Life gets busy……

 post Covid I took a bit of time to get back in the swing of things and for the first few weeks I couldn’t manage to get out to do the markets on a weekend.  This made things a little harder for Bill but we managed and soon I was back where I should be albeit a little more slowly.  We had a few outings for coffee with friends at The Nest and Fare Enough.

My first big day out was with Bill to check on stock and while in Chiltern we called in to see Lisa Bishop who is a fabulous artist with a great shop in the Main Street.  A few years ago she did a painting of the Chiltern main st and produced it as a microfibre tea towel.  I have been going to get one for ages and each time they were sold out.  Today they were not so now at last I have my very colorful tea towel.

We have been checking out Galleries in other areas as we travel around and loved the exhibition which replaced Bill in the Kyabram Town Hall.  The Northern Plains Basket Makers had some interesting pieces on display and it was certainly different from Bill’s birds.  That day we also checked out a few galleries in Echuca.  It was a good day out and we enjoyed the different types of art that we saw.

We spent a delightful afternoon with Genevieve and Greg when they invited us to their place in Strathbogie for a barbecue lunch.  Together with Sue and Tony we all enjoyed the day.  At home Bill has been busy when not designing next year’s calendars.  He has decided to transfer all our music off the computer and make it so we can take it and listen to in the car.  It’s been a long job but great now it’s done.

Another fun night out happened when the Euroa Photography Group had a treasure hunt down at the creek.  Armed with a list of items to photograph they all set off to find and capture them.  Judi and I joined them afterwards for a barbecue tea in the park.  

We called into the Shepparton Art Museum (SAM) one day for lunch and then had a look around.  Now in its new home it is a lovely space and we saw some great items on display.  As always a few that made one scratch their head in wonder as well.  Another visit to Shepparton saw us visiting The hospital as Bill had an appointment with the physio.  While there I found this gorgeous mural of the ever present Cockatoo and couldn’t resist snapping it.

A bit of excitement at the museum one day as I was indexing the rate books.  We had a visit from the Postcards crew who were doing a story on Euroa.  We met Todd Woodbridge who was hosting that episode.  He was very interested in what I was doing and it was nice to meet him.  No filming for that though so I’m not to be the star just yet!

Line Dancing, the museum, Family History, Trivia and helping out at The One World shop are all keeping me out of mischief while Bill continues to work away with new design ideas for cards, calendars etc.  As we start thinking about getting away this year Bill has been kept busy with getting the car serviced and the van has been taken to Shepparton to have some work done.  

The week before Easter we had a surprise visitor to Melbourne and joined the family at the Chelsea RSL to catch up with our gorgeous niece, Shanae and her partner Travis, who were visiting from Brisbane.  It was so nice to see them as it’s been a long time.  Lovely to be able see the rest of the family before we head off again.

Our last month of markets have been busy.  We are looking forward to a break but before we do we have one more big one to go.  The Mansfield Easter Bush Market is on Easter Saturday and we drove up on Friday and stayed at Shelley and Darren’s cabin again.  The 5.00 start for set up is very early but necessary as the market starts at 8.00am.  We had a great day and we were very grateful to be able to stay in the cabin for one more night and rest up before heading home the next day.

The following weekend we returned to Mansfield to catch up with Shelley, Darren and Kyan.  We spent the morning enjoying the sunshine on the deck and then drove to a small nursery just out of town for coffee.  This quirky little place has it’s coffee shop operating out of an old horse float.  Returning to Euroa that afternoon we joined Judi and Peter and a few of their friends at their place for a late lunch.  Delicious home made pizzas, good wine and great company made for a fun finish to the day.

At last we collected the caravan from Shepparton and now we have to clean and pack in readiness for our winter escape.  The weather is getting cooler and we certainly feel like it’s time we weren’t here.  I have finally been able to get my third booster shot so hopefully will be safe as we travel around.  A few days later I got my flu needle as well so fingers crossed.

But first we have to catch up with a few people.  We had a delicious dinner at our new Indian Restaurant with Judi, Peter, Bethany and Neil one night.  Another delicious meal at Northern Republic with Janet and a really delightful day at Baileys Winery in Glenrowan with Marion and John from Benalla.  Pizza and wine in the garden with lots of catching up was a very pleasant way to spend some time.  We’ve snuck in a few coffee dates as well with Rae and Wayne, Joan, and just us a couple of times.  Loved popping into to celebrate little Zara’s 1st birthday and catch up with a few other people I hadn’t seen for a while.

Finally it was time to get serious and finish packing the van.  Tomorrow is the day we head off.  Watch this space to see where to next.

until next time…….

2022 begins……….

 with a fervent hope that things would improve and Covid-19 was going to become a memory relegated to history.  As time has gone on this is not the case and as new strains emerge we see huge numbers being infected each day and more people dying.  Having said that life has returned more or less to normal as each state has opened borders, both national and international, and done away with the majority of restrictions.  It really is up to each individual to take care and keep up with the recommended vaccinations. 

For Bill and I we had a day of rest on the 1/1 then got straight back to work with a drive to Stanhope to see Deb at Many Makers Gallery.  It was time to do the rounds to pick up any unsold Christmas cards and calendars.  Not very many left at all which was good to see.

The next day was ‘Meet the Artist’ at Bill’s exhibition at the Kyabram Town Hall.  Still technically a Public Holiday we didn’t know if anyone would even come.  We were pleasantly surprised as quiet a few people dropped in to check it out and talk all things photography and birds with Bill.  It was lovely to see people appreciate his work.  We had a surprise visit from Ben and Jen who drove up from the city to see the exhibition and us.  It has been many years since we had caught up so lovely to see them both again.  We also caught up with Kathy and Russell who dropped in with some friends.  They invited us to come back to their place after we had finished and we ended up staying for dinner.  The delicious roast lamb and vegetables were a real treat. 

The next two days were busy as we drove first to Mansfield to catch up with Shelley, Darren and Kyan and then Bill did a day on his own out to Yackandandah, Beechworth, Chiltern, Rutherglen, Glenrowan and Benalla.  I spent a quiet day at home.

With just three more days to trade in Pop Up Arts Euroa for this season Bill and I opened up and had a fairly quiet day with just a few sales.  Carmel’s earrings were the popular items sold today.  The last two days were reasonable and on Saturday afternoon and Sunday we packed up the shop and saw most unsold items returned to their makers.  Once again it had proved to be a great success and we look forward to doing it again next year.  We finished the season as we did last year with a breakup barbie during the week.  Valerie, Carole, Ross, Ali, Melanie and Simon all came round and we enjoyed a fun night with a simple barbecue, good wine and great friends.  Going to bed at one o’clock that night made me ask the question how on earth did I do this every weekend for a number of years.  Old age must be setting in - surely not!

I joined Roma at Cafe 56 the next week with some friends and family to celebrate her birthday and we all had a lovely time over coffee and scones.  We had a few trips to Shepparton the next week as I had to have 3 different medical procedures all on different days.  I think the car could go there on its own!  The results were all good when they came in but I have been referred to a specialist in Shepparton to follow up on my surgery in Cairns last year.  Things don’t seem to have settled down as they should have but good to know all is well otherwise.

We returned to Kyabram to check out the exhibition and were pleasantly surprised to find that four pieces had sold.  With just two more weeks to run we decided not to replace them but just did some rearranging instead.  Bill returned to take it all down at the end of the month and was very happy with how things had gone.

We drove to Alexander and Yea one day.  Outside the Yea Wetlands Discovery Centre we found this new sculpture titled Gurrong dharrang, The Scarred Tree.  With the artwork by Taungurung artist Sammy Trist it is a Eucalyptus tree featuring Indigenous line art and the Taungurung totems, Bundjil the wedge tailed Eagle and Waang the Crow.

Leaving here we continued on to Seymour where Bill had booked us into Blue Tongue Berries for lunch.  This little blueberry farm has a lovely cafe on site where lunch is a set menu consisting of two servings of yummy dumplings followed by the most decadent blueberry tart, said to have a punnet of blueberries in each slice, served with a delicious blueberry and bush lemon ice-cream.  Totally scrumptious and as neither of us could eat all the dumplings we brought them home and ate them for a very late dinner that night. 

During January only Violet Town and Euroa markets are on and we attended both of these and were very lots of happy with the results.  It was good to back out there and the weather was nice both days.  We have had lots of catch-ups, coffee and lunches with friends in town.

We spent a lovely morning in Benalla one morning with Bill taking me to meet Marion and John who live on the Broken River just out of town.  While Bill spent some time taking photos of the birds along the river I had a nice walk with Marion around the property.  Afterwards we all had coffee and a long catch up inside.  A thoroughly enjoyable morning.

Now here is where my sad tale of woe begins.  That afternoon I started to feel unwell with a nasty sore throat developing and a very bad headache.  Together with more of a cough than usual I was more than a little worried.  We were due to leave for Mansfield the next day for the Australia Day Market on Saturday. That night I went to bed early but got worse through the night with fever and I suggested Bill stayed in the spare room as we didn’t know what was wrong with me.  Of course during January there were no RAT ‘s available so we could only guess what was wrong.  The next day as I was no better we decided that Bill had better go to Mansfield on his own and I would stay here and hopefully recover.  He did and though tiring had a very good market.  He stayed the extra night as planned and came home on Sunday.

He’d rung me before leaving and as I was still bad he called in to a testing site on the way home.  They would not test him as he had no symptoms but gave him two RAT,s to bring home.  I tested immediately and straight away it showed positive.  I had Covid!  Bill showed negative but had to isolate now for seven days.  I reported my results as directed and the next morning had a phone call from GV Health who did a thorough medical check over the phone and decided that my age and BP put me into a high risk group and as such I had to go to the hospital and get an anti viral infusion.  This was to prevent me getting pneumonia and having to go to hospital.  Bill drove me over and while I was there he managed to get a PCR test which came back negative as well.

As you can imagine our next week was very quiet.  We lived at different ends of the house and Bill stayed in the spare room.  While Bill worked on all sorts of new ideas for the market I watched lots of catch up TV and slept alot.  At the end of the seven days and still showing negative Bill was free to go out again so the first thing he did was go and get his third booster which had been due the day after I tested positive.  Because of the treatment I had been given I couldn’t have mine for 90 days.  Still feeling quite unwell I didn’t venture out for a few more days and then wore my mask wherever I went.

So hopefully from here on 2022 will be free of drama but I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

until next time………