A visit from Aoife

Ella caught up with Aoife twice in the past week. Last weekend it was at Black Mountain Pennisula and yesterday at Aunty Nadine's house. It's moments like these when you wished you lived in the same city....

Letterbox

Latest breaking news is that I have put the finishing touches on the famous letterbox
which caused so much hullabaloo last weekend.

The finishing touch was to borrow Searlo's angle-grinder to get the old letterbox post out. Now, I'm not an avid angle-grinder at the best of times. I mean, it's fun to cut stuff up & all, but there's always the thought in the back of my mind that one slip & I'll lose an arm or leg. Or that the dog will want to come & help me & she'll lose a paw. Today there were two added stresses. First, I was angle grinding metal so there were sparks flying everywhere. Second, there was the thought that maybe last weeks gas leak was still active & I would blow the whole street up.

At this point I should point out that this is the first solo home handyman project I've done by myself in the year since we moved in to #5. In that time my darling wife has re-landscaped the back garden, painted half the house, planted an entire new ecosystem, painted the fence and gutters ... the list goes on. My only project has been of the slow and stealthy type. I first decided to make a letterbox when we found a large brass #5 in New York last October. I bought it off a Chinese lady for $5 (I still remember how she got angry when I asked her if it would have been $4 if I lived at #4 -- she shouted something about how they retail for $12 over the road). The letterbox materials (wood, etc.) were bought at Christmas, and I really started construction in April for a June finish. Only 6 months over schedule and a factor of 5 over budget !!

The letterbox, as you can see from the attached photo, as a fine specimen and was well worth the trouble. Pippa has been posted as guard dog, as the box has already had death threats of baseball bat variety. From the angle photographed you can see that the box almost as big as the house, and constructed to a much higher standard. Now it's time for a coffee, and to think about what's next in my busy handyman schedule ...

Firecrackers - who needs them??

Poor Pippa suffered somewhat over the recent long weekend due to firecrackers being legal in ACT.  Laws were applied this year to restrict both the buying and setting off of fireworks.  We thought this was much better for us as Pippa was on a lead, lying at our feet, under a blanket for only a few hours rather than as in previous years being anxious all evening as random firecrakers were let off. According to the RSPCA, this years restrictions made no difference to the amount of calls or to the number of lost dogs and hence they are petitioning for a complete ban on fireworks.  Who knows what next year will bring - if they are not banned I think we need to go on a trip to the vet prior to the long weekend.

Sleepyheads

So Andy departed this morning at 6.35am for orienteering training - Ella woke up briefly then drifted back off to sleep.  The phone rang at 8am and woke both of us up.  It seems her sleep patterns are changing again but for the good!  I could consider that almost a sleep-in.  Day time sleeping however is still a hit and miss affair and i tend to take it as it comes - sometimes it's 2, other times 1 longish (2+ hours) or like today only 1 small (1 hour) sleep.

As good as new

Well I managed to complete my long-weekend-project without blowing up the front yard, our house or even the next door neighbours house (see Andy's latest blog: National Emergency in Aston Cres). I restored my old toybox for Ella.  Wasn't too sure when I started what the end product would look like but I think it's not too bad!  The black base is actually a chalkboard ..... now just need to get some chalk and teach her how to write.

 

National Emergency in Aston Cres

What can I say? It's been a traumatic long weekend for me, and I've only just recovered sufficiently to write about it.

The focus of the weekend was to finish & install our new letterbox. I had borrowed the post-hile digger of my folks, and had the concrete. The letterbox was painted and I spent saturday attaching two posts, one on each side. All that remained was to dig a couple of holes & plonk the letterbox in. A nice little job for a sunday afternoon.

I started by trying to dig out the old letterbox. Two problems there. It was heavily cemented in, and also appeared to be sited above the gas mains. I didn't want to dig through the gas mains, so I decided to shift the new installation back about a meter. Dug one hole, then the next, but they weren't quite deep enough. I needed another 5 cm. So I went back to hole #1 a bit deeper and then -- WHOOSH -- the ground beneath me erupted! I had conveniently missed the gas mains, but instead had hit (and punctured) the line running between the mains and our house. Gas was pouring out, and continued to do so until the fire brigade arrived to clamp it off. Nat, meanwhile, thought this was sufficiently funny to record it for posterity -- hence the photos of the fire crew at work. When I pointed out how much it would cost to pay for the gas to be fixed on a public holiday sunday she didn't think it was so amusing.

I guess we can console ourselves with a few things. We now have the most expensive letterbox in the street. I'm only going to do this once (the head fireman pointed that out for me). We provided some entertainment for our neighbours. And Ella got to see a real live fire truck in action.

Orienteering

Yesterday we went orienteering at Birkenburn. Mum looked after me while Dad went running and we had lots of fun. We chased our own shadow for a while and discovered kangaroo poo (just the right size for little fingers like mine to pick up - although Mum always managed to get it before I got it into my mouth!). Then we went for a little walk in the backpack and saw some bark, leaves, a wombat hole (but no wombat) and I found a control right at the end. My friends Abby and Zoe were there but they slept most of the time and I didn't see Max until we were leaving. On the way home we stopped at a coffee shop in Bungendore and had some yummy scones. Here are some pictures mum took today showing my adventures.....