A Country Life

Hello and what a few weeks it has been sorry for not posting but we have not had internet connection in the house yet so when we did manage to get to the coffee shop Christian was communicating with the office and working so no room for me on the laptop.


View from the beach houses back garden, the grass leads to the sand dunes and down to the beach, so we don't have too far to walk for our lunch time picnic.
Jumping on a plane to the other side of the world and then trying to set up a home for five months on a shoe string and what a small shoe it is, has been a challenge. The exchange rate is not in our favor and to our fun and amazement this country town has garage sales..... oh my goodness it's like a giant treasure hunt around the town. On a Friday the local paper has a list of the sales for the weekend and armed with a map you plan your loop around town. They start at 8am so the early bird catches the worm or in our case a coffee table, baskets, dressing table, monopoly game, candle stick, side lamp, back gammon case and so much more. It certainly has helped me navigate my way around town and meet lots of people.


Collection of just some of the treasures we have found to decorate the Beach House.
On every saturday the farmers come to town from the surrounding areas to attend the farmers market with all their wares. A perfect setting in the park, lush green grass surrounded by gorgeous Eucalyptus trees by the cathedral in the centre of town. The size of the vegetables and the quality was fantastic, and of course I used a couple of the baskets I had found at a garage sale earlier that morning. I felt so happy with my baskets of vegetables and fruit I could have skipped across the park, this will be my weekly destination from now on.





All the furniture we have collected so far has been sanded and the mammoth paint-a-thon has begun each needing three coats so it has taken quite a few days. Another stroke of luck was the 'Spotlight' sale, this is a store like I have never seen before, just about every imaginable craft material you could ever need under one roof, it makes Hobbycraft look like a part timer. They had a sale on their fabrics if you bought the whole roll is was a $1 a meter.. yes a $1, I knew exactly what I was looking for and there was a perfect match buried under a pile of upholstery fabrics. We had managed to find a three piece lounge suit for just $270 in a second hand store that with a coat of white paint on its tied wooden frame and a blue stripe for some new fabric covers would give me the Ralph lauren beach house look I want for the house. Using just 10 meters of fabric to cover the cushions and unpicking the existing covers for the zips I was away. But what about a sewing machine I hear you say, well my little guardian angle has been working overtime in the last week as a lovely gentleman called Sean from Castlemart which was a secondhand furniture store gave me a vintage Singer sewing machine. We purchased a number of bits of furniture in his last week of trading before he closed his store after it had been open for 36 years and simply gave me the sewing machine as a welcome gesture to town. After a while of trying to work out this old machine I had managed to wind a bobbin spool but just couldn't get the tension right, so me and my new sewing machine headed into town the very next day to see the Geraldton Sewing Center. There I found Sharon who gave me a quick lesson on how to use this lovely old machine, I love country towns it would seem that nothing is too much trouble.



View from the beach house I could sit all day sewing and watching the ships in the distance slowly edge along the horizon.