Throw Another Log on the Fire

Brrrrrrr!!!!

Its freezing here!!  I arrived 'down south' 10 days ago.  Perth was rainy, windy and cold for the 24 hours I was there.  And the road trip Thursday to Kalgoorlie was the same.  We left Perth around 11.30am 9 days ago and it took us pretty much 6 hours exactly so by the time we got to 'Kal' my friend had finished work and I went back to her place for the night.  She has just installed a 'donga' (transportable quarters of 5 small rooms) behind her mums house, that she bought second-hand.

As I am broke, broke, broke - I am on a strict budget.  My friends mum had a heap of orange trees and a mandarin tree in the backyard just full of fruit so if I felt a bit peckish I would have a couple of them.  My friend had left me instructions to help finish off the 'extra' Jenny Craig meals in the freezer that she had left over. Happy to help fix her guilt problem! And with the shopping for the camping trip (which I still had some food left over) I managed to go without another big shop while I was there.  I did pop to the corner shop to get 2 loaves of bread, 1 lt milk and a small jar vaseline for my chapped lips for $19!!!  I nearly fell over!

I then scored another lift with the bloke who I had travelled to Kal with, to my hometown where I have been (exept for 3 nights away on my mates farm) ever since.  My brother has an excellent vegie garden in so I have been making vegie soup every day and am really only shopping for staples every 3 or 4 days - milk, bread etc.  When I went to visit my friends farm I also gathered 2 large bags of pine cones to burn in the fire, 2 bags of lemons (I have made one batch of lemon cordial* already) and we made a heap of soap that is now curing.  More for fun than budgeting.


*Lemon Cordial Recipe

2 cups lemon juice (and then I strained it before use)
2 cups sugar

Heat in a saucepan till all sugar dissolved, cool and pour into bottles for storing in the fridge.

Dilute as per shop bought cordial.

Whats left?

Its been a range of many emotions while I've been packing up my late fathers house.  My mother passed away 2004 so theres also all her 'stuff' to contend with too. They both kept everything!!  I mean everything!! So apart from grief, I mostly feel overwhelmed.  Mum had cancer so I guess when she knew that it had got the best of her, she had time to label stuff and sort, and also write a list of what pieces of belongings whould go to whom - my brother or I.  Dad on the other hand died suddenly of a heart attack, and with his latest passion being research there was stuff just everywhere.  Each room - except his bedroom had papers and old photos and little scraps of paper spread everywhere. He obviously had a system but in our frenzy to clean up in preparation for incoming rellies and funeral arrangements we pretty much just had to throw all of it into a box and stack it away.  And it hasn't been touched for over 15 months. 

So its been a hugely slow process although I started with the easy stuff.  Sheets, blankets, dads clothes and mums (dad hadn't got rid of much of mums stuff either) clothes too.  Hundreds of books, over a hundred ornamants, mums art and craft work (everything from paintings to handpainted fabric made into cushion covers etc).  There were blankets from our childhood and quilts that I have put aside and as I go through all the belongings I find other 'stuff' that is tugging at my heart strings, my pile of stuff is building up and then I have to cull that too.  I have inherited some furniture (most of it made by my late great grand father) so I have to arrange for removalists too.  So can send it all back with that.

But as I go through each room and throw out mostly everything, I also sort of wonder what my parents would have wanted me to keep?  And I know that I can't take heaps back to my house so its very tricky to say the least.  Whats left of their lives after their passing that isn't just a bunch of trinkets? I mean dad published a book (he must of had a reprint before he died as there are about 7 boxes of them) and mum was an artist so there is heaps of her art too.  Out of all of their photo albums (did I mention dad was into photograhy so there are mega amounts of photo albums and packets of negatives) I will only be able to keep a few photos from each otherwise it will just be out of control. But basically it seems their lives has boiled down to what they let behind.  And frustratingly what my brother and I can't keep - there are just so many memories in everything but it would be impossible to hang onto it all.  We both live in smaller dwellings and physically cannot keep everything we would like to, and thats probably a good thing (that we physically can't fit all this stuff into our homes) as I could imagine trying to add all this stuff to my stuff at home - phew!!

May I suggest that everyone go through their stuff and do a major cull?  Luckily I had been reading for a year prior to my father passing, a heap of organising books (and though my BF can't see it) I had been systematically going through each room and trying (its not always easy) to get organised.  Clothing that hadn't been worn for a year - donate or sell! Trinkets - regift, upcycle or donate! Now I am glad I had been doing all that as I have more stuff to come in. 

I miss my dog...