Getting the place ready for Xmas

 Which inevitably means quite a bit of mowing. Now you all know how much I enjoy saddling up Roger and mowing the lower paddocks and the lawns around the house, but the part of the property I really find challenging is down by the creek. Part of the problem is the long walk down the paddock pushing the mower over uneven ground and snags until you actually get to where you need to mow. And then there's the long walk back up the paddock after you've exhausted yourself mowing. This is a shot from the seat that Kevin and Antonin installed looking down over the area I was mowing today.

 I (or Julia, as Julia mows down here more often than me) hadn't mowed down here for probably close to two months and it showed! My heart sank as I wheeled the mower down and saw the extent of the growth. A suburban back yard has nothing on this!

It took me four hours (with a couple of breaks to refill the petrol in the mower and refill my water levels) before I'd conquered it. I'll mow it again next week and that should have it looking great for the Xmas and New Year period when we'll have quite a few friends staying over. No doubt there will be some creek-related activities and so we need a pleasant access to the creek.

No storm, no burlesque

 So we were all set to head down to Kyogle Golf Club to meet up with our friends, Elizabeth and Mel, to enjoy a night of burlesque and drag, when this big, angry, nasty looking storm front appeared. After some phone consultations we decided we would wait until the storm passed us by, rather than driving directly into it.

The BoM satellite showed that it was headed directly for Kyogle so we thought it safer to sit it out in the comfort of our home. It turned out that we were on the very edge of it and apart from lots of lightening and thunder, and a few spots of rain, that was it. However, it wasn't until 8.30 that it passed and the show had started by then. With another 20 minutes to drive down there, we decided to give it a miss. Bugger.
The sky darkened over again late today but all we go were a few spots of rain.  We definitely don't want another hail storm, but a nicely energising electrical storm with about 20 mm of rain would be perfect.

Weekend Triumphant in Newcastle

 This past weekend we spent in Newcastle. Steve, together with Bev, had been nominated for best costume design in a non-professional production, for their costumes for Metropolitan Players production of Phantom of the Opera, so we flew down on Friday afternoon in time for the CONDA Awards in the sumptuous Civic Theatre.

 The category was second up so Steve and Bev didn't have long to wait.  The agony was over when they were announced joint winners along with Valmay and George for hair and wigs, also for Phantom.  Phantom picked up 7 CONDAS and Steve's CONDA was his 6th.

 And here is the proud costume designer flanked by our friends, Joel and Glen, who were looking resplendent in matching ivory tails with sequinned fronts (courtesy of Steve some time ago, for another show, 42nd Street).  We celebrated in style after drinks at the end of the awards ceremony by sneaking into Hamburger Haven around midnight. (Well it is a culinary icon in Newcastle, let's face it, though we both agree its glory days are in the past).

 The next day saw us enjoying a lovely lunch with friends, Glen, Graham, and Geoff, who took the photo. Always great to catch up with the boys when we are in Newie. We needed to do a bit of shopping in the afternoon and then we celebrated our friend, Damien's 40th birthday, which was much fun, held in the salubrious Gallipoli Legion Club.

After a bit of a slow morning, Geoff (who's fabulous art deco flat we were staying at), Steve and I visited our friend, one of Newcastle's Living Treasures, Terry (aka Miss Bubble LeGay) who was recovering from having his second leg amputated. He was in very good spirits considering all that he had been through and the challenges he was facing with getting up to hospital three times a day for dialysis and delays in being properly equipped with various devices to help him with his daily life.
Then on to my mum and dad's for lunch with my bro, Brett who had come up from Sydney and my sisters, Alison and Leanne and their respective families.  Mum always puts on a great lunch and it was lots of fun.  We won't be coming down to Newcastle for Christmas this year, but instead we are having a quiet, low key, Larnook Christmas, so this lunch was a pre-Christmas celebration, where we could celebrate that we were all together and in good health and in good spirits.

Floral Arrangements

 This is our gorgeous Madagascan 'palm', Pachypodium lamerei. It's actually a relative of the frangpani, which can be see in the style of flower. This amazing plant which is now close to 2.5 metres tall has been with us for about 10 years but this is only the second time it has flowered. The first time it flowered it only produced one flower, so it's a real treat to see a few flowers on it.

 One of the sights of summer in the northern rivers, a beautiful Poinciana in flower against an endless blue sky.

And another sight of late spring/early summer: an Illawarra flame tree. These are so stunning and this one in particular stands proud on the side of a slope along Rock Valley Road about 15 minutes from our place.

When in doubt post pics of eating and food

 So that's what I'll do. Piglet, aka Michael, has been staying with us this past four weeks, he leaves at the end of this week, and a couple of weeks ago we had a scrummy dinner with Glen, Liam and Julia. Piglet slow cooked a shoulder of pork and then made this delicious

 salsa, which was then combined with the pulled pork, the most crunchy and gorgeous crackling and a tortilla, into

 this very enjoyable creation.  Stevie made his decadent toblerone cheesecake to round things off, but I have been remiss in not having photographed that creation.

Then for Sunday breakie we had what is becoming a trademark Larnook Big Breakfast which consists of corn fritters (made with corn off the cob, of course), home made guacamole, bacon and bbq'd roma tomatoes on a piece of Turkish bread sprayed with olive oil and then toasted on the bbq.  Not a bad way to start a Sunday, really. Oh that's right, we also had orange juice and champagne to wash it down.  Decadent with a capital D!