"I call this my gallery," Merle Hare says, pointing to the family photos that lined the walls of her small unit.
The unit which, at 104, she still lives in on her own.
Mrs Hare has always been fiercely independent.
When she's not tucking in for lunch at the local football club or spending time with her four great-grandchildren, she can be found in her garden, tending to her lemon trees or gathering kumquats to make jam.
"I always like to get up and get going," she says.
"I just keep doing things all the time and doing things for other people."
Requiring no mobility aids and still cooking for herself, the only assistance she requires is a fortnightly cleaning visit - a fact that has inspired awe for Calvary Hospital case manager Ben Roche.
"She's a machine," Mr Roche says, pointing to the collection of bird seed she regularly uses to feed the birds that visited her flourishing backyard.
"She calls us if she needs anything, which is quite rare.
"We've never had any concerns."
Born in the eastern Victorian town of Sassafras, Mrs Hare has lived in Canberra since 2000.
Wanting to be closer to her two children in the aftermath of her husband's death, she "just got in the car and drove off", embarking on a solo-trip across Gippsland en route to the city.
"I had a ball," she says, smiling.
"I explored it all on my own.
"No one to tell me what to do, not what to do."
Mrs Hare has always been active and sociable, saying she loved growing up in the country and "knew it all backwards".
"I used to just disappear with the dog and go walking," she says.
"People would say, 'Where's Merle?' Nobody ever knows where Merle is!"
Mrs Hare also loved school, developing a knack for numbers and eventually going on to pursue a career in accounting.
"It was a little school, only 30 pupils," she says.
She tells a story of sticking up for a shy friend who was often teased for her reluctance to speak up in class.
"I whispered to her, 'You know the answer'?" she recalls.
"Well stand up and say it loud and clear so that the teacher can hear you and all the other kids will pull their heads in!"
She followed her siblings and joined the Navy in 1943, undertaking accounting work at the Flinders Naval Depot.
Her twin brother Don served as a Sergeant for the Royal Australian Air Force, while her older sister Alva was an army nurse.
"She was a great nurse but a real bossy boots," Mrs Hare says, laughing.
Her husband, Bob, also served in the Army as an anti-aircraft gunner.
But her life changed when at just 25, Don was tragically killed in a plane accident.
"Being twins, we had to protect each other," she says, pointing to his portrait that hangs at the centre of her living room wall.
"Losing [him] was the worst thing to ever happen to me."
Family has always been incredibly important to Mrs Hare.
"There are 17 of us," here in Canberra, with her two children - a son and daughter - living locally and regularly coming to visit.
Her son, Don, was named after her beloved brother.
She maintains a vibrant social life, with her fridge calendar filled with social appointments - as well as a reminder for next week's booking at the nail spa.
On the amazement she inspired with her unwavering independence, Mrs Hare doesn't seem fazed.
"I've just gone through life," she says.
"I've got a lot of friends, I've played a lot of golf."
And on her secret to living long and happily?
"I breathe in and I breathe out," she says.
