In Balboa Park San Diego

One of the buildings in the park the purple stuff along the garden is geranium maderense which flowers here now and in the northern hemisphere in spring, we found so many plants that flower in our autumn flowering in spring. Click on the photos for a larger view. Then a squirrel that let me get really close, they were fun to watch, although John tells me I may have got more than I bargained for here. The Spanish village where there were all kinds of artists and their work, fascinating, I could have spent more time there. and the "dragon" outside the wonderful Mengei museum oh and I seem to be in the background too. This was a museum for usable stuff, or in a way a folk museum. We got there almost on closing and raced through it which was a shame. A couple of really interesting exhibitions on.
I will talk more about that in a later post. I am rushed for time tonight and the internet has been slow here. I thought I had edited some of these photos but obviously I havent.
Beading tonight and Adelaide to see Mummy tomorrow. John is still not feeling terribly well but is refusing to see a Doctor, says he isnt bad enough. Men!

Millie, my TIF for April finished and my base for my Art Quilt

Isnt Millie just gorgeous! Tabby and John and Millie came for dinner last night, only pasta, and Millie who is not quite 6 months is sitting by herself, also blowing bubbles and squeeling. they are so delightful at this age.
I have also finished my TIF Challenge for this month, just in time, this month I have more or less gone with the colors and the theme of 'change', using the change of the season as my inspiration. I found the spider in an extra bit that Dale had sent me, went in quite well.
Then today I finally got my art quilt base put together for Ellen Lindner's e class. This was a piece of commercial fabric that I rushed into my quilt shop who was having a sale and bought, it was all they had left of this particular piece on the roll and has worked out well..
We didnt have a huge amount of rain, but another 11 mm overnight has helped. It has got very cold though. I have even bought a pair of slippers!!
I will probably put up more Californian photos tomorrow to finish the trip off.

Encounter Bay walk and a new class

I thought I would take a break from the Californian photos for today and show the ones I took on this mornings cold and damp walk around Encounter Bay.
We headed in fairly early and walked along from Whalers to the Bluff Jetty and back, I saw this grey heron on the rocks so he had to have his photo taken, then the wonderful view from the deck of Whalers while we had coffee and finally another look at the progress of the new boat launching facility that is still in progress.
I am also taking a new e class with Ellen Lindner called Instant Art Quilt Class. It is a 3 week class and this is the material I have chosen to use. I hope it will come out alright I am not a quilter so am a little apprehensive about this. Some how I think I thought it was over 3 months, still better to be quick so I havent time to panic.
I have also just signed up for a mermaid class with Angela Jarecki, I have done all of her classes and love them. I havent made a doll for ages and as it begins at the end of May, I will be back from fishing and a good time in the middle of winter to think of a doll.
Then there are the TIF challenges to do, a jumper I am knitting for Millie as well as a heap of beaded jewellry I want to do. Not enough time in my day.

Still in LA

here we have John and Lauren and I standing on about the top most bit of The Getty, I know we walked up a lot of inclines to get here and it was hot and thirsty work. A wonderful view of the city below.
The next was of the incredible reflections in the glass in one of the buildings from the central courtyard.
Then an evening view of one of the elephants on top of the Hollywood and Highlands Babylon Court, I now there were at least two of these and some very Egyptian looking frieze along the top of the buildings.
We had the most expensive dinner of our stay here at an Italian restaurant with one course each and a bottle of wine.
And the last is of the incredible roof of the Union Railway station which is where we caught the train part way down to San Diego, and then caught a bus for the rest of the way as they were working on the lines. That was a bit of a muddle but we got there in the end.
Today it has got cold and rained. I went in to do my shopping, I do not normally go on a Saturday and met all sorts of people, the car park in Woolies was a disaster and it took me 2 1/2 hours to get all my shopping done.
I have pulled weeds in the garden and made soup stock and fiddled around, not feeling I am getting any where but I suppose I am.

TIF thoughts and Mexican style garden

This is not what I was going to do but things really are conspiring against me.
Today is ANZAC Day, the day we lost a battle and became proud of ourselves as Australians.
John had to lay a wreath at the dawn service so my day began early a bit of light drizzle in the Valley but clear in Victor. I am afraid I stayed home in bed.
Then I took him over to Goolwa to meet D'Arry to go fishing down the Coorong as the weather forcast for today didnt sound very promising.
Of course no shops were open so I was home by 9.30 but have to go in this afternoon to meet Wendy who is going overseas on Wednesday and call into an 80th Birthday party, and then collect John again.
What I was going to do was thank Gail on this blog for the award she gave me which is done by Artey pico but I cant find the image I have transferred so it may have to wait. Gail is from Expression Studio blog, and I am not savvy enough to give links! How hopeless is that, and I am supposed to link to the arteypico blog, which is also a blogspot blog but as it is all in Spanichf I have no idea what it says, so if interested go look them up. I am also supposed to nominate 5 blogs for the award, which I enjoy and are very inspiring, well all of the blogs that I regularly look at seem to have been nominated for this award so I will just list the blogs I really like and as I cant link them unless they are in my side bar ...well!!
These are in my side bar and the ones I most regularly look at are, apart from Gail's, Maggie, Dale, Julie, Wendy, Alison and Hashi, that is more than 5 ah well.
I can get photos up and write my blog almost daily but I fail in quite a few things regarding blogging. I need someone to stand over me and tell me how it all works, or perhaps go and spend time going through the files, no time for that at the moment and all it does is give me a head ache.
so to the photos, the first is a scan of my TIF challenge for April, only in its early stages, no sewing or embellishing, the theme was change, and as it is autumn I think that says it all, I was going to start last night but my daylight bulb in my lamp by my chair has blown so until I get a new one nothing will bet done, I think my eyes are not too good at the moment.
The second photo if you can see him was John patiently waiting while I did over the shops in the Bazaar del Mundo and I had stopped to take photos of this little courtyard. This was in San Diego Old town.
Tomorrow I will be back to more photos.

Walking LA and the Getty

I dont really care if I am boring people or not, there were after all about a 1000 photos!!
Any way this is still the walk around Hollywood back streets, showing a house I rather liked and one of the hidden stairways going from one street to another Oh and that is Hashi taking a photo in the first one. well maybe not a photo it could have been saying oh look what is that?
Then we went to The Getty, latish in the afternoon and it is a fantastic place, the buildings are incredible and the gardens to die for, lots of photos of those. we walked and walked and it was hot, although thank goodness you can take a train thing up to the main area. We saw a couple of pretty odd exhibitions but the gardens made it and the whole of the buildings, apparently there was a fuss as the architect is known for his use of stark white so the compromise was that anything seen from the street sort of pale grey and the interior walls were all very white.
I am finally beginning to get some textile stuff done, well my TIF challenge which has to be finished by the end of the month.
I think we have both had a relapse of jet lag, we both feel worse today than we did yesterday!!

Hollywood. LA,, Venice

A few more of these, Adelaide yesterday to see my mother who is well but I think has an abscess on her leg but I think is ok, and then my nephew and his family from Perth today so although I am gradually getting my head around things it is still slow!
Any way more photos, the first is from our bedroom window in the Hollywood Renaissance hotel, then the amazing array of labels on the chili bottles at the farmers market, John got quite carried away with them!
A bit of the Chinese theater which was just up from the hotel, we were right in the midst of things there, the Kodak theater, the very incredible shopping plaza and Hollywood Boulevard so not far to go for anything.
Finally the obelisk thing by the sand pit at Venice Beach, an incredible place, I may put up more photos as I found the bicycle track interesting, we had had a quick tour of Rodeo drive and Beverley Hills in the bus but all those photos and more were out of the bus, it is going to take me forever to label all the photos.

From Visalia to LA

The first photo is of the enormous American flag waving over the meadow at Fort Tejon where we stopped and had a boxed lunch.A fascinating place with several old buildings, gopher holes and is used by schools to recreate how living at the time this was set up was. some where i have a pamphlet on it, not really organised yet.
A bit further on the next photo was taken from the bus as we traveled on to LA and showed the wild flowers and californian poppies on the hills, not sure what the purple was sage perhaps and what the terrain looked like. The yellow was I think daisies and there should be some orange at the top which were poppies.
The next is of Hashi, Lauren and John on our walk around the hidden staircases and roads behind the Hollywood Marriott where we were staying, I will come back to this walk later as I took lots of photos of gardens and houses. Lots of Aussie plants in the gardens and others that I have here.
The last is one of the panoramas in the La Brear tar pits museum, this is an incredible place where heaps of animals, no dinosaurs it was later than that, were found in the tar pits when they started excavating them and it was all left as a park and museum right in the heart of Los Angles. Absolutely fascinating. this is a large sabre toothed cat, the teeth were enormously long, on a huge short faced bear.
Hashi is an Australian married and living in LA who I had done some walking and sketching with on line and who I had contacted and she was so good, took us around and introduced me to a fascinating book called Walking LA its hidden secrets by Erin Mahoney which taught me a lot about LA from just reading it, a book worth knowing about. Hashi's blog is on my side bar. Lauren is her absolutely delightful step daughter. the walk we did was walk no19, Whitney Heights and Hollywood Boulevard.

Cows, banksia roses by the roadsides,Californian poppy and a house in Visalia

I thought there should be at least one shot of cows, these were jerseys in the first dairy we went to, only about 3,000 in this herd!! Being milked on a rotary dairy. I couldnt get over the size of the udders on some of them, all completely housed and they had water beds to lie on. I had distinct worries about enviromental problems but they seem so far to be ahead of the legislations.
So you may not see the manure disposal units only what I think are important!!
So the next was this wonderful use of Banksia roses along the highways, those and plantings of lots of other flowers, I presume some are native but some certainly were not.
Then I had to have a close up of a Californian poppy, the state emblem, we saw lots but usually when speeding by in the bus. Apparently it was a good year for them.
And finally when I had a day to myself in Visalia I went walking and taking photos of my favorite things and houses are one, I thought this was a wonderful house.
I still havent really gone through all the photos and one lot has somehow got into another area of my photos.
Any way this was from San Francisco heading down into the San Joaquin Valley, at least I think that is what it is called into Tulare County and finally the town of Visalia where we spent three nights.
I may revisit some of these areas but dont want to be boring.

San Francisco, Sausalito and near Visalia

Three more photos. The first is of the Grace Catholic Cathedral nearly opposite the Fairmont Hotel on Nob Hill where we were staying. the cherry blossoms in the little park in front of it were out and although not a Catholic I went to look inside and evensong was in progress with a American African choir and they were doing something about Martin Luther King. The voices were lovely but I had to leave after a short time as John had no idea where I had gone. They rang the bells as I was sketching it. Supposed to be a mini replica of the French one in Paris.
The second is of Sausolito which is on the other side of the Golden Gate bridge and where we stopped for lunch one day, very pretty with yachts and lots of tourist shops but fun.
The third is of the barn we had a western style dinner well a bbq with western music which was also a lot of fun, although the amplification was a bit high. Just love the shape of this barn but you could see the sky through the cracks in the rood, I suppose with a 10 inch rainfall you dont need to worry.
Today I have done dishes, done all the washing and brought some in, put away any clothes that didnt get done yesterday, fed the chooks and dogs and Oscar, hoses on as it is so dry and swept up all the feijoes that had dropped by the back door. I have not walked except down to the stables to give the girls the branding numbers for the foals.
I am halfway through scanning pages of my sketchbook and there are a lot more sketches than I thought, some will go on my other blog. Still havent sorted the photos so these were a bit at random.
Thank you to all who welcomed me back it is great to be home, but sometimes I like being away better!
If it had really rained I think I would feel more happy about being home, although the weather is about as warm as it was in LA although the nights here are colder.

Back home from California

We are home after what seemed like a 24 hour trip, probably was if you count when we left San Diego and went up to LA and to the airport and then on the plane. Both very tired.
I have not edited these but they are some I took in San Francisco on about the second day.
I was obviously starved for flowers as I took them wherever I saw them, and as it was Spring they were lovely.
The second is of the wonderful houses, I love these houses all over San Francisco, and the third is of John in I cant remember but I will look it up, a building undergoing construction with a lake and walk around it.
I need to get in and edit about 1000 photos and get my head around where we were and what we did.
For now we are home and getting ready for an early night.

The tree branch that fell off.

The pea chicks thought this was another lovely roosting spot but it has made a mess and will have to wait until we get back I think unless someone takes pity on us.
The bags are packed, the frig is cleaned out, the sitters are briefed so I think all will be well. I may manage to blog while we are away but if not, I will be back on or around the 19th.

This is how I feel

What a day!
A huge branch of a tree has landed, luckily not on the roof but on the terrace in front of the house, a heck of a mess. Not sure if it will be fixed before we go on Friday.
My mother while I was with her developed bleeding hemorroids (sp!!) blood every where and nurses and carers and me in attendance and I had to shriek "piles" several times before she understood and they understood.
It blew and we had gales and a bit of rain. Adelaide was horrid and my hip ached.
Not sure about going away, I think I feel very aged and not sure I can cope. Bugger getting old. Sorry all, but at the moment that is how I feel. I dont think I ever worried about how I was going to get around before.
I am trying to think positively.

Hairy caterpiller

I stopped down at the stables after my walk and the girls took this little fellow off my t shirt. He is the weirdest little thing a bit over an inch long with a great tuft on top of his head and long hairs along his tail. a side view, a front view and him on a gum tree that I put him on.
I wonder what sort of moth or butterfly he turns into.
the house is clean and tidy, John has his stuff in the smaller suitcase which we hope will not fall apart, that one has been around the world twice and to Japan about 3 times as well as numerous trips to Queensland etc etc.
We will be in Adelaide tomorrow doing a few last minute things like getting money, seeing my mother and a beard trim for him.
Very odd weather, quite warm now but really cold this morning and rain and blustery conditions forecast for tomorrow.