Irene's Blog

Take a moment to listen today To what your children are trying to say. Listen today, whatever you do, Or they won't be there to listen to you. Listen to their problems, Listen to their needs; Praise their smallest triumphs, Praise their smallest deeds. Tolerate their chatter, amplify their laughter, Find out what's the matter, find out what they're after - But tell them that you love them, every single night, And though you scold them, be sure you hold them tight; Tell them 'Everything's alright - Tomorrow's looking bright!" Take a moment to listen today To what your children are trying to say. Listen today, whatever you do, And they'll come back to listen to you.

One of the lovliest things in life is when a wild creature trusts you enough to eat out of your hand. At the Silvan Reservoir (in the Dandenong Ranges, near Mount Evelyn, 50 km east of Melbourne), if you're really lucky, you can have this experience as we did. I have Rosellas come into my garden every day, but they are nowhere as friendly as the ones we met at the Reservoir. We had them on our heads, on our shoulders - one, two and three at a time. We had overseas visitors with us at the time and I think this was the highlight of their whole trip - and I can truthfully say, it was a highlight for me too.

CROYDON - what a great place to live. The Main Street (pictured) is a lovely small shopping area but there are a few much larger shopping malls within a short distance so it has the best of everything. Croydon is about a 45 minute drive east of Melbourne and lies at the foot of the Dandenong Ranges.

Anyone visiting Melbourne and taking a tour of the Dandenongs, would do themselves a disservice if they didn't visit the William Ricketts Sanctuary in Olinda. It's an amazing place - completely tranquil set amongst ferns and beautiful aboriginal sculpture. William Ricketts lived amongst the aboriginal people and was known to them as "Brother Billy". He died in 1993 at the age of 94. Once you've visited the Sanctuary, pop across the road to the tea rooms adjacent to the car park - they serve the most delicious Devonshire teas and there are a few more sculptures too, and don't forget to watch for the Rosellas which come down to feed on the bird feeders.

My Galileo thermometer.....it's a hot day today as it's reading 28ºC. The various coloured globes inside have weights attached to them. As the liquid changes temperature it also changes density and the weights go up or down accordingly. Each weight has a temperature engraved on it and the yellow one at the top in this instance is 28ºC. I find it pretty accurate within the range it covers which is between 16ºC and 28ºC so if it's any cooler or warmer than that, you'd have to refer to a normal thermometer. Looks good though.

I've been waiting for months to see if my Protea would flower and today the first one has started to open and I think it's beautiful. There are about 6 on the bush all in different stages of opening.

Hello, this is my first Blog.......until a few months ago, I'd never even heard the term so this is all very new to me. It's still very summery here in Victoria, Australia where I live even though the calender tells us it's now autumn. Last night, this is what we had on the wall of our house, a large huntsman spider - thank goodness it decided not to make it's way indoors or the family would have left in a real hurry. The Commonwealth Games finishes on the weekend but it's been a great time for Melbourne with lots going on in and around the city. As a Scot by birth, it was great to see the Scottish team in their kilts and even better to see them winning so many medals.