Small bag underway

I have to get some dark cord for this little bag, again made from scraps of fabric I bought in Japan, attached to cotton and then automatic stitches machined over the top.
Somewhere I have a dragonfly charm that I will put on it as well.
I like these little bags they are useful and every one is different.
I have just hobbled in from my walk, sometimes I wonder if they do any good at all. Still cool and pleasant thank goodness.
We had a lovely dinner last night with Tabby's girls being very helpful and useful and a delight to have, her John certainly has had a good influence on them. Millie slept most of the time. so no photos, she is growing at a great rate.
I had to laugh today some people came and I had a hose on watering and they were horrified, I think they are all so indoctrinated into which day you should water I had a hard time telling them it was not mains water, it was water from our spring brought here on pipes we laid ourselves. As it is the big trees are having to fend for themselves and only the close garden is getting water.

Walking on Monday

I have had a busy few days and not much time for anything. I went to a friends for lunch yesterday and that was a lovely day as we havent caught up for ages.
Today I am cleaning the house as a/ it needs cleaning and b/ I have Tabby and her family coming for dinner. I actually asked if she wanted to come and then found they would all be home.
I havent managed to see her or Millie this week so that will be nice.
As you can see from the photos we have almost gone into autumn early, I have no doubt we will have some very hot days in March but so far a lot of February has been cool. Only trouble is we need the heat to get any hope of rain.
Sarah dropped in this morning as she is moving ponies around, stallions have come out from their mares and soon we will be weaning foals. At the same time the cows will be calving so a busy time for her.
I went on with the hand stitching on my felted piece and have finished that, now to add some further things to it, havent made up my mind what yet but the hand stitching has certainly firmed up the piece.

Embellisher play

When I came back from Melbourne and had actually seen some of Dale Rollerson of the thread Studio's work I was pretty inspired and sat down to have a go at a few things I havent tried before.
I embellished this wool onto some wool felt and then cut it up and wove it into well a weaving and added some colored wools and ribbon and embellished some more and I am now in the process of hand embroidering with the lovely valdani crewel cotton I got from her over the top.
Still a way to go.
Warming up today and I had a friend come to collect some of the dog club journals I had moved out to the shed, she will have fun trying to get through them and they were a bit musty and dusty. A bit of our pug history in there though so I hope she finds some useful photos as they go back quite a long way.
Talking of pugs the old boy Tuppy (not his proper name he is Aust Ch something or other but as I own him in conjunction with another Penny tuppy or tuppence he became.) is out there barking and telling me it is time for food, he is about an hour out, goodness nows what he will do when we go off daylight saving.

TIF Challenge for February

This is my completed TIF Challenge for this month. All beaded and embroidered. I am quite pleased with the way it turned out and is now the second page for my fabric book. I have not finished the page completely as I will see how they all look before I put them together at the end.
I found an old string of pearls that I pulled apart and scattered across the top, they were a sort of browny color, with age I suppose but went in with the colors really well.
Lots of small mistakes but then nothing I do is perfect!!
John and I walked in a bit of drizzle on the beach this morning, lovely hardly any one around.

Here is my cybrefybre swap postcard

This is the postcard Susan Lenz sent me as my swap for the one I sent on her Cyberfybre site.
I love it and it is so much nicer in real life.
Almost all but not quite all the cards had been taken when I last looked but it is worth going to have a look. I believe they will all be exhibited next January, what a wonderful idea. There are atc's as well.
Cold and damp here today so I am doing some indoor stuff, made soup for the week, that is my lunch when I am home.
Played with the embellisher and have just printed off the 3rd Fibre and Stitch installment.

Take it further Challenge

This has been a much more difficult month to get what I wanted done. I didnt want it to be too like January but it has to back onto that page so I used the same base fabric.
I think I have managed the colors, to the best of my ability.
I had lots of ideas but none seemed to be what I wanted but this is what I finally came up with. I found a stamp of a woman in a hat, my mother loved hats like these, some lace and a cut out of a clock to emphasise that time past was what I was thinking of.
It is not finished yet but at least I have got this far. Lots more to do in the way of beading etc.
and the lace is only pinned as I am not sure if that is where it will stay.
An interesting challenge.

Back from Melbourne

We are home from Melbourne and had a lovely few days although the weather was a bit up in the air, stinking hot and then damp and warm.
the top photo is of the Melbourne grandchildren off to school. Evie and Will. Will had his guitar with him for his first lesson and was terribly pleased with himself.
the next photo is some of the booty I bought from the Thread Studio stand at the Quilt expo, finnish wool, silk tops, the fibre fusion encrustation book, some stamp stuff some threads all sorts of things I need. The last photo is of a couple of packs of vintage silk kimono off cuts and some silk kits of odds and ends and lovely colors.
Home to try and get things sorted out again after a lovely few days away.
We have had some showers and wind today but John has just come in to tell me that the main dam is very low and not to water the garden.

Playing

I had fun playing with this and adding beads and buttons. I have no idea what if anything it will become but I love these muted tones.
Much better than yesterdays photo!
Very hot today, after so much mild weather we are not really used to it.
I have spent most of the day ironing sorting out what we are taking to Melbourne, it is only 4 days but the weather can do anything.
Oscar is at the cattery I called over to drop some mail in for Tabby and Millie and have started emptying the frig and rubbish.
I have also stewed the last of the peaches which I will freeze, it is only a little self sown peach but a free stone and a lovely taste.
The lap top is coming with us so if I have time I will report in if not well I will be home on Thursday.

Death of a mattress

Here is the mattress that we have slept on for at least the last 25 years. I know we got a new one, this one, so we have now had three in our years of marraige.
Why do I have a dead mattress well I have nothing else to write about and I am trying out some bits with picasa who seem to let me go from them to this.
Because we changed mattresses and I now have new ideas for the pink spare bedroom, while in Victor this morning I bought a pretty messed about cupboard for $15 then had to get the Toyota and drive it in to get it, an interesting experience as the poor old thing is a bit tired but it got me there and back.
John still has a bad sinus infection and is trying to get a few things done while his wife goes off and buys unmentionable things!!
I will think about another bed for that room when I have to.
I spent all day tidying up. Now to have some fun and mess it up. Oh and the snake that was in the house was about 18 inches long.

The old truck in the shed

The sheds are supposed to be cleaned out soon and I thought I would take a photo before it is. One day Nick will come and collect this truck for his collection.
Today we had a lot more excitement than I needed, a small and very active red bellied black snake found its way into the house. I thought Oscar was chasing a mouse and tipped a chair up and got more than I bargained for. I have never had one in the house before but this was a very small young and thin one so we think he got in through a door that has a gap at the bottom.
we unfortunately had to kill him to get him out and I have to say I am now looking carefully in dark corners.
Poor John has an infected sinus so wasnt feeling very happy with me, first I decided to try out a different mattress on our bed as the old one is getting rather past it and then he had to find an angry young snake.

the House in the woods

I have had a busy two days, not home which is not like me so I have very little to show for it.
This is for the exhibition and sale next month, I did a small embellished and beaded hanging and decided it needed to be a bit more important so I made some silk paper and backed it with that and then sewed it onto a stretched canvas.
I quite like it now.
spent a lot of the day with my friend Wendy, we are both on cow related trips overseas in the next few months so were getting things a bit organised, she has never been overseas before so a bit of advice was needed.
I took over some sewing but somehow we didnt get around to that.

Big foot Woman

I love these little Wild Women, Sarah Lawrence had some in Stitch magazine, but interestingly I had been playing with the same idea when I first got my embellishing machine and hadnt seen her version until a few months later.
I tend to call mine the big foot women as I love the polymer clay feet and hands.
Any way who ever did them first doesnt really matter. I have made a few and mounted them on small canvases for the Mixed media exhibition next month.
Another busy day, it is one of my grand daughters 16th Birthday today and we are going out to dinner with them to celebrate.

My swap postcard for cyberfyber

This is the postcard I made to swap with Susan Lenz for her cyberfyber exchange. this will culminate in a gallery show in Columbia in USA next year. Susan has made a huge number of postcards to swap and I chose number 43.
My card was made from a base of curtain lace onto I think a pre glued heavy interfacing, may have been pelmet vilene I cant remember, which was painted in various colors and when dry I gilded it with some thing, I cant remember as the base has been around for a little while, probably treasure gold, then some free motion embroidery. I cut this up and did some hand stitching, put on the bit of hot glue gun dribble that I had on hand which had been painted and gilded, added some sequins and that is about it. On the back I put a piece of hand dyed cotton.
I hope Susan likes it.
After yesterdays miserable post which probably put any one reading this off, I was pretty productive, did a heap of things I should have done, sat and hand sewed and watched the delightful film How to steal a million dollars or some such name with Audrey Hepburn and Peter O'Toole at their delightful best. The scenes in Paris, the fashion of the time (short skirts, Giverny hats and gloves!) it was gorgeous and just what I needed. Hard to believe it was done in 1966.

The way I feel today

Like Oscar, not wanting to move off the bed. Although he didnt want to move while I was trying to make it.
Yesterday was not a good day. Hearing of the death of a friend and neighbors husband, and then going to a party to celebrate another friends wife's life.
It was heartbreaking to see her 20 year old beautiful twin daughters and her husband doing what she wished, but at only 53 and much loved it was difficult. The party was lovely and we ate and drank well and had a toast to her memory but I couldnt help thinking that she was never going to see what her daughters did with their lives or her grandchildren.
At the moment I seem to have too much death around me, normal I suppose at our age and
I suppose I should feel very lucky to still have it all but today John is fishing and I ache and feel depressed.
Now to get on with some work and stop feeling sorry for myself.

two bags and a view

the first bag is the one I was asked to make, now finished, the second is one I put up before but now also finished with a closure bead and some trim around the edge of the flap.
the view I took yesterday of the wild part of Victor just over the hill and where we like to walk. All damp and misty looking yesterday.
Today is warmer and dry and I got hot and bothered vacuuming the house. I absolutely hate vacuuming and usually get John to do some of it for me, but he is off again to meetings today and as it is 2 weeks since I did it I felt really guilty and had to do it, why do we feel we have to do these things! I think if Oscar didnt shed his hair I wouldnt see all this fluff and worry. Of course John has also been coughing and sneezing!
I have a new book and new to me author, she is an Australian called Kathryn Fox and this one is called Malicious Intent, it is sort of on the lines of Kathy Reich and Patricia Cornwell but I am enjoying it and it is set in and around Sydney.
I have decided to to a swap with the cyberfyber postcard swap, by the time I decided a lot have gone so I hope I get what was my second choice, my first went while I was looking at it. So now to make a postcard, luckily in one of my tidy ups I came across some painted lace on pelmet vielene which will make a good base. Now to get to work on it.

49th wedding anniversary

No photo of the child bride this time instead a lovely one of the cat Oscar, especially after reading a wonderful blog about some cats in Wales, the name of which escapes me (the champagne for lunch!) but I will find it, it is a wonderful blog. Dale of downunderdale recommended it.
Then the scrappy box I have finally nearly finished, still needs a closure but then so do most of my boxes.
The table with glasses of the Johnston Christina Sparkling wine, not really supposed to call it champagne in Oz anymore, the French get stroppy, a lovely wine, and then the view from our table all taken with the new camera.
We had a lovely lunch even though it had rained and we couldnt sit outside we did the next best thing in front of the open french doors.
I really cant believe it is 49 years, the big one next year, I certainly didnt think we would get to that when we were married. My parents only made 25 before my father died.
They have been good years, naturally some ups and downs but who doesnt.

Walking around the farm

I remembered to take my camera with me today and despite the fact that everything is aching and I am on painkillers I managed to do a reasonable walk.
The two and three year old fillies were in a bunch down by the fence, the tall one is a Welsh Cob the rest are welsh A and B's, a nice lot.
I rather liked the clouds in the last one, shows how dry we look too. The colours on the grasses and reeds in the creek looked interesting and I liked their contrasting textures.
I got the latest Quilting Arts today and love the panels of found objects, as I am always picking up odds and ends this has spurred me on to do something like it for myself.
I am also still mulling over what to do for this months take it Further Challenge and am now thinking that as my fabric book is really supposed to be a celebration of my mothers life that I would take as my theme hats, she always wore one, with gloves and was very clever at making them over so that they looked different, we didnt ever seem to have much money when I was at school and with three daughters and on a Professors salary in those days there wasnt much left for my mother to dress herself up for the formal things she had to go to.
This may change but at the moment this is the way I think I may go.

Hanging Kerosene lamp

In my quest for what I am going to do with this months Take it Further Challenge I sketched an old hanging kero lamp, wondering if I can transfer it and use it but I am not quite sure if this is where I want to go. I am still thinking. The colours are not right but I could change that.
It has got quite cold today and we have had a couple of showers of rain! Wonderful.
Yesterday we went to Adelaide and took my mother out for lunch, she tires very quickly at the moment but she does enjoy getting out.
I also bought a new camera, I decided on the Nikkon Coolpix P50 as I loved my old coolpix 3200 but after the cat threw it on the floor and broke off the toggle that holds the battery cover together I really felt a bit unsafe with it but this new one has a view finder, anti shake, a lot more features I probably dont want and is in the same familiar format and I can use the same batteries and card as well, now to wade through all the stuff in the manual.
Not as compact as some but I dont mind it has a sturdy feel to it.

Take it Further Challenge for February

These are my colours for the Take it further Challenge that Sharon b has on her in a minute ago blog.
They havent scanned very well and I am still a bit worried that they are not right but in the flesh they look better. I bought two new threads but used the others that I had. I still have to find some materials to go with them.
The colours are ok but the challenge is to do something that you remember from way back, well I was born in 1939 so I can remember wood stoves, kero lamps, out door loo's and no running water in my grandmothers cottage, petrol rationing during the war and even in Australia we had food rationing.
I am still thinking about what to do, even when I married I came from the city to a wood stove and 32 volt electricity and a kero fridge. Worst was washing using a boiler.
we were skiing when man walked on the moon and I was ironing when John Kennedy was asassinated, no I dont think I will go there, man on the moon might be interesting.

Walking this morning

I took these this morning when we walked, the house is Adare which is a Christian holiday place these days.
I was so cross with my camera this morning I am looking for a new one with a view finder, this is a 7.5 mpxl sony cybershot but is hopeless, I cant see a thing in the led when I am outside.
I have been in and out of Victor like a yoyo as first it was walk and papers and take Tabby's car up to her and then drop John in to go on a bus tour and now I am off to collect him.
I cleaned the house and tidied up my work room for what is left of the day.

More of Willunga and a bag

A couple more photos from yesterday of some old buildings, the first is a B & B and the second is now a council building, cant remember but I know we went there for Tourism Awards way back when we went to those things.
I seem to be into bags, I made this fabric up as a demo with chocolate wrappers and transfer foil and wasnt sure what to do with it, any way it will make a fun bag, still needs a closure of some kind and a bit more on it, beads I think.
Warming up a bit but I spent the morning doing the weekly shop and this afternoon I have fiddled with a painting (on the other blog) and sorting out some paints that I think I want to take away with me.
Not being particularly productive.