Passing time in the valley

So we've been here since October and we're really settled in now. I keep waiting to start pining for the city, and I do sometimes have moments of longing but at the end of the day we moved here so we could have this lifestyle, and it does seem to be that it was exactly what we wanted!

Every couple of days we get a massive number of beautiful plump broad beans off the bushes in the hothouse and a whole bowl of juicy ripe tomatoes of all different colours and types. I've planted some new basil and coriander seeds and brussel sprouts too, but the chooks got in and scratched the garden bed up like mad so I'm not sure if any will come up.

The chooks have gone back to laying lots of eggs and we're planning on getting a couple more in the next week or so just to keep us on top of demand. Spikee has finally decided that he will eat what we call an "egg cup" or a microwaved scrambled egg (I should hang my head in shame) and we are all rejoicing because it is ONE source of protein in his diet.

Today we took Vinnie for a nice long walk and picked what is starting to look like the last of the blackberries for the season. We have a tin of them that we're gong to have with chocolate cake. I'm also going to get around to using my frozen banana supply in a low gi self saucing banana pudding.

The front of the house is nearly fully scraped and within a day or two it will be painted, that'll leave the side and half of the back only. Waiting for a few days without rain has been the challenge, but this week si supposed to be fine most days.

The weather has been gorgeous! Not too cold at all, just pleasant. The thermometre said it was 17 today but it can't have been because I was wearing short sleeves. I think cold is different down here to in Sydney. But once the dead of winter hits I'm sure it'll have quite a bite, so I'm buying lots of second hand cardigans.

The Library Arrives!

While in transit from Sydney to Antarctica all of our bookshelves managed to completely implode, except one of the less beautiful ones. So although we've been here for about two months all our books were still in boxes. Yesterday we discovered that the local two dollar shop was having a sale on book shelves, and they were only $32 each so we grabbed three of them. We'd been scouring the tip shops and ebay etc for months with no luck so this seemed like the best option. I spent New Year's Eve unpacking a huge box of books and squealing with delight at some of my discoveries ... not the most exciting NYE to many I'm sure, but it was perfect to my inner book lover. Now the surviving book shelf from Sydney has gone into Stylish's bedroom because the colour of it will suit her room when she paints, and we have three large dark brown ones. Two in the lounge room and one in the ugly room.

Tonight Stylish and I went for a really long walk, we walked for two hours and got to see some gorgeous rolling hills as the sun was setting. It's always nice to touch base with her, she's changing so fast at the moment, and so am I. Apparently I have suddenly become the most embarrassing mother on the planet!

When we came home we checked the nesting boxes in the chook shed and found the smallest egg we've ever had, it's about half the size of the phantom eggs we normally get. One of the LOTL has been broody, last week she had a crush on A, and followed him around clucking at him affectionately and then she went beserk about her eggs! Getting the eggs from underneath her became quite an athletic and strategic event, not unlike a jujitsu tournament crossed with a chess championship. I would have left her to it had she not been so violent, we couldn't get eggs from underneath her without risking life and limb so we needed to fix it. A's brother gave him a book about chooks and the first chapter was on brooding. We had two options, one was to make the nesting box really uncomfortable, but since she shares it with the other LOTL that's not going to work, so we resorted to option number two and stuck her in the cat carrier cage by herself for the day. She's back on the nest again now, so it looks like she has to go back in the cage again tomorrow. Ultimately I'd like to get some fertilised eggs, but there aren't any available locally at the moment.

Moving In

A took to whipper snippering the jungle in the garden and after three days (two of those full work days) he managed to relocate a lawn. Then he tidied it up with our new mower. It looks lovely and tidy and it'd getting greener every day, it was all yellow and dead looking after being covered with layers of dead grass. It took Stylish and I a few hours to rake it all up and A and Spikee were madly making our piles of raked grass into giant piles along the back fence. We were wondering what to do with it all but we decided that it will be perfect for the chooks.

Stylish and A went out in the "to be chook shed" yesterday and insulated it using all the carpet they ripped up from in the bedrooms. Our chooks will be lovely and warm in winter and nice and cool in summer. They're the only family members I want living near that festy carpet though.

We've been slowly unpacking everything and moving is over the last week. We got heaps done yesterday and even set up a dining area and unpacked then put all the clothes away. It's starting to really feel like home!

The plan is to get everything unpacked so the rumpus room can be set up. This is happening at the same time as we get chooks, the cat comes home, and family life continues! We're looking at making a green house too. We thought about buying a kit but that would cost $1000, or there's the poly tunnel option, but they don't look very sturdy and sturdiness is a must when you house share with three wild and unschooled children. Well, two are wild and the third is working on it.

Today I'm going to finish sanding the mantle piece hopefully, then we can varnish it an put some pictures up there, that's one of those finishing touches that really makes a place feel like home. A is planning to make dhal to help ease the pain of leaving Sydney's Indian food. I might look at making some chapati to go with it!

We're On Our Way to Antarctica!

We're currently in a motel in Melbourne enjoying cable tv and internet. Tomorrow we leave the mainland and head straight for Tassie on The Spirit Of Tasmania. Since leaving Mould Hold, or The Black Spot as Stylish named it, we've spent a week in the Eastern suburbs of Sydney being tourists in our home town, and a night in Canberra, a night in Albury, tonight we're in Melbourne and tomorrow on the boat. Then a night at A's parent's house before we finally go to OUR HOUSE!!!

The placenta is traveling well, it's far less argumentative than the children, and experiences far less reflux than the baby. I can't believe we've come 1000 km in three days and by the time we get to Tassie we'll have seen four states in a week. I'm pretty desperate to get "home" and eat something cooked by us, not that I'm complaining about the lack of washing up or anything, but home cooked food is so much nicer, not to mention healthier.

We're pretty sure the power, water, phone and net are organised, but we're still unsure what sort of net we'll be able to get. A's family have been over to our house and mown the lawns, cleaned the fireplace, organised the electricity (which we needed an electrician for) and left us a couch. We're very glad about the couch because we actually don't own one. We didn't even have a loungeroom at Mould Hold.

Speaking of Mould Hold, the property manager is trying to get us to pay for the mould damage! I'm very keen for him to take me to court because I'd love to show the rental tribunal all the photos and discuss how he refused to return my calls when I rang to tell him about the problems with the property, from the mould to a broken window, cockroaches, rats, and a blocked drain in the side passage which prevented the bathroom sink from draining and the foul smell coming from the toilet. Not to mention the five days in the middle of winter with a new born baby when we had to stay at my sister's house because there was no electricity. Now, I know I'm not a bottle feeder or anything like that, but I'm a cloth nappy mama and we couldn't wash nappies or heat the house and we had no hot water either. So. Giampaolo, if you read this, we'd love it if you could take us to the tribunal. We'd really love it. Especially since we said you could keep our bond due to some very slight damage to the kitchen bench and the need to steam clean the carpet.

The Plans

So plans are as follows. Leave the Mould Hold on the 8th, stay in Sydney for another 5 or 6 days (depending on the available accommodation at destination B). Leave early in the morning and travel to Canberra, spend a few hours letting the kids run amok at Questacon, maybe do the National Gallery too. Stay the night in the ACT then make a run for Melbourne the next day.

The placenta will travel with us. We decided it is too much of a risk to trust an airline with it.

We located a cat box in the shed, now I just need to find out whether it's an acceptable one to post the moor unsuspecting cat to Antarctica in.

The Modern Day Migrating Feline

We're at that unbearable point where all our worldly possessions are in boxes. All my books, all my treasured things, all the kids toys (except a select few) and all their books too, are all in boxes, stacked in the hallway. I did the last basic grocery shop today, mostly snack food, and cat food and litter for his holiday at my friend's house.

I had a really difficult time packing James' ashes into a box. I put them in with all our precious things, candles from his funeral, beloved decorations, photos and gifts, then labelled the box very carefully. I had to have a good cry before I was able to put him in there though. I should be packing his toys, twice because he should be unpacking them faster than I can pack them.

I'm still working out how to transport the placenta to the new house. we have a few options.

1. Store it in my friend's freezer (next to her placenta!) then let it fly down with the cat in his carrier box, telling the airline that it's cat food because they allow that (they probably wouldn't allow a placenta)
2. Courier it down to a friend there and store it in her freezer (again, next to her placenta) until we arrive.
3. Take it with us in an esky with ice, adding more ice every time we go past a servo and storing it in hotel freezers
4. Same plan only with dry ice so it doesn't need too much maintenance as we travel.
5. Get it dehydrated so it's easy to travel with.

I'm leaning towards number one because it's the easiest way, and the only way to keep it as is. Having never had a placenta and having had four babies, I'm a bit precious about it. I want to plant it underneath a fruit tree in the new garden. I'm thinking of doing a whole placenta ceremony where everyone in the family (none of us have had our placentas buried or even honoured remotely) chooses a rock, catches some blood from our finger (the kids can just use red paint) and ties a small cutting of hair to the rock and then we'll bury it with Angus' placenta.

Today I rang several companies to find out how much it will cost to fly our cat down to us. It looks like being about $120 plus $10 cat cage (second hand from the cat protection society) and whatever the cost of sedating him will be. Yesterday I organised for our pay tv account to transfer to the house, I'm researching phone and internet options, and I've created an account for electricity. I can't get the electricity on properly until an electrician has been to the house because apparently there is a problem with the hot water meter. I've never even heard of HOT water meters so I'm inclined to agree ... there's a problem!

The Move Begins In Earnest!

We're on the count down, it's only 11 days until we're out of this house and then another six until we leave Sydney and embark upon our crazy making tree change adventure. Packing is in full swing, I'm in the process of changing the deed into my name, I've stopped grocery shopping (WOOHOO!) and I'm either throwing out or giving away a truck load of stuff - most of which our hoarder neighbour is snatching up. I discovered that I need to apply for the first home owners grant before the deed will go in my name which is irritating but it's all one big fat learning curve.

Working out what to pack and what we'll need to take with us is complicated by the differing weather in Sydney (where it was 26C today) and Tassie where it was snowing last week. It's hard to pack for the baby too because he's grown out of his winter clothing and no where is selling it now, not even vinnies. I suppose that he'll be warm enough in his trackies, strapped to me in a sling with my cardigan around him when we go outside. We're going to have to buy suitcases for the boys because taking clothes and toys for them will mean they need a fair whack of space.

The best thing about moving will be the adventure! the worst part will be NO INTERNET!!! I'm sure there will be plenty to occupy me.

The Great Conveyancing Saga Continues!

It is one week until settlement and I have been getting rather nervous about the lack of information I had obtained about conveyancing. Today however I managed to get some decent, meaty information!

I've spent weeks phoning the local council, the land title office, and various conveyancing companies with the idea of hiring them on our behalf since I'm so heavily pregnant and not getting any information. However the solicitor acting on behalf of the vendor called today and said that she needs me to send her a form called the "Transfer" and told me where to get hold of that and gave me the numbers of the certificates I need to apply for from the council, in order to get them to complete the searches. All up it looks as though we'll save about $700 - $1000 by doing it ourselves, so that's not to be laughed at! That's quite a few tins of paint.

The certificates will certify that there are no rates owing on the property, that the vendors actually own and are therefore able to sell us the property, that the boundaries are correct, and that all the renovations - or things that are built on (namely our very strange rumpus room) - were done legally, with council approval. I was talking to a friend about the whole drama today and she said that checking the boundaries is really important because her mother has recently lost so much off her property that her driveway is too narrow to park the car in!

We're thinking we might not leave here til a month later than we planned because then A will be at work, earning good money in the month where they do massive parties and he gets lots of over time. So, we'll wait and see what mood strikes us, he might be totally over it by then and not give a damn about the money .... here's hoping!