controlling nature

I planted a mulberry tree in the middle of my very small garden.  It grows about 3 metres a year and last year, Bill helped me to cut all the long branches off.  with all the rain we've had, it has grown very long legs and arms which have been reaching up to the sky and not really doing what I want it to.

So -  used all my strength to climb up a ladder and pull the branches down and plait them together so that I now have a pretend weeping mulberry!!!
I wish I had taken a before shot.....

but here is the after....

The funny stick thing in the front of the mulberry is a pawpaw which has finished fruiting and is now shooting all the way up it's trunk.  I think I'm supposed to cut it off and let it start again.
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 Shame I had to include a little bit of the veryrichhouse in the picture but it's hard to get away from!!

weekend was better than the week

This week has involved fairly hard stressful work, culminating in a High Court appearance (by video link) on Friday.  It all felt a bit stormy and overwhelming....

To make matters worse, I went to get in the car on Friday morning and found that TWO of my tyres were flat.  RACQ man thinks it was someone being mischievous!!!!

The walls of both tyres had been hit - nothing that a trip to Bob Jayne and $265 couldn't fix!!!

I have been making bunting - and hanging it all around the house so it is looking very festive.  However, it's not for here  -  it's heading south for the baby shower.......

This morning I had a lovely visit to the Allen family - dear little Blake is very tiny but sooooo cute!  It was good to have a chance to practice for my Granny's certificate - I managed to hold him and put him in his cot without anything nasty happening.  I didn't take photos of the dogs - a mastiff puppy and mia the staffy - both of whom are behaving well with the little babe.

I even got him to go to sleep!!!!  He's now 3.3kg and 7 weeks old,wearing size 0000!!!!

Cleaning up

Last weeks humid weather played a nasty game with my Moroccan rug - the smell was so bad, I had to put it out on the patio and shut the door.

Having googled "smelly Moroccan rug" I took the advice of all who had suffered the same way as I was and scrubbed it with wool mix and extra eucalyptus

Then I hung it up and hosed it and lots of evil smelling YELLOW stuff came out - I hope it was dye and not camel or sheep wee!!??

It's been baking out in the sun for a while now but the smell still seems to be there - even if a bit weaker - this might become a weekly occupation?

Next step in the cleanup will be to hose down all the concrete - however Brisbane is SHORT of drinking water so I have to wait until they have cleaned the mud out of the filters in the reservoirs before I can do that.......