hello, where've you been?

Phew, that's another school holidays over with.

We had sleep-overs, friends over, the movies, the museum, swim parties, playdates, the library, shopping expeditions and rollerskating at the Rollerdrome where i almost shattered my kneecaps.

I'm not sure which is harder - making lunches, getting them to school and tackling homework , music practice and the bath every day or trying to stop them from killing each other during the holidays. Of the 13 hours a day they're together they get along really well for about 9, which is great but there's always that other 4 hours. *Shiver*

And my old cat who's about 18, flatly refuses to go outside any more for anything and she's a bit too old to learn new tricks. So she steps into a kitty litter tray but doesn't realise her arse is hanging right off the back and poops and wees all over the floor. Every night. But at least she steps into it now - she used to squat next to it.

Last weekend i was making a stuff for friends who've had a baby and my six year old decided to make one too. She designed and cut out the shapes, stuffed and sewed up the stuffing hole and cut out a face. I sewed on the face and added the hair for her but i think her stuff is a winner.

illness, death and destruction

it's been a week of mini catastrophes. My little one's just recovered from viral bronchitis and the wind's been a howling gale setting my nerves all a jitter.

A few streets from us lives an old italian couple who, over the last 45 years, have cultivated one of those typical old italian couple gardens. Full of amazing and unusual succulents that grow to triffid sized proportions. I walk past it every day and always stop to marvel. There's the Tractor Seat Plant whose leaves are the size and shape of - yep - a tractor seat and the Kalanchoe Felt Bush with giant stiff velvety leaves. There's a cactus that stands twice as high as the house with a trunk two foot in diameter and branches that weave and curve in all sorts of crazy directions in the sky and directly underneath that is a perfect Dracaena Draco which is one of my all time favourite trees. You can probably see where this is going, especially when i say there were all these wonderful things - on Sunday night the mighty wind ripped the cactus out of the ground and it crashed down crushing everything under it. The beautiful Dragon Tree is decimated and the old man was telling me that last year someone knocked on their door and offered them $10 000 (i'll put that in words - ten thousand dollars!) for it but they weren't interested in selling it.

Anyway, they kindly let me take what i could of the draco because they'd called rubbish removalists and it was all just going to be cleared away. Most of it was underneath the cactus and impossible to get to but i did manage to salvage a few stem cuttings which are about as big as me. I've got no idea if i'll be able to get them to strike, i don't think it's easy - they're prone to rotting. If anyone's got any tips let me know.



And finally this week, we woke up this morning to find our guinea pigs dead and gone. One's dead, the other's gone presumed dead and the big heavy cage had been knocked around and the wire rolled up. The incriminating evidence at the scene suggests a black and white cat (which is often in our garden) but how the fuck a cat can roll up chicken wire and have the strength to move a box that big and heavy i guess we'll never know.

Maisy and Popcorn we'll miss you.