CHRISTMAS TREE, MAGENTA BUDDHA AND TERMITES

Hi everyone!

I'm still here but have been a little preoccupied with other things this past week such as a little painting and sketching, some Christmas shopping, more clearing in the garage to make room for tradesmen to work, and watching DVDs with the kids. I also caught up with some blog reading which I always love to do. In fact, I probably spend way too much time doing that but hey, what can I say....I love reading blogs!

The heat has been absolutely horrible this past week and I feel like it zapped all my energy. It's truly sauna-like conditions here with the humidity so high. At 11pm last night, it hadn't changed which made for a very uncomfortable sleep. Forecasts say we may get a storm tonight so, hopefully, it won't cause any damage like the last one did but will cool things down instead.

On Monday, we finally put the Christmas tree up. It has always been our family tradition to put the tree up on December 1st and then take it down before the New Year enters. This year, we held off and waited for Beau to be available as he bought us the new tree last year and he's the only one who remembers how to fit it all together. It's one of those fibre-optic types with lights so there are electrical cords everywhere.

Pigma Micron pen, ZIG pen, & coloured pencil in A5 sketchbook
Click on any image to enlarge

More sketching.........Mum gave me a Buddha many years ago and I decided to give it a new look. Previously, this Buddha was the typical dark cherry red colour but I have now gone with a bold magenta. WOW! What a difference! I painted the frame of Michelle's print in a pale yellow-green and it sits beside the Buddha and they compliment each other perfectly.

Watercolour crayon, ZIG pen, & micron pigma pen in A5 sketchbook

OH, remember those termites we discovered way back in September? Well, it took the landlord/property manager three weeks to actually do anything about it which happened to be when I discovered a second area of termite presence, on top of my constant phone calls and emails. They finally had the termite control guy come out to check it out. Thankfully, he said the termites we had weren't the aggressive type. He then came back two days later and drilled tiny holes in the suspect areas and loaded the wall cavities with a pesticide of some sort. Now, two months later, they have come back to repair the damage. The repairs involved cutting out the wall area and removing the internal nest and damaged wood and plaster/gyprock. Each of the various tradesmen who have been dealing with us over this issue have said that we were very, very lucky that the termites only caused damage to two small areas. Someone up there must have been looking out for us. Mind you, the pic certainly doesn't look like it was small damage but I guess the tradesmen have seen a lot worse. All that nest you see in the pic was pulled out from inside the wall cavity. Incredible, huh?! That small section that is cut out in the pic was only cut out so they could remove the nest. They actually took away three feet of the wall in width, from cornice to skirting.

Today, the plasterer came and put up the gyrock sheeting ready for the painters who will hopefully finished the job early next week. I'm just so relieved that it will soon be over with and things can get back to normal around here.

How has your week been?

Love, light and peace