Intelligent Bulbs - HALLELUJAH

Look look look - oh my soul - a winter bulb that has grown down, and now UP!!!

 

Happy dance - happy dance !!!!

 

 

Before and nearly-after - BATHROOM

Beautiful inviting bath.....

Best we wash our hand in the broken toilet, yes? WTF? No basin...

Bit better nowadays, don't you think?

Here's the bathroom in the cold cottage....still not done properly, but what a difference.

And yes, there is the dratted toilet that I fell off.....

Some BEFORE and almost-AFTER pics...Cottage Kitchen

Poor little cottage when we bought....

Luffly - stripped kitchen

Almost fitted - this is much better these days !

I think it's time to show a bit of the work that we've done here. I'll do it bit by bit, and start with the cold cottage. Still not done, no internal electricity cables ( we have to re-chase them with an angle grinder through the stupid walls) or switches (all ripped out and sold for scrap by moronic previous owners). Man also had to rebuild the staircase which was stolen, and there was once a fire place (I think a Jet Master) - gone too. Remember also there were no window panes, and 2 of the big windows were pulled out completely, just big gaping holes where once there were windows and frame. Same with kitchen door. Just a hole in the bricks.

Ok - we will start with the kitchen......

Update on the main house

Stupid Patio that broke the man's head....

Original tiled roof with Dallas-style patio (yuk!)

These thatchers worked like demons!

New full frontal of thatched roof and no frickin Dallas arches obscuring view - YAY!

Well, we are still in the cold cottage trying to fix the main house (which has THE most amazing fire place) and at the same time get the fishing lodge going so there's some income coming into this household. The thatching is done - HALLELUJAH! And it looks good. We're not sure what the previous owners were thinking when they TILED the whole roof OVER the original thatch. When we looked more closely at the whole house after we had bought, we saw that the roof was far too heavy for the house, and the walls were starting to buckle and crack!

So we took off all the tiles and brandering, and did a new thatch job. I am way impressed!

And we removed the stupid "Dallas" style patio. Again, what what what were they thinking? The patio roof sloped down at a really steep angle (the man bashed his head open trying to get under it - don't laugh or you're a bad person) and cut off ALL the view down the valley and up the hill. Made the lounge really dark - couldn't see a darn thing from inside.

And of course, every single pane of glass had been broken, and the chickens thought that our main house was theirs. Yip, that's where they roosted and played housie-housie. So we decide to replace all the panes of glass. Mmmm......after day two, the guys came to me and said "please feed your chickens!"

Huh?

Seems the chickens were eating all the putty out of the new windows as fast as they were being put in. Ate the putty out so clean that you wouldn't even know that there had once been fresh putty there! Ah, I ask you with tears in my eyes!! So the glass was put on hold for about a week while we built a chicken coop. And in the meantime, the biggest window simply fell out. Just like that. I guess that's what putty-less windows do - they fall out!

Still some miles to go, but at least we are seeing some progress. All good.....

Eish but it's cold - Passion-Killer cold!

I'm not too sure what makes a 4x4 splutter and fart, and backfire louder than a 38 special, but ours is doing that. Couple to this loud jerky travel machine, 30cm flames that shoot out the side every 20 seconds when we drive into the town. Sigh. I've been trying to sit low and hide behind my Raybans, but I've realised this is a futile attempt at anonymity. People know its us. DUH!

Today it is well below freezing and our goose pond is a solid block of ice. I know it is solid because I rested a full box of biscuits on it, and the man's favourite pen. I could probably have sat on it myself. The wind is bringing down the temperature too (as well as 4 of my glass lanterns which were hanging outside). Some of our windows still don't have latches, and there is a round window in the lounge that has been too high and too oddly shaped to replace. And of course.....ta-ra...no electricity!

I now dress according to my station in life which is plotta-ma-plotter girl, or squatter farm lady. The man is not much better. And I care not.

Bring it on, Mother Nature, I can still add copious layers of socks, spencers, long-johns and hats! At least if I fall down on the iced up ground, I'll probably bounce right back up, like the Michelen Man!

I AM WOMAN, HEAR ME ROAR!

And give us an Old Brown Sherry, dammit....

...But she forgot about my ol' John Deere...

Ah, memories are made of this.....

Brings back fond memories of my dear homie o'Richieeeeee - Richard Thompson - currently doing another long stint in the UAE with his band. He sings country that will rock your cotton picking socks right off.

This, friends, is how we start our John Deere (which I have learned recently is German, not American) because the starter motor is still stuffed.

And today, we have to be thankful for small mercies. Mercies like - oh, no, we don't have electricity yet, thank you Eskom....because the man ran over an electricity cable with the slasher, which promptly wound its stupid self around everything at the back of the tractor, and brought everything to grinding halt. Literally.

Very small video clip attached - quality bad, as usual ( but at least I managed to hurtle out the front door, no geese in sight).....

Sigh....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTr9_rwLYj0
WHAHAHAHAHAHAHA - I AM FINISHED!!

As if a tractor ain't enough...

Oh my hat. And it's the end of May. And life continues in the wild. So......we hire ANOTHER huge TLB machine because we need to get cracking on this dam we are building (but it's looking good so far me thinks), make campsites, etc ad nauseum. And the weekend comes....so the TLB owner decides to leave this monster machine with us, because really, even in the arse-end of the bush, nobody even in Africa is going to steal it. Are they?

Well......

The man decides, in his infinite manly-wisdom, that this earth moving giant can't be that difficult to operate. Can it?

And he steals it. Yip, he truely does.

What a farmer brown. How he managed to get up there in the first place is just beyond me. Let's not talk about operating it with only one leg (gasp). And its got a big scraper digging thing at the front and a big squashy thing at the back. And he PLAYS with it for a very long time. the chickens and Bartholomew and I barely escaped with our lives.

And all he did was make a humungous mess which we had to clean up by hand afterwards so the TLB dude wouldn't know his machine had indeed been hijacked, in the arse-end of the bush!

Bloody McGuyver. What next?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8Gtl8wIWCs

http:/www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtF34kvq7xw

SISTER OF THE SOIL?

16 MAY 2011 - and I decide that if nothing else, surely I can have a garden that smiles and looks nice. So off we hie to the local co-op and buy 110 (expensive) winter bulbs for the garden that I plan to create.

I diligently and with great care plant :

• 35 Freesias


• 25 Fabiolas


• 25 Tritonias


• 25 Anemomes

I plant an inconceivable number of Nasturtium seeds and Hollyhocks (and then notice that the Hollyhocks will only bloom in ELEVEN MONTHS!!)

I get creative and plant 3 Hyacinths in a beautiful glass bowl with water and colourful pebbles. They'll stay inside and brighten my world too.

I plant a Yukka tree, I move wild African Violets around, transplanting them with great care. I stake up rambling rose bushes and plant 5 chilli bushes (which I later learn will promptly die with the first sign of frost). I plant bushels of Parsley (which the chickens immediately eat off so that only bare stalks are left poking out the ground). I plant Fennel and Coriander, Mint and Garlic Chives.

At the end of the day, I am well pleased with myself. I am a sister of the soil, a woman of Africa, I am the creator of all things bright and beautiful in my tiny and wild little world.

The man comes home (after playing with his tractor or something) and I proudly display my still sparse but clearly worked-on garden, and as a grand finale, my beautiful bowl with 3 Hyacinth bulbs sitting on top, waiting to bring us sunshine.

Man : Those bulbs are upside down.
Me : No, can't be.
Man : Did you read the packet?
Me : Yes.....but.....
Man : Are you sure?
Me : (silence)
Man : Those bulbs are upside down.

Sigh. I say a silent prayer that I have purchased intelligent bulbs that will somehow grow down, and then up. ONE HUNDRED AND TEN WINTER BULBS!

I can't dig them up, as the man so cleverly suggested - they are strewn in wild abandon all over the place, interspersed with hundreds of tiny little seeds - I know not where they are!

Note to self : Perhaps one shouldn't approach gardening like cooking, or painting abstract art. Perhaps this requires a bit more fore-thought or structure....

I have failed my winter bulbs. I have condemned them to grow upside down into the very depths of the cold dark earth. How very sad.

PS : It is 17 June now, and nothing, apparently, is growing down and then up......faith like potatoes dear heart, it may still happen!

Mother's Day 8 May at new dam....

Had a lovely Mother's Day, with mother (of course). Picture is taken early in the morning (still in my townie silk PJ's, no less) in front of the new dam. Actually, in the exact same spot that we went "slip sliding away" at. The dam is much bigger than the pic shows, very deceptive. We've attracted a ton of bird life - so nice to see. Many different ducks and water fowl.....

This pic is also taken where earlier I posted a photo of the TLB digging a great big hole. Filled beautifully.

Water is so soothing.....good for the soul.....as long as it behaves I guess, and doesn't decide to take over and wash us all away, which is what it almost did on the evening of 7 June.....but that is another story!

STUCK in the 4x4 at the Overflow of the end of the dam....

Ah farmer brown - whatcha gonna do now?

Stuck in the overflow at the end of the dam! Photo taken from inside the bakkie....

Never a dull moment!!

PS : We got out - eventually - and overnight we had hellish rains, this part of the dam is completely flooded today.....Mother Nature and Water will not be fooled with....LOL