How do you choose only one?? Wedgetail eagles are unbelievable. Wagtails are bossy. Emus are ridiculous. Get your vote in here.
vote for your best Aussie bird of the year…
20 Monday Nov 2017
Tag Archives: nature
a little goanna in the garden
30 Saturday Sep 2017
an Aussie Christmas
28 Friday Dec 2012
A belated Christmas check in with you all. I hope you had a sane day/s with your family. If not, I hope you were safe and warm and fed and at peace. I fear more and more people don’t have “somewhere to go” during the holidays. I hope if you weren’t with family, you got a smile from someone.
Our family’s Christmas venue changes each year – and that’s ok. What ties us to the years before is what we do on the day. Â We make sure we do the little things each year to celebrate the season and the beginning of a new year.
It’s a simple as:-
- a tupperware server full of nibbles – chocolate scorched almonds, choccie peanuts, jubes, rumballs, cashews, macadamia nuts. And it magically refills overnight to be full again for the feet up tradition of watching the Boxing Day test and the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race
- a bowl of mock chicken dip (my Nanna’s recipe and made by mum)
- a tray full of mangoes – eaten over the sink or in a bowl with ice-cream
- copious cups of coffee and tea and a good chat over each one
- cold roast chicken and ham off the bone with salads galore for lunch, dinner, lunch, dinner…you get the idea!
- christmas cake or pudding with custard – although no-one ever has the room
- short walks in the heat to stretch the legs and amuse the dog
- a christmas tree with gifts under it and cards amongst the branches
- at least one gag gift – this year I got an M&M dispenser….”You get in the bowl!” Ha.
- no twitter/facebook/texting – but lots of calls
And the best Christmas gift of all – a cracking storm that dumped enough rain to fill the tanks and back up the down pipes.
Here’s cheers to you and yours.
The best Xmas pressie an Aussie can get
look for the silver lining
10 Saturday Nov 2012
So, the second day at the Gabba for the first Australia vs South Africa test in 49 years has been delayed due to rain. Rather than wait all day, I’ve bailed and will go back in for tomorrow’s play (fingers crossed it happens).
Regardless, there’s always a silver lining if your eyes are open – here’s the pretty view on the way back to pick up the car.
Something that makes me happy
11 Thursday Oct 2012
It never fails to make me feel better to smell a freshly mown lawn. My mower went under in the floods so I’ve splurged on a mower man who comes once a month. On a weekday morning, I hear the whippersnipper fire up when I’m in the shower. The mowers are going when I’m blow drying my hair. And by the time I am dressed and walk out to the kitchen – I look out on my lovely, looked after backyard. Somehow it looks more ‘clean’.
A little pot plant gardening
23 Sunday Sep 2012
My front door went from zero to hero with my pot plant revamp today. I had two very heavy black pots with ugly little plants left behind when I moved in. I knew they’d filled them up with dirt but I didn’t realise it’d petrified into stone 🙂 The other owners did mix their soil with beanbag foam though! Yikes.
Now it’s dug out and with some lively Aussie natives. I can add a few each month now and build a sweet and colourful entrance. Yay!
Meet mah boiyz
17 Monday Sep 2012
Tags
This is Sith – flash and sizzle
It’s been a long time since I’ve had a Siamese Fighter. Â I had quite a few, one after the other – Kostya, Ali, Lionel and Clay – and they were amazing. But when Clay died I didn’t have it in me to get another.
Well now, in my new home, I dragged out my old tank and went looking for a new fish.  Caboolture Markets hosted the Betta Australis International Betta Show a few weeks back and I put my name down for 4 of the non-placers (assuming I’d be able to afford one of them).  Then, by-the-by my brother says he can make me a new tank – with compartments for a couple of fish.  DILEMMA!!!  Now I had to wait to see whether my ones were still available and if I got the call to give me their prices. As it turned out, I got the chance to buy up to 3 of the ones I’d liked, but could only afford 2, so I grabbed my favourites and have a third section in my new tank to use for water changes or maybe even a boudoir for a little lady.  *wink wink*
“Artie” is named after the late, great Artie Beetson. Â He’s both NSW blue (where Beetson had to play to make a buck) but the Queensland Maroon surrounds him and shows through. Â “Sith” has his name because he’s black and vibrant red and the first of the two to fire up.
If you’ve never kept fish, they can seem quite sedate, but they honestly have their own personality and attitude that you see in them. Â It’s been a couple of days now and they are both settling in, starting to respond to feeding time and are not scared away from my hand at the top of the tank.
I think me and my boys will be just fine.
There’s a little Steve Irwin in all of us..
08 Saturday Sep 2012
I had a lovely little wildlife encounter today when I went outside to water the plants this afternoon. An adolescent magpie hunting around the backyard came running up to me with a couple of grasshoppers in his beak. He came right up close enough to pat. I think the previous owners must have fed him some mince… Very nice having him follow me round the yard though. I might have to restart the tradition.
market day
01 Friday Jun 2012
Wednesday is market day in Brisbane City – Reddacliff Place next to the “lego block building” that houses the Brisbane City Council allow farmers markets to set up. Â It’s an interesting mix of stalls – a lot focused on the single/professionals living in the inner city. Â Not sure it’s “straight from the farm” prices, but it’s a nice wander through of a lunch hour. $2 for a macaron, $5 for a bunch of gerberas, $4 for a large bag of lollies and fresh honey, fruit, vege and herbs.
a friday photo
09 Wednesday May 2012
tranquility
09 Wednesday May 2012
firesprite
05 Saturday May 2012
all babies are cute
10 Tuesday Apr 2012
ready for a close up
16 Friday Mar 2012
Tags
Change of season is a lovely time to take a second to smell the roses, literally. Â With what we call autumn in the subtropics upon us, this is the last flush of flowers before the winter.
nature girl
04 Sunday Mar 2012
Beautiful morning.
7:00 Great walking. A bit of slipping in the mud. A careful eye on the uneven ground in front. A thud from a low hanging branch. A bit of laughing. A leach caught before it’s dastardly act. A dramatic re-enactment of it’s woeful attempt to do evil. More laughing. Silence at the waterfall. A bit of sweat and puffing on the walk back up.
8:00 Terrific start to the day.
laurenetrim 