Day for the Girlies

The boys at the Seat of Knowledge were very happy this morning when BGWLBH arrived with goodbye cakes - NOT because she was saying goodbye lol.

Five boys this morning 

It was her last morning at the Seat of Knowledge before she goes home on Sunday :(

We spent the day in The Bay.  A girlie day.  Shopping.  Taking photos.  Lunch with Vegan Chickie and Chicklet that lasted for over three hours.

Sweet and precious little grandchild of mine.  I love her.  Such a treasure.

It was a lovely day.

Tomorrow will be a big day at the Sunshine Coast, so it's time for bed for me.

Nite all.

To Market

Unfortunately, there were a couple of the boys missing from the Seat of Knowledge this morning for our group photo, but we'll try again tomorrow.

This is still a nice reminder for BGWLBH of how her holiday mornings all began.

We wanted to attend the Maryborough markets today, so we hurried home and Adoring Husband was happy to be our chauffeur.

We had to walk past this amazing building/church on the way there.

The markets were much bigger than I expected and we had a lovely time buying bright shiny sparkly things and healthy things and garden ornament things and, of course, a present for Chicklet.

One of the stall holders even talked me out of buying some of their food because she couldn't guarantee that some bread roll hadn't landed on the hotplate!  I appreciated her honesty :)

We got some delicious coffee and did some crafty shopping too, while Adoring Husband went looking at cars.

We were home for lunch and then spent the afternoon doing our favourite thing ... nothing!

BGWLBH and I went walking/triking this afternoon and took a few photos along the way.  The sunset kind of faded into nothingness, but for a brief moment, it was quite vibrant.

We arrived home in time for me to finish dinner, which was a casserole cooked in the slow cooker with lots of vegetables on the side.

Adoring Husband made a delicious batch of home made passionfruit ice cream.  Yum.

He is happy because his NSW Blues team won the State of Origin game last night.

Tomorrow will be a girlie day for BGWLBH and I - our last holiday day together.

We will go into The Bay so that she can say goodbye to Vegan Chickie and Chicklet and we have some other stuff to do as well.

It's all coming to an end way too soon ... which means September is creeping up very quickly too and that means I need to focus on getting my photographs together for the exhibit.

So much to do.  So little time!

Nite all.

QUEENSLANDER!!

Sorry :o)  State of Origin time again :o)

The game is just about to begin and I hope to finish this post before the game is over - though I must say that State of Origin games go so quickly, they are usually over before you know it!

It's all that build up and excitement and the game is played at a much faster pace than a regular weekly game.

Let me tell you about my morning ... yes, you guessed it ... it started at the Seat of Knowledge, though two of my boys were missing today.

One of them began chemotherapy today.

The Little Gnome didn't turn up, but at least somebody saw him driving his car, so we know he is safe and well!

It was very unfortunate, because BGWLBH wanted a photo with the boys this morning.  She only has two more mornings at the Seat of Knowledge before she goes home.

Anyway, after we left there, we went for a walk to the big lake behind the new housing estate.

What began as a leisurely stroll around the path that surrounds the lake, ended up being a two hour trek through, for me, unseen territory!

BGWLBH decided to take a different route.  She walked through some scrub, following the sound of birds singing, and discovered a sandy road.

There were lots of Honey Eaters about making the most noise, but I also spotted some Striated Pardalotes and was lucky enough to get a quick snap.

Striated Pardalote

It was impossible to ride the trike on this road so it meant that I had to pull it behind me, which was a bit tricky on my arm and my back.  BGWLBH took the trike for a while when I looked like my arm was about to drop off!

We started out on a sandy road track, but were eventually forced to turn back when we came to a flooded section that was just too deep to walk through OR wheel the trike through.

We watched a lady walking in the distance with two dogs and she took a side track, so we decided to follow that track to see where it led to and thought we might catch up to the woman.

The track started quite wide but the further we walked, the narrower it got and the terrain changed significantly too!  Suddenly we were walking through what looked like rain forest with lots of fern trees and vines.  It was much greener than the usual scrub around my town.

Path to Nowhere

We walked and we walked until we came across another wide path with a line of power poles that we could have followed, but not too far ahead, there was another flooded area that we couldn't get through.

In the other direction, the path kind of disappeared and became scrub.  If I hadn't had my trike, we might have attempted walking in that direction.

So we retraced our steps a short way to where there was a fork in the path.  BGWLBH followed it a short way, but it ended quite abruptly too, so we had no choice but to go right back to the original road.

All the while we were making up stories about serial killers watching our every move and the woman with the dogs being part of their evil 'luring' plan!

We also spent some time wondering if my phone had enough charge left to call for help if we seriously got lost!

Eventually, BGWLBH's stomach made the decision for us, to find our way home.  She was starving!!

After a brief stop to feed the ducks the stale bread that we had saved for them (at least we would have had food if we'd got lost on our trek!)

One of the ugliest birds that nature has to offer - Ibis.

We arrived home at about 11am and I cooked up a big feed of bacon, eggs, tomato and toast to replace all of the energy that we had used up on our trek!

Tomorrow, we are thinking about driving to Maryborough for their markets.

Right now, the second half of the State of Origin match is about to start, so I am off to watch it.

GO QUEENSLAND!!

Nite all.

Fam fun and movies

It's been quite a full day today.

I actually set my alarm so that I could get up early enough to capture a possible pretty sunrise, but there was not a cloud in the sky, so after checking the sky through the bathroom window, I climbed back into my warm bed and enjoyed another forty five minutes snuggled between my flannelette sheets.

So it started in the usual way down at the Seat of Knowledge.  A beautiful sunny day.  A little windy and a little cool, but the sky was blue and so was the water as the tide was on it's way out.

From there, I met the girls for coffee after they returned from aqua-aerobics.

It was around this time, for some reason, I began to feel a bit sad.  I have no idea what triggered it and even though I tried, I couldn't pull myself out it.

I did some grocery shopping for lunch.  I bought all the ingredients for the 'S&@t, I forgot the pavlova' pavlova, which Vegan Chickie had requested the previous week, but the bakery was out of meringue back then, so I had to wait til today to fulfil her request.

BGWLBH did lots of preparation for lunch today.  She chopped and sliced and peeled and mashed and shredded til everything was prepared and sealed in containers ready to load onto the outdoor table.

AT the same time I was whipping and blending and crushing and roasting and baking.

The family surprised me and arrived a bit earlier than I expected!

We had a lovely time out in the garden and Chicklet found almost all of my garden ornament frogs.  Adoring Husband recruited the Bare-chested Chef's assistance to put wire netting up along the fence.  Then he planted the new passionfruit vine against it.

We were all afraid when Adoring Husband wheeled out the heavy machinery, but when the Bare-chested Chef loudly uttered the word "ouch", we decided that we couldn't stay outside a minute longer!

After the family said their goodbyes, BGWLBH, Adoring Husband and I freshened up and drove into The Bay to the movies.

BGWLBH saw 'Prometheus' and Adoring Husband and I saw the Tim Burton movie, 'Dark Shadows', which starred Johnny Depp.

BGWLBH was the only female in her cinema with ten solo men watching her movie, while Adoring Husband and I had our entire cinema to ourselves!

Ours was one of the worst movies that I have ever seen.  Very cheesy.  But I LOVED it anyway.  I adore Johnny Depp.  I could even see it becoming a cult movie in the years to come.  Great old 70s music and excellent costumes.

By the time we arrived home and began preparing dinner, I could feel my sadness dissipating ... finally.  It took such a long time to lift.  There were times during the day, when it almost engulfed me and times when I could push it to the side and pretend that everything was ok.

I wish that looming sadness would leave me alone on family lunch days.  I want to be free on those days to enjoy each moment.

Anyway, tomorrow morning I am going to wake up fresh as a daisy and happy as Larry!  Just watch me!

Nite all.  

A Trivial Day

We played Trivial Pursuit.  What else do you do on a cold, wet, windy public holiday Monday?

I'm sure Adoring Husband knows exactly how many games of Trivial Pursuit or Trivia related games that we have - I'm guessing about 8 to 10 boxes.

Today we played 3 of them - one of them, we continued to play even after we had a winner.

I think we won one game each so the score is tied - I'm pretty sure that in total over the past month, we have won two games each.

The good thing about playing this board game, is that BGWLBH and I can both knit while we play, so we are being creative at the same time as exercising our brain!!

At the end of it all, I passed on the job of cooking dinner to both BGWLBH and Adoring Husband.

Dinner was rump steak, sweet potato and potato chips all cooked on the barbecue and a delicious salad.

After the cleaning up was done by the two of them and not me, we each sat in front of a different television in different rooms to watch different shows lol.

I don't want you to think that our trivia games caused some kind of rift between us, because HONESTLY, we finished the game as friends!!

Everyone else is in bed asleep and as usual, I am the last man standing so I need to share my only two photos for the day and finish up here, so that I can sleep and possibly rise early enough to catch a nice sunrise.

I have morning tea with the girls, lunch with the Chicklet family and then we three are going to see the movie Prometheus in the late afternoon.

I need a good night of sleep to be bright eyed and bushy tailed for my big day!

Nite all.

Sunday Drive

After a brief, but pleasant start to the day at the Seat of Knowledge, we made ourselves beautiful and climbed in the car for our Sunday drive.

The weather started out quite clear.  A few scattered clouds, but nothing dark and looming - until we were about 45 minutes out of town.

The dark clouds closed in and the wind sprung up and some scattered showers passed over us.

Nothing dramatic, but unpredictable enough that we couldn't plan anything too far from the shelter of the car or buildings for protection.

We drove to Woodgate and walked a short path to the beach.  Nothing spectacular there.  The weather guaranteed that the beaches would be deserted, so at least it was quiet and peaceful.

We found the one and only cafe on The Esplanade and got ourselves a coffee, which was the most expensive coffee that we've ever bought - $5 per standard take-away cup.

Adoring Husband tried to get a photo for our flickr challenge without success, so we went for another short drive to Walker's Point, which is almost directly across the river from our little town.

A 15 minute ride on a boat or 1 hour and 20 minutes by car!

By then, the weather was closing in, so I didn't even get a photo across the river, as I'd planned.  It was just too dark and miserable and I didn't want such a gloomy memory.

The problem is that I didn't take even one photo all day!  So now I have no memories of the day at all - except this blog post with a description!

Adoring Husband suggested that we stop in Childers for lunch at our favourite Childers cafe and when we arrived, we were pleased to discover that the little boutique next door was open too!

We ordered lunch, sat Adoring Husband down at the table with our bags and wandered off to fill in time until our meals arrived.

Talk about a little corner of heaven!  Clothes, shoes, bags, jewellery, scarves and all at very reasonable prices!

Unfortunately, I found nothing for myself **insert sad face here** but BGWLB had a fine time and by the time lunch was served, she was feeling very happy with her purchases.

Lunch was lovely.  We left.  The rain came.

We arrived home safe n sound but the day grew colder and wetter, so we all changed into our comfy slobber dog hangin' round the house clothes and spent the afternoon doing our own thing.

BGWLBH knitting while watching dvds in her bedroom.  Adoring Husband watching the football while researching everything to do with camping/caravaning online.  Me, watching football while editing old photos and updating the June Photo a Day challenge.

A lazy afternoon ended with home made Chicken and Vegetable soup for dinner.

A couple of horse-themed photos from our road trip.

Only one week left with BGWLBH, so we'd best make the most of it!

Nite all.