7 Quick Takes Friday (Vol 130)

1
Last week we went shoe shopping and were fortunate to ‘strike it lucky’ at the sale table.  We picked up four pairs of sandals for only $5 each!  Thus leaving the shop with 6 pairs of shoes for $85!  I’m slightly embarrassed to admit yes, one pair was for me yet again, blush.

2
Talking ‘stretching the dollar’ we’re needing to be more frugal and part of the plan is to tackle our grocery budget, I’m looking at our meals searching for nutritious yet economical meals.  As we are grain free this could be a challenge indeed.   Any suggestions?

3
Last week Princess made Vanilla extract, simply vanilla beans and vodka.  She is keen to help out in the kitchen, not only creating but organising too.  Last night I walked into the kitchen to see my newly 11yr old with a drill in hand repairing cupboard doors:)

4
Our current building project for the past couple of weeks and the next two to come is roofing, specifically re-roofing our dining room.  It goes like this, temporary (past 2yrs) roof off, trusses on, sarking and then iron on.  As we only have weekends to work, our prayer whilst we have been ‘open to the elements’ was that it wouldn’t rain.  Yesterday morning at 3am saw PC and I hurriedly removing what little furniture was left out of the rain and spreading tarps over the floor and up the walls.  Once daylight came the tarp was stretched over the trusses. Today it is snowing in NSW, can you believe it, snowing in spring, a one in one hundred year spring snow!!!  Whilst it is not snowing here it is 2hrs away over the mountains and it is freezing with no roof.  Now we are praying the wind dies down tomorrow so we can put the iron sheeting on.

5
Yesterday did seem an endless day of dramas, despite plenty of undesired water about, the dam tank ran dry and yet we couldn’t get water to pump up.  After some worrying investigation it came to light early this morning that when the horse ( my brother’s horse) had escaped, last week’s dramas when 3 times the horse swam across the dam to another paddock,  he had dragged the pipe and buoy out, which was why the water was not pumping up.  There is still the situation of a hole in the pipes to investigate but for now we have water.

6
Went to town this afternoon to pick up Carpenter from work, he is helping a friend as builders labourer.  Whilst sitting in the van chatting to friends we heard a ‘burk’ and turned around to discover a chook!(chicken).  How strange to take a chook to town, the poor bird must have been trapped in the van for 7 hours, thankfully it was a cold day.

7
This afternoon I re-wrote our list of building tasks, all going well we could be finished by January 2014!!  I can hardly dare to believe it:)

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