Spring is in the air

A few weeks ago I experienced a willy willy which pushed the bird cage over and moving the dog kennel in the chookpen. The dog kennel is used for protection of the chooks during rain or sun and it was moved about half a metre to the front. One of the chhoks was injured and she has been a bit weird since. Looks like she has some sort of neurological damage since the incident, poor thing.

When the bird cage fell over, Bella, our blue Ringneck escaped. She has escaped previously and always came back but she's about 10 years old now. So we were a bit worried about her. Mr S and I seen her flying around and one day I came home from work he reported he observed her feeding on our Grevillea when a Hawk too her. She was screaming and wiggling and eventually the Hawk let go of her. Mr S checked where she was dropped and she flew on his shoulder. When he wanted to take her to the cage, Janus jumped on him and she flew away again. She was gone for a week and our hopes for her safe return were diminishing.

On Saturday morning I observed her in a nearby tree and went to put a bowl of seeds down for her. She quickly went for the food and I caught her with a net and took her back to her cage. Since then she hardly came out of her Nestbox which she normally used for sleeping only. I checked the box and found 2 eggs in there! Ah well, I wonder what she was up to when she flew away... She had a few partners before but she always killed them and therefore she has ended up alone. I don't know if these eggs are developing, probably not but I would be curious to see what they are... She must have known it's spring...

My 200 x 150 cm study is too small for my sewing so Mr S and I have been thinking of options on where I could sew. Mr S really likes his mancave and he also wants to keep a separate room for Guests, so there's no other option than for me to move into the Patio. I bought a couple of cube shelves and put a door across and voila there's my new custom made sewing desk! Janus approved!

After painting the floor and giving the Patio a good clean, I redecorated. Janus received his 'big-boy-bed', a larger kennel where he can sleep in and rest, I made some mats for his feeding station and organised everything into boxes to keep it clean.

Mr S oiled all of our beautiful timber furniture, so they look like new again.

Love the Patio - it's one of my favourite places to be and now where it's spring again, it's nice and warm to be out here most days.

I decorated the table nicely...

... and even have some beautiful 'Night-Roses' on my sewing table.

The garden is ready for spring as well and this is the first harvest of my 'accidental' eggplants. Accidental in terms of I didn't plant them, the planted themselves in the chookpen. I sold some at work and made eggplant balls (like meatballs but with eggplant instead of meat) , cooked in tomato sauce and served with spaghetti - yum, they were amazing!

I replanted our hanging baskets on the Patio with some colourful plants.

These ones just look so cute!

Janus dropped in for work with me one day, he loves all the attention. Everybody loves having him around, the office seems a whole lot happier with him there.

Janus spending the evening with me on the couch...

He's so placid, loves to play and is just THE best thing which ever happened to me...

And he needs to rest and chew on his leather.

Selfie time!!!

I love my boy!!!

We have been doing Rally O and Janus is actually really good! I still make a few mistakes, but Janus is doing great!

Mr S and I enjoyed a few markets/event such as the Cultural Festival and CQ Eat Street. trying out new food in a nice atmosphere is always a lot of fun!

We need rain - desperately!!! It's really hard to keep everything alive. We haven't had rain since March...

However, I did manage to grow my first asparagus!!! How exciting! Now I need to read up about propagating it.

I'm also trying to grow Rhubarb again, I grew it once before but it wasn't the best spot, so I moved it to a partially shady position this time round. Fingers crossed. I've planted asparagus, rhubarb and perennial capsicum in one gardenbed as they should last for a few years.

I've ordered some 3 m3 of pure cow manure to fertilise all my gardenbeds and then I will water them thoroughly and I should get a successful harvest. This time of the year is great to work in the garden. It's not too hot, not too cold and I can get everything done befor the summer heat starts. I will post a few pics of my spring garden soon.