Productivity.

So...it's back to work and today we cracked on with building our Roxy shed at the back. This shed will keep Roxy safe from hailstorms, be a place to put lots of the stuff we have clogging up the back verandah and also, when we get some water tanks, collect rainwater for us.Today we dug holes for posts, felled some dead trees for posts and put up four more posts...the shed is taking shape.

 

Adding sparkle!

So...ever since I saw Jenny Agutter in the Railway Children floating into her surprise birthday party beneath a canopy of twinkly sparkly lights I have been obsessed with filling rooms with branches covered in twinkly, sparkly lights so that I can get that Jenny Agutter experience.Frogknot is now fairy lit!

Campdraft.

So...this weekend it is Stanthorpe Campdraft.I had never been to one and did not know what to expect having only had experience of a draughty camp. We should have been shed building but we went anyway.I expected it to be quite busy but there was hardly anyone there...well, townspeople. The only people who seemed to be there were competitors and their families.So... from what I observed it would seem that first you get on a horse, then they put you in a pen with about 10 cows and you have to pick one out and separate that cow from the rest and then chase it out into the arena and then make it run around some posts and that is it basically. Apparently Dulcie used to do it when she was younger.There was an awful lot of denim and cowboy hats and after we watched for an hour or so I was campdrafted out.I don't think I need to go to another one.

Chasing chooks.

So...this week Will has enjoyed the luxury of taking Roxy to work rather than riding in on Jaxy. Since the boys left and we returned to Frogknot I have spent two full days having a good old tidy up. The first day I blitzed the kitchen and the second day I swept and tidied the rest of the house.Each morning, however, has begun with 'chasing chooks'.Odin has been out of the pen every morning this week, following closely behind, as the second serial offender, is Keket who has been out twice and this morning it was Odin and Isis.Isis and Keket have had their wings clipped but somehow still manage to scale the fence. Luckily I have been able to corner Keket and Isis and throw them back in but Odin is another matter...I have only managed to get him back in by manoeuvering him near to the gate and opening it for him to run in.This morning I had had enough and decided to leave Odin and Isis out and I threw all the scraps to the well behaved chickens. Odin and Isis ran up and down the fence trying to get at the scraps in the pen but they missed them....they never last long.A few moments later I heard a fluttering of wings and there was Odin sat on a fence post surveying all below before he flew back down into the pen...but he still missed the scraps.I was outside again later and Odin was out of the pen again and this time Keket had joined Isis.I cut some garlic chives and threw them in and Odin came running to the gate which I opened and he ran back in. I then chased down Keket and Isis. Keket flew back in of her own accord but I caught Isis and threw her back in. Yes, I know I said I said I was going to leave them but on the outside they have no access to water. I was right to get them back in as Isis went straight to the water tray for a drink.When Will came home he caught Odin and clipped one of his wings but 10 minutes later there he was again atop of a fence post!Flippin' chooks!

Frogknot catch up.

So...the last three weeks have been taken up with showing Lewis and Nathan what it is like living here in Australia but now it is back to the old routine…Here is a catch up on other matters…

The chickens are doing well though we have had to clip the wings on Isis and Keket as they kept on escaping the pen. Isis is now being good but Keket continues to get out whenever she can...even with clipped wings.

On the first morning back at Frogknot after our trip to Canberra and Sydney one of the cockerels crowed for the first time but the hens have not yet started laying.

While we were away I picked up another supply day at the end of May and was asked to cover a Teaching Assistant post for a day but couldn't as I was a 800 kms away.

7 Celtis St was under contract to be sold, then it wasn't but now it is again...so hopefully that saga will all be over soon.

As for my camera....it broke again the day the boys arrived and I took it back to the shop the day we came back from Stradbroke Island. The same thing was happening that had happened to the previous two cameras with it over exposing certain shots. The long and the short of it was that Fuji could no longer replace it as they do not make that model anymore, nor were they prepared to replace it with a different model. I was offered a refund by the camera shop but it was only as credit in their store. I emailed them and said that as it was unlikely that I could afford anything in their shop even with the credit I would prefer the cash refund so that I could spend it elsewhere. Even though a cash refund was against their policy they agreed. My search for a replacement begins.

Roxy managed the trip really well. You may remember the overheating problems before the boys arrived but apart from a few moments where the temperature rose above normal, usually on uphill slopes, she coped really well all the way. I think Will running the engine with the radiator cap off got rid of any air bubbles in the system and I never once had to top the radiator up the whole way round.

We had a message from Deranie to say:

"..of everything in Phoebe's holidays the thing that she most wants to do again is having Lewis and Nathan visit".

Isn't that lovely?!

Oh...and I got a speeding ticket bringing the boys up to Frogknot!

I was doing 67 in a 60 km per hour zone. Damn!...$157 and a demerit on my license!