Abby's Sunday morning

Spring Sunday mornings in Melbourne bring out the lawn mowers & the car washers. The clocks went forward last night & daylight saving has begun. Only six months until we turn them back again & say a grateful hello to autumn! I don't want to wish my life away but I don't enjoy summer. However, I could hardly complain about the weather at the moment. This morning was glorious & I was out washing the car bright & early, well supervised by Abby. Once she realised splashing water was involved, she left me to it & retreated to her favourite spot under the hebes where she could make sure I didn’t miss any dirty spots but not get wet. Then, I did a little weeding, feeding & tidying up overhanging branches around the garden & took a few more pictures of spring in the garden. 

This is one of the Don Alphonso tulips I planted in the autumn. They've just started blooming this weekend.

Red geranium in bright sunshine near the front fence.

I don't know what these flowers are. A friend gave me two beautiful blue pots when I moved in five years ago & these lovely bulbs blossom every spring.The photo's not very good but they're the most delicate pale blue.

Finally, this is the climber, Snowbell, just about ready to break out into lovely creamy blossoms near the back door.

I’m also trying out my new oven by baking a fruit cake. I’m very excited about the oven as I’ve never had a new one before, just whatever was in the houses I’ve lived in. It’s a gas stove & I’ve only had electric in the past. But, we had a gas oven in my parents’ house & I’ve always preferred cooking with gas, it’s so much easier to control the temperature for simmering. I’m still learning the finer points of simmering with this stove though as the fruit caught when I was boiling it for the cake & it took a lot of scrubbing to clean the saucepan. I’m also a bit worried about the cooking time & temperature recommended by the manual. It’s a fan assisted oven & the manual suggests 130 degrees for 3 hours. This seems too long & too low a temperature to me but I’ll give it a go, keep my fingers crossed & post a photo later if it works out. Maybe I’ll still post a photo even if it’s a disaster! 

I can’t resist posting one more photo of Abby just because she looks so lovely. I took this yesterday afternoon on the back step. I hope you’re enjoying your Sunday wherever you are.