January 21 – late afternoon

January 16 – in the carwash

At least I can PRETEND that it’s raining…

January 15 – sunset through trees

When, oh when, will it rain?

We are back at work officially now. But the boys are still on holidays, so can take puppy duty during the day.

The pup went to meet our vet today. Our vet is the kindest and best vet in the world. After much mutual admiration, the vet offered Zadie a treat, but she just dived head-first into the treat jar instead. However, the verdict from her check-up is that she has a slight infection after her de-sexing operation. Not so unusual, for an operation performed at such a young age, the vet says. She is having an antibiotic and should be fully recovered and even more energetic in a few days. This is slightly alarming news.

January 12 – just too darn cute

And just as well that she is, given our interrupted sleep and ruined carpets… Also, she has already formed a long-term plan to eat the garden. Starting now.

January 10 – water lilies

Tags

new puppy

Dear reader, we are finished with office renovations; the carpet was laid today and although there is still much to be done, you can be grateful that you no longer have to hear about it.

The more pressing and important issue is, of course, the puppy. Here are the facts:

1. The puppy’s name is Zadie.

2. Her father was a border collie-kelpie cross, her mother a Jack Russell. Obviously a love match.

3. We did not buy from a breeder, but from a lovely vet nurse placing an abandoned litter.

4. She is eight weeks old and we picked her up yesterday.

5. Scamp, our problematic, old and grumpy dog, loves her already.

6. We all love her already.

7. Expect an abundance of adorable photos to come.

January 9 – welcome puppy

Tags

new puppy

We are all tired after painting the office today. Some parents take their children to the beach at this time of year. We take ours to the office and put them to work. But there is also a new family member to welcome…

January 8 – boxes

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rash painting decisions, weary

Boxes. Boxes and boxes. Boxes of boxes. Tonight I will dream of boxes.

No, we are not moving. We are refreshing and refurbishing the office. Everything has been packed into boxes and crammed into one half of the office. Tomorrow, the long brick wall will be re-painted. The next day, the office will be re-carpeted on one side, then everything moved to that side, and re-carpeted on the other side. This is because we have no storage area. I envision a sort of swelling tidal movement of furniture and boxes. I wish I had taken lots of photos of it now, I could have made a stop-motion-type thingy of the ebb and flow of all that stuff.

Thank goodness, we do have the boys to help us. But I’m done in, in any case. Stopping at the hardware on the way home, I chose the paint in approximately 10 minutes. The paint that I will be looking at for the next three years. At least. Was this wise, I am now wondering?

January 7 – city

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coffee snobbery, Melbourne, Michael Leunig

C

Last day of our break. Lunch at Chin Chin in the city, coffee at the Federal Coffee Palace. I’ve read some poor reviews of the coffee there, but we’ve always had good luck with ours.

I bought a diary at last, but we hunted for a calendar in vain. Do calendars all get taken away and burnt in January? Usually, we get the Leunig calendar with the newspaper, but somehow missed this year’s. How to replace it? A very Melbourne dilemma!

January 6 – a new New Year

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encouraging words

Resolutions (you are always late with these):

1. Make time for creativity

2. And also; keep on doing your thing, girl. I reckon you’re doing ok.

Spring flowering

Hello. Wow, Spring is really here, huh?

If you have an ugly old water tank to hide, I can recommend ‘Albertine’. Just as long as you don’t need to get access to the tank. Very thorny.

The west side of the house is covered by the Virginia creeper and the Charles Austin climbing rose. The standard roses in the front of these are ‘Grace’. It’s a little rangy to make a good standard, but it does look lovely at this time of year.

‘Charles Austin’ has a misleadingly masculine name for a very feminine rose. It opens deep apricot in colour, then fades to a soft pink.

This is the vegie patch, all cleaned up and lettuce, rocket, tomatoes, capsicum and parsley planted. The plastic bottles are Leo’s method of keeping the snails and slugs from demolishing the frail new seedlings. Sadly, the zucchini seedlings were eaten before he thought of this idea.

The terrace has been cleaned after a long wet winter turned the pavers almost black.

VCE exams are upon us and we all look forward to the end of that, I can tell you. Were you gripped by the US election? Us too. It was just like an episode of the West Wing.