37 Black Swans: November 2011

Well after our 2 late nights, Sunday morning was a slow start...for Tom at least... John was up pricing books and I did a couple of loads of washing.The tide was up very high this morning when I did my walk..looked lovely

After breakie we decided to spend some time in the shop...pricing books and setting up Christmas stock...so we opened the doors to customers. We had alot of curious visitors...and locals coming in to introduce themselves..

We took a morning tea break up at the Red Velvet. It was really buzzing...They had hosted their first Wedding Reception last night and the wedding guests were having breakfast..made me think of Jess and Aaron ...made me smile

Back to the shop to do a bit more..then a late lunch..
The boys decided to attack the garage...what a job.
They worked like trojans and I helped as best I could...but ended up baking a cake for them instead..
What a fantastic afternoon's work...

Finally we are able to park our cars in the garage...a simple thing but it feels so good. Now we are really home

We went for a walk down to see if the tide was up again...only to find it lower than low...must have got our times wrong...interesting though.

Sunday evening, and we began our Advent journey. Every night Tom will take a star from the path and place it in the sky over the stable..bringing a special gift to the scene ...this week it is minerals/shells. John suggested we light a tealight candle and place it in front of the travelling Mary and Joseph at night...it looks lovely and is a beautiful ritual at the end of each day as we head towards Christmas.

We went down to see the high tide before school on Monday...it was still coming in..

Monday was a busy day at the shop...lots of orders came through and John was busy making oils. We had an array of customers throughout the day. Quite an assortment of people some asking for New Age books, others wanting Murder Mysteries....its such fun.
Tom went to scouts and had a great time (as usual)...
After dinner I went for a walk up through town and enjoyed the sights and sounds..

Little lambs in someone's front yard

AFL training at the oval

I was contemplating the joys of knowing people in this community and feeling like we are known too.

The other day Tom and I were walking up to the Post Office and a boy hung out of a car to yell 'Hi Thomas' and then a little girl in the IGA called 'Hi Tom'..Nice
There are a few Christmas decorations going up around town. Simple but lovely.

lights at Red Velvet

Tom is going to take part in the Christmas Parade down the main street on Christmas Eve. The school is organising a float depicting the First Christmas. Should be alot of fun.
Tuesday I had a lovely walk to begin the day.

Lotus eaters window display..lovely

We had a lovely range of visitors.. some enjoying and buying the toys and others in raptures over the books.. John is in his element.
We had a call from a book dealer who wants to sell alot of his stock. John nows him as he has a shop in Hobart. He plans to specialise in only Tassie Books so is selling the other books. We will be meeting him at Sorrel Markets early Sunday morning...
It really warmed up today...quite humid in fact reaching 27 degrees.
I went over to Tom's class to help with craft. Tom's teacher Julie rang me earlier to say Mr Nicholson the music teacher was covering her class that afternoon. We had a great time making Christmas decorations and singing along to the Christmas music he put on...lots of activity,noise ,laughter and GLITTER!!
The afternoon became quite grey and heavy with humidity. The boys got to work on leveling the gravel outside the garage...I decided to go for a walk before dinner. We could hear the noises of Cricket being played on the Oval at the end of town..really lovely.

Wednesday and we woke to heavy rain... it had begun overnight.
The temperature had dropped but still a mild 16 degrees aiming for 19 degrees.
Luckily the rain eased ast is graduation day for St James Year 10 class. I went over to see the beginning of their Graduation mass at 10am...lovely.

We had an interesting afternoon with a visiting family of 5 who stayed browsing in the shop til nearly 5pm...just couldn't kick them out at 4..
The bought 8 books and enjoyed being in the space..playing with toys, riding the rocking horse and just quietly reading...really nice.
The weather was very changeable.. I planned to go for a walk then the heavens opened and it poured down..so I decided to wait half an hour, enjoying a sit down with a cuppa.
Sure enough, the sun came out and we all went alking down to Martin's Point. The wind was bitterly cold so we were glad to be rugged up.. We had a very enjoyable potter around the foreshore as it was low tide. The boys started crab shell collecting and came back with some treasures.

The weather looked like it was heading in again so we made for home.

Thomas rollicked home taking the opportunity to hurdle every fence along the way...oh what a life!!

After dinner I went out for a short walk around town...brrr bit chilly. I was drawn to the wonderful rose garden around St James..such a stunning display. I get great pleasure seeing them each day ..

Stopped to view our window display before heading inside for a hot shower, a cuppa and a good book

Thursday and the boys were hard at work on a major lego project.

We packed two big orders and a number of small ones before opening up for the day.. Very chilly morning...with sun , cloud and wind in varying degrees..
Another day of intersting customers looking at and buying books. Others looking at and buying our products...
John headed into Hobart after lunch to pick up our Christmas tree and do a bit of shopping.
I had a reasonably quiet afternoon with curious tourists passing through the shop. Definitely getting into the tourist season now..

Tom engrossed in Spiderman book he borrowed from the library

Set for a Tassie Christmas..tree fromKilliecrankie farm

Friday and the day began with stunningly blue skies.

Ryan and his colleague came by at 8.30 to do a walk-through the building to complie a defects list. He will take this to Dave the builders and start attacking the jobs hopefully next week sometime.

Tom went off happily to school after an intense lego-building morning.

We had a cuppa at Lotus Eaters before opening at 10am. Plenty of orders to keep us busy and customers buying toys, medicines and creams. Every day brings new and interestingpeople into the shop. We are so enjoying the process of engaging in conversations with them and learning about their backgrounds and how they come to be in Cygnet.

Thomas completed his lego model while we finished in the shop.

After closing we decided to go in to Hobart as john was after a book he'd seen the other day when in town. After collecting the book we parked down at Constitution dock and had dinner at T42degrees..a restaurant on Elizabeth pier. The place was really buzzing with people having a drink after work, tourists, Christmas parties and lots of action on the harbour. A cruise ship was in port and set sail as we waited for our meal..

Love the fish-eye lights

We took a walk after dinner over to Salamanca Place and Tom enjoyed an icecream for desert while we people watched and looked at some Christmas decorations

Silly girls night out in Hobart

Saturday and the morning was cool and windy.

John got on with some work in the lab while I got the washing underway and Tom had a sleep in. The boys them went up the street to get some milk and the papers. We read about yesterday's celebrations on the Derwent in Hobart to mark 100 year since Douglas Mawson's Antartctic voyage.

I also spotted an article about an Open day at Anglesea Barracks in Hobart to mark its 200 year anniverary. We decided to make the trip into town late morning after doing more chores, as the fantastic flying team the Roulettes were to do a fly-over at 12.30...was worth the effort..had a great day...(Libby would have groaned at all the brass bands!!).. and even saw the 4pm fly-over as we walked back to our car after a late lunch/coffee break at Battery Point. Exciting stuff!!