some of the visitors in our garden

photos  of mine of some of the little visitors in our garden. planting the flowers first up has meant that the bugs all came in, which brought the birds in. Now that the growth on the wattles is a bit bigger we get loads of the bigger birds too. Love it!       M

eastern spinebill

a native bee

yellow-tailed black cockatoo

crimson rosellas

wdge-tailed eagle

blue wrens- a juvenile and a female

a jeuvenile and adult koookaburras

little cranky wombat

a swamp harrier...awesome!

silvereye

cranky-pants

tree creeper

leopard slug

red browed finch

blue wren

the garden progress

 Alright then...here is the garden update from Michelle. YAY! I am not entirely sure where to start. After the fires cleared away a lot of our bush block it looked as though nothing was ever going to grow ever again...ever. But as amazing as Mother Nature is, she started little by little and before long covered everything in a blanket of green. The first thing I wanted to do was to get some little flowering shrubs in. Luckily for us the house we were renting in Wattle Glen had a pretty full garden due to the landlord being a landscape gardener. So I pinched shoots, took cuttings and saved seeds so that we could start someting at our place.

I set up a bit of a ramshackle vege garden that had to keep the rabbits out at the bottom, the kangaroos, wallabies and deer out at the top. I hadn't reckoned on the mice, bush rats and our cute little ratty type native animal, the antechineus (anti-kine-us). Or the birds...

I will pop a few photos up of the journey of the garden to catch up a little bit...Some of the plants which grew up on their own and a few of the ones I planted to encourage the birds and the insects to come and live at our place.

Oh and these guys...

2010 Checking out the vege garden fortress!

2010- that is the vege garden up to the left

a pig-face flower

Pig-Face flowers

viola hederacea- a little native violet

Ranunculus lappaceus- native buttercup

A 'must-have' , the good old lavender

flowers starting to bloom...

This was one of the first cuttings & one of the first to go in

The steps were a moment of greatness. Pippi approves and is often found sleeping on them in the sun.

The daisy bush has been a trooper since the start and is now massive!

The gum trees are all going about their business

Stellaria pungens - Prickly Starwort

The gorgeous Dianella admixta - Black-anther Flax-lily

All of these plants are growing at our place and we have tried to preserve and encourage as many of the local natives as possible. I collect seed, buy-swap-and beg native plants to keep the birds happy. Althouth I do love the pretties like the daisies, lavender and dahlias! Next post from me I will show you a few pics of our little friends that are all living here with us.

October and we decided to pour a slab in the back part of the kitchen. This will be covered with floor boards milled from the trees that died on the block, the same trees that have provided all the timber used so far.
                               

 

Meanwhile, back at the shed, work continued on the paving of the carport area.

 

What!? It's November already?

So, two months to catch up on. Still the weather is slowing progress but it's improving, and I'm thinking all the prep work has been done so soon the build can can go ahead full steam.
Big BIG news for September was the removal of the porta-loo; yeah the one I thought we'd have for a couple of months but two and a half years later we finally bade farewell to the old stink box. Big thanks to whoever it was that covered the hire for all that time.

Bye bye stinky.

So what do we use now?

Behold! A new dunny installed in our new bathroom. Floor by Michelle. 

All made a bit more private now there are a couple of doors.

 

Meanwhile work on the landscaping continues. With style. Michelle is promising to add photos and details of that so stay tuned.

OK so it's official, that was the wettest winter in the last sixteen years, and I'm using that as the reason I haven't finished the house, as so many laughingly expect.

 We did get a few fine days here and there, and now it's spring I've been able to push on and make progress on a small but busy wall. We nearly have a bathroom!

Smarty pants me thought I'd build a cabinet into the wall.

Smarty pants

Smarty pants Michelle is adding glass rods that will hopefully light up as coloured dots in the wall.

"How the hell....?  A common pose.

Rainy July

Work progressed and the window was set in place.

And then it rained. A lot. And when it didn't rain it was foggy. Not really the sort of air that dries mortar. About here I pretty much abandoned the build until the weather improved, and got stuck into that list of jobs that just kept growing. An electricity cable was brought up to the house, second hand bricks ferried to the block from a neighbours house, and building a shower in the lean-to were the main ones.

Oh and these things appeared. Hmmm.

Autumn schmortum.

So we laid that first brick.

And carried on

We've started with the bathroom, hoping to get it all finished before our hired ( but free ) portable dunny and shower are taken away. The weather isn't being helpful, hence the temporary roof. Note the first window frame in place ready to be "mudded in".