Other Bits and Bobs from June

I’ve posted about my stitching achievements for June, but not about anything much else.  I was very much mistaken when I predicted it would be a quiet month, as we didn’t seem to stop.

I’ll start with my non stitching goals:

READ A BOOK

It did look like this would be a fail, but at the very end of the month I picked up a young adult’s book that Mick had read.

It wasn’t too bad and was a quick read, finished in one session.  Flash Jack is about a kid’s adventure during the summer school holidays…. and they all lived happily ever after….

TRY A NEW RECIPE

I did try a new recipe, as I don’t really think making popcorn for the first time really counts.

I recently ate a rather tasty lemon slice, so went looking for something similar.  I found this one in a Women’s Weekly baking book and it was rather nice.  We shared it with some visitors and they declared it a success.

HAVE A FUN DAY OUT

We really surpassed expectations on this goal.  I’ve already shared some of our adventures here and here.  There were a few more as well, but we’ll get to them later.

GO FOR A MOTORCYCLE RIDE

I did not expect this to happen, but surprisingly it did.  That was one of our fun days out.

USE THE CARAVAN

This was not expected either, but it ended up happening.  Obviously, I have some more posts to load.

While I’m going here, I’ll share a few other bits and bobs.

On the home front, I changed out our little kitchen shelf for winter.  

The little print is new try us, from the white elephant stall.  It is rather subtle, but a nice cozy wintery scene.

While I’m sharing new pictures, here is another new to us one.  A beautiful cross stitch, now hanging in our laundry.  As you can see, our zygo cactus was flowering beautifully.  The cross stitch was found in an op shop at Lithgow.  We had to bring it home.  It is so sad to see such beautiful and well framed work not being loved.  At least it didn’t go to land fill.  

Mick has been working in the garden.  Here he is planting two asparagus plants.  We should be able to eat some in a couple of years time.  Not a quick result, but they should then provide nice fresh spears each spring for about twenty years.

We went to a garage sale one Saturday and came home with this rather large pot for next to nothing.  It has no hole in the bottom and is glazed, so Mick had the perfect spot for it.

Some years ago, he created a nice little corner on our verandah and made a water feature out of some flower pots we had sitting around the place.  It worked fine, but the corner needed refreshing.  At this stage he had removed some smaller pots, ready for his makeover.

It looks much tidier now and the new pot is ideal for a little water feature.  You can even see our vintage gnome, rather than him being hidden in the foliage.

We also bought a vintage bird bath, complete with little frog, from the same garage sale.  I think we may have enough now, as we have six scattered around the garden.  Mind you, the birds do like them, particularly in the hot summer weather.

We visited yet another garage sale, this time at the home of a friend that has moved to aged care.  I bought this cute blue wren runner for my Mum’s aged care room, as she loves blue wrens. She was rather pleased with it.

A friend and I had lunch at a cafe in town that I hadn’t visited before.  It was a cold day, so we sat inside and had a nice steaming bowl of soup, but we had to check out the outdoor dining area.

Such fun murals.  We need to return when the weather is warmer.  

The cafe is located at the rear of a delightful shop selling homewares ands a well as clothing and even has a florist on site.  

The funniest thing is that until recently, the building housed the Salvation Army store.  It looks so different and much better now.

That’s probably enough for one post.  I’ll share more of our June outings soon.