Tredegar

As we stood on our verandah, looking out at the land and the kangaroos, we noticed that two of them were having a fight! These photo’s don’t do the boxing match any justice … they were really getting stuck into each other including some significant kicks to the body.

Spent another night at the house and it was very very cold. Funny how a couple of bottles of Heathcote Shiraz can steel you against the cold! That, and a small kerosene heater. The house looks more and more finished every day. No big changes this week except more rubbish seems to have been taken away.

This morning we woke to our kangaroo family feeding, resting and generally sunning themselves on our land, down by the dam. Which, by the way had water in it. The most water we have seen since we have own the land.

AND…..all the creeks and streams were full of water this week as well as, again for the first time, the Campaspe River. It would be a stretch to say it was flowing, however there is water there and it’s a big breakthrough.

We can’t help but comment when we drive up how green everything is looking now. It was so dry for about 18 months, and now it’s really green and looks wonderful.

So, thanks to the builder (and Mum), we have widened the stairs at the front of the house.  We can’t believe what a difference it has made to the whole look and feel of the house the verandah.  It’s a little bizarre that we didn’t do this in the first place, however, it’s done now!  Go back and look at past entries to see the narrow stairs.  I think you will agree that this is a really good decision!

The floor boards are now also fully in.  The living room, kitchen and hallway are now complete.  Obviously we need to do the finishing, however this won’t happen for some time as we have internal painting, etc to be done.  We are now thinking about getting the heater installed.  We have looked at the (be warned - annoying guy speaking on website) Pivot Stove and Heater range and are hoping to get this in in the next few weeks.

We took the dogs up for the day to play.  It rained the whole time  which had us lamenting that we don’t have the tank in.  This has been exacerbated by local news suggesting drought breaking rain expected for Victoria in the coming weeks.  *sigh*.

The dogs, however, loved it.  They ran around in the rain for most of the visit, and both rolled in many versions of droppings (wombat, rabbit, kangaroo) and then coming up and grinning  at us ways that only happy, wet, muddy, poo covered, dogs can grin

On the power front.  It seems that we finally have a solution.  It will cost us heaps more than we budgeted and borrowed for, but we are stuck between a rock and a hard place needing power in by Christmas to accommodate the family that are coming to stay!

We have a new BBQ for the property and Steve cooked our first real meal at the property.  It’s great having a space to leave stuff.  We are looking forward to the kitchen and laundry being finished so that we can start leaving stuff like crockery, cutlery and bedding.  We are very close to having a fantastic weekender for  several months before we live there permanently.

We were very surprised with the light in the upstairs bedrooms.  They remained bright and well lit through most of the day.  Very cool, and power/money saving.  Emma is starting to talk about how she wants to decorate her bedroom.

It’s been a long entry this time, and the final thing to report is the planting of two trees.  We have an overall strategy of only planting things on the property that can be eaten.  So, in keeping with this, we planted an olive tree, and a bay leaf tree.  Apparently bay leaf trees grow as high as 15 metres and are great for wind breaks and hedges.  We didn’t know this.  So, in the pouring rain, Steve dug holes, planted trees and put kangaroo proof barriers around them.  A pivotal moment in the development of our new property!

Sorry for the delay.  So much has happened and a lot of work has been done to the property, yet the changes are not as obvious to the naked eye anymore.

The really big major changes have really all happened now, and most of the new stuff is happening on the inside.

The floors have begun, with the main living room being finished, and still the kitchen area to be completed.

The plaster work is also completely finished with all the architraves and the finish around the doors, etc being finished.

At this stage the skirting isn’t finished, but we are nearly there.

We had a call from the builder suggesting that the outside stairs are too narrow.  The funny thing is that Mum mentioned this on her visit, and secretly (without telling each other) both Steve and I have had separate thoughts to the same end.

We asked the builder for a quote to widen the stairs and we were, frankly, gobsmacked when they came back with approx $400 for both sets of stairs.  It was a no-brainer, and really got us thinking about why we didn’t do this in the first place!