Christmas Day

In years gone by we have always had friends come on Christmas eve for drinks and nibbles and then viewed "The Star" from our paddock when it was dark. I first saw "The Star" twenty two years ago when we first arrived here. There were no trees on our block except for the ginormous sugar gum on the corner of our block near the gate. So we had a clear view from our bedroom window to the Sellicks Hills. And there, the week before Christmas, I was jolted with this view of a giant Star on those hills. It was magic and most years after that, except for once or twice, the Star appeared just before Christmas. Now of course our trees have grown so much they block the view from the window and we lead our guests out into the paddock to see the magic Star.Last night we only had four of our friends who were able to join us and one couple had not seen this before and were enchanted by the scene.It was a beautiful , clear and calm night which added to the magic of it all. Being in the "third age" we finished the night early.

This morning was lovely and cool and as we were on our own, the first time for years, we opened our present and marveled at my new journal book created for me by a dear friend who lives interstate and is extremely creative. I shall love using it in the New Year. Brian was very pleased with his 18 year old whiskey. I was very touched to get a Christmas message on my mobile from the eldest step grandson, such a pleasure to know he remembers us, the young are notorious now for totally ignoring almost everyone, so it was doubly good.
We left about mid morning to go to my brother and sister in law's place a little way out of Strathalbyn. We always take the shortcut through the Kuitpo forest and we marvelled at all the Christmas bushes flowering in profusion along the way. It is the native Bursaria spinosa and we have two bushes on our place as well but not flowering as prolifically as these.

 To the left is a photo of our little Christmas tree which consists of a couple of Cyprus branches. I keep up with that tradition as my youngest son always brought home a branch from the pine trees when we were at Hughes Park and he used to decorate it right from when he was a little tacker.







Below is the Christmas table my sister in law organized and decorated.

We had a very pleasant day with my brother and sister in law, a lovely lunch and after coffee we went and looked at her bromilliad collection while Brian looked at my brother's blowlamps collection. Took a lot of photos of the plants which are quite beautiful and of course brought one home! They have native rats in their garden and they are a real pest though quite cute looking.They dig underground passages and if you happen to step where they are, the ground collapses and you can have a nasty fall. My brother trapped 70 this season and lets them go in a reserve as you are not allowed to destroy them, being native.
When we came home there were several messages on our answering machine and two people had called in and left greetings and presents for us.
We wound up the day by having a Chivas Regal on the front verandah watching the birds diving into the pond for their evening drink. So another lovely Christmas day ended!!

A Treasure of a Day

Had a fabulous cello lesson this morning with my teacher saying she thought I had really progressed with my Elegie by Faure...it spurs me on. After lunch I went to Noarlunga and Harvey Normans to see about a graphic tablet and my friend there offered me a used Nikon D80 for a price I couldn't refuse.When I arrived home with it and showed Brian he was over the moon for me, so now we will be able to go on photo shoots together!.
Tuesday 18th December.
This morning the light was so beautiful I took more shots of the flowering Raintree and the pond.The Agapanthus are very vivid this year too, though they all need to be revitalised after the flowering, dug up and sorted out.
We are getting close to Christmas now and we still haven't got a little tree yet, perhaps tomorrow ( creeps in this petty pace from day to day) can't remember the rest of that quote...
My violin friend rang this morning sounding somewhat stressed so we have cancelled our music playing till after the New year unless we find a free day between now and then. what is it with the Christmas season? Everyone seems to get so wound up, food seems to be the major worry, yet we have so much now we are able to buy. Looked at some turkey legs in the supermarket this morning and I wondered if they may not have been emu? they were huge (and tough I imagine) still, done in the slow cooker they would be fine with wine and herbs......

Golden Rain Trees Flowering

The Golden Rain Trees are flowering now. They originally

came from my friend Washington Parker who chose them for street trees in Watervale  when he was councilor there in the 1970ies.The trees are now 20 years old and have managed to cope with the droughts we have had for quite a few years.I love their flowers and then their clusters of Chinese lanterns which rustle in the wind and then drop their little round black seeds in the autumn when the leaves turn all golden and beautiful.The resulting crop of little seedlings are easy to deal with. Two have escaped our notice of course but as they were in quite suitable places we have let them go on and they are managing to compete with gumtrees.
The Kniphofia is flowering too now as well as the small Agapanthus. The Morning Glory vine has gone berserk as they are inclined to do, but I adore their spectacular blue/purple flowers. We have had 6ml of rain and the lawn is now covered in yellow oxtongue thistle flowers !! it will all need mowing again and as I have a suspected stress fracture in my left foot I am supposed to rest it, mowing may be a slow process.It is neither here nor there compared to what is going on in the rest of the world.I wept last night for all the horrors we see on the news.I only look at the news to get the weather map and forecast which I note down each evening so that we can look at it in the morning to remember what the forecast was for the day!! I know, you will tell me the radio announces it each morning but we don't ever have the radio on before 10am ,if at all.
Brian has just come in to tell me it is sherry time.We started having a sherry on a Sunday lunch time so we sit on our front verandah and watch the birds and the fountain on the pond.......a little ritual...

Train ride to Adelaide

This morning we braved the hot weather (forecast 36 C)and left early in case of hold-ups with all the roadworks going on, to catch the 9.45am from Noarlunga center to Adelaide. I love train travel and the scenery along the coast at Hallett Cove is spectacular.We traveled past the State's white elephant, the Desal Plant, and all the graffiti on the fences along the way. Some of this is quite artistic and at Oaklands park it is positively stunning. I think it is Oaklands Park but it may be another station. On reflection it was possibly Hove.It is also amazing how some of the plant life survives along the track, on banks so bare and desolate looking. The ubiquitous artichoke thistle flowering away with the stunning purple flower which later will turn a beautiful golden colour. Fabulous in dried arrangements my late sister in law used to create when we lived on Hughes Park and our horse paddock was covered in them. The horses would pull back their lips and delicately bite the golden tufts to get at the very palletable seeds. Hundreds of Galahs would land on the plants as well and create such a din with their screetching on a Sunday morning when we had a chance to sleep in, we would go out and shoot at them to move them on. By then ofcourse we would be wide awake and stay up and make our pot of tea and drink copious amounts at a leasurely pace.
Back to our train journey. The train goes past the new hospital they are building at the railway yards and it looks like a massive place. We got to Adelaide in good time and were shown how to use our new Seniors card to get through the gate.Walking through the underpass to Hindley street to the Grainger studio where we were going to hear various ensembles from the ASO perform, we wondered how it was dug out as it would have had to be done with pick and shovel back in the early 1900 dreds.How physically hard people worked in those days.
We got to the Grainger studio in good time and as it is an old picture theater the space is huge and we were able to sit anywhere so chose to sit very near the front. The first item, after the introductions etc, was by the ASO Brass Ensemble and Brian found out he was not as deaf as he thought! Next was a harp and violin duet, a Suite composed by a young Russian harpist by the name of Izmaylov. Beautifully and sensitively played. Looking at the harp, what a large instrument it is and it must be a nightmare at times to transport. After that we had the reed ensemble playing three English songs the first one recognizable as "Early one Morning" which we learned at school and I still on occasions sing.Last we had the choir "Stress Free Zone" which sang a capella after which they were joined by the brass ensemble and sang traditional lovely old Christmas songs in which we, the audience  joined in with great enthusiasm. I wasn't allowed to take photos unfortunately. After a coffee and mince pie we went back to the railway station and caught the train home.It was blazing hot by then so we didn't divert but came straight home to the airconditioner!

Birds and their Nests

This morning I found what I think is a Peaceful Dove, drowned in the compost bath. I do have netting over the bath but a tiny area was not covered and it must have got into the water there and then couldn't get out again. We are not aware we had any Peaceful Doves on our place, though the bird map shows it is possible. I wonder if it may have been an aviary escapee?

The Blackbird chicks fledged yesterday, they grow so quickly as on Tuesday they had feathers but were all huddled together in the nest which sat in the middle of the standard Bonnica rose I was deadheading.Quite near the front door and this always does have us intrigued, Blackbirds have their nest where people walk past with great regularity and at our shoulder or lower height. I remember finding one nest in a low daisy bush.
Unfortunately I found one blackbird chick drowned in the pond, this afternoon.

The nest the Murray Magpie builds is perfection in mud, beautifully constructed in the round on a tree limb high off the ground in the Ashtree where the frog mouths had theirs not far away. Theirs is an untidy collection of sticks and you wonder how the eggs manage to stay there!The frogmouths have made the Peppertree their home it seems , as my friend took some photos of them with his fabulous lens.

An Enchanting Saturday

Yesterday we had the pleasure of seeing two well brought up children. Monique and Benjamin arrived with their parents for lunch and greeted us with shy but spontaneous hugs. Responded with"please" and" thank you" when asked would they like a drink after their long journey from the other side of Adelaide to Willunga and while their parents enjoyed their respective drinks they went about looking at things without whingeing or whining to be entertained.
We had lunch under the vines as it was a lovely cool day and they ate what was their choice and us adults were able to converse with each other or the children without any hectoring or sulking by the little ones. What a delight!!
After lunch we decided to look for the Tawney Frogmouths and take photos of them if we found them. We did indeed find them, in the Pepper tree, much to every ones delight and astonishment, for the birds stay still and pretend they are invisible.
Monique and Benjamin then decided to move the round hay bales to the corner of the paddock, but we thought doing all sixteen of them a little on the ambitious side.

 We walked through the paddock and came to the pond in front of the house. Here the children were fascinated by the gold fish and hearing the frogs but not seeing them.Benjamin found a fish skeleton, eaten clean by the ants and revealing it's delicate bone structure. So he was able to take it home in a little plastic container for "show and tell" at Kindy.

They all went home Monique carrying the little knitwoven bag I had made for her some time back. They are all most welcome to come again and hopefully find more treasures on our place.
As adults not in touch much with young children and seeing very often the awful tantrums displayed by children in public places, it was a real pleasure to experience our happy and contented family members!!