Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Don't you wish you were here??? I do!!

This morning I slept in til 10a.m. No wonder I was up til 2a.m. playing a game called Abundante, it really sucked me in! From about midnight I could hear voices outside of some girls and thought they were out the front of our place, they went on and on and laughing and getting louder and louder. By the time I went to bed, they were in full swing. It was Suze next door outside on the balcony having a good catch up with a girl friend with quite a few drinkies. I don’t know what time they went on til, but it was a perfect evening up there on their balcony, the moon was so bright, it lit up the place and I could only imagine the stunning reflection it would have made as it hovered over the water. I should have gone for a walk, but thought I had better go to bed, I was wide awake, so instead I lay in bed with the brightness of the moon lighting up the bedroom wall as it shone through our window.

I have not appreciated the moon like I have while living here. If it was not for the renovations, I probably would not have noticed it so much. I was always shutting the blinds in Melbourne for privacy and never noticed what was happening outside! But while the renovations were happening here, I had to take down the curtains and live for months with no window coverings! It felt odd at first, but where we are situated, there are no houses facing our windows or roads etc, just a bit of bush and water! So the only passing traffic at night would the odd boat, which are too far away to see inside and the odd person who would go for a stroll in the dark! It seems pretty safe here. I changed the furniture around in the lounge and can see the moon shining in through the verandah to the lounge some nights and it is just mesmerizing. It is also such an exhilarating feeling going outside, standing on our little bit of decking, looking out onto the water and see the water shimmering from the reflection and to see the black swans floating by through the light. It is just awesome for me. Could just sit and watch it every night. The silence of the night is interrupted by the odd noise of a swan or a duck, calling from one to another or alerting each other of a predator near by. I will never forget the night we were out for a night walk, no moon this time, but it was a warm night and over by Raymond Island I could hear a whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, in the water, it was some dolphins! Could not see them but could certainly hear them as they swam by. There is always something happening around here.

The night before I was up til 3.30am as we had gone out to tea with some friends who were down for the night and brought home with us a little dog wandering the streets. It was friendly enough and we put him out the back with access to where our two sleep on the verandah, he got on well with ours, they were not worried, well I suppose at midnight they just want to sleep! Anyway what a mistake. He barked and barked for three hours!! I ended up letting him go, Gerard and Sudsy were out to it and GT and I were both wide awake by this time, the little rotter kept trying to dig out by GT’s bedroom window and bumping the kayaks, so they thumped on the walls near us! Talk about zombies in the morning. So two nights of little sleep will catch up soon I suppose.
o.k. so at the moment it is 1pm and I am lying on the swing. Oh do you remember my swing? Well it has been neglected for a while as it has been covered up with sheets like everything else on the verandah ‘cos we had black soot floating in over everything from the fires. So it was soo frustrating to go out there and to have to dust all the mess off and I have not been writing to you that much lately, sorry about that. Anyway it is a lot cooler in the lounge room with the air conditioner on, but I am suffering the warmth for now as I feel inspired to write to you.
So here I am lazing on the swing, it is a warm day, I have put on the fan to blow on me as I am hot!!, there is no wind outside and I have found this more comfortable lying out here than being inside for the moment! I have my 1.5ltr bottle of water beside me, going down rapidly the sky is a gorgeous blue with those soft fluffy clouds floating by, but in the distance the sky is grey from smoke!

The water when I got up was so calm, I said the usual thing in the mornings when I look out the kitchen window, it would be a good morning for a paddle, and blow me down, he said o.k. lets go. He does not start work til 5pm today so there was no rush. So by about 10.20 we were off, no need to shower till after being out on the water! It was the perfect time, calm still water, no flies to bother you. We headed out to the left and towards Eagle Point, probably got half way there and thought we had better head back. It was so peaceful, no boats, just us cutting through the water with our paddled. We stopped for a while and just let the boats drift along, it is amazing how far you could drift along and quite quickly even though it was calm. The swans were in their dozens further along, disappointing this year as not many babies were around compared to the following year! I just love my second kayak, it is so much easier to handle and it just glides through the water. As we paddled we had little tiny fish jumping out and in of the water, absolutely stacks of them, I saw a long thing slinking along on the bottom and heaps of jelly fish, could not count how many, the paddle kept hitting them as they were hard to avoid. Some fish about 6 inches long swimming around and quite a few fish were jumping out of the water or making ripples when they came up for air. Unfortunately no dolphins this time. Would have been the perfect end to the paddle, never mind another time for sure. It is just so peaceful out on the water, must look out for an anchor, they do have them for small boats! So can take a book out or a good stamping mag and just laze out there with no interruptions! Have I made you envious yet?? It was such a shame to come back in, but we found that the current was getting a little stronger and if we went any further it would be harder and longer to paddle home.

Gerard’s wrist was aching quite a bit because on Sunday night after going out for tea the boys wanted to know if we were going bunny spotting again, like we did one other time when they were down. I just love going to a certain part of Paynesville where there are heaps of wild bunnies and seeing if I can see them. Well there were quite a few and lots of little ones this time. Just when they thought they were safe! It is a new estate that has been opened and no houses are built there yet, so I drive down onto the blocks and down the hilly part and with the lights on high beam we see them scurrying about. Some of them just bob down so flat and don’t move, I nearly ran over one as I did not see it. We do this for about 10 or 15 minutes and you would think there were four hoons in the car, but no just four 50 odd year olds having a bit of fun. Gerard had had a few drinkies and he got out of the car to see if he could catch one!! Lol and he went A OVER T to the ground and grazed his knee and must have gone down on his wrist. The fun was then over for him and he just wanted to go home. That is when we found the little dog, closer to home! So his wrist has not recovered and his knees have those horrid grazes on them!
While I was trying!! To get out of the kayak another person paddled by and was laughing at the ladylike manner in which I managed to get out!!! He said he has the same trouble. Lol. It is not easy especially when you have paddled up to the bank and you are leaning back! Anyway I am managing to get out easier and easier with each time I go out. Thank goodness for the wheels, they are so great, just pop the kayak on them strap it on and off I go over the car park to home. Gerard had a go in my kayak after and he has decided he wants one too so will have to try and sell the others for a good deal and get another one for him. Want to buy a pair of kayaks?? Will do a good deal?

Anyway so now I am stifling out here, the sun has moved around to this side of the verandah and all I am getting from the fan is hot air! And also the lap top gets hot on my legs!
While we were on the water I kept sneezing ‘cos I could smell smoke once again! It is all hazy over the mountains as it has been for weeks now, but as we got out of the boats, I noticed that the fires must have flared up again as there was a large thick trail of smoke coming up to the sky once again making the sky rather dirty looking over the mountains. Hope they can get it under control as we are in for some rather hot days again later this week. Expected to be 28 today and I feel it could well and truly be that already. Hopefully the arvo breeze will kick in soon and make it more comfy.

Oh before I go, mum is having trouble once again with her fridge, it has packed up again and running all night just for the freezer, no one will be out til Thursday, hot weather again!! Well this time she is on her own, so hopefully Maggie will get anything for her as needed, she is stressing again!! Just not fair. I won’t be down for about another two weeks so that does not help her!
So I am off to make some phone calls now and spend my time waiting for the good old customer service to answer their phones and have a whinge once again!

Oh here comes the wind, I can hear it and see the trees are blowing but what it is like I will have to get up of my comfy swing, could go to sleep now, make some lunch and then get on the phone. Hopefully I will find time to bath milly as she is scratching a lot.
o.k. great talking to you and will be in touch again soon.

Bye for now
Luv Jill

posted by Jill @ 2:39 pm 0 comments

Sunday, January 21, 2007

How nice for a change

It was such a change tonight to look outside at the sky and see a grey sky with some pink through it. Much nicer than looking at grey smokey skies. It is also great to see some blue sky. Had almost forgotten what it looks like seeing the smoke from the fires has been around for so long.

posted by Jill @ 8:48 pm 0 comments

Saturday, January 20, 2007

Home again - jiggety jig!

Pigeons in large fir tree in front of Mum's balcony.
WOW!! View from Mum's bedroom window one early morning, there were five of them!
Sooky Millie sucking on her new snowman
Just look at my long tail. yes it is a possum but now sure what type maybe a ring tail?
WHO ME?????? Shame about the eyes!
I got home on Thursday arvo, boy it was so nice to be able to have the air conditioner on in the car for the whole three and a half hours and have Damien Leith blaring out of the car with me screeching along with him!! Such a golden voice he has. I am feeling the heat when it is hot and also when it is cool, it is like a warm glow comes over your body and while sitting for one minute you think you have a heater on your back, then you start to get all clammy and sweaty. YUK what a thing to say. Well I am 53 I suppose I have to go through all this shit sometime!!!!! It was so hard living with Mum for the week, cause she seems to not feel the heat, but feels the cold. So here we are in the loungeroom on a hot night, the fan is on, I am in my thin nightie, Mum is in her warm jarmies and her thick dressing gown as she is cold and I am sweating madly. And I had to sleep on flanellette sheets to make matters worse!! lol. But I survived that is the main thing.

I walked in the front door to be greeted by a long black trail of little ants heading for the loungeroom and another trail heading for the kitchen and another going to the laundry, I swear we live on an ant hill!!! Not to mention they are back in the Palace too. Off to the supermarket to get more Ant Rid for the buggars. It is so dry here, they are desperate for water, the bird bath had a ring of them around the edge.

It is good to be back walking through the front door and being greeted by the view of the water through the glass at the back of the house. The magpie family are still here, driving Gerard crazy for food. The large family of wild ducks have decreased in size but are still wandering around the car park each day. The Plovers are noisier than ever, waking me up this morning at 5am, it was still dark, so don't know what the commotion was about!

Gerard went off to the servo this morning at 5.15am. He does not officially start work til 6,30am so whether he could not sleep, I don't know. So here I am in the loungeroom feet up and have seen in the new day. The sky was a pretty pale orange earlier, there was a haze of smoke over the water for a while blocking out Raymond Island, but has since cleared, but left the smokey smell from the bushfires. We had a heavy downpour for about 10 minutes last night which was wonderful to hear as it is the first real bit of rain we have had here for months, but unfortunately it did not last. Hope it moved on to the fires and gave them a good dousing out.

I cannot help myself, while at mum;s at 9.15 on the first night there were a couple of black birds squarking madly and I ended up going out on the balcony to see what was wrong. It was almost dark and there to my delight were three little possums in the tree right in front of the balcony. They obviously live in the tall fir tree next to this other big tree and had woken up for the night for food and the birds obviously don't like them. So each night after that you knew it was 9.15pm as the birds started squarking madly and sure enough there were the possums. Also found some pigeons living in the tree at night, they looked so cute all puffed up huddled together. It was so hot in Melbourne and while parking the car at the supermarket, two pigeons did not even bother to move from the concrete step right by my car. They looked awful, really suffering from the heat, all scruffy and not well at all. I got out of my car and they still did not move. I got my water bottle out and poured some on the concrete and they gladly drank it. Poor things.

We have Gerard's sister and husband, Chris and Jim coming down on Sunday for the week and I have no energy to do anything. The Christmas tree needs to be taken down and the outside lights on the verandah, so that will be my job for today, nothing too strenuous. It is expected to be 37 today, eugh...

They are predicting rain, well they reckon there could be the possibility of thunderstorms and flooding!!!! I hope not, don't want a flood here no thank you, mind you there was one about 9 years ago!! Also in about 1975 the fires came down beside us! Hope not this time....

Have been watching The Australian Open these past nights and boy what a lot of exciting tennis. Too many late nights, am feeling a bit sleepy as it is now 8am and I have been up for a few hours now. The haze is still there, pigeons are cooing, a slight breeze and the sun is starting to get through the thick smokey clouds. The water looks like it is moving fast and is a dark grey. Looks real cold! The bushes are moving slightly.

Well I had better get up and get dressed and do some tidying before it gets too hot.

Oh before I go, the cats were acting strangely in their enclosure when I got up and there was something dark on the floor, thought it was a bit of pooh been scratched out of the litter box, but as Gerard went to pick it up with the scoop it moved. It was still dark and only the light from the kitchen. It was a frog!! Alsmost 2 inches big. Could not see what type it was, Gerard just wanted to get it away from the cats and took it out onto the grass. Why on earth would a frog come inside??? especially into the cats area. silly thing. so glad to see we still have them about, obviously the rain brought them out from hiding.

ooooh rooo for now.







posted by Jill @ 7:35 am 0 comments

What a week!

It was good to see Mum and see for myself how she was as she does not always tell all as with a phone conversation to Chris over the phone while I was there, telling her she was fine and o.k. o.k. my foot....

The past week seems like a fortnight now that I am home, I feel as if I have been away for ages.

Luckily Gerard had to come to Melbourne also to pick up "Harry Holden" from the panel beaters as he was having a make over or should I say a new coat of paint, some rust taken out and now looks like new again, I think Gerard said he is 43 years old. an old EJ Holden! So he lugged the telly up the stairs for me and then struggled down the stairs with the no good telly, thank goodness otherwise I don't know what I would have done. We did not stay long at Mum's then as we then went to Rowville and met Kate for lunch and then went to pick up "Harry", before Gerard then had the three and a half hours drive back home, well longer in Harry as he does not go as fast as modern cars!! lol... or is it that Gerard does not want to push him to make him last even longer... anyway... I then went onto Little Bits for our monthly ATC night and got to Mum's about 9.45pm.

First priority was to look at the fridge only to find that the fridge part was at room temp and the freezer was over freezing with all that soft frost everywhere and this is what you call a "frost free" fridge and freezer?? Moved a few dials around and still no change in either, Just have to wait til morning. No wonder Mum's food had been going off for the past two weeks, she did not realise the fridge was off.. pardon the pun.. She was just so overwhelmed with the telly and the freezer and her physical state she could not think rationally which sounds awful I know.

So it is now Thursday and after making a few phone calls and get told the same as Mum and Wendy my sister in law that no one is available til the 18th January to come out and have a look, which is still over a week away, finally got through to them and they sent out a man on the saturday, thank goodness, poor Mum was going crazy it was stressing her to the max. Well once again to cut a long story short and in simple terms, a switch was not working to tell the fridge to defrost the freezer every eight hours so the tank where the water goes when defrosting was turning into a hard block of ice and not letting the fridge cool also! get it??? well the next thing was he replaced the switch and then told us to turn the thing off for two days to get the block of ice at the back to defrost and then turn on again and all should be good.

WELL....... hmmmmmm, says Mum in a little voice "so you will come back and check it then and turn it on???" Oh no says the man you can do that it will be fine, just ring if any problems!!!! What about the block of ice where will the water go, "Oh just put a towel on the floor, there won't be much water!" Two days turning off the fridge to defrost the block of ice and there won't be much water??? Mum's face told it all, absolute horror. All she could think of was the water running all over the floor. Well as it turned out there was not much water leakage, about a mug full as we put a pot under where there was water dripping. Must have evaporated somehow, with no power... You tell me. Mum could not let it go which is understandable she was so worried.
She had has so many sleepless nights worrying about the fridge motor running all the time and not shutting down for a rest. she is rather paranoid about electricity more so than others would be.

Anyway two more days without being able to go to the fridge for food and for me no cold water, finally turned it on and hey presto it works!!!!! The dilemma of course was that we had five days of having to go out for meals and each day buying fresh food as it would go off otherwise as we were also going through such awful hot weather which was not needed at that point in time.

Poor Mum she was frightened to touch anything, she felt like she had made the wrong decision in moving and everything was jinxed. She did not want to use the washing machine until I was there to again re assure her that the noises it was making was normal. I have just remembered she wanted to use her new rice cooker with me there for the first time just in case something happened also. She is frightened to move..

As if that was all to get through, we head off in this goddamn awful heat, I just lurve the heat, to the council office to get some parking permits as the parking has changed outside the units and because her pension card does not have her new addy on it nothing can be done! BUT while there I bit the bullet and asked about home care and also someone to take Mum shopping and yep we had an interview with a lady and she is now on a waiting list for assistance. When it finally comes through it will be wonderful cause Mum won't have a long list of things for us to do and it will be a little more relaxed for both of us even if it is once a fortnight she will be able to get a few things done in between times and it will be good for her to have some other company too.

I had rung Centrelink to find out if we could change Mum's addy over the phone and the guy said no she will have to go in.. damn what a hassle I hate going to Prahran cause the parking is a problem and Mum cannot walk far, so it looks like a taxi job in this rotten heat. I decided to ring and check if we needed to make an appointment to come in and the lady said she could fix it all over the phone!!! am I going mad or what???? So job done and now waiting for her new pension card to arrive (3 to 10 working days) then off to the town hall again and the other places we need to prove change of addy.

You would think it would be a simple thing to just swap over tellys?????? Mum had forgotten when her new telly arrived that it needed to be tuned in, she is forgetting a lot of stuff these days.. anyway of course the replacement telly had to be tuned didn't it?? So of course where are the instructions?? who knows so after spending a couple of hours fiddling and finally working out how to tune it, my fingers and thumbs were so sore I could hardly move them with all the pressing of the button. The frequency or whatever the lingo is, is different in the country to the city and I ended up spending hours waiting for the little green lines to appear across the bottom of the screen, fill up and then start again. So to save time the channels are all over the place to add more confusion for Mum, but at least she has the channels written on the back of the remote and she has a telly and a good picture.

We bought Mum a DVD player for Christmas as she has often commented on wanting to be able to watch some films. After the saga of a video player I had been putting off encouraging Mum to get one as she got so confused with it and ended up selling it as she was too confused with working it. Anyway after much thought I got one for her, and one for me in the Palace as they were a good buy. Mine was playing up though and I had second thoughts on giving the other one to her, but took it to her anyway, she was rapt! Kate and Matt bought her a DVD of Queen live in concert, she loves the group and was rapt and I brought down Gone with the wind and Doctor Zhivago to see, brand new discs and everything was fine, so I was relieved, I got the dud machine. But nup the Queen DVD started playing up so Doctor Zhiv was the next one to try. We sat down and 13 minutes into the movie, it starts playing up. Buggar!!!! Nup it wasn't behaving either, checked it out with the other new DVD, nup the same, plugged the player into Maggies telly and it was the same. So back in the box it went and back with me to return with mine! Disappointing for Mum another electrical thing gone wrong!

For the first two days of my arrival we went out to do things and Mum was so tired as I forgot for a moment that she had not been out for two weeks, her feet started swelling once again as she had been on them for some time and she was stuffed.... We had a so called rest day on Saturday waiting for the fridge man to arrive. I encouraged Mum to go down the stairs by her self to go see Jean one of the ladies who also had a fall as she had not been down the stairs yet by herself and she had made the comment she felt all dizzy and shakey when she opened the door and walked outside. So after the second time going out there, I asked if it was better now going out the door and she replied NO!! She does not like heights and that is why she feels funny!!!!!! SHIT!!! why take a first floor unit???? Desperation to get back to the city. She had made up her mind to go and would take upstairs if she had to!

So the fridge was a goer now and I had planned to leave on the wednesday, Mum had a doctors appointment on the Tuesday and had to stay in until she came, did not know roughly what time as she did not bother to write it down, cause it did not matter she was going no where that day! So we stayed in waiting for the doctor. I had rung Coles to find out what the latest time was to have a home delivery and it was 3.30pm, sdo usually the doctor comes late morning, so plenty of time to do a shop! I managed to get Mum to do some craft work instead of just sitting there waiting and doing nothing and by 2pm I said to Mum that if she does not come soon, we won't be able to get the shopping done in time, would they ring you if she could not come? Don't know was the reply, have you checked the date? not trying to make her sound forgetful.. Oh yes it is today, we just have to wait she must be delayed. Did you write the date down? Yes it is on the calendar. hhhmmmmm... Yep it was there on the month of december. Dr Jan 17th early arvo.. It was the 16th today!!! we have waited in all day for nothing, oh well we did get some craft stuff done though. Too late to go and shop and it was so hot again anyway. So not going home tomorrow now, have to get up early, still hot, sleep deprived, ended up sleeping on the doona as mum has flannelette sheets only and I get hot.. and off to the supermarket in the morning, we were there for over two hours in the supermarket getting mum's shop, organising home delivery and then rush back for the doctor.. too hot and late to go home now..

Doc checks her over and says she needs time to recover as she has had a hard knock.

I don't want to get any older I have decided, lold age is cruel, here is a person who was an intelligent young woman, secretary to some top executive in London, got married, her new hubby gone off to war, left to have her first child and bring him up for almost five years by herself, hubby comes back, falls pregnant, finds out her husband is unfaithful while at war and when back from it, travels to Australia by ship by herself with my brother 9 and sick sister 4 for I think it was 6 weeks to meet dad here in Melbourne and to find they are to live in a tiny caravan!! What a great start to a new life. Falls pregnant again with me this time and struggles to bring us up while being an Air Force wife. Five years later she has my sister Chris, and has managed to bring us all up with dad not around much as he did a lot of shift work and only came home once a week as we lived too far from his work for him to come home each day.

We were posted to Malaya for two and a half years and once again Dad went there before us and Mum had to organise all the packing and getting us there safely. My brother did not come as he had just started an apprenticeship with the PMG and could not come as there was no work available there. It was one of the hardest decisions Mum had to make to leave her son behind and not see him for those two and a half years, I know she never got over that heartbreaking decision, he must have been about 17 I think at the time. I am not sure as I am not good at remembering numbers! Mum also ran a very successful craft shop for some years and also did many other ventures, ran her own ceramic studio, sold ceramics, sold hobbytex and artex.

Dad got a posting to Laverton and once again he went on ahead and Mum had to organise everything once again. Whikle living there Mum went out to work in the city working for AMP for some time. We then moved again back to good old Mount Evelyn, Dad eventually got out of the air force and bought a milk bar. So Mum spent all her time working in the Milk Bar for several years. Moved house again and again, that is where we reckon she is a gypsy. Also carrying the burden that Dad was not at all faithful to her for so many years, but did not feel she could leave as her children were so important to her and so she sacrificed so much for us and wanting to keep us all together as a family.

So from doing all that bringing us four up, to now forgetting things, being helpless at times, confused, unsure of herself, needing help filling out forms etc etc it is just so sad and not only frustrating for me but for her as she knows sometimes what she is like and other times she doesn't. They say patience is a virtue.. well it has been trying me out for some time now. I love mum dearly and it hurts to see her changing so much. She brought me up and looked after me and now the roles are reversed, at times she is the child and I am looking after her.

Well once again I have rambled on way too much as usual, but hey I had so much to tell.

talk again soon bye for now.. xxx

posted by Jill @ 5:51 am 0 comments

Monday, January 08, 2007

Mum has gone back to Melbourne!

I have mentioned in the past that Mum decided to follow us up here to Paynesville as she felt it was too much for me to travel back and forth all the time to see her and she did not want to live so far away from me, so she got into the local Hostel here in Paynesville. After 6 months she decided she was not Hostel material yet and it was costing her so much money she did not have any extra for extra food, personal things, the phone or the pokies! She was lucky enough to get into a two bedroom unit near the shops so after getting rid of all her household stuff cause she did not need it at the hostel, we had to scrounge around for those sort of things once again for her to set up house.

Mum almost managed to stay here in Paynesville for two years. But after me working in Melbourne for the ten weeks which I think was the icing on the cake for Mum, she had made up her mind to go back to Melbourne. She did not want to rely on me too much and found that she was, and wanted to be independant once again! To cut a long story short, she managed to get back to Elsternwick where she was before, but on the first floor! So once again exhaustion set in with all of the organising and the moving back to Melbourne. Not to mention trudging up and down those stairs to the first floor almost killed me during the week of settling Mum in. My knees don't like stairs!

Mum turned 86 on July 31st 2006 and a lot of people were amazed at her wanting to move again. It must be the gypsy in her.... (in joke) I was concerned for her moving back to Melbourne as she was comparing herself as to how she was two years ago and she has changed quite a bit in those two years. She has cataracts on her eyes, but not ready to operate on, also found out she has glaucoma in both eyes and has to use drops for the rest of her life (did you know it is hereditory? Yep the optician said to make sure the family are aware of this and to have regular eye check ups) and if that is not enough she also has macular degeneration! So in other words her sight is not good. She wondered why she felt so unsteady of her feet and it was because she was unsure of the levelness of the ground when walking. She cannot pick up when going from sun to shade if there are steps or see any uneveness on the ground. So for the past two years we have been walking around looping arms to make it easier for her as she was worried she would fall over. While living in Paynesville she did not go out anywhere by herself, she did rely on me to take her everywhere. She did not want to walk down to the shops because there was a hill and no footpaths and was worried she would get hit by a car! There is more to it but I won't go on.

Anyway she got to Elsternwick, she wanted to prove she could still be independant, and not be a burden to any of her family! as she always said in the past. Well for the first few weeks of moving in she relied on me to take her food shopping when I was there. Maggie has taken her down to the supermarket a couple of times to get food. She caught a taxi to the local RSL for lunch with two other ladies and also exhausted herself by getting a taxi to Chadstone shopping centre, got disorientated as the taxi dropped her off at another entry point and not the one she was used to when she regularly went to Chadstone on the community bus over two years ago. I think it gave her a bit of a boost in confidence, but also exhausted her as she had to do so much walking as Chadstone is such a big place.

When here she was saying how good it will be to be back there cause she can walk to the end of the street and catch a bus to the city whenever she wants and walk around in the city and then catch the bus back. Go for walks around the block and walk down to Glenhuntly Road and do her shopping and get it delivered. Well how many times has she done all that in the past 4 weeks?? None! She was also going to come back here to get her hair cut each month and to join in still with the stamping with Narelle and myself. Well she did not come in December cause she was tired and was not sure about catching the train from Caulfield to Bairnsdale. O.K. the confidence she did had about this has gone as she was so eager to do this.

Well Christmas was almost upon us and Mum was invited to my sister Chris's for Christmas and on Boxing Day with Pete's parents which Mum had been included in for many years. She decided to go. Kristy my niece picked up Mum on the Friday before Christmas after work and took Mum down to Rye. Chris and Pete have just had a house built down there and had just moved in. I am not sure of the exact details, but Chris showed Mum about the house and told her what to watch out for and to be careful of cause things were not completed. Well!!!! what happened next, I won't know exactly what, but Mum fell down one of the heater vent holes as they did not have their covers on them yet. Mum went down as her leg went down the hole and she landed on one knee and somehow hit her head also. Mum told me she stayed there for a little while to check she had not broken anything, then got up and did not tell anyone about it. For how long I don't know but she did confess to Kristy and wanted her to keep a secret!, I don't know if it was the next day or later that she had fallen. Kristy could not keep it a secret as she felt Chris should know about it which is fair enough. Just imagine if she had caused some sort of damage or the shock was too much for her and she had died in bed that night. The shock of finding her in the morning and not knowing what had happened and she had bruising on her legs and head???!!! Mum got some bruise cream and applied it to her leg and ended up with a black leg from the knee down. She did not let on I don't think as to how bad she felt, she just wanted to get home into her own bed and place. So Kristy and Chris took her home on the Wednesday or Thursday which was the 27th or 28th December.

Mum said she has not heard from any of the family to see how she is! I am horrified as Mum has not left the unit. Apparently she has been in a lot of pain with her knees and hip and cannot walk up and down the stairs so she is a prisoner in her flat! The shock of it all has set in and she has lost any confidence she did have about going outside, but the pain is so bad she cannot use the steps and there is no lift! This was another concern as Mum was so desperate to move she was willing to take anything even upstairs, whereas in the past when she was there she was so glad she was on the ground floor for that reason! It is now 10 days later and although she says she is starting to feel a bit better she has still not ventured out and still no one has rung her to see how she is! I am angry, probably because I know what Mum can and cannot do and can and cannot see etc, and that vent should have been taped up and covered so no accidents could happen. Mum is also forgetful and cannot see properly, but they would not know all of that because they don't see or speak to her often enough to know how much she has aged and changed these past two years.

I will be going down on Wednesday and most likely stay a week, to get some sort of confidence happening and get her out and about a bit and get some shopping done and anything else that is needed to be done.

Unfortunately when she got home from Chris's her TV had cracked it and was not working. Mum lives for the telly and also to be house bound and not feeling well she almost lost it. Also her new fridge was leaking water on the floor. So she was having doubts about her move. Thankfully Maggie lent mum her little portable TV. Mum will end up with my bigger TV which she used before she bought that one. Unfortunately she has no receipt for warranty purposes and it has already had work done on it once! Costing more than it is worth and it is so damn heavy I will have to organise some help taking it out and disposing of it and carrying mine which is heavy up the stairs! Not an easy task. So the purple palace will have to have the little one in there for now.

My friend Machele has been wonderful, ringing mum up and visiting her often seeing I cannot get down so often now and Maggie and some of the other ladies have been looking out for her too.

Mum did not make it to the January stamping here with Narelle and I as she was in so much pain so again she has not had a hair cut since October now!

So now that I have had my whinge I might think about going to bed as it is oh my goodness 3a.m. and I am not really tired. Probably have the moon shining in on me when in bed and that will keep me awake some more as I just love looking at it! Probably still a very dark orange from all the bushfires smoke covering it!

night night!


posted by Jill @ 2:17 am 0 comments

It is a boy!!!

Annette and Paul have a baby boy. So wonderful for them. They have named him Logan, thank goodness it was not something like Wilberforce! Seeing for a few days he was known as baby W!! I am rapt as we are planning to go up and see them in March. I am a sort of granny as both Annette and Pauls parents are in England, so I volunteered my self as an Aussie granny, although we are so far away too. Paul's parents are out here for about 5 weeks, so they not only had visitors for the birth and Christmas, what a wonderful time for them to celebrate with the family. Gerard's friend Geoff is going to house sit for us which is great. He really enjoys the dogs and Milly thought he was terrific. Geoff was holding Milly in his arms like a baby and she just lay there!! amazing. He likes dogs so that is half the battle. The cats also did not mind him staying here so that too is a bonus! So roll on March... oh no not so quickly as I really need to lose some of the weight I have stacked on over Christmas to feel a little bit comfortable at least! Yep still battling with the weight, gosh it sucks. Why do we have to deprive ourselves of the foods we like?? Trouble is I cannot stop once I get stuck into the chocolate! I won't tell you how much chocolate the four of us went through in a week... So when am I going to start??? I think I need to get serious very soon like tomorrow or the next day!




posted by Jill @ 2:09 am 0 comments

This weekend!

I feel terrible I completely forgot Maree was coming down this weekend for her Dad's birthday, so instead of us going to the movies, having a good chat and catch up, we only managed a couple of hours on Sunday before she and Trevor left to go back to Melbourne. It was great seeing her, she looked so well and her spirits were high. and why not when you are living in your dream home now, after a long wait, it sounds like a mansion!! Imagine having your own theatre room with luxurious chairs like at the movies and each chair elevated so no big heads in the way!! lol.

It has been so warm this weekend, and they had a special day on Sunday for the kids to learn how to and go fishing and a fishing competition. Right in our own backyard! Well not really, it was held in the car park that backs onto our place. There were demonstrations and information on sizes of fish you can catch etc. What really impressed me was the demo of what is alive in our lakes!

They got four buckets of water from the lake with a bit of the week that grows in the water and poured each bucket into a white tray. I could not believe the amount of live creatures in each tray!

There was a jellyfish, well yes I knew there were heaps of them in the water, the rest of the stuff, I have forgotten their real names. BUT there were tiny black specks darting around in the water, they grow to about half a centimetre and turn green! There was like a long skinny worm, but it's head was the shape of a seahorse! sea snails, shrimp, other green things and other slimy looking things too. other things like shrimps but not shrimps!! I was amazed as to what does live in the water here. They said the water has really improved in quality and no wonder the fish are not biting with all the food they can get by themselves.

I don't think they had as many people supporting the event as expected, it was too hot for one thing and then the change came through, we had a huge downpour which soaked everything but only lasted about 10 minutes if that, but it was enough to spoil the whole event. The wind also came up and was so strong it kept blowing the laundry door open. I had to barricade it to keep it shut! By three o'clock everyone had packed up and gone home., It was supposed to run til 5pm. Such a shame, it was great to see the car park being used for this event.

So far for the holidays the car park has been used a lot with holiday makers which is good to see, heaps of boats going out.

When the cool change hit with the rain, I had to shut the veranday windows to stop everything getting wet. It did cool down and I turned off the air conditioner and opened the windows when the rain stopped. I went and picked up Maree and by the time I got home again it was so hot again, so back on with the air con and so in the lounge is where I have been most of the day.

The smoke is getting tossed back and forth with all these strong winds. Fires have flared up in Bruthen which is about a half hour drive from us! Bit of a worry if we get ember attacks if the fire comes closer. Marg the next door neighbour was awake at 2.30 and could see the glow from the fire in the distance .They have a two storey house with the most magnificent views as well as our blue roof!! While sitting her in my chair I happened to look up at the window to see a large orange ball, had to look again until I realised it was the moon. It changed so many times from a dirty dark orange to a pale orange to yellow glowing and also trying to fight past the clouds which at times looked black. It managed to peer through most of the time, I found it fascinating to watch as often when I go to bed about oh I don't know 2am ish I see the moon from our bedroom window and I just cannot stop looking at it and then I lay there wide awake for ages! Yes I do eventually roll over to I cannot see it!!! lol.

posted by Jill @ 1:32 am 0 comments

Friday, January 05, 2007

The Smoke is back!

So when we went to bed last night it was very warm so we had the overhead fan on low and eventually drifted off to sleep. It was one of those restless nights, partly cause it was hot, the other the fan being on which is not the norm!

So finally at 6.30 I got up with the strong smell of smoke once again! Looking out the bedroom window, I knew at once what the day is going to be like once again. Yep the smoke is back well and truly.

From the kitchen window the sun was struggling to get through the smokey clouds and now an hour later It has broken through a little bit, but it is a firey orange ball with no rays!

I keep feeling like I am going to sneeze! I did say to Gerard if it is flat water again today we will go for a paddle, but even though the water is flat, the visibility is not good so probably won't go out, no we won't be going out today! So frustrating, it is either so windy the water is too choppy or the water is so smooth but the visibility is so bad!!! Patience is the key!!! not too good with that at the moment.

I will get off my big bum and take a look at the sun and see if it is worth a picture and do a bit of cleaning and tidying up here before it gets too hot, expected to be about 33 again.

Am meeting Narelle tomorrow for a stamping session which will be so good, catching up on any news and getting into some ATC's for swapping.

So bye for now will talk again soon!

posted by Jill @ 7:13 am 0 comments

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

New Years Eve

Something went wrong with this addition, looks like I lost all I had written, so it is your lucky day, a short version as New Years Eve was so long ago! Machele and Tamyka were here and oh yes I remember, at midnight I walked to the water's edge to see if I could see the fireworks from the main street and yes I could, they were stunning. While walking back there were some more fireworks from around the Bairnsdale way and yet again could see a glow from most likely the Lakes Entrance ones. It was fun having the girls down for the week, My Chrissie present to Tamyka was me and the Purple Palace and she could do some cards etc. We had a good time in there I have put up some pics of what she made, she does have a good creative mind and a talent with colours. Machele also did some cards and some canvas prints as I gave her the stuff for a pressy to make them herself, she was surprised at how easy it was and we all felt we achieved a lot.

This photo does not do this card justice, mounted onto a CD and glitter added it looks stunning in real life! We gave the CD the crackled effect for this card.

Again a crackled effect on the CD and layers of petals with glitter applied makes alovely card.

Serviettes applied to a canvas and glitter that you cannot see made this such a gorgeous Christmas decoration.



posted by Jill @ 11:46 pm 0 comments