Monday 15 February 2010

MONDAY PHOTO-A-WEEK & .......

Firstly, I want to thank each and every one of you for your care and concern for Michelle. Thankfully, she was not facing a life-threatening condition and is doing much better now. She just needs a little time to heal emotionally. Michelle was very touched by all your well wishes and hopes to return to blogland in the near future as she does miss all her blogging friends. Thanks again....xo

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MONDAY PHOTO-A-WEEK

This week, Mary chose - CLOUDS - for our photo theme.

I adore Cumulus clouds and I LOVE cloud-watching! I remember when the kids were young, we would often try to see different shapes in the cloud formations. I still do that. In the lower half of the pic directly below, I can see the upper half of a flying dragon. Can you see it?



Click on any image to enlarge


If you're interested in joining our weekly photo group, feel free to check out the picture link under 2010 Happenings in my side-bar.


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WOW! What a busy week it has been!
We have some unwanted visitors staying with us at the moment....TERMITES!!!....AGAIN!!! The tradesmen only just finished doing all the repair work in December from the last lot. The bad news is that the particular variety staying with us now are the bad ones....the ones that can devastate a house within three months. YIKES! I notifed the Property Manager on the 4th as soon as we discovered the soft wall....the termite guy came to check it out on the 9th to confirm. He said would come back on the 12th to treat the termites and do a full house inspection provided his superiors gave the OK. I'm still waiting to hear back and it's now the 15th! All the while the termites are merrily munching their way through the house. A piece of trivia about termites that I never knew - They actually munch a lot faster if you have rock music playing. Who knew?! Needless to say, all loud bass and drum music is currently banned from being played in the house.
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On Monday, we rescued an injured crow.



Beau had spotted him/her near the bus stop on his way to TAFE so gave me a call. While many people see them as pests, I like them, and I just can't turn my back on an injured animal or bird so I went down and picked it up. It made no attempt to fly away and I couldn't see any outer bleeding so I figured he/she may have been hit by a car. I phoned the RSPCA and they told me to drop the crow into a veterinary clinic where it would be assessed...so I did. All local vets take in injured wildlife which are then hopefully treated and passed onto wildlife carers before being set free again. The vet said that they would do their best so I can only hope he/she survived to scavenge yet another day.

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Over the past couple of weeks we had A LOT of rain which actually caused electrical problems and flooding in some areas. Our back yard is flat so doesn't drain well at all...there is one little drain in the middle of the lawn which does nothing so our back yard always becomes like a swamp when it rains. Even now, five days since it last rained, my back yard is soggy and waterlogged....and smelly from the stagnant water. You can see the water just sitting on top of the lawn......I'm sure the mozzies will be having a hey day!


The Sacred Kingfishers are also having a hey day as the waterlogged lawn attracts lots of insects, such as dragonflies and mozzies. We have three Sacred Kingfishers that come and sit on our fence numerous times throughout the day, all with a keen eye on the lawn...then suddenly they will dive down to catch their prey. Sorry the pic isn't the greatest.....these birds are quick on the uptake and fly away the moment they see any movement so I had to take the pics through the flymesh screen. You will see him/her more clearly if you click on the image to enlarge it.


One night last week, we had another period of heavy rain and I forgot to bring my potted lavender plants undercover and it poured all night. The pots don't have holes in the bottom so this is the mess that I found the next day. I was so upset.


If you look closely you can see the level that the water is sitting at in the pot and I know that lavender hate wet feet. I drained it as best I could without losing all the soil with it. Note to self - Drill holes in the pots so it doesn't happen again.

There's a lot of new growth so I hope they will be okay as it will take days for the soil to dry out.



I was going to post some pics of sketches I've done this past week but, as this post is already photo-intensive, I will leave it off for another day.

On another note, Reece and his girlfriend, Sarina, left for a holiday in Thailand this morning....how exciting! I wish it were me. They will be staying in Phuket, then Bangkok, and will arrive back home on the 27th. I miss him already!


~ I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful weekend ~

Love, light and peace

22 comments:

  1. Oh I love your cloud pictures and I can see the flying dragon. :-)

    Serena, I love seeing your outdoor photos because it always reminds me of how beautiful Australia is. Thank you!

    I hope your lavender continues to blossom and bloom.

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  2. Hoping and praying Michelle will be perfect very soon again!!! She is such a beautiful girl...inside and out. I hope only the best for her, Serena!

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  3. So glad that you rescued the crow, they are favorites of mine. I rescued a hawk once and that was pretty neat.

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  4. Oh, Serena....termites again! That's terrible....and all that water, too. You seem to be having quite a time of it. I hope your lavender plants survive and your yard dries out.

    I do see the flying dragon in the clouds! I've been taking some cloud photos lately, too.

    Good for you for helping the injured bird. All creatures deserve to be helped when they're injured or sick.

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  5. Your clouds are so fluffy and white against the blue sky- lovely,
    How sweet of you to rescue the crow. Hope he heals quickly and is flying free soon.

    Hope your lavender gets over having wet roots and bounces back.

    Good luck with the termites. We fight them here, too. We've been treated 3 times but they keep coming back.

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  6. OMGosh! I can't believe you still have termites! I hope they allow them to do a really intensive search for them this time. Good grief! I can't imagine they can destroy a house in three months! Yucky and scary!

    The grass in the lawn here gets just like that in the spring and with hard rains. Water just sits there with tiny bits of grass poking out the top of the lake of water. But what are mozzies? If you could ever get a picture of one I'd love to add that to my new knowledge of Australian bugs--hehe! We have mosquitoes here, but they are so small. Are mozzies tiny, too? Maybe too small to get a picture of them? I do love the kingfishers, tho. I always think of your beautiful painting. I hope the poor lavender plants will be okay. And that Reece and Sabrina have a great trip! He must be feeling better. :)

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  7. So sorry to hear about the termites! We don't have them in my area (Thank God!) and I can NOT imagine an insect eating and destroying a home. Crazy! I know it's true, just CRAZY!
    Oh, the poor crow :( How nice of you to try help :)

    Hope you've been well Serena! Have a great week!

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  8. I am really glad that Michelle is not facing a life threatening condition and hope she heals fast. its a good thing that she has the support of her family to help her :)

    I do see a dragon in that cloud, very cool :)

    I hope you lavender survives!

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  9. In the top picture I see a running cartoon dog. In the second picture I couldn't get past the exotic looking trees to look at the clouds. Now I have to go back and read the rest of the post!

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  10. Your beautiful pictures bring me hope for Spring! They make me want to run out and garden. I had never heard the term mozzies before and had to look it up! I like it!

    Crows are so smart and worth rescuing! We had some guarding our yard one year because we were feeding them and they chased away a hawk that happend by looking for a squirrel snack. Our house looked like something out of a horror movie that year. We regularily had about 10 or 12 hanging about on fences and our roof.

    It's awful that the termites are back and worse! Hopefully they get to them in time!

    Great post Serena! Lots of fun to go through and see the interesting pictures!

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  11. Wow, you have had a busy week! First I'm so excited that you are excited about Reese's trip...how great is it to travel...something I have never done.
    I know what you are going through with a soggy yard...ours is just the same...we live at the bottom of the water table, close to the river and battle with wet all the time...termintes, hopefully no!
    As kids, driving down to the country, we always played finding objects in the clouds...why were there always clouds on those driving days? We have been overcast for a few days...maybe today, I will see a few clouds...my best to Michelle...Shelly

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  12. Oh my, you *have* had a busy week. I hope it isn't too overwhelming. Your cloud photos are beautiful. We won't see skies like those for several months yet I'm afraid. I am so ready for this winter to be over, LOL!

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  13. Oh yeah... I forgot to say that I hope the crow survived, bless you for saving injured animals. I also hope that the termite are sent on their merry way very soon. x

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  14. Wow, lots going on down there! Sorry about your messed up lavendar pot!

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  15. hi! i'm eleni from greece[ a pink dreamer]
    thank you for visiting my blog and became a follower! i hope you will like my recipe! in a few days i will post an onion pie!
    your paintings are fantastic!

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  16. Beautiful blue sky and big puffy clouds, love it.

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  17. Oh my goodness, Please send Michelle my love also. Bless her. She must of been feeling really ill. I hope she picks up quickly!

    Love to both and you and your family!

    Hugs!

    Julie

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  18. You poor thing, Serena, dealing with the termite infestation twice now. How funny that they chew faster if given musical impetus.
    (What on earth is a mozzie? A mosquito, maybe?)

    I thought the pic of the sacred kingfisher was fantastic. What a beautiful bird! The coloration of his plumage is spectacular.

    And I can definitely see the dragon within the summery cloud picture.

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  19. I love your sketches they are so beautiful. As kids we used to play at seeing things in the cloud formation. Even now I see things in clouds just like you and others.

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  20. My internet was misbehaving yesterday so I'm late getting around to blogs this week! But your clouds are so beautiful!!! I watch them here a lot, too, and have many photos.
    Bless you for rescuing the crow. I don't like them because they gobble all the food I put out for the smaller birds, but I admire you for doing that! And I love that picture of the Kingfisher...I've never seen one of those, maybe we don't have them in our area. Great photos all around!

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  21. So glad to read Michelle is doing better. Enjoyed reading and the photos!

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  22. Serena that looks like a Raven more than Crow? Then again, I could be wrong. I love Ravens, Crow, Jackdaws and Rooks!

    It drives me nuts that people think they are ugly.

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