Patience, visiting Sydney and 

HAPPY EASTER!

Taken very early in the morning

I have had to exercise enormous patience waiting for the demolition of the old house to be completed.  A drive-by every two days has not managed to hurry things up at all!.  As a consequence,  we have visited Sydney quite a bit in the past two weeks.   Last week,  a friend and I went to see War Horse - the theatre production.  We were spellbound throughout the performance,  after which there was a standing ovation.  Hand fulls of tissues were essential as the magnificent puppetry conveyed the emotions of the horses  - quite extraordinary. The war scenes depicted were incredibly real as a result of fantastic lighting, sound and puppetry.

It's a bit exciting visiting Sydney and having the chance to window shop and walk the streets,  in between a coffee or two.  I've grown to love this city, but not quite as much as the Southern Highlands!  I was given a couple of very beautiful scarves for my 60th birthday last year and I wore one of them last week - something I never seem to do on the farm!

Bunny and Penny were extremely naughty in Sydney.  While we were out one day,  Penny (and perhaps Bunny) spent considerable time trying to get a tennis ball out from beneath the sofa.  The evidence in the photo below might explain why I was extremely cross with both of them.  They hate Sydney,  and I am really worried about the coming months we will be spending there while our new house is being built.  They both fall into a decline and mope about as if their lives are about to end!!!

They really are much happier on the farm... This era of their little lives is sadly soon to end ....

I did a little tidying up of the garden in Sydney,  and also enjoyed a visit from Miss Kitty one afternoon!

Sydney courtyard garden

Miss Kitty in her ballet outfit!!

We have also had a couple of "last supper's"

 here on South Acres Farm which have been fun - perhaps bitter/sweet...I have since been emptying out drawers, clearing out cupboards, throwing out and making piles and piles of stuff to be packed when the move happens on 15 April.

The Autumn garden has been lovely  - we have had unusually hot, dry weather which promises good autumn colour as the month of April progresses.

Taken this morning - mist in the distance, with early rays just catching the petals of the Naked Lady

The wind-flowers are always so welcome in the Autumn and make a glorious sight!

The Cimicifuga are flowering now - their feathery tales swaying in the breeze!
Flower arranging in Autumn is always a pleasure as arrangements seem to last much longer.  The Hydrangeas go on for days and days!

We are spending Easter in Mollymook which I am looking forward to enormously.  Long walks on the beach,  healthy eating and fun with the family... what more could anyone wish for...

Wishing everyone a very happy Easter! 

THE NEW HOUSE BEGINS!

These past weeks have been both busy and quite exciting.  The latter because we have appointed a builder to build our new house. We have bought an old house in 'old Bowral' .. which is coming down and we will be building a new one in it's place.  I quite like the existing house.  It has two bay windows, is full brick and I thought it would renovate well.  But as we investigated further,  it became apparent  that the damp problems were pretty serious.  The builder told us that starting again would be cheaper in the long run.

Over the next months,  I will be sharing the building experiences and developing house... deliberating over decisions and ideas.  I do feel that I could be presumptuous in assuming that you all might be interested!  I will however,  have these posts to reflect back on when the projects reaches the end.

Below are a couple of pics of the old house.  The elevations have been drawn by Andrew Bell.  This is the second house that we are working on together and as before,  it is a pleasure.

The old house sits on a 1500sq meter block and it faces North.
  

Situated on a lovely street in "Old Bowral.  An easy walk into the town.

The rear of the property

This is the front elevation and to the far right is the garage which is shown in the photo below.

I love the new plans and am so looking forward to the whole project!  We are in the process of making many many decisions.  I know that the lovely Heidi of Adelaide Villa knows all about this as she is in the process of renovating her lovely home in Adelaide at present.

The demolishing team have been taking the old house apart for the past 10 days and I will show pics of the empty block in  the next post! 

I have found that Pinterest has been a wonderful place to  find and store ideas!  I am presently dreaming of ideas for the new garden.

Before I can really begin enjoying things I still have the move to face.  We have lived on the farm for 8 years and there is an enormous amount of clearing out and organising to get on top of.   Happy days!!