Hallelujah...we have got some of our land back...

Early last week some different tradies arrived on the site next door, complete with a nifty and narrow machine which moved a whole lot of dirt that had been banked up near the back of the next door block.

Here he is, swivelling to manoeuvre in the tight space

 The only access from the street was through the garage area of townhouse #1 adjacent to our backyard... so the operator of the equipment had to do some nifty manoeuvres to pick up from the pile of dirt, drive through the garage and then fill the trench between house #2 and our fence line...there has been a 6 ft drop since the initial earthworks in May,,,so the photo below shows this all filled in...

Let's step back a bit now...
Remember the sight that had greeted us when we arrived back home from NZ, way back in mid May???
Here is a photo showing the temporary fencing on our land...my compost bin and my store of stacked empty pots are corralled in next door. Now my compost bin was relocated a few days after we came home but everything else remained on the other side of the fence...

A healthy looking tomato plant that grew out of the bottom of the bin was a 'fatality' when the bin got moved...

 The photo below taken at the same time as the previous photo, is looking towards the front and shows the lilly pilly and the clump of bamboo, also corralled...

Well after the little earth moving machine had done its work last week this is the surprise that I got later in the day!
Yes, I know there is still a mess of pots...
 But can you see where the temporary fencing is now??? Yep! The 'boys' moved several panels of  the fence back and we have much of that strip of land back!!

 And the huge dirt pile at the back corner has gone!!

 And best of all is the fact that I can stake the tomato plants that came up on the former site of the compost bin...it was so frustrating seeing such healthy plants growing on the other side of the fence!

Here they are 'behind bars!

And here they are now...

Hmm...I still need to stake them...

My clever friend Jean...

As a follow up to my last post on my school reunion, I must tell you of my friend Jean's very clever, 'jiggery pokery'.
My DD2 commented on the group photo which I had posted on my Facebook page...

Mumsie! Your face in this shot cracks me up!! You aren't even looking at the camera, but you look so happy! xo 



Which prompted my friend Jean to admit that the photo had been 'photoshopped'! I did know about this because later on Saturday afternoon, she had commented to me that when she had checked through the photos of the group, I was hidden by the person who sat beside me. So Jean took my image from another photo and placed me in the group...very clever in my opinion. The only photo that I was visible in, that Jean had to work with, was one where the group had erupted into laughter ...

So here we are, having a good laugh...( about how difficult it is these days for some of us to sit on the floor, let alone sit cross legged on the floor!!) 

And here we are again in the 'official' photo! I guess anyone looking closely at the photo might wonder what has 'fueled' my jocularity ???? hmmmm

So that's the story behind that photo :-) 

Last Saturday...

Last Saturday I went to my high school reunion. It was just for my year level, not a whole of school one. I spent a large part of the morning getting ready...a girl has to look as good as possible when attending a school reunion :-)
Unlike many of my former classmates, who came from other states, or even from overseas, I just had a short drive to the venue. It was a wonderful 4 hours, with the time just flying by as we reminisced, laughed, joked and chattered. We have been having a reunion for a few years now and the number of attendees is growing. There were some 'new ' faces this year...each year we gradually find more of the 200 Grade 8s that our cohort numbered.
Conversations stopped when my friend Alison arrived pushing a shopping trolley...

 Hmmmm...lol!

 Pretty soon, with a bit of help, the mannequin was assembled and dressed in my old school uniform...
Somehow or other this uniform hadn't been thrown out and I found it in a storage crate last year...now my friends 'forbid' me to throw it out as we've become a bit sentimental about it!

During the afternoon a number of us posed beside the mannequin...

 Some of the 'boys' catching up...

 One of my former classmates came all the way from Western Australia where he works for the department of agriculture...here we are last Saturday...

And here we are 48 years  a long time ago...forgive the blurriness...my mother was famous for her blurry photos! lol

This is my friend Richard who came all the way from PNG to attend the reunion. Richard handed out strings of 'money shells' to each of us...note the lovely woven basket he carried all the strings of shells in...In my last year of school, Richard made a cupcake for my birthday complete with a candle...a lovely boy who grew into a lovely man.

Peter, the man in this photo, not only went through 12 years of school with me, but also our children all attended the same school so we served on the same P&C committee for years.

We had a lovely surprise when the couple below dropped in on the celebrations...

These are 2 of the most popular and respected teachers at our old school. He is still an inspiring maths teacher but not in the school system any more. She was my geography teacher for year 10-12 and as well as teaching me that subject she taught me to develop organisational skills and resilience to continue to strive to do my very best...a wonderful teacher!! I've always been proud of my A in the Senior Public Exam!

 And here is our group photo taken by my friend Jean, who set the timer on her camera and then ducked into the photo on the front right (dark top).

Some of my classmates are still working but most are retired and enjoying the good life...but none of us know where all those years have gone!

The USS George Washington...

Recently here in Queensland our local army base at Enoggera played host to this year's Talisman Saber war games.  'This year's scenario pits a joint US and Australian force against a fictional enemy who has invaded two small 'countries' in Queensland and Northern Territory...' The actual war games were held  north of Brisbane.
When all that was over, the USS George Washington docked at Luggage Point on the river here in Brisbane. We saw a news story about it where it was said that there were 6000 personnel on the ship...so we reckoned it must be somewhat large! It is also nuclear powered. So DH and I went to have a look last Thursday afternoon. Now the closest that the public could get was on the other side of the river...no public tours of this ship...
We had to park on some rough ground near the bank of the river...

And then we walked to the river bank...below is our first glimpse of this big war ship...

We weren't alone...this is only some of the other onlookers...

Now a couple of views to our left, down river and to our right, upstream...

 Looking back up the river...

Now...just a bit of 'zoom' ...

Let's keep zooming in on that ship...look at all those planes on the aft deck (?)...back of the ship then!

And this is the bow...and more planes...and helicopters !

And here's a shot taken of the 'middle of the ship'... 

Now apparently while Brisbane residents were having a 'sticky beak' at this warship, many of the personnel from the ship were having some R&R onshore...hope they all had a good time!

How's the building work going?...

Thank you for all the lovely comments on my last building progress update, when the garage wall of #1 townhouse was completed, thus giving me a new 'vista' from my kitchen window. 

The wall is growing...

 Within the hour, it is completed...

Eventually there will be a wooden fence built so I won't see so much of that dreadful grey brick...and I have plans. Because of the buildings next door, I don't think we will get so much direct sunlight each afternoon when the project next door is completed. So I think that I will be able to have pots and hanging baskets with some lovely colourful tropical plants from now on...before, it got too hot for them down that side of the house. I also plan to grow some vines on the nice new fence...the old fence had been damaged by termites and old age so I couldn't grow anything like vines on it, even though I did have some lattice against the old fence in the front garden. 

So now a bit of a progress update...

Monday morning and this truck pulled up...

DH was heading off to golf early that day...

 Mmmm...bit squeezy here...

 Driveway successfully navigated...

Lots of timber was then unloaded...

Brad and a couple of young men, then worked throughout the morning, moving the 'bundles' of timber around the site.

Then all was ready for the next lot of tradies to come in...

So with saws whirring/screeching and  nail guns popping we started to see these frames...

And then these were attached to the walls of the lower levels of the houses...

And this is how it looked from the street...

Gradually throughout the week these builders worked their way around all 7 houses...they are quite small as you can see.

FnwF...

Yep! Last night was Friday Night with Friends hosted by the lovely Cheryll.

So what did I work on last night?...

Some tracing, cutting out and stitching...

One block

 I had tried tracing this design using the light box but the 'dot on dot' fabric just seemed so difficult to 'see through' to trace. Eventually I resorted to using a transfer pencil, but only back stitched for a while after all that 'drama'.

 And I finished the evening knitting a number of rows on this ...yep! The good old chevron design and again in favourite colours. This one is a 'thank you' gift to an old friend. It should be finished in the coming week as I work on it most evenings.

So there you have it, my Friday evening of crafting while watching 'Broadchurch' and 'Doc Martin'.