New garden bed- In which there is much digging

This project really started some time ago, before the new fence was put in. The pile of grass in this photo actually has a raised garden bed under it.

In clearing the fence line to allow the new fence to be built, my parents helped me to remove the grass, plus the sleepers that made this a raised bed.



When I decided I wanted to put in a lemon tree, I decided that this would be a good spot. To remove the Kikuyu (the really hard to get rid of grass), I decided to dig out the garden bed, and sift the soil to get rid of the grass roots ( and also the large amount of broken glass I was finding in the garden).


Once I dug down about 200mm (to below the level of the grass roots), I discovered that the underlying soil was pretty much solid clay. Lemon trees require good drainage, so the best option seemed to be to build up the garden bed, and fill it with non-clay soil.

I decided that I wanted the raised garden bed to be deeper than the existing area. So I dug out a section in front of the original space. This required a lot of work with the mattock, as the spade wouldn't cut through the Kikuyu roots. I was able to reuse the sleepers that had been removed from the area during the fence clean up. I also bought a couple of redwood sleepers, to accommodate the larger space. I used a bow saw to cut the sleepers into the required lengths.


It took several weekends of hard work to dig out the existing root infested soil, sift it, and put the soil back in place with roots, broken glass and general rubbish removed.

I was finished with that piece of work eventually, but then discovered that I didn't have enough soil to fill the new enclosure, even after mixing in a large amount of composted lawn clippings. I decided to mix the lawn clippings, the sifted soil, and a bag full of fertiliser through to make the bottom layer of soil in the garden bed. Then I ordered a delivery of topsoil from a local garden supply place. I decided to get 2 cubic meters of soil, as I will need to build up garden beds elsewhere in the garden as well.

Here is the big pile of dirt that was delivered.

And here is the remaining dirt, once I had filled up the garden bed with a section. Still a lot there!

I watered the topsoil in thoroughly, using grey water from the washing machine (with Planet Ark washing powder) and left it for a week. Then, this weekend, it was finally time to buy the lemon tree, plus some garden herbs to plant. I bought a Eureka lemon, because they have strongly flavoured lemons, and are supposed to fruit year round.

I dug out the hole for the lemon tree, and filled the base of it with citrus planting mix. I used citrus planting mix to fill in the hole around the lemon tree roots. I made a kind of basin around the tree, to hold water, and watered the tree thoroughly. I then topped up the soil in a few places, from my big pile of dirt. Next step was to plant the herbs. I planted oregano, lemon thyme, marjoram and feverfew. I had wanted basil, but the weather is not warm enough yet, so I will add that in a month or so. Finally, I added some pine bark mulch, to keep the water in the soil, and the weeds down.

I am very happy with the outcome :)

Gardening - In which there is much weeding

A few weeks ago I decided that as the weather was getting warmer, it was time to get stuck into the garden. The first step, was to weed and mulch the front garden, in preparation for summer.

I ordered a cubic meter of pine bark mulch to be delivered and then got stuck in. Here are the before and after pictures for the front garden.

Before:


After:

Broccoli recipe

I'm stuck at home sick today, so I thought it might be good to cook up something healthy, as I can probably do with the vitamins.

The ingredients:
Broccoli (chopped into large chunks, about 2 cups)
bacon (low fat), (about 50g), chopped.
toasted almonds (approx half cup)
dash of olive oil
pinch of salt

To prepare:
If you don't have toasted almonds, then put some raw almonds on a non-stick tray in the oven (at 150 degrees C) for about 15 minutes. open the oven and shake the pan around a bit every 5 minutes.
Put a large pot of water on to boil, with a pinch of salt.
In a second saucepan, heat the dash of olive oil 'till it is just starting to run more freely, then add the bacon. Cook, stirring, for about a minute. Add the almonds and continue to cook until heated through.
When the water in the first pot is boiling, add the broccoli. Allow the water to return to the boil, then drain the broccoli (should be just cooked, but still a bit crunchy).
Put the broccoli in a large bowl, mix in the bacon and almonds and serve.

Very tasty (even if my sense of smell is a bit below par right now).

Daffodils

Dad came and planted some daffodil bulbs in my front garden a while back, to try to revive some bulbs that weren't doing well in the spot they had been growing in. They have grown nicely, and now a few of them are flowering. Spring is starting to... spring!

Let there be (working) light!

Recently, I turned on my living room light, and it started to hiss and spit and make popping noises and sparks. Needless to say, I promptly turned it off! Removing the globe (long dead) from the socket that had been causing the trouble just moved the problem on to the next globe. Time to get a new light fitting.

I had been planning to spend a while finding just the right fitting for the room and updating the light when my budget was in better shape. Suddenly the issue was a bit urgent, so I went with the first reasonably affordable fitting I could find that I liked. Fortunately, while I am not deeply in love with the new fitting, I quite like it, and can certainly live with it for a while. And it has a great feature - it works!

Here is the old light.

And here is the new light.

Tasmania 8

Wow. It's nearly the end of August, and I still haven't finished recording the details of my trip (which was in February)! I had better get a move on. Although I am finding that writing about the trip is a nice way to relive the experience. Just so long as I finish before I forget all the details :)

The day after arriving in Sheffield, I decided to visit the Mole Creek caves. There are two caves there that are open to the public and with regular tours, Marakoopa and King Solomon. Marakoopa is a "wet" cave, with a large glow worm population, while King Solomon is a dry cave.

When I got to the booking office, I discovered that Marakoopa has two different tours, one of which goes up into the "cathedral" and one of which goes down to a lower chamber with a river. I really enjoy cave tours (I have already been to Hastings caves in southern Tassie, Buchan caves in Victora, and the Waitomo caves in New Zealand), so I decided to take both tours of Marakoopa, plus one of King Solomon.

The first tour of Marakoopa was the glowworm tour. I had seen a glowworm cave before, at Waitomo in New Zealand, but they are always amazing to see. Then we were taken on a tour back further through the cave, where we saw some still ponds. The reflection of the surrounding cave formation in the pools was very beautiful. I took a few photos, but due to the reflection of the flash off the water, you don't get the full impression. Tourists are not allowed to take photos of glowworms (at least not with a flash) as light causes them to stop glowing, so there are no glowworm photos.

The second tour of Marakoopa was the cathedral tour. When we reached the cathedral, it was the largest open space we had seen in the caves. The guide told us that the acoustics were great, and invited us to sing. It took me a while to work up the courage, but I figured I might never have the chance again, so I sang the opening chorus of Agincourt Carol (very sonorous and in Latin). The acoustics were indeed amazing. It sounded like half a choir was singing. I got a spontaneous round of applause from the rest of the group, so I wasn't the only one who thought it sounded great. Now, if I could just manage to sound like that without the help of amazing natural acoustics :). Apparently there are sometimes concerts in the cavern. I would love to hear one some day.

It is remarkable how much difference the lighting used makes to the appearance of a cave. The older lights used in the cave have a yellow tint, which makes the cave formations look yellow. The picture below is taken of a part of the cave lit by newer lights, with a "whiter" color. This is a better impression of the actual colors of the cave.

As a dry cave (no flowing water, and no glow worms), King Solomon's cave had a slightly different look to the Marakoopa cave. Also, a lot of the formations are streaked with tannin, which produces a brown shading in the rock.

I have about another 50 photos, but these give some idea of what the caves look like. If you like caves then I highly recommend a visit to the Mole creek caves.

Tasmania 7

The next day it was time to leave Strahan. We travelled together in two cars until we reached Zeehan, where we had a look at some of the old locamotives at the museum there. After coffee, we headed off seperately. My parents and their friends were heading North, and I was heading to the Sheffield area.


On the way to Sheffield I stopped off at Tasmazia. This is an "attraction" with a number of different types of mazes to explore. My expectations were not too high after my experience with the Westbury Maze (which was pretty lame), but this was much better. The great maze was made more interesting by lots of little statuettes and signs with jokes (mostly very bad!) down all the wrong turns. Half the fun turned out to be finding all the things hidden in the maze, not just finding the centre. Also, the maze was set up so that you couldn't find your way through just by putting your hand on one wall and following it all the way. It was a challenging maze to solve.



While I was there, I saw a bumblebee. I have never seen one before and they really are quite different to the bees we get back in Victoria.



After finishing the great maze, there were several other types of mazes to explore, including a balance maze (not hard, but fun) and several other hedge mazes. These were smaller, and lacked the fun things to find, but were very challenging to solve. I had a lot of fun at Tasmazia.




After I got tired of mazes I continued on until I reached Sheffield. The motels were all pretty empty so I had no trouble finding a room. After the long drive from Strahan, and Tasmazia, I was very tired, so it was time to call it a night.

Tasmania 6

Onto the next part of the Tasmania trip.

After the train trip we still had an hour or two to kill before dinner, so we went on one of the short walks in Strahan. The walk was to Hogarth falls. The walking path followed the stream up to the falls area.

The walk only took about half an hour, but it was very pretty.

Bookshelves with books

Well, I'm home sick today, so I thought I might as well get back into blogging.

First up, here are the new bookshelves, now with books!

Painted downpipe

Just one more thing I got done this weekend...

Seeing as it was fine weather, I put a couple of coats of paint on the downpipe I had not finished last time I was painting the eaves. The wall behind is now a bit splattered, but I will overpaint that when I repaint the wall.

Not a huge amount of work, but that much less that I need to do to finish the house.

New bookshelves

I had some old, falling apart bookshelves against the back wall of the living room that I wanted to replace. I wanted shelves with glass doors to cut down the dust, but I was on a budget, so I couldn't get anything too fancy. My family had kindly given me some Ikea vouchers for my birthday, so I went with the Ikea Billy bookcase option.

First I dragged dad down to Ikea with the station wagon, and he helped me pick up the shelves. Then I assembled the shelves and drilled holes to fix them to the wall.

Once the shelves were attached to the wall, I put the doors on, then put the adjustable shelves in position.

It was all pretty straight forward, but a lot of work, especially putting the hinges onto the doors. I am happy with the result though.

Bathroom cabinet

Now that the bathroom is painted, I have been wanting a new mirror cabinet, to replace the old mirror I took down. I did a lot of looking around, and found that most of the bathroom supply shops didn't have anything I liked the look of. Then I stopped by Bunnings and found something I thought would work well. So I bought it. Now I just needed to install it!

I started by removing the doors, to make the cabinet as light and easy to work with as possible. The cabinet came with four fixing points, and I was a bit uncomfortable with that, as I wasn't confident that they would support the weight. So I added another hole in the middle of the top of the cabinet, using a power drill. I then held the cabinet up to the wall, worked out where I wanted it, then marked the top right hole.

How to drill a hole in a concrete wall:
1. Mark where you want the hole to go, using a sharp ended object, such as a small screw driver.

2. Use a nail punch and a hammer to put a small dent in the wall where you want the hole. The dent will guide the drill and make it less likely to slip.

3. *Wear a dust mask for this step. There will be lots of dust. * If the hole diameter needed is large, drill a small diameter pilot hole (using a masonry bit and a hammer drill). Then enlarge the hole using the correct diameter masonry bit (and drill). If the hole diameter needed is small, just use the right diameter drill bit to start with.

4. Use a small brush , with a handle diameter smaller than the hole (a cheap water colour brush works well), to clean the dust out of the hole. Use a cheap brush, because this will destroy the brush.

5. Use a vacuum cleaner to clean up all the loose dust.

6. Insert the wall plugs into the holes.

Next came drilling out the hole I had marked. Then I held the cabinet in place and put the first screw in loosly. Using a spirit level I held the cabinet level and used a small screwdriver to mark the locations of the remaining holes, including the extra hole I was adding.

I used the provided wall plugs, plus one extra, in the holes, then held the cabinet in place and screwed it onto the wall.

Next step was to wipe off all the dust, then reattach the doors.

Finally, I inserted the shelves. Job done!