Daisy daisy

Hello from the NSW South West Slopes

Firstly, I have to tell you that the chicken schnitzel with gravy at the Golf Club on Saturday night was absolutely delicious. Hopefully we will be going back there again sometime this holiday – and maybe this time we’ll win a meat tray!

Another thing you will need to know if you ever come visiting this way, is that there are a lot of daisies in the garden  – bring yellow shoes to disguise the pollen stains.

Today we discovered that getting a three year old to walk all the way home from a long hike up the road is easy with a little forward planning. My mum quietly set up a series of little stone cairns every 50 metres or so up the road on the way to Totoro’s Forest (as that is where we were going – I bet you didn’t know that Totoro’s Forest is on the South West Slopes of NSW). On the way home the challenge was to find each cairn and place a big stone on the pile. Lily was intrigued. There was hardly a grizzle.

Fascinatingly, my Dad is becoming a Birder. He has spotted 100 different bird species and entered them into his database. Today he spotted his 101st – the Red Capped Firetail. Amelia has started a list too. She has a new shiny red plastic pair of binoculars for her birthday and her plan is to out-spot Phoebe Snetsinger, the woman who managed to see 8400 birds by the time of her death.

In other news, when not walking, filling a shopping trolley with huge amounts of food to cook for a hungry holiday household, cooking, looking for birds or wrangling children, I am reading The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas… and loving it. I have been wanting to read it for the longest time and have finally caved and bought myself a copy as the waiting list at the library was enormous. I have heard such mixed reviews but his characterisations are brilliant. I know it won’t be everybody’s cup of tea but he makes me want to write more honestly and not shy away from uncomfortable, human truths.

So that’s me for today. How are you?