February Dragon*

It's been about four weeks since I last blogged, and the main reason it's taken so long has been the bushfires in Victoria. Our worst natural disaster, the current death toll is 210 people, and at least 7000 are homeless. Fires are still burning in Victoria weeks later. There are stories of great tragedy and great heroism as well as wonderful generosity which outweigh the stories that might make you despair of the human race. Being too far away to help out in a physical way, we've donated (over $100 million has been raised so far). Just about every school, business and group seem to be raising funds-I've never seen anything like it. There are also various initiatives in the craft/blog world to make handmade things for survivors as well as restash our crafting friends in Victoria. At the same time as the bushfires, around 60% of Queensland was under water. What a country we live in. We've had similar conditions to those in Victoria, but have been lucky so far to avoid any major fires. We've still had no rain (the odd shower) since the middle of December, so it's extremely dry here.

On to other things (briefly)-I've spent the last 4 weeks stitching on the model. It's mostly done-the magazine has it for photography for the next issue (it's being released in parts), and then it will be back to me for a few more days stitching. I'm planning on using the next few days to go through my WIPs (both stitching and knitting) and work out which ones I want to be working on in the near future. Maybe I'll even take some pictures.

To finish, here's a picture of our Easter Lily. This was planted in a garden bed that is basically dirt-no other plants (they had been moved) and consequently hasn't been watered (I think we forgot that there was anything else planted there). A couple of days ago I noticed a shoot, and it's now flowered. Ideal plant for there conditions, really.

* February Dragon is a novel by Sth Australian author Colin Thiele about a bushfire (aka the February Dragon)

Hot

That says it all, really. The South Eastern area of Australia has been extremely hot (5 consecutive days 40C (104F) and above, with the hottest here in Adelaide at 45C (113F) ). We have been lucky here in that we've suffered no power loss (there's been power off in various areas) and so far South Australia hasn't had any majow bushfires. It's not looking good in Victoria with a big bushfire east of Melbourne. It certainly wasn't the ideal weather for the first week back at school. Both kids seem to have settled in fairly well-only 10 weeks to go until Easter and the next school holidays.

We have a new addition to our chookyard. She's been named "Copper" and has coped surprisingly well, considering the heat and new surroundings. The older chook was quite indignant that there was a stranger in her yard, but has adapted. Here's a shot of her on her first foray out of their yard, trying to keep cool on the back veranda.


I've been stitching on the model sampler this week, but took a break to start Dark Cherry which is a HAED QS which is one design that quite a few stitchers are trying to finish by the end of the year. We are getting pages every second month, and there is a monthly SAL. I'm a late starter. and won't post a picture yet as I've only done a 100 stitches or so, but it's nice to have a new start.
I'll also be stitching a Christmas Ornament next month-I will wait to see the poll results before making a decision on which one.


Speaking of new projects, here's a picture of my new knitting project. One of Ron's workmate's wife is due to have a baby in the middle of next month, so I'm knitting the cardigan (they know it's a girl) but since I've only cast on, there's no picture of that either.

Before I go, I promised on my craft stash that I wouldn't post Luke's "first day at high school photo", but I didn't promise not to post any other photos. This photo was taken on Australia Day at a local breakfast. I forgot to mention last post that he is now officially taller than me (I'm 5'4") and he takes mens size 10 shoe (Ron takes 8s).

RIP Pecker

.....Pecker being one of our chooks, if you didn't know her. She was put to sleep by the vet after suffering from a virus and complications. She was one of our family for over 4 years, and will be sadly missed (I know she was only a chook but she was a nice chook!). A new addition to keep the remaining chook, Ginger, company is most likely to arrive tomorrow-hopefully the place she will come from will have some tips about integrating a new chook with an old one. The picture provided was one of the few I could find, and was taken and modified by Luke years and years ago for a school project.

Going back a couple of weeks, I celebrated my 40th birthday with a bbq with family. Unfortunately, both my Mum and my brother and his family were unable to attend due to illness, but we still had a lovely day. Here's one of the few photos from the day (artistically shot by my daughter).


I've been getting some crafting done also (tennis and cricket season is ideal for this) and here's some finishes. The advent calendar was finished in 2008 (not the best photo, but I was wanting to pack away Chistmas decorations). The other two were ornaments I started in 2008 but finished this year.

This is "Sing Noel" by Primrose Needleworks from The Gift of Stitching Ornament Issue 2008. I changed the colours somewhat to make them less pastel.

This ornament is called "Christmas Delights" by Cats Whiskers Design Studio and is from The Gift of Stitching Ornament Issue 2007. I used a Needle Neccessities green (#139).
There should be many more ornaments here during the year as I will be trying to stitch an ornament a month-starting next month, so I'm working on finishing up a few I started last year. I will also have a finishing spree, where I plan to actually make these into something.
I've also re-entered into the model stitching world, now that I feel my arm can withstand stitching to a deadline. I'm currently stitching on a mystery sampler for The Gift of Stitching magazine, so I won't have any pictures anytime soon on that.
This week looks ideal for crafting of any kind as the forecast temperatures for the first week back at school are for 41C, cooling down to 39C on Friday-blah! Uniforms are organised, shoes are bought, stationery has arrived (it gets home-delivered and didn't arrive until about 2pm yesterday) and hairs are cut. I just need to label Luke's books and we should be ready..........well except for the early mornings-just as well it will be a short week!

Insert Snappy Post Title Here

I quite often have trouble coming up with post titles, especially when I don't have a specific subject for the post (e.g. when I am summarising weeks/months of activities due to slack posting). I'll copy myself from my last post and give a brief run down of what we've been doing since then.....

• bought that new caravan I mentioned last post.
• attended new parents information sessions for Luke's high school (and he attended his transition day as well).
• spent the day at the cricket (someone at Ron's work was giving away members tickets). Unfortunately Ron couldn't go, but he let me go, so I spent a lovely day by myself.
• participated in and/or attended many end-of-year functions for various sports, school things , brownies and scouts.
• helped set up the school gym for Luke's Yr 7 graduation, which was lovely.
• went to Carols By Candlelight (which was enlivened by lightning -in the distance, thankfully, and a little rain-but it's so dry here, we love rain!).
• organised for Christmas which we spent down at Kingston SE (about 4 hrs away) with my parents and sister.
• enjoyed the weather on Boxing Day by going to a local beach where you can drive onto the beach and swimming and playing beach cricket.
• just recently celebrated the start of the New Year by having a street party with quite a few of our neighbours.
• taken down the decorations and getting the house back into gear in time for a family BBQ that we are having to celebrate my 40th birthday in just over a week's time. And family adds up to somewhere between 30 to 40 people-immediate family.........
• fun things also such as knitting, stitching, sewing, playing on our new Wii, catching up with my knitting buddy Bobbie who is temporarily back in Adelaide.
• my arm seems to be doing well-I just need to not overdo things and keep stretching it.
• Ron's work is going well-the company he worked for went into administration, and since then into liquidation, but he's got a six month contract doing exactly the same job (his old company had the contract for the IT for Santos but he's now working there on contract). Bonus is that contracting is good money, but there is no pay for public holidays, and the six months the contract runs for has most of the year's public holidays. We should find out later this year what's going to happen (either work directly for Santos or another company takes over the IT contract). The guys that are working there should stay there-we'll see what pans out.
• we also have some more uniform shopping to do for Luke (fun for the whole family) as well as shoe shopping (will the fun never end?).

I think that's enough rambling for now - I need to go do some housework, as well as some sorting out in my craft room (guess which I prefer).
Finally, some photos from the Christmas Pageant. I still need to dig up those photos with Ron and his moustache-he has them at work somewhere.

Back so soon?

It's only been a week since I was here last - I shock myself!

So-the last week in brief......

• Ron's growing a "mo" for Movember - pics to come soon, but he already has quite a good one already, but there is some grey.


• We sold our Jayco camper trailer (for about only $500 less than we bought it for 7 yrs ago) , but have got our eye on a pop top close by that might be just what we are looking to upgrade to. We're in no rush, so we will see what is around.


• Caitlin was able to miss a softball game to go to the Christmas Pageant so the kids and I (Ron stayed at home to sell our camper) braved the crowds to sit in the rain (well it was only showers, but still...)


• I decided that I deserved a day off so I journeyed to the showgrounds for the Craft Fair. There was very little in the way of knitting or embroidery supplies, but luckily I have also become interested in stitcheries/patchwork/quilting etc. I took a class from the Thimblelady in hand quilting which was fun-I must do some practice soon. I will have to take some pictures of my purchases soon too.

I've finished some stitching on some ornaments-I will need to work out how I want to finish them and get that done so I don't end up with too many to do at once.

Please excuse the oddly cropped pictures-I'm still working on using the software that came with our new printer/scanner. The snowman ,white ornament, and the Peace tree are all from last year's Just CrossStitch Ornament magazine (I actually stitched the snowman earlier in the year, and the white one in Oct). The Sampler Tree (I will look up the proper names for these designs and the designers later and edit the post) was from last year's ornament issue of The Gift of Stitching magazine .

I'm off to the city tomorrow -mainly to meet Ron and look at bathroom tiles and setups (did I mention that we are looking to get our bathroom renovated in the next 6 months?) - but I'm sure I'll get some browsing done too. Maybe even some Christmas shopping-although I have already done some.

I'll have some pictures of the pageant next time-they are still on the camera and I'm not going to go hunting for it now.

Dormant or Extinct?

Long time, no see........... So how do you write a post on a blog when you haven't been near it for 11 months? A blow-by-blow description of each month's events? (supposing, of course, that I can remember what happened) Or perhaps start with what is happening now, and if something occurs to me, or nothing exciting happens (?) I might return to the past. I'm going to go with the latter.

I stopped blogging in December last year when things got hectic (as they do at that time of the year), but did not get going again when I ended up with Tennis Elbow which meant that for some time I was doing little or no crafting or using the computer. I'm not back to 100%, but it is about 90% and I can stitch and knit, but not for unlimited amounts of time, and with lots of stretching.

I've found a few pictures-"Flower Sampler" model that I finished just before Christmas last year, and a couple of ornaments that I finished up recently for our stitching group's yearly exchange with an English stitching group.

And here's some irises from our garden.

I'm feeling the need for a list or two, and maybe a vague plan to organise what craft I want to get done in the next couple of months.........We'll see how long that lasts.

I also have to have a plan of attack for the craft fair that I plan to visit on Sunday. There's nothing worse than wandering about, overwhelmed by all the stalls, desperately trying to remember what you wanted to look at or buy.

I'm off to keep stitching on more Christmas ornaments-I'm really enjoying the quickness of these at the moment.

Mystery Revealed

I have a feeling that I won't be suddenly posting on the blog everyday. The November experiment (posting everyday or nearly everyday) ended up with the grand tally of 6 posts. We live and learn.

Since my last post we've had several events, but the first of these was our trip to the South-East to Kingston SE for my mum's 60th birthday party. Luke had a sleepover for scouts on the Friday night so we left home early on Saturday morning, picking him up along the way. The weather was just lovely, which was a change from the weekend of my dad's 60th nearly 2 years ago when we had temps around 40C. I don't have a lot of photos as I have never been in the habit of snapping everything. Some people seems to view a lot of events through the lens of their camera or video camera. Some moments are ideal for photo taking, but a lot of the time I prefer to enjoy the moment or event without worrying if I got a good shot of it. I also spent a lot of the day organising food and chatting to people (some that I haven't seen for some time). The younger kids had a great time as Mum & Dad have a cubbyhouse in their new backyard, and we really didn't see too much of them. They played quite well together as young kids do, even when they don't know each other well. Luke helped out with setting up and serving-he's at the age when he doesn't want to play with the younger kids, and there were no other kids his age there. I am also able to reveal the mystery project that I have been working on-a knitted lace scarf for my mum. It got favourable comments from quite a few people, and I was happy with the way it turned out. The yarn was 2 ply 50% silk/50% wool from The Knittery in the Denim colourway. This yarn is just lovely-the loveliest yarn I've seen. The pattern was "Scarf with Clarence Border" from Victorian Lace Today, and I really had to stop myself from casting on something else from this book for myself. It was a fun knit, and it only took me about a week, I think. Yes, I do tend to leave things to the last minute, but I went for something simple because of that.

Now, some pictures.....

The birthday photo shows Ron and my mum trying to get the candle to stay alight in the breezy conditions (and the lovely cake that my SIL LeeAnne baked & decorated for the occasion). The various pictures of the yarn and scarf are not the best in terms of colour-some were taken in bright sunlight, and others with flash. I think the picture of the yarn is the closest to the true colour.

Last week, Caitlin and her Brownie Guide group participated in a local Christmas Pageant, with the theme being "Nursery Rhymes". She was dressed as a cat for their nursery rhyme-The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe, and Ron drove his parents' vintage truck as their "float".

Only 1 week and 2 days before the end of school-we have 2 BBQs and one concert to go before then and then we have some quiet time before Christmas. This year we are having Christmas lunch at home by ourselves, with dinner at Ron's parents new home with his family.

Craft wise I've been busy finishing up the model I'm doing for Naomi from Stitches N' Spice, which should be done by the end of this week-I will take photos when it's finish. I've got a tea cosy to get finished for a knitting exchange, as well as some Christmas ornaments for the kids' teachers. I'm itching to get back to some WIPs-both knitting and stitching, so maybe there will be some more progress on some projects that haven't been seen lately-but not for a couple of weeks.

Please forgive the strange set out with the photos-I have great trouble with Blogger and the way it decides to display pictures-I don't seem to have much trouble uploading them-just getting them to line up in a halfway normal manner. I'm giving up today, and going to do something more productive.

How many days?

Only 4 more weeks of school to go! The year's just speeding by. The weekend's just about over too; just dinner and end of day things to do. Yesterday we spent most of the day in the garden weeding, mowing, and generally tidying up. Luke has been initiated into the way of the mower, so maybe the "normal" lawn will become his domain? We have about 1/4 acre that is basically paddock that Ron mows with a heavy duty push mower (it's too rough for a ride on). There's still more to do outside, but we got a good amount done-luckily it wasn't too hot yesterday.

Today we went into the city to the Botanic Park for Ron's work's Christmas Picnic. Even though the weather was hotter today, it was very pleasant in the shade. Everyone had a great time-Caitlin had her face painted, got a temporary tattoo, got a balloon animal from one of the many clowns, and went on one of the bouncy castles. Luke & Ron both went on the Circotron, and I had a nice back & shoulder massage. There was plenty of yummy food & drink, and a good time was had by all.

This week should be fairly straight forward-I was going to say "normal" but I'm not sure if that applies. Saturday will be an early start as we head down to Kingston for my mum's 60th birthday party. We will head back sometime Sunday in time for work & school.

I've been working on the secret project, which is coming along nicely, and have just realised that I will get a big chunk of knitting time in the car this weekend (at least 3 hrs each way). I also need to start Christmas decorations that I make for the kids' teachers each year, as well as my Embroiderers Guild Kris Kringle gift, and then there's the advent calendar that I need to sew.... Luckily I'm not planning on making lots of homemade gifts for Christmas this year!

The next couple of days are going to be much cooler than first thought-we were heading for 37-39C days, but now we've got 31-27C. Much more comfortable-and the forecast so far for the weekend looks to be warm (30C) but not overly so-thank goodness.

It's Heating Up

Well, so much for good intentions. First I had a day where nothing happened-well, nothing interesting anyhow. Then it got busy and I didn't have time to blog, and before you know it-here we are 9 days later.

Here's a few shots from the pageant-held through the main streets of Adelaide. We had a lovely day, but to get a good spot and allow for street closures it meant an early start for us (Luke & Ron left home at 5.15am, and Caitlin & I left at 6.15am). You can see the streets at dawn, and then later as the street began to fill up. We actually got to hear most of the bands (last year we seemed to be in a spot where every band had a break from playing).

Luke's camp went well, but he was very tired as he got home from camp on Friday afternoon, had scouts that evening, and then up at 5am for the pageant.

This weekend we hope to spend Saturday getting work done in the yard. Sunday is Ron's work family picnic in the Botanic Gardens. It's usually lots of fun, but the forecast is going to be fairly hot (36C) so shade will be at a premium. We've got another few hot days after that with 39C forecast for next Tuesday. We're hoping it will cool down after that as we have my mum's 60th birthday in the South-East at the end of next week.

Tomorrow will be me getting housework out of the way early so I can work on a secret project in front of the a/c and cricket before the kids get home from school, and the weekend begins....

Shopping!

I was going to take pictures of my purchases from our shopping trip today, but Ron had snagged the memory card from the camera, and now it is dark, so you will have to wait until tomorrow. Bobbie & I went to The Yarn Barn, which happened to have everything on sale, as they need to make room for new seasons stock. I picked up 8 balls of Jo Sharp DK Cotton in a nice blue, a skein of Filatura Di Crossa Centolavaggi (laceweight merino) in white, the Harmony Aran book, and a Fibretrends Mobius Scarf pattern. We next went to the Button Bar which stocks KnitPicks, and both stocked on up a few accessories we needed. Apparently the owner is also getting lots of Clover accessories-depending on the suppliers, maybe by the end of this month, or perhaps in January. We browsed Borders, Dymocks and Angus & Robertson, but didn't buy any books. It was good to see a lot of titles in print-some I thought I would like were not to my taste, and I did see one which I have ordered through Fishpond at a lot cheaper price. We also squeezed in a coffee and lunch break, before heading back to pick up kids, etc. All in all, a lovely day.


This afternoon has been busy with baking (supper for Luke to take on his camp) and packing, but tomorrow should be fairly quiet, so I should be able to catch up before a busy end to the week.













Here's a few more pictures from our holiday-kangaroos which would come and feed on the grass in the caravan park in Hall Gap (in the Grampians in Victoria), and various pictures around that area, including one which shows some burning off far in the distance.

Don't forget (especially those of you who don't read lots of blogs and may not know) that you can click on the photos to see a larger version.