Antarctic Vortex #2

Today, 17th July, is the 50th anniversary of the big snow falls in New South Wales (1965).

So we should have known that Mother Nature would celebrate by entertaining us with a just as impressive display of snow of its own on this day.  I took the train to Blackheath to see for myself.

She didn't disappoint.

Linking To 

Skywatch Friday.

Everywhere A Sign #2

On our road trip, in 2010, we came across a number of novelty road signs relating to our unusual wildlife here in Australia.

But until this year, I didn't know we had elephants at Scotts Head!

A Weekend Story

I'm only a week late posting about the great day we had last Sunday with our Second Son.

He has caught the African Violet bug off me and has them growing all over his apartment, including under glass on his balcony.

His African Violets are taken from cuttings off my plants.

Mr M is a jeweller. He makes jewellery from throwaway materials. Above are some of his experimental pieces which he made from shrunk polystyrene.  (Propped up in front of his child hood box of wooden blocks.)

He is also a bit of a bower bird, littering his rooms with all sorts of interesting objects.

He served us up some smiley shortbread biscuits.

And made coffee,and tea.

This green mug is a Fire King vintage glass mug - our son collects Fire King pieces.

I made some GF choc brownies (nut free too).

Sorry about the quality of the picture, I'm still learning how to use the point and shoot camera!

Afterwards we went for a walk to Marrickville Markets.  But I didn't take any photos while we were there...simply didn't think of it and we were too busy eating a delicious late lunch.

After that Miss Five was rewarded with a play in the park.

She has turned into some kind of climbing whiz in the past year!

Above is The Vic On The Park at Enmore.

Below are some of the sights we spotted along the way back to the apartment.

(I just love the inner west of Sydney. It's such a vibrant place.) 

The walk from Newtown to Marrickville was a good twenty minutes there another twenty back so Miss Five was a little tired but she managed to stay awake on our drive back to the mountains in time for a quick dinner of bacon and eggs before she went home with her Mum.

We add a few veggies to our bacon and eggs; like tomatoes, broccoli and zucchini. It's not something we have very often but it's a great meal when we need dinner in a jiffy.

Do you ever have bacon and eggs for dinner?

Day 231/366

When growing carrots in the garden, they need more potassium and less nitrogen for better growth.

Too much nitrogen induces forking while adding potassium promotes sweetness and solid growth.

Soil temperatures that are too low (below 5oC) will slow seed germination and temperatures that are too high may mean a wait of anything up to thirty five days for germination.
A soil temperature of around 10oC is best for germination.

Carrots are cool weather vegetables preferring sandy soils.

After our holiday, I think that a detox is in order.
So I made soup for tea tonight.
My carrot plot needed a further thinning out so I pulled the above tiny carrots to make a stock with some chicken carcasses I had in the freezer.
A nourishing stock was made by adding a bunch of fresh herbs from the garden, an onion, Celtic sea salt, filtered water and peppercorns which were all simmered for around two hours.
A light soup was made by straining the stock, adding two parsnips, the shredded chicken meat, the onion (chopped), two cakes of rice noodle,shavings of fresh ginger and  simmering again until the parsnip was cooked.
I served the soup with the addition of a dash of cream, freshly cracked pepper and slices of fresh lime (purchased yesterday from an op-shop in Bangalow).
Here is the result:

The soup was very satisfying and there's enough leftover for lunch tomorrow.

Day 230/366

Our last night on holiday was spent in a warm house with Brother-and-Sister-in-law.

Our holiday is officially over.

We spent eight hours on the road today and travelled through four seasons to end up in an icy winter.

I only took one photograph today so here it is...Where are we Honey Pie? 

He wasn't sure so found us on the GPS on his mobile telephone.

We're at Urunga (having lunch).

The sun was shining but the wind was blowing cold.  This was our first warning of the chill that would greet us once back in Sydney, but particularly the Blue Mountains.

No matter how good a holiday is, the part I love most is coming home.

Day 229/366

Once again, it's difficult to choose just one photograph to depict the day's experiences.

On our way south, after stopping at Bangalow for morning tea, we went to Bexhill, to visit the open air cathedral.

The 'cathedral' is surrounded by a memorial garden with a beautiful array of Australian native plants.

The majority of the native plants are grevilleas. 

Grevilleas come in an array of colours, from ivory, to gold to red to pink to apricot.

Grevilleas belong to the family Proteaceae and are known for their quirky resemblance to a toothbrush.

Like this one:

After our visit to Bexhill, we drove to Casino where we went on an op-shop crawl.

We managed to pick up a few bargains which I will post about once we've returned home.

(Actually, our op-shop crawl began in Bangalow!)