News & Updates from Vicki Avcin ~ AusCrafts · Page 78

Anyone that knows me knows I definitely dont have a green thumb.

Well I do but the only variety of things I manage to grow without a problem is weeds…….. they just seem to take over the garden and occasionally some of the real plants that are managing to surviveactually flower.

So imagine my delight when some of the of roses growing bloom! I was especially chuffed a couple of weeks ago when one of the roses managed to put out tworoses from the one stem.

Usually its one bud at a time that opens so I never have a massivedisplay and these two roses pictured both opened on the same day.

But look at the differencein their colour. The pale pink is the usual colour with a hint of darker pink on the edges of the petals. But the other one was a pale pink with the deep red colour on the edges.

They were beautiful and the perfume from them was divine. These always have a lovely smell but it was even more so from both of them this time.

Now I have no idea what Ive done (I did do some weeding in that garden in the couple of weeks prior) so did they reward me for clearing around them or was it just the rain that wed had and theyd had a good drink?

The three roses I do have growing are over 10 years old and were here when we brought the place so probably a lot older than that, and this is the first time 2 different colours from the one stem of the same plant weve had since being here.

Might be time to give them some TLC and they might reward me again.

26th January saw Aussies celebrate Australia Day.

The way its celebrated varies but it is a public holiday and the majority of Aussies celebrate with a BBQ with snags (sausages) being the main cuisine, but steak and other meat items are also on the menu according to ones tastebuds. (throw another shrimp on the barbie?) Copious amounts of amber fluid (beer) is also consumed also during the day.

Various traditional games are played also throughout the day such as Thong Throwing, Backyard cricket is extremely popular (with wheelie bin stumps), Cockroach racing and Dunny Racing.

All these things take place in backyards, streets, parks and at the beach all over the country.

It is a day when all Australians celebrate this great land and all it has to offer. Australia Day is the official national day of Australia.

Celebrated annually on 26th January, it marks the anniversary of the 1788 arrival of the First Fleet of British ships at Port Jackson, New South Wales and the raising of the Flag of Great Britain at Sydney Cove by Governor Arthur Phillip.

We celebrate the countries diversity, we reflect on our history and citizenship ceremonies are held around the country. The photo is taken down at my fire station where members got together and had a BBQ and relaxed.

We werent sure quite how long the celebrations would last as the temperature was around 35 deg Celsius so some couldnt celebrate with the alcoholic fluid and had to stick to the soft drinks in case the call came to attend a fire.

None the less we all had a great day.

22nd January saw the start of the school year for Aussie kids. Although most children started on the Monday for the majority some did not start till Tuesday. Our grandkids were there all ready for the new year and looking forward to it.

Zoe started her second year of high school (year 8) while Zac started his first year of high school (year7).

Riley is still in primary school as is Nathaniel. Chloe also is in high school (year 8) Even little Bella graduated from baby kindy to toddler kindy this week.

Ive not got photos yet of Chloe or Nathaniel but as you can see in the photos the others are happy to go back and see all their friends and learn new things.

As it worked out Chloe was lucky as it was her birthday on Monday 22nd January and as she is in 2nd year high school she didnt start till Tuesday….. so day off for her birthday!

As usual with grandkids growing up and not knowing clothing sizes or what they liked (especially with teenage girls) we were trying to work out what to get them as presents this year.

With some investigative work regarding their interests, we came up with the idea of getting some mugs made up and personalising them.

Chloe and Zoe (the teenage girls) both love clothes and clothes shopping as does any girly girl so their mugs featured vector style ladies and their shopping bags.

Zac is into space and loves his telescope so his had the planets and a telescope Riley loves riding his little motorbike so pics of him and his bike went on.

Nathaniel loves dragons so of course what else but a dragon!

Axl is still a bit young for a china cup so as he loves playing with his dinosaurs we did a shirt with an Axl-saurus on it……. and its a hit because he wants to wear it morning noon and night daily.

The other mug has pictures of my daughters dog Jaylee on it with the words For Mum on it and her partner who has Jaylee for most of the week while Bridget is working had For my Other Mum on it.

They all absolutely love their mugs and were quite impressed that as they put it…… Its out of the box thinking.

Each mug and Axls shirt had From Nanny & Poppy Christmas 2017 on them somewhere and each one also had a small inspirational quote on them.

So glad we went down this avenue for presents this year and it made shopping a lot easier.

The other 2 grandkids got other things as they are still small. Bella got a Ty Toy (small plush toy) and the new baby Clay, only 2 weeks old, got a big soft teddy with Christmas 2017 on its foot as a keepsake for his first Christmas.

This is the first really spectacular red sunset this year. Our normal weather patterns for 2017 have had records smashed but 2018 has seen a pretty normal summer in my part of the world so far.

Although down in NSW they broke records for the daily temperatures with places going over 47 deg C. In fact last Monday the hottest 15 places in the world were all in Australia for the day. Weve averaged around 32 deg C so far this January.Our skies have been clear at sunset till Thursday when there was some cloud and this gave us this brilliant sunset.

From the deepest of orange to beautiful golds and yellows to fade off into gorgeous pinks and purples as the sun set.

Quite often we see these sunsets when there is a lot of smoke around but there were no fires so this sunset was just beautiful to see.

These photos taken from my yard.