F is for…..

Football and Flowers!!!

A most unlikely combination but one that has relevance to my life. Not in combination though. Football is completely different beast to flowers.
I just couldn’t decide between the two for the letter ‘F’ so decided to go with both.
When I talk about football, let it be known that I am talking about Australian Rugby League. Not soccer (you know that game with the little white round ball), Grid Iron (sorry Sea Hawks fans… you know who you are), Rugby Union (I’ve tried and tried and can’t understand that game) or Aussie Rules (what some of us call ‘Aerial Ping Pong’).
No, this is league!
Big men. Big muscles. Big hits. Big salaries. Big egos (well sometimes anyway).

Although I am the one in my family who knows the least about the ins and outs of the game, I join in with the Teen and the Garden Gnome and sometimes watch a game on the television with them. As a proud Queenslander, I also follow the State of Origin games each year. The Teen and the GG often sit up late watching football or the Footy Show whilst discussing players and teams together. The Teen even has a referee that she has decided she doesn’t like very much lol
Me? I know enough about the game to be able to make somewhat respectable comments or ask non-stupid sounding questions but I’m not as in to it as the other two are.
We have also been following the QRL (Queensland Rugby League) competition. It’s been fun watching some of our local lads who play for a couple of these teams compete and I must admit we were a little excited when one of the players was picked up to play next year for an NRL team.

This year we have attended two live games. The first was the Brisbane Broncos (my team) against the North Queensland Cowboys (my second favourite team). Due to the fact that this was a rematch of last year’s Grand Final, the game was a sell out with approximately 45,000 fans attending. We had ‘nose bleed’ seats but we thought that the atmosphere was electric. In last year’s Grand Final, the Broncos were beaten by 1 point. This time around, the Broncos beat the Cowboys by 1 point!
So when it was time for the GG’s 50th birthday, he suggested we spend a weekend on the Gold Coast and look into attending a Titan’s match (our third favourite team who are based on the GC). Thankfully, I purchased the match tickets weeks ahead to enable good seats because in the week prior to the match, Jarryd Hayne signed on with them and was taking the field for that match. It quickly became a sell-out event as well.  Everyone was excited that he had come back home to Australia after playing for the 49’ers earlier in the year.
The game was great. We had heaps of fun. And the Teen’s most hated ref was on field. (I made sure I took photos of him for her lol).

I took the following photo as well because I thought it was just too funny. Here are two of the game mascots trying to have a conversation with each other. I imagine it’s hard enough communicating through the costume without the roar of the crowd thrown into it.

So that is football. At the moment, all three of these teams look to be in the play-offs for the final. Of course we are hoping for a Broncos vs Cowboys final again but the Broncos lost the plot for a while mid season and fell a little behind. You never know what will happen but I’m sure I’ll share what happens with you all. 😉

Now…. Flowers!
I love flowers. It is Spring and my lavender bushes are blooming beside the house. The gardens around the neighbourhood are full of blooms right now as well. We have other flowers out in the garden at the moment and it looks so very pretty.
I adore flowers yet when I went to look for a photo to share with you all I realised that I haven’t taken any photos of blossoms this year at all. That’s pretty slack really and I must work to remedy that.
Flowers truly are a masterpiece of the Creator. They can be both beautiful and sometimes downright ugly but they serve a purpose in life and in nature (including making me smile).
I love having flowers in a vase on my kitchen bench or dining room table. The GG bought me flowers for my birthday last month and they lasted for almost two weeks. Then I went out and cut some native Golden Wattle and put them in a vase with purple Irises. They looked stunning for a week or so. Recently, I’ve had a small vase of Sweet Peas from the front garden on the bench. Unfortunately, flowers are so expensive to buy and don’t last too long whilst cut. It’s just as well there are many beautiful gardens in the area for me to gaze at.

So that concludes the letter ‘F’. Flowers and Football! A strange mix but both integral in my life.