Category Stay at Home Daughter

May 31 2025

Done and Dusted!

Finally, my front garden project is complete! Now all that is left to do is to see what survives and what dies and deal with these outcomes accordingly.

Aunty Peta (and I) decided on a magnolia tree to be the centre piece of the garden. It took a lot of time, effort and money on her part but she finally settled on a lovely little Teddy Bear magnolia which is a dwarf variety and should suit the location well. Aunty Peta dropped it off whilst I was at work one day. Thanks Aunty Pete!

The magnolia is the one on the left!

With the threat of a ridiculously wet period upon us, Aunty Peta said I had to get it in the ground toot sweet! She was a bit worried that I wouldn’t be able to accomplish this task on my own but after giving me copious instructions and me reassuring her that this has been covered on previous episodes of Gardening Australia which I watch every Friday specifically to learn this stuff, she relented and allowed me to proceed alone.

Nailed it!

Today I took advantage of the mostly dry day to finish off the garden with some ground cover plants, a stepping stone to the worm farm and the mulching. I’m very pleased with the outcome.

Now to see what survives and what doesn’t!

Here is the prospect down the drive of my house when it was first built followed by what it looks like now. Have I added value? You decide!

For reaching the end of my front gardening journey, here is a little treat. The day I planted the magnolia, Terri came round because I needed to get on the roof again to do some repairs before the rain started. She didn’t laugh at me this time but she did something else. Enjoy!

Apr 19 2025

Doh! Missed the pit!

I know what you’re thinking because I was thinking the exact same thing as I took this photo. Why didn’t I just get them to dump the soil directly into the hole?

I don’t have a good answer to that question and believe me, I was kicking myself as I spent the next hour shoveling a combination of earth, mulch and sheep shit into my hole which was right next to the pile! Still, at least I burnt some calories which I can use to justify the cheese, nibbles and wine I’m currently having for dinner because I’m too exhausted to do anything else.

In addition to filling in my hole, I also cleaned up the rest of the front garden, removed the dead and dying from the back garden and risked death by climbing on to the roof to clean some hard to reach gutters. I had asked Terri to drop by to hold the ladder for me whilst I was getting on and off the roof and to be on standby to make the 000 call if I fell through. She was no use however as she was laughing so much she was doubled over and not able to simulataneously secure the ladder. Apparently my butt looks comically huge when descending off a roof!

Nonetheless, the garden bed is made, the veggie patch and some empty pots are ready for autumn planting and everything looks neat and tidy. I need to wait a couple of weeks to let the new garden bed settle down and then it will be tree time! Yay!

Apr 13 2025

Check out my hole!

Forget going to the gym. If you want a full body work out, dig a hole. Dale was on to something.

It took me two days to dig my hole and it was not the simple exercise I had initially envisioned.

Firstly, I needed to borrow some equipment so I asked Terri if I could borrow her wheelbarrow and garden fork. She informed me that the tyre on the wheelbarrow was flat so I asked if she could kindly inflate it for me.

On Saturday morning, she dropped the wheelbarrow and garden fork around and told me that they tried to inflate the tyre but it was completely shot. She said it was still usable though but I may have to limit how much I put in the wheelbarrow at a time. I wheeled the barrow into position and it felt alright. I half filled it and discovered that this made it as imovable as a ten tonne block of concrete.

So off to Bunnings I went. Three trips to Bunnings at two different locations later, I had a new wheel to fit the existing wheelbarrow and I was ready to start digging!

Unfortunately by this time I was already pretty much over it and it was the middle of the day so the sun was out in full force. After digging four wheelbarrow loads out, I was sweating from my eyeballs and exhausted so I gave up for the day. I realised that this job was not as simple as I thought it was going to be.

Later that evening, Nicole came around to inspect my progress. She was not impressed. She was correct in her assessment.

The next day, I got a much earlier start with a fully functioning wheelbarrow, or so I thought. Two loads in and I decided to orient the wheelbarrow in the opposite direction for filling. This meant taking a right hand turn with the fully loaded wheelbarrow.

The rusted and bent old leg buckled further and the whole barrow toppled spilling its contents over my beautifully kept drive. In order to right it again, I had to empty the entire thing and then use the garden fork as a crowbar to bend the buckled leg back into place. As a further precaution, I made a mental note to avoid right hand turns.

Progress was difficult but I managed a much faster pace and was able to work for some time in the shade so by 11am, I had removed all the road base and was down to sand. My hole was complete! Standing beside my hole, I felt a deep sense of personal satisfaction at my achievement. No wonder Dad was so proud of Dale!

Now for the next steps to finishing the garden bed…

  1. Purchase a soil improver. How much? Who knows! Perhaps two cubic meters?
  2. Dig out a bunch of the sand and combine it with the soil improver to build up the garden bed.
  3. Cut back and tidy up existing rosemary.
  4. Purchase and plant a dwarf magnolia.
  5. Embed a worm farm in the corner.
  6. Plant the remaining space with other small flowering plants or ground cover.

Apr 5 2025

Steps 1-5 completed!

That was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be. I only had the one return trip to Bunnings and the whole first five steps of the new garden bed plan were completed by 4pm!

I can’t take all the credit. Thanks to Kim and Vicky who were amazeballs! Vicky already knew the word ‘haunching’ and could use it correctly in a sentence. She also knew a good deal about mixing concrete. Kim was the muscles in the team whilst I provided lunch!

With the first five steps completed, I now just need for the concrete to harden before step six which involves digging up all the hard road base and then replacing it with soil ready to plant. Hopefully I can get this part done over the easter break.

In the meantime, I have some more design choices to make. I’m sure people won’t mind sharing their thoughts!

  1. Do I keep the rosemary or not?
    I could get rid of the old, original bush and shift the middle of the two newer bushes to the left to make three evenly spaced clumps.
  2. Should I plant one tree in the middle or two trees side by side?
  3. What type of trees should I plant?
    I already have a frangipani that isn’t doing very well in a pot but should do better in the ground and a yuzu tree which is going gangbusters in its pot.
    A dwarf portwine magnolia is another possibility.

Apr 2 2025

The before picture

Bolstered by my recent success of replacing my own back tyre on my bike via youtube tutorial, I’ve decided to scale up to a bigger DIY project – my front garden!

Here is the before picture.

Hot and grey, this is not an inviting, lush entrance to my home…yet!

Pretty bleak, ha! My vision is to pull up the pavers at the very top of the drive by the house and plant a tree. I’ve spent at least 15 minutes googling and have decided this is not going to be a difficult job.

  1. Go to Bunnings and purchase the following items:
    • chisel and rubber mallet
    • cement and builder’s sand
    • trowel and string
    • new peg basket for my clothes line
  2. Mark out the area that will be the new garden bed with something called a string line.
  3. Pull up the pavers.
  4. Cut pavers where necessary and relay the pieces along the string line to create a straight edge.
  5. Create a haunch (I just learnt this word tonight) to fix in the pavers with the cement.
  6. Prepare soil and plant the tree!

I feel this is an extremely solid plan. Now for timing. Days before the last heatwave, I predicted the end of summer. Now I’m predicting it again. I think this weekend is the perfect time to start this project!

What could go wrong?

Seriously, I’m asking, what could go wrong? I’ve no idea what I’m really doing. Tips in the comments please!

Apr 4 2018

Back on the wagon…again

I’m in the middle of the third week of the Michelle Bridge’s 12WBT and I’m going strong.  The first two weeks were a real challenge because I was taking a friend on the Dead or Alive Flora and Fauna Tour #2 – The Midwest.  It was a great trip and I managed to stay on the wagon for the first week, but by the time we reached Coral Bay, I had a bit of a wobble and fell off.

Having said this, I still managed to complete my exercise training every morning except one.  And I mostly chose the grilled fish and salad option without chips.  In fact, I didn’t eat a single chip.  And I love chips!

 

#dawn

Morning exercise routine at Monkey Mia with the pelicans

 

So after two weeks of following the program loosely at best, I can report that I have lost 200g!  Yes, lost!  Any loss is a win when you’re on holidays.  Terri lost more than 2 kg in the same time period which is fabulous too.  She has had a much better start than me but next week is our 4th-week milestone weigh-in and measure-up and I know I’ll have caught up a little by then!

Mar 12 2018

Shock Test

I had a bit of a shock today when doing a fitness test before starting the 12 Week Body Transformation next week.  It may have not been my best effort because Terri and I decided to do the test together in Perth but I forgot to bring up my exercise gear and had to borrow hers.  This means my pants were too small, my shoes too big and I had no sports bra.  Still Here are my results:

  1. Number of pushups without stopping = 8
  2. Time taken to run 1 km whilst holding my boobs up = 6 minutes 33 seconds
  3. Longest plank (from knees) = 3 minutes 4 seconds
  4. Wall sit = 54 seconds
  5. Flexibility test = -13 cm (I was 13 cm away from being able to touch my toes!)

All these stats were put into a formula and the advice given was that I should start the beginner program.  Beginner!  I ran a marathon a year ago and now I’m back to the beginner program!

It was a shock!

 

Mar 10 2018

Getting into the Swing of Things

Before the 12 Week Body Transformation program begins, there is a pre-season.  This entails doing a bunch of different tasks and challenges each week in the lead up to the start of the program in order to get into the right mindset for success.

Trying to move more was a challenge in one of the weeks.  I read this on Friday and I was bored of sitting in front of my computer all day, so I decided to ride my bike to the nearest decent cafe which happens to be a 20 km round trip.  I felt really good having done some exercise.  Of course, when I got to the cafe, I ate an egg and lettuce sandwich, a bucket of chips and a piece of fudge so it wasn’t a complete success.  I did decide not to get an icecream though as I knew that would make me too thirsty during the cycle home.  Yay for me!

Another such task was to go into your pantry and throw out or donate all the food that shouldn’t be there – sugary and fatty foods.  Well, that just seems an unnecessary waste to me, so instead, I’ve been eating them.  I’m currently getting through a block of delicious Margaret River cheese, bread and butter cucumbers and a crisp glass of sauvignon blanc for tea.  For lunch I had a few old butterscotch lollies I found at the back of the cupboard.  Once I’d finished them, I licked the icing sugar out of the tin.  Mmmmm.

Next Saturday is our last free day, so Terri has invited Uncle Adrian over for dinner and he’s bringing dessert!  Uncle Adrian makes the best desserts in the world.  This is true.  If you don’t believe me, you are wrong!  And his portion sizes are also very generous.  This is actually really good planning because there is absolutely no way we will feel like eating on Sunday which is the first day of the program!

 

Mar 6 2018

Rising Like a Phoenix from the Ashes

Ahhh geez!

Well, I’m drinking a glass of wine whilst I’m writing this and it isn’t my first for the day.  I haven’t run for a week after tearing a muscle trying to do a cartwheel for a couple of six-year-olds and I’m about to tuck into a feed of garlic prawns because otherwise, I would have to throw them out.

In short, my foolproof plan to become tropics ready has crashed and burned.

I’m putting it down to isolation.  Normally, I would be going to work where I would be annoying everyone with my constant chatter about my progress, successes and challenges.  Although this would irritate some in the staffroom, there would always be others that would listen and make helpful suggestions.  Turns out, I need that!

Solution: I’ve joined the Michelle Bridges 12 Week Body Transformation.

She speaks my language and in an accent I understand.  My sister recommends her whole-heartedly and we will be doing the program together – her in Perth and me in Lake Clifton (at least until the house sells).  The first two weeks will be the biggest challenge as Madrid and I will be travelling around the state!  But not to worry – plenty of chances for exercise whilst swimming with whale sharks and snorkelling on the Ningaloo Reef.  My pescatarianism should be easy to maintain as well whilst heading up the coast.  And if I have to venture beyond that, kangaroo is a very lean meat.

So I’m starting today with the pre-season exercises and this is my shout out to everyone – I’m doing this!

#Horizon

Not a bad environment for some extra exercise!