The Hippeastrums say hello

 

Hippeastrums

Well I must say I hadn’t planned on it to be over two months between posts but such it is.

In that time uni has been well uni. It’s my last semester and and the two subjects I’m doing are ones that require a lot of brain wrangling.

Textbook pages a flutter

 

I had a birthday. I’m now 27. Gosh, it’s hard to think that this time ten years ago  I was busy decorating my formal dress, having fun and looking forward the two and a half months I was having going round the world instead of going to schoolies.

Tim tam pikelet stack

 

The girls at work made my desk into a “winter wonderland” aka filling my drawers and covering my desk with very finely shredded paper and then wrapping it all up in bubble wrap and presenting the above tim-tam wrapped berry and cream pikelet stack to me as my cake.


Bubble wrapped

Mum sent me a bunch of flowers to work which was very nice.

Birthday blooms from Mum

My birthday presents to myself was a tablet (Google Nexus 7) which I love and would be more handy that I imagined in the past few weeks, a pair of new shoes and nose surgery.

Nexus 7

These are my shoes. They’re silver. Oh so pretty. Oh so comfy. They Spin in silver from Ecco.

Shoes, Silver Shoes.

 

For the last couple of years I’ve pumped drugs up nose on and off in a bid to clear it. I’ve not really smelt or tasted things very well. One reason, why I’m always slightly paranoid about people’s response to the food that I make; does it taste ok? That all came to head earlier this year when I got sinus pain whilst flying. A change of nose drugs didn’t really do much so it was time to consider other options. I had a septoplasty and turbinectomy at the start of the uni mid-semester break.

Gosh, I’m still in recovery and if it wasn’t for those who I’ve spoken to who’ve had the the surgery previously I would seriously be questioning why I undertook it. Imagine a tap on your nose that you can’t turn off and splurts out rubbish down your nasal passage and your throat all day long.   I work in the medical field, I’ve seen, read and heard enough gory surgical tales that 99.9% of it is water off my back. Facial surgery though is that .1% that makes me go argh. I do though get a kick out of the fact though that I can now say I’ve legally used cocaine.  Yep, it’s commonly used during nasal surgery as a local anesthetic.

Roses from work in a Figgjo Flint Lotte jug

Work sent me these lovely pink roses (I can sort of smell them) and no, they didn’t see the irony in sending me roses as they came from head office and not my office. We got a laugh out of it though. I also finally picked up the Figgjo Flint Lotte water jug that I’ve had my eye on for some time.

 

Bed time

Now it’s time to have a little nap before I venture off to uni this afternoon. I’m not using four pillows anymore but am down to two pillows. The blanket came from the farm, the pillow and sæng cover are from Ikea, love those dots.

And here is another photo from the garden to sign off with. I’m so happy it’s finally raining! Not only to settle the dust so it doesn’t irritate my nose but to water the garden and to give the tank a good fill. Not sure about you but my water tank has been empty for almost two months. A Pale-headed Rosella (Platycercus adscitus) enjoying the Grevillea.

Lorikeet

Signs to here, there and everywhere.

Uni started back last week, the painter has returned to the house and I’m trying to get back into the routine of work, study, play, eat, sleep again after the uni holidays!

A few signs from the road trip.

I came across North Star in an address at work a couple of months ago and when I looked on the map to see where it was I decided that I would be stopping in on the way to visit Mum. North Star, isn’t it just the delightful name for a town? I do think the town sign should say “Star of the Golden Triangle” instead of “Heart of the Golden Triangle”.

Welcome to North StarWelcome to North Star

If you’re on Facebook with me you may have seen this little ditty I penned about the Newell Highway. If you’re not, here it is.

Southward bound on the Newell,
Said goodbye to the Gore,
Cotton, the white jewell,
Covers the verge, it’s no bore.

South on the Newell

I love signs like this 🙂 I was sort of tempted to drive to Darwin but didn’t know I would make it there and back in the five days I had.

Which way from Goodniwindi?Which way from Goodniwindi?

This drive fatigue sign is part of a three part series. This one though about country drivers getting tired too made me giggle.

Those country drivers!

That is a few signs from the trip. I’ve got oodles of photos of buildings and op shop finds to post yet. Ornamental brickwork! Pressed tin ceilings! Gorgeous  Art Deco and Modernist shops, hotels, town halls and more.

A trip to the farm

I went to The Farm on Sunday and  I came back with a boot load of delicious goods and plenty of splinters in my hands (one day, I will actually remember to wear gloves whilst sorting through the macadamia leaves seeking out the nuts). I returned with oranges (Navels and Valencias), mandarins, bush (macadamia) nuts, a pumpkin and some flowers.

I was a little late picking up the bush nuts this year, mostly due to Uni commitments and also in part I guess to not wanting to go to The Farm as I wasn’t sure what my emotions  would be, particularly as a lot of my memories of Grandad in the recent years have been around macadamia harvesting process. I got three boxes full of bush nuts. I husked the two smaller boxes this afternoon and have the large box to go. I should end up with a bit more than a milk crate worth of bush nuts in their shells. Then they will go into the deep freeze for a couple of  months before I start shelling them. Whilst the bush nuts waited for me, the mandarin tree didn’t and I only got a very small box of mandarins. I won’t have enough mandarins to make any more mandarin jam 🙁 🙁 I’ll have to be conservative with the mandarin jam till next year. I did however get plenty of oranges 🙂 which means there will be plenty of orange cakes, eating oranges and who knows what else.  I’ve already got a bottle of orange extract steeping in the cupboard and I’m most certainly getting my daily vitamin C intake at the moment 🙂

Reading chair

image

I finally set up my reading area again today. Exams are fast approaching and there is serious study to be done. Oh I so do love the new polished floors 🙂 I’ll have to take some photos of the house when the painting is finished (our painter is currently overseas on a holiday), gosh it looks different.

Chrysanthemum still life

Stair shelf

One thing I will miss about my current work place when I leave next year is the half price chrysanthemums I pick up from the Woolies across the back. Chrysanthemums are the cut flowers I remember most of my childhood and there is something lovely in their simple petals and colours.

At the moment there is chryssies throughout the house. There is a vase on my duchess, a jam jar on the counter in the bathroom, some jam jars on the shelf above the steps (as seen above), a vase on the sideboard in the living room, another vase and some jam jars on the counter in the kitchen and lastly a single bloom in a Brennivín shot glass beside the kitchen sink.

Winter Days

On the beach

I took some photos for a friend of her little family down the coast and gave my camera some love last weekend. It has been some time between shots for my baby. Was quite good to have fun with the camera again as uni/work/house “reno” has pretty much consumed my life for the last X weeks. Uni however is just about finished for the semester and I’m looking forward to that day in 2.5 weeks or so when it is all over 🙂