March Wrap-up

The month started with my birthday on Monday the 2nd. 
As it fell on a public holiday, we had a picnic in a park by the river in South Perth, with our son, daughter in law and 2 grandkids. It was lovely to play with the kids, little J loved the kids play area and we had a great time.

A bunch of flowers from a colleague and the other from my son & family

Afterwards Jose and I drove around the river, stopping at Bayside Kitchen in Matilda Bay for a take-away coffee for Jose and an iced-chocolate for me.
We sat down on the grass watching the kids enjoying a splash on the river, adults on their canoes, the black swans gliding past...

Matilda Bay, with the Royal Perth Yacht Club in the distance, kids swimming, canoes, boats, black swans

Back to the car we drove to City Beach, which was almost deserted.
In the car park two vehicles caught our attention - a well cared for Valiant and a very stylish VW kombi, with red leather interiors, which had a sign on the back window "Wolfsburg bus crew" .
Wolfsburg is where VW's are made and it's just about half an hour's drive from Braunschweig, the city where we lived in Germany in the 80's, and where my children were born.
Our blogger friend Iris also lives in Braunschweig.












We observed a crow trying to get some food out of a discarded packet of crisps that was inside a cup which he pulled out of a bin. They are such clever birds.

On the way back home we drove past a few sculptures that have been in past "Sculpture by the Sea" exhibitions. Various Perth councils usually buy a few sculptures from the exhibitions and display them around their suburbs.

At night Jose and I had dinner at Super Tetsudo, a Sushi train Japanese restaurant at Carousel shopping.  And they really have a cute little train that delivers drinks and A la carte dishes, in case you don't any anything coming around the food carousel.

The white train with a bucket where Jose's wine was delivered 

On Wednesday 11th, I arranged with another committee member from the Portuguese Australian Women's Association to finally hand over a cheque of the funds raised during the Gala dinner in February to Zonta House Refuge Association for victims of domestic abuse.

Isabel and I hand over the cheque for $1323,35 to a Zonta House representative

My birthday party was planned for the Saturday 14th, when we would also celebrate my daughter Karina's 35th birthday.
She was expected to arrive that morning from the Philippines. 
Due to travel restrictions imposed to some Asian countries, she had already changed her previous flight via Hong Kong, to a longer flight via Sydney.
But the day before she was meant to fly, she called us to say she had bad news - Manila was being put in lockdown from Sunday 15th, and the airport would also close for 1 month, which meant if she left she would be unable to return for 1 month. (In Australia, self isolation for 14 days for any traveller entering Australia also came into effect on the 15th).

That night a few friends also cancelled worried about being in a group - there were no self isolating restrictions yet, or crowd restrictions, just travel restrictions from some Asian countries.
I carried on with the food preparation,although I cut down on a few things, and with Jose's help prepared the tables on the deck.
The weather had also suddenly changed and the prevision was rain and even storms....nothing was going to plan, lol.

I had made a board with photos with the most important events in my life, from birth until now, which I hung outside by the drinks table.

photo board over drinks table, outdoor area prepared and the table with food in the dining room

On Saturday morning a few more friends cancelled, and eventually from an expected 30 people we had a total of 16.
It drizzled, but not during party hours, I set up the food indoors, but we ate outside on the covered patio, and we all had a great time.

The cupcakes were make by a young lady from our local "Buy Nothing Group", as she has a cupcake home business. I just asked for pink themed ones - they were Velvet cake with pink icing, raspberries, a pink sugar flower and a pink mini biscuit. They were dainty and delicious.

To my birthday party came a family friend who had arrived from Portugal beginning of the month. She's known my parents even before they were married, met Jose when we were going out, attended our wedding....but we hadn't seen each other in many, many years, as we moved around the world and she also moved from South Africa to England and after our move to Australia, she moved to the south of Portugal after the death of her husband.

It was Elsa's first visit to Australia, she came with a friend and they were staying with a couple I had met shortly after our arrival in Australia. It was so nice to see her.

Elsa with Jose and I

Elsa brought a few gifts from my parents and sister in Portugal, and among the ones for the great-grandkids was my Mom's 2nd children's book, published in November last year, with a dedication to all her 5 great-grandkids.  (Nicolau's journey through the world of fantasy)

                   

On Wednesday 18th - after my half day at the Clinic I picked up Elsa and her friend and took them around to see the statue of Eliza, the swimmer and the Crawley Edge Boatshed (also known as the Blue House), Perth's most instagramable place.

Eliza, the swimmer in the Swan River and the Crawley Boat Shed and me, Elsa and her friend Esmeralda

Then onto Cottesloe Beach to see the yearly Sculpture by the Sea exhibition, which they thoroughly enjoyed. 

The Homer lookalike blowup was made by Australian Portuguese collective Cool Sh**.

The sun was setting when we left the beach and went across the road for a hot drink before I took my friends home. 

We planned to catch up the following week so I could take them to Caversham Wildlife Park so they could see and interact with dozens of Australian wildlife.

That just didn't happen, because just a few days after strict measures were put into place, and people were asked to avoid congregating and going out as much as possible.

They eventually departed to Portugal last weekend as all their planned travel to Sydney, Melbourne and then New Zealand had been cancelled, and apart from their first two weeks of sightseeing they had been staying home...

This month we were meant to celebrate my granddaughter's Christening and 1st Birthday, but that was cancelled due to the new guidelines issued the Government on gatherings.
So we had to contend with a Whatsapp video call to see the grandkids and sing Happy Birthday to little E. 
And sadly that is the only way we'll see the kids for a while...but we all have to play our part to stop this pandemic!!

                                                           * * * * * * * * *
I'm still working, and busier than ever as we had one colleague that after 4 weeks holiday had to go into quarantine after she arrived from overseas, another one got a sore throat and the clinic's manager told her to stay away for 2 weeks too, even though she felt fine after 3 or 4 days...that meant that we were down to 4 staff instead of the usual 6, and somehow I always feel I have to volunteer for more hours...

The Government has instituted Government paid telehealth consultations and I find that probably 50% of patients, mainly the older ones have taken that up. 

With all that is happening, I find people to be very stressed, anxious, grumpy, some even rude...the phone doesn't stop the whole day, the flu vaccines arrived last week and we've already run out, next batch hopefully arriving end of next week, as everyone wants to have the vaccine yesterday!

Even though I'm usually a very positive person, I've been coming home exhausted and sometimes close to tears as I'm so stressed, with work, worry about my parents far away, and I need to stop listening to the news, as the 6 months predictions has me worried about  the future...   
Luckily Jose has been doing the cooking and tidying up of the house.
Next week it will all go back to normal at work, as both colleagues are back at work, phew!

In the waiting room, chairs have been removed to make a barrier by the counter so patients wouldn't come close to us. That didn't really work too well as some obviously haven't heard the news and would try and get through between the chairs...
So our manager bought plexiglass screens and the only opening is where the eftpos machine is.
We also encourage patients to sit outside, or stay in their cars and we give them a ring when it's their turn, so we have the minimum number of people indoors.  

Changes to the work envirnoment

To relax and when I have a bit of energy I've been doing some furniture painting.

The roll top desk cost me $20 but looks so much nicer now. The chairs were given to me by a neighbour and one has been painted to match the desk in blue and mustard, the other is in tones of lilac

On weekends I enjoy spending a little time in the garden even if it's just to pull out a few weeds, and to get a bit of sun as well...
We changed the bamboo screen around the whole garden, as the old one installed maybe 7 or 8 years ago was falling apart. It looks so much tidier now. 

A dove on the garden fence and the new bamboo screen

Flowers from the garden

The doves still come around to get their daily dose of seeds. 

If there are no seeds in their feeder they've learned to come to the patio if Jose is sitting outside and then he goes and pours some seed. One day I was hanging out the washing on the side of the house and they hadn't been fed that day and suddenly I saw them come close to me as if to remind me they needed their seeds. So cute 😊.

Luckily the cats are too old and can't be bothered even if they come close to them.

Dove in the nest, the noisy Lorikeets, dove sitting on the feeder, doves in patio, doves by front door of house

I presume not much will be happening socially in April...

Keep safe, keep your distance, wash your hands and stay home as much as possible 💗💗