We’ve been driving on Mitcham Road a fair bit this year. The Maurys’ home is a few minutes away off Mitcham Station and on many Thursday nights Tress and I would drive along Canterbury Road, turn into Mitcham Road and head to their home for the church small group meetings. Last Friday however, we did this drive (part of) to get to a little Italian restaurant (L’Anima) on Mitcham Road. It’s an unassuming little place with a large pizza oven taking pride of place in front. The food was nice, the waitress’ Italian accent was beautiful and Tress and I managed to get a very relaxed night out to start off the weekend.

Saturday saw our usual homemade brekky after which I did little stuff around the house while waiting for someone to come look at our sofa which I had advertised for sale on gumtree. Tress too the little fellow out for a walk and after the guy came and saw the sofa he made a deal and I got it sold. Our new one wouldn’t arrive for at least another couple of weeks so the lounge would look sparse once it has been carted away the next day.

We then attacked the jobs waiting for us – tidying up our wind ravaged gardens. We also did some cleaning – the windows and fly screens look much better now – as well as gave the little fellow a bath. We started just after 9am and worked till around 2.30pm, then cleaned up and headed to Madam K’s before going to look for a coffee table and then grocery shopping. When we got home I did some cooking for the week’s dinner and then finally settled down to put our feet up and watch some telly to wind down. It had been a warm and productive day.

On Sunday after church we got home, the sofa buyer picked up the purchase and Tress and I then took for the Dandenongs. We had wanted to visit the National Rhododendron Gardens for a few weeks now and finally managed to schedule this in. We got to a little café next to the Sky High lookout and had lunch (quiche), before getting to the star attraction. We spent a couple of hours walking through the beautiful gardens – and caught Jason and Mel there very briefly – before heading home to walk some more, this time giving the little fellow a chance to taste the day’s wonderful weather. We then had some barbecued fish and salad for dinner before watching some telly. We got a phone call from a couple friend however, who wanted to come over to get some documents certified. They came around, we chatted a bit and having past my shut eye window, couldn’t go to sleep again till past 11pm. I managed to catch the first half of United’s game against the Toffees however so that was a plus.

It was a physically active weekend, which while it left some sore bits after my usual run on the treadmill this morning, was very satisfying. The forthcoming warm weather would probably see more such weekends which would mostly be a good thing.