Procrastination, nervousness about starting the verandah and roof, returning to casual teaching, bad weather, Christmas and New Year, visits to Paul's place, chest cold - all these have led to little construction on the house.
Minor welding, grinding and cutting jobs are about all I have managed to get done indoors.
Outdoors I have been a little busier.
I had a return weed inspection from Council to check on what had been done since their last visit months ago. I noticed that quite a lot of serrated tussocks had partially survived their initial poisoning, so I went back over quite a number of them with more poison.
The veggie garden has come along nicely and I am now picking mint, chives, basil, rocket, beetroots and masses of rhubarb! The strawberries have had their first crop, the spinach is newly sprouted and the pumpkins are just starting to bear fruit.
I have found an endless supply of manure for the garden - I pass the local trotting track everyday on the way to my land and they let me help myself to top quality horse manure. So a couple of more years and the quality of my soil should be pretty good.
rhubarb:
I also made a post and slab base for the dam pump (which is chained to the base), which makes filling up the garden tank really easy.
At the moment the 2" hose from the pump has to be put into the top of the tank every time I fill it. Eventually I will make a permanent fixture for it and bury the pipe from the pump up to the tank. But for now it saves me dragging the pump down to the dam and back for every fill.
There has been very little rainfall over the past three months and the level of water in my dam has dropped about half a metre.
So I took the opportunity to build a small jetty. We like having a swim in the dam on hot days and this will make it easier to get in and out without getting muddy feet.
When the dam fills the jetty will sit a few cms above the water. I think it will also be a nice place to go and sit.
We're having an odd summer with the temperatured yo-yo-ing from day to day.
Last week we went from 34C down to 16C then a few days later up to 38.5C.
Middle of summer me (on the 16C day!):
Also Google maps have updated their aerial coverage and my containers are now viewable:
Recent photo from my front gate showing the dry colours of summer
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