Adoring Husband decided to mow the back lawn today. He only mowed it on Sunday, but the little bit of rain that we've had caused it to grow considerably in a few days, so it's now looking trim and tidy.
His next job, was to de-clutter and tidy up the shed! I seemed to get sucked into the vortex and firstly, I listed the 250 odd vinyl records that have been stored in a box for about 12 yrs. There are 78s, 45s and 33 1/3s.
Fabulous oldies like Liberace, Jamie Redfern, Doris Day, Winifred Atwell, Judith Durham, Fred Astaire, Bing Crosby, Morcambe & Wise, Harry Belafonte, Louis Armstrong and Joan Sullivan.
Musicals like 'The Sound of Music', 'The King and I', 'Carousel', 'Calamity Jane', 'Showboat' and 'Hello Dolly'.
Some of them are real treasures.
The next box contained jewellery. Unfortunately, it was mostly junk dress jewellery, some of which I kept, but most of which I tossed.
My final fun job, was to sort through some small notebooks, all of which were filled with very small handwriting, describing Aunty E's daily 'goings on'. Starting with the time that she woke in the morning, collecting the morning paper, all of her phone calls to her sister, grocery shopping trips, visits to the bank, paying the bills, meals, plant watering, hair tinting, toilet visits, drives in the car (Ford Escort), how much she paid for petrol, what she watched on TV, visits to her sister, the temperature range for the day and the weather.
It actually reminded me a lot of this blog!! Every day there is some 'same old, same old' that gets repeated with every post and none of it is very interesting or exciting .. but I just couldn't stop reading it!
She had soup and toast OR fruit and ice cream for dinner every night. She froze huge numbers of cheese sandwiches, but never seemed to eat any of them. She loved to watch English church services on TV and collected the New Idea and Woman's Day magazines every week. The Daily Mirror was her favourite newspaper and the local rag, The Leader.
She listed the medications that she took every day, her doctor's visits and hospital visits, collecting the mail from Caringbah Post Office, the bus and it's number that she caught to Miranda Fair, what nationality the driver was, how she was feeling, physically, each day.
Aunty E was aged in her mid 70s for most of these notebooks and she lived til the ripe old age of 97. She was born in 1917 and we also possess the golden key from her 21st birthday, which she celebrated in 1938. She enjoyed lots of international holidays with her two sisters over the years, and ocean cruises and camping trips around Australia.
She lived a very long, full and exciting life and I wish I'd known her. By the time I met Adoring Husband, she was already in a nursing home and quite ill with dementia, so I never got to meet her, but there are many many albums full of her holiday photos, so I feel really good energy whenever I think of her.
So my day was pretty much filled up with those activities. At 5pm I began preparing dinner. Mostly leftover chicken with a few extra salads. Fresh grated beetroot with shallots, dressed in chocolate, raspberry balsamic vinegar, carrot salad with roasted almonds and cranberries, garden salad, buttered mushrooms, rice salad and sweet potato chips (which I just this minute realised, I left in the oven! Doh!).
I was worried that there wouldn't be enough food, but there was plenty, and everybody was sated and full of compliments.
Tomorrow, AH and I will go watch the kids play a couple of their games and then we'll do a big shop for Saturday's party.
This means no tennis for me tonight! I was up very late watching Roger Federer pull of a miraculous five set victory in his match, to get through to the semi finals. It was about 2am when I fell asleep.
It's now 10.45pm.
Nite all.
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