Blossoms Come and Blossoms Go!

Wow, I can not believe how quickly the trees come into bloom and how short a time they are in full bloom.
Then suddenly the blossoms are all gone, the ground below each tree is a carpet of pastel colours and within 2-3 days the trees have turned from full of blossoms to full of green leaves.

The turbo boosting components in the atmosphere here are stunning in their veracity!

Bought lots of plants for the garden...These are the extras I had to buy to fill in gaps!

So, with the lovely weather coming straight of from the sub zeros of winter, one would think there would be a gradual temperature increase...but not so here...

Winter's over, spring is here, so straight up to 36C in the shade this past week it goes!
Hahaha, one has to laugh as this weather is nothing to get bored about.

I planted over 30 pansies, purple and yellow...Plus about 40 gladiola behind the iris which self grew.

The spa deck paving is completed and this week I complete the water metre readers path, as I had to wait for Imre to trim a lot of the half bricks I'm paving it with.

Running short of full bricks, but found a lot of pretty good half bricks so Imre trimmed them up for me and they should look great when completed by Sunday arvo.

The garden will look nice in a month or so...

Using the old metal from the wine casks to stabilize the bottom of the drums, plus wooden struts.

A table made from an old wine vat bottom. and an old drum, plus a stool for the spa deck.!

Then on Monday Imre will finish the rails around the little spa deck and that will be a nice job out of the way and will improve the look of the front of the house a lot.

Imre has also cut seat tops for all the drum seats/stools and now all I have to do is make some round foam and cushion cover things, like the old milk jug covers, with the elastic around the edges to pop over the wooden seat and foam cushioning.

I need the girls from OZ to come back and paint 2 more seats I had Imre make out of another old drum I found laying around!

Front room ready for flooring...Will empty it after I get back from Greece and Imre will lay, glue, sand and seal the floor.

The front room is now ready to use, but I'll wait and get Imre to lay the timber flooring when I come back from Greece, now at the end of April, as the tour was put back a week, but all is good.

Yeahy...the tool shed has a locking door! Render has to be completed on the exterior too, but no probs! Washed some curtains I picked up at the markets to test drive. They look nice.

The tool shed has a lockable door at long last even with amber coloured glass in it. I bought a few old doors and a very nice sideboard from a neighbour last year for a few dollars and the 2 doors have come in handy...one for the tool shed and one for the bathroom.

Imre wanted to paint the tool shed door, but I'll keep it looking "antique" until next year as it is under a fairly big overhang and should be ok until then. We'll cement the path outside the tool shed when it's all been rendered outside, put on some gutters and a drain pipe, dig a dry well and fill it with old cement and bits of brick rubble, then another task will be completed.

So all Imre has to do in April to complete the tool shed is to tidy up the footings cement inside so he can line the brick walls neatly, line the ceiling, paint it all inside and put in 2 little windows, which we forgot to do when building the back wall of the 3 door/tool shed last year! Dohhh.

Will use the old, but in pretty good condition, lino from the front room for the tool shed floor and that will be another big job done. Can't wait to set up the tool shed bench, using my present kitchen set up and put away all the tools and stuff laying around everywhere outside together with a lot of small electric tools still in the house.

While I'm away in Vienna/Salzburg/Eagles' Nest next month, he'll paint all the window frames, doors and trims inside and out and the place will be ready for me to move into at least one really completed room. Then all the girlie stuff begins, like hanging curtains and finding or moving the light fitting.

Then we only have to  do the middle room, which is fairly OK, as I had a lot of the flaky plaster removed about 18 months ago, so it will be a quick job. Then into the end room, build the wall/rail around the stairs to the cellar, put in some power switches and do the wooden flooring, heave a massive sigh of relief...and start on the Summer Kitchen in June!
Can't wait.

So, with all of that flurry of work and growth happening outside, there is extra work now as, the lawns need to be mowed every week and then next month, every 4 days!

It grows so fast, so long and so thick these first 3 months...April, May and June and thankfully, in July when it's high summer and very hot, it slows down a bit.

Anyways, am off to mow now as it's past 2 pm on Sunday, so will race out and do it while the urge hits!

See you next week before I leave for Belgrade, via Budapest, on the way to Greece!

Cheers,
Mary