Breaking the silence

Don't know why I haven't been posting - nearly a month now since I last posted. Life is carrying along happily, and pretty mundanely to be honest! No big exciting things happening ... :) I did have a very nice yoga class on the weekend, and feel pretty good about that side of things. Work is going well - though I'll be really glad when it gets to be light at the time I have to get up (5.30am). Did some gardening on the weekend - planted some tomatoes and another strawberry plant. And other veggies planted are doing well.

I've got a couple of garden 'projects' that I'm hoping to finish, or at the very least get underway before Christmas. One is to mosaic an old round cement slab that's sitting in my front garden. It's about 1.2m in diameter. I know I need to do it before summer gets to its height (January/February) as it'll be too hot to work outside then. I went to the library on the weekend and got some mosaic books out, looking for a design/ideas. Then I can work out how much I need in the way of different coloured tiles etc, and start to collect them.

My other project is the swimming pool. My swimming pool is an above-ground one, that is decked in around most sides, and only accessible via the house verandah. A few months ago it started leaking a bit (again!) and the people who look after it told me that the tree roots that have been trying to get in from underneath are too much of a problem and I needed to replace it (and remove the tree-roots). About $1000. Then it turned out that I'd have to replace the supports as they were rusting away ($$$), and the pump no longer works properly, and ($$$$$) ... So I decided the swimming pool had had its day; stopped paying the pool guys to come and clean it every month and just left it (covered).

I had the idea to convert it to a garden pond, but it seemed like it might be too much work. And then someone else said to me that she'd deck it all over (having removed the pool itself plus water) and have a large entertaining area there. Now that seems like a good idea, at least for when I sell the place (which I will do eventually). But right now I'm saving to go on an overseas trip next year and I don't want to spend money on something like this. So, after consultations with another friend, for now I'm going to encourage frogs etc. into the pool, get a few low-maintenance water plants into it and see what happens!

I find it's good to put a kind of deadline on things - gives me something to aim for. I don't know how far I'll get along with these projects, but I'm pretty sure that if I didn't say to myself - do this by Christmas when you (I) will have family and visitors around, it's quite possible nothing would happen!

Hmm - seems like I did have a few things to write about after all !

Back home again

I'm home from a week's holiday in NSW - had a lovely time. The wattle was flowering all along the roadsides - lovely! However, it was pretty cold down there! One morning the pipes had all frozen, and the water in the birdbath was solid!

On the Monday we drove up to Sydney and I managed to get in a quick visit to the new Apple Store in Sydney. Gazed longingly at the new iPhone there - one day I'll get one! But for now my aim is to save up enough to go overseas next year! My accountant also told me I needed to get a new laptop, but I'm afraid it's going to be the same story regarding priorities!


We spent a few days in Mudgee, a lovely little town in central NSW - has a thriving wine industry among other things! We were staying with family friends who have a property (farm!) there. It was so nice. I spent half a day driving round helping to cart rocks to put into a creekbed to help erosion there. Then we went wine-tasting and even honey-tasting!

Met up with someone who I used to work with - she is enjoying her new life down south!

I took my yoga mat with me and managed to fit in a bit of yoga once! (naughty, naughty!) But I guess that's better than nothing. Monday evening I'll go in to class.

Now I'm sitting in front of the fire, but it's a lot warmer up here! Tomorrow I'll work on a small website I've got to do, and I'm also going to try and finish (or nearly finish!) my mosaic piece! On Thursday evening our new book club is meeting at my place and some of my fellow mosaic-ers are coming and want to see it finished!!

Mosaic and stuff

Well, I had lots of fun at the mosaic workshop, though like many things it's not as easy as it looks! This is what I've done to date. Still more mosaic to go on, and then grout. I'll post another pic of the finished item. god knows what I'll do with it when it's finished, but it's something to get started on!!

And the smaller mosaic at the top of the picture - there's a good story attached to that! When I was a kid we lived in Libya (my dad was in the British Army and we were posted there for a year). We lived in Homs, and just down the road (or mediterranean coastline) was a ruined Roman city called Leptis Magna. My sister and I learnt to swim there, in the rockpools. The sea had receded since the city was a functioning port city. Anyway, we used to swim in the rockpools with masks on. And in the bottom, in the sand there were all these bits of tessarae - the bits of mosaic that the Romans had used to make mosaic floors. The mosaics had been broken up by the sea I guess. So my mum still has boxes of these that we collected as children. And she made the little pot-stand (can't remember the actual word for this!) in a craft class a few years ago, using some of those bits of what had once been part of a Roman mosaic!!

What with all the running around, getting tiles, safety goggles, glue, etc. I didn't end up having time to get to yoga on Saturday. I realised I'd forgotten to bring my mat with me anyway, so perhaps I subconsciously knew that would happen?! Anyway, I went yesterday evening, which was good. I haven't been going to the classes during the week for a while now. It's just easier for me to go on the weekend - considering that it's a 45 minutes drive there.

At work I've been trying (with the emphasis on 'trying'!) to learn Joomla. A content management system. There are 2-3 websites coming up that I'll be working on that will need to go into a CMS, and we've sort of decided that Joomla is the way to go. I can get some of it, but the template file that incorporates all the CSS, and actual graphic layout of the site ... it is just doing my head in! Luckily someone told me about a place that sells a sort of 'kit' that includes an hour-long video explaining everything, and a Dreamweaver extension to use. And even more luckily, my work has agreed to buy it! It got very good reviews on the Joomla website, so hopefully it will help me get my head round it all!

Healthwise everything is good, although there is still the tendency to put any little thing that happens under the microscope and think, what is this? is it something I should worry about? ... etc etc! I guess that sort of comes with the territory nowadays!! I am trying to wean myself off reading so much on the web about lymphoma nowadays, not visiting the discussion boards very much or anything. For a while I felt compelled to read everything every day, but I'm trying to be more 'normal' !! I am still on a couple of email lists, and do follow up on things that sound relevant to my situation. But it feels good to pull back somewhat from all that. :)

Why am I so busy?!

Had to make the decision last night not to be part of the choral recording that my choir is doing in a few days time. I just seem to be so busy at the moment and there's heaps of music that I either don't know, or else am very rusty on. I can't see when or how I can do enough rehearsal to be able to do it ... Ah well, there'll be another concert next semester that I'll be singing in.

Why am I so busy? Well, one of the reasons is I've been asked to update a website that I did years ago. It's one for an organisation I'm involved in ... shan't put the URL here as I'm not proud of the site anymore. For one thing it's laid out in tables (shock, horror!) instead of purely CSS. Anyway, it's taking a lot longer to fix up than I thought it would and there's pressure to do it asap. And this is of course all being done in the evenings, after I've been at work all day, then gone to the gym on the way home. Apart from that - I guess I've just been taking on a bit more than I had been and, particularly if I don't go to bed early enough (ie. by 10pm) I end up getting tired ... and grumpy with myself!

Anyway, I just needed to clear the decks a bit! This weekend (Sunday) I'm going to a mosaic-making get-together with some friends which should be great! I've always wanted to do some mosaic, and so I'm going to have fun! I'm either going to do a plant saucer/platter, or a large square pot rest. I'm restraining myself from launching into big complex projects before I've done anything! It's been hard, but ... :)

At yoga class last weekend it was wonderful to meet up with a woman who'd gone to live overseas last year, and had somehow heard about me getting ill and sent me some sweet emails at the time. She is back on holiday and I had no idea - so it was lovely to see her walking in! We had a nice little chat. She told me she followed my blog so she knows what I'm up to - hi there Daniele if you're reading this!