Sunday, February 13, 2011

Not much to post

I'm fine!  thanks to all who wished me a speedy 'back to normal'.  I was shaken up a little by the fall but there was no serious damage done for which I am so grateful.  I will certainly have to learn to pick my feet up though - I seem to have a bad habit of dragging them LOL.

I've had a busy week - bible in 90 days is going well - in fact I find myself 2 days ahead of myself and I'm not sure how that happened so this morning I took a break as am nearly at the end of Psalms and they tend to be much of a muchness in content.  Am at Ps 134 so almost at the end of them and almost to day 45 - the middle of the exercise.

Have been doing a lot of family history stuff in the past week.  Sometimes I can go for a few weeks without doing much at all but in the last 10 days, I've had 3 people make contact with me from a couple of genealogy sites I have my tree listed on.  Have found I have a second cousin in England I never knew before, another in Western Australia whose great grandparent is a sibling to mine, and a slightly more distant rellie in England I've made contact with.  It is an exciting pastime and I really enjoy delving into the history of it all.  Amazing things can be found out about people from the past.  On a sad note though another person who made contact with me about 12 months ago - another distant rellie on my great grandmother's side of the family has passed away after a long battle with breast cancer.  I was so sad as she wasn't a very old person.  It's still a dreadful killer isn't it?

Our weather is blessedly cool with showers at present after that really beastly 8 days we had where the temperature was so high and sleeping was so difficult.  Nights at present are cooler which is a relief.

Grandson L5.5 has had one week of school.  His reaction on the first day when he phoned to tell me all about it - "it was  AWESOME!"  The next couple of days he wasn't so sure when it came time to leave home, but he's now made a couple of little friends from his class so he's feeling much more comfortable about it all. 

Have just come in from my volunteer stint at the Visitors Information Centre - it was a fairly slow few hours but is pleasant enough as I take a book or some cross stitching to do.  Haven't done anything recently on my 'Daisy Girl' but have been working on a very simple little Dimensions design on 16 Aida which is easier on my eyes.  I'll soon get back to Daisy though.

Have finished off 2 scrapbook albums in the past week.  One for a nephew's wife who had her 40th birthday last Saturday and has a nearly one year old.  Now she can put all those gorgeous baby photos in order.  The other is a surprise gift for someone who any day should have a new baby grand-daughter in the family. This album will cater for photos of her as well as her other little grandie, a boy.

Well no more to tell - must away and get dinner started - roast lamb tonight!

Blessings!

Sunday, February 06, 2011

Feeling a bit sorry for myself!

Oh my goodness -  have just come in from the library where I fell up the steps!  What a silly old moo I am!  My watch took the  brunt of the fall and I've cracked the glass and belted it up a little - grazed knee, took a bit of skin off my hand and a sore forehead where I landed. Thank goodness I didn't damage my specs apart from a little scratch on the side!  A dear old lady came rushing over to me and helped me up - she was so kind - one of God's angels there for me.  I'll really have to watch my step (no pun intended) - must be my advancing age I think and not picking my feet up properly.  I guess I'll know tomorrow if bruises emerge where else I might have landed.

My mum's back in hospital. My brother phoned me from NZ to let me know she has been in a week. He was not supposed to let me know (orders from her) however he felt I should be told.  I've spoken to her a couple of times on the phone and she doesn't sound too good.  The problem is pain in her lower back, hip and knee but especially down her right thigh.  I feel strongly that she may have a pinched nerve in the lower spine as I've had similar pain in the past myself.  There is not much that seems to relieve it.   Anyway she is having all manner of tests carried out and I just hope that before long a diagnosis will be made.  It's not good being so far away at a time like this.

We've just had 7 days of heatwave!  A record has been broken for Sydney - 5 days was previously the longest over 30C (86F). For most of those 7 days, it reached 40/42C (107F) and has been most uncomfortable - especially sleeping at night.  For those of you northerners reading this, we 'downunder' as a general rule don't have air conditioning/heating built into our homes although having said that, more and more people building new homes these days are certainly doing just that.  We mostly have brick homes too and once those bricks heat up after a number of hot days, it takes a while for them to cool down, even with insulation etc.  Yesterday we got a predicted cool change mid afternoon which brought the temperature down by about 15 degrees in quite a short time.  What a blessed relief.

Australia has certainly had dramatic weather conditions in the past few weeks.  Floods in Queensland, Northern NSW and Victoria, Cyclone Yasi has devastated many towns on the northern Qld coast and a few hundred miles inland and in the last few days, Western Australia around Perth has been battling dreadful bush fires.  It's all happening here folks!  All we in Sydney have had to cope with has been the heat. We consider ourselves more fortunate than our neighbours in other parts of the country.

Recently I've been feeding the Rainbow Lorikeets sunflower seeds instead of grain bread.  I was really being a bit aggravated by the brown Indian Mynah birds which are so aggressive, even to their own. The seeds are working out much better as the 'brown bombers' are not seed eaters.  I am putting out 3 trays each afternoon with the seeds and the birds come down and really get 'stuck in' to it.  I took a couple of pics of them with their heads down, tails up feeding - they look so comical!

Youngest grandson L5 1/2 started school this morning.  I am anxious to know how it all went for him.  His daddy was planning to take pics of him and big brother E7 before they left.  I'll post them here if he manages to send them on to me.

Well that's about it for now.  Hope you are all doing OK and thanks for popping in.

Blessings!


sunrise during the heatwave


scrambling for best position
 
heads down, tails up!


and a drink afterwards!