham in the fridge!!

When my sniffles have ceased I will go down and wax lyrical to Ruby about how great her turkey tasted!

I did do a few useful things with the day. I ended up blanching and freezing the excess snow peas. I have never done this before, so if anyone has some tried and true tips – love to hear from you.
Anyway – this is what I did.

Jeff has gone back into work tonight, so its just Pip and myself again… or more likely just me as I suspect Pip has gone and buried himself back under the bedcovers. He spent all day sleeping in the bathroom cupboard. Not a fan of the continual noisy rain!

Have a great day!
Cheers!

Hello!
I read about a lot of people madly dashing off to join in Boxing Day Sales. I, on the other hand, stayed firmly at home and had the laziest day! Bliss.
I slept until the clock said pm, not am… ambled my way through coffee and toast before realising with a shriek that all the chooks were in the backyard on the house side of the fence!! Screecher was happily digging up my basil!!!!!
Cue undignified dash through the yard in my nightie, flapping my arms about and yelling at chickens!
Finally got them all on the right side of the fence and locked away.
Thinking there is a good reason I should get dressed straight away when waking up.
I had a lovely day eating raspberries, picking more strawberries and a swag of snow peas along with a bit of therapeutic hand watering.
I hope your day has been awesome

Cheers!

So – What happens on Christmas Eve around Norwich House?? To be honest, this year – not much! Nothing really Christmassy anyway. Watering, weeding, picking, eating 🙂

I have kind of let the side down in the way of sharing what happens in our neck of the woods over Christmas. I haven’t even decorated!!  No-one was heading our way to celebrate, so Jeff took on some night shifts right over the Christmas period.  Seemed silly to go to all the effort of finding a tree, and putting up decorations if no-one but myself was around. Figured I would be happier in the garden anyway!
No worries. I figured I would just gate-crash lunch at Ruby’s (naturally)
Best laid plans and all…
Guess who caught a cold???  ME!!
Sigh. Can’t go sharing my germs, so its just me & Pip tomorrow with a sleeping Jeff.

So – I dashed off to the supermarket to grab a few things since I would be making something for dinner tomorrow night for Jeff before he heads back to work.

In a pathetic effort to get into some kind of Christmas spirit, I dragged poor Pip upstairs to do a dodgy photo-shoot in his various festive costumes.

First we have Pip the Reindeer

Sometimes your model has to rest.

Clearly he is over the reindeer outfit – time to move on

An Elf… very fetching

The hat wasn’t doing it for him

Unfortunately all the elastic has gone doo-lally on the Santa outfit so it didn’t stay on very well… then my model fainted

I think by this point Pip was probably plotting to do away with me while I sleep tonight.

Whatever you are doing over the Festive Season, I hope you have a wonderful time!!
No doubt I will stroll back past my blog sometime Christmas Day since I seem to be at a loose end! 😀

Cheers and Merry Christmas
xx