TAST 2 knotted buttonhole stitch

I really liked this one, perhaps because I didnt have to think about it too hard just do it.
So here is my weeks TAST 2 for Sharon B (on my side bar).
I am also going to use this for my bit of texture on Holey Moley, as I loved the way I could use the different threads, sizes and textures and pile them up on top of each other.
I loved doing this and was watching the lovely BBC TV series on British Rivers last night while I did it, I am sad that series has now finished.
I am tired, I went to Adelaide today, the first time I have driven up since my eye decided that I couldnt see out of it, it is a 3 hour round trip, as well as buying petrol, which as the price will jump up tomorrow meant a long wait and seeing my mother, always a bit depressing, she was ok just sad and feeling lonely although they have a really nice young carer in at the moment, I wonder how long she will last.
I think that all sounds a bit disjointed. Forgive me, Wednesdays are never good.
I did drop in to give the rabbit to Millie, I should have taken the camera, it and especially its egg were a great hit, she played with it the whole time I was there. Cuddling it, dancing with it and placing it and its egg in her dolls house, and getting her other rabbits to talk to it, so for once a good outcome, with children one really never knows.
The next few days will be a bit sporadic, I will probably post here and not on the other blog unless I have time to do some sketching.
The trouble with Easter in a holiday destination town is that the town fills up with tourists and the locals have to fight to do any shopping and find parking spaces. Good for the big retailers, probably not so good for the others.

What we did today

Well some of it, certainly not cleaning the house which thank heavens did get done, the dust I moved was rather more than I like to think about.
Here is Millie's Easter rabbit, she is cute but I am still not sure if she looks like a rabbit, she is holding a cloth egg, probably wont go down at all well with Miss Millie but we will see. I am sure she will lose her hat very quickly but getting the dress off may be harder.
Our walk this morning was across the causeway to Granite Island, all the beaches were swarming with school children, here on camps and as we havent walked across for a while, off we went.
I took the photo of the horse tram horses in their day shelter, they are big Clydesdale's, lovely big quiet horses, although in the old days they were light draught not heavy ones.
Then a shot of the causeway, I love all those shadows underneath.
The fairy penguins in bronze done by Silvio Epogny one of our well known sculptors, they are always being rubbed and like the bronzes in the temples in Japan get a lovely patina.
Finally the tram itself coming back to the mainland from the Island which is in the background, this is a huge attraction for the town and there are I think four other horse trams in the world, one on the Isle of Man, one on the Northern Island of Japan and one I think in Florida, somewhere in America any way.
I dont know how like ours they are, I know the Japanese one is smaller as I have been on it.
Any way a busy day but a lot seems to have been done so I feel that my time has not been wasted.

TAST 2

Portuguese border stitch was quite fun to do but I have only just finished it, tonight after having a busy day, a busy week.
More tomorrow.

A bit of this and that

It has softly rained all day, we didnt get a huge amount but it does now feel a bit more like autumn is coming.
No walk as it was just that much too wet and when perhaps we could have I felt suddenly very tired.
We had a foal who tried to take off half a nostril this morning so had the vet out to stitch it up. I held the mare for what seemed like about 2 hours. The foal was very good but it means poor Sarah has to give it injections for the next few days.
We also went in to an art exhibition opening, a friend of mine had some very nice paintings in it we were not there for long but caught up with a few friends. It was in aid of a school in Africa.
No money to spend, as we have just organised our trip to Queensland in April and then a couple of nights in Melbourne on the way back. I wont be home for much of April at all.
The photos well I dont know if I have shown the first one before or not, it is the top of my cupboard in my work room, not sure why I even took it but it came up as a screen saver, I love seeing the odd photos I have taken rolling past.
This month with the Holey Moley is texture, I thought that this sea weed which was heaped on the beach on my Saturday walk looked like texture.
Finally this poor little toad fish all bleached, I wouldnt want to walk on him in bare feet. Actually I think I took his photo when he was first washed up but that was the lot that the display on my camera had been moved.
He looks quite sweet, belying his nasty poisonous flesh.
I have spent almost all today trying to make up a pattern for a rabbit that is like a cloth doll, what I have ended up with looks like a dog. I will dress it and see what I think tomorrow.
The best laid plans.

Wet Saturday

I have once more managed to get my photos in totally the wrong order.
I went in to the market and it was drizzling, John had gone fishing, (he had an interesting day, it got windy),
any way I did my marketing and then went along to have a walk on the beach, there were yachts sailing and a pair of the little plover were on the beach, right where people come down with their dogs, silly things.
I now know why there are areas of sand all scuffed up with dog prints, people go down and stand and chat and throw balls, no exercise for them but I suppose the dogs get some.
I noticed that the bit of the Ferris wheel in the fair ground now has its baskets on, so I suppose it was being got ready for Easter. I wouldnt like to go round in it.
I came home and was going to do all sorts of things and spent the whole afternoon looking for a rabbit pattern to make up and I cant find one I like so I suppose I will have to make one up myself.
I had called in to see Millie and Tab and I remembered that Millie doesnt like dolls but she does love rabbits. I hadnt seem them for a week and it is lovely to see them, Millie is so sweet.
Oh and we had a reasonable time last night at the cocktail party at the Hilton for 'Advantage Adelaide' which I think is such a stupid thing to call a tourist awards scheme. I have to say I told them so too, I must be getting to a certain age!! I put Advantage on my dog and cat, its a flea repellent, and what on earth does advantage Adelaide mean?
Enough silliness. Off to cook dinner.

Here and Adelaide

The first photo I took this morning while we were walking around Encounter Bay, the Bluff and Wright Island showing up well.
I have to report that my eye had the laser treatment and all is now well, apart from huge floaters in it yesterday I can now see without thinking I have a large blurry mist in front of the eye. So all is sort of well with my world.
Also yesterday I got a lovely package from Robyn Gordon, more on that tomorrow but I have to say that I am thrilled to bits with what she sent.
On Wednesday P and I went to this wonderful place, One Rundle Trading, not only does it have the most wonderful bits and pieces but fabulous clothing, all a bit over my budget but a great place to have a bit of nostalgic nonsense. Last time I was there I bought some porcupine quills. In an earlier life it was a picture theater, but I am rather afraid that with the for sale sign on it it may be going for redevelopment which would be a shame as it has great character.
I actually managed to get out without spending anything but only because I had bought at Cheap as Chips a great little flat pack of a kitchen 'thingumy' on wheels, it was only tiny and I had hoped it might fit in a funny corner in the kitchen, it didnt but will be a great help when I am entertaining, just giving me another small top to put stuff on with a drawer, a basket and a tray, all pretty small but I cant have a large one any way. A bit of re-organisation in the kitchen and it is done.
Cant take photos there really isnt room and the whole kitchen is due for a mega tidy and clean.
Off out to a cocktail party tonight, so off to feed animals and think about what to wear.
Thank you to all who asked about my eye, after all my worrying I couldnt believe it was done there and then and was so simple. Interesting lights while he was doing the laser though. multi coloured circles spinning out from it.

Some bits of my day

We had a very early doctors appointment today, he was half an hour late and we had various things burnt off bits of our body. No flu shots yet.
After that we staggered down for a walk along the beach, staggered because we had burns on our legs,
but there was some lovely bits of sea and sky to photograph.
There is a bit at the point we walk to which at low tide has a low reef and I love the way the water funnels through between the rocks in various ways.
I put all these in the wrong way around again, when will I ever learn in which order to put up my photos!
We had to get the mail and John needed a loo ( too early a start for him) so while I waited I took the photo of the railway crossing, well the tram crossing, this is for the horse drawn tram. I dont know if the side shows are being dismantled for good or only for winter but they were busily taking down the big one, looks a bit unsubstantial in this guise.
We finally came home and I have been doing a few more gelatin prints, they really are such fun and this was one of them.
Tomorrow we will be in Adelaide early and spending the night as my eye specialist appointment is early Thursday morning. so probably no blog for a couple of days.

Embriodered fish

Still need to be backed or on a backing but I did some simple running stitch on this last night with a bit more of the embroidered grasses and love the way it has puckered and rippled, I thought it might make them look more fish like.
No photos today, we went to the beach and walked but I had the camera on totally the wrong button and didnt notice so nothing came out very well, A shame as when I came home I found three Ibis in the garden and I took photos of them too but that didnt work either, then when I went to put them on the computer I discovered they were wrong.
Cant get everything right all the time.
I had two trips into Victor so not a lot else got done, we spent time at Centrelink trying to get together everything for this pension application. It is now in the lap of the gods.
I have done a few more prints but not ready to show them yet.
Off to feed the dogs and move a hose or two.

TAST and gelatin print

TAST for this week was beaded hedebo edge. I quite like this edging but I really made life hard for myself for a while until I clearly understood how to do it. I think the last two on the green one are correct.
I used no 5 perle cotton and then had trouble finding beads that the needle would go through.
Another good stitch from Sharon b or pintangle,(see my side bar).
I have been having a lot of fun making prints using a gelatin block, it is so simple and great fun. If you want to see more go to my other blog here.
We are both having a slightly lazy day today, all sorts of plans but nothing has been done except stuff around the house.
We had a nice night last night when invited to be with our local MP to see the election results at his place, lots of people and he got back in without any trouble at all which is good, but no results of the whole State election yet, I think the other side will get in but they lost 2 cabinet members and there was quite a big swing against them so perhaps they will stop being so arrogant and listen, not that I have much hope of that.
I have the last of Stieg Larsson's books, "The girl who kicked the hornets' nest" and am finding it riveting stuff, usually the third in a trilogy is a bit ho hum but so far not this one.
I will be sad when I ahve finished it as I have nothing very exciting to read, I had better go and investigate books I havent looked at for years, which is what John is doing.

Textile fish and flowers

These are the unfinished fish I did yesterday, my printed block in the middle and then a stamp which I put embossing granules on and heated. I am slowly doing a bit of stitching but not sure where it is going or if it will be discarded.
After an enjoyable dinner out and then an early start so john could be at the polling station by 8 I went in to the market and then walked along from Kent Reserve at Encounter Bay.
I walked along the beach one way and along the bike track the other way so there are amix, one of my usual ones of the Bluff in its many moods, early there was quite a lot of cloud and we had thick fog but it went very quickly.
The lorikeets were nearly deafening as they were all in the trees some of which like this one had loads of heavy gum blossom on them.
This tufted grass is a South African weed but I love its seed heads and I am sure it is not doing any harm here on the sand.
I am forever looking for some sort of photos I can use in my textile stuff and this was another possibility.
I have put up all my photos as a screen saver, why i havent done it before I will never know, but when I look at them rolling through I realise that some of them are pretty darn good when up on the full screen.
Of course some of them havent been edited and some are really pretty blurry but on the whole....

Sand hill sedges and embroidered leaves

This photo was supposed to go in yesterday but some how it vanished. Computers are a bit like that I have discovered.
I really love the colours of the plants on the sand hill in the light the other morning, all orangy yellows with some green and grey.
I finished off the printed piece of fabric last night with stitches and had a lot of fun doing it. I know it looks a bit messy but that is what it is supposed to convey, stones and sticks and dead leaf litter in late summer, soil that is old and tired and discoloured. Any way it was fun to play with.
Today I have been doing fish, they may appear later.
A much cooler but still humid day, 2 mm of rain over night but I would like 25mm at the moment.
We walked this morning, I have fiddled around with a few odds and ends and am not sure I have got any where!
We are out to dinner tonight, possibly out tomorrow night (wrap up of the election) so a bit social for a change, I will have to brush up on my small talk.
Our morning walks have been magic, a different place this morning with more shells. I just haven unloaded the photos yet.
I am still trying to work out what I do with all these small bits of stitch that I have been doing.

Stitched stamps and this mornings walk

This is part of my Holey Moley, stitched stamps then printed onto some fabric, more stitching will go on top of this and it was fun to do.
Although I am feeling rather brain dead and not capable of much at the moment, one of the down sides of having a blood test with fasting is that I go in very early and have a coffee and totally forget to have my pills so I am now aching all over.
An overcast and odd sort of morning and a lot earlier than I normally go.

KISS

Dijanne Cevaal who is wandering Europe at the moment and whose lino cutting course I did put out a while ago a challenge to use only two colours of cloth and as many colours of thread as we liked, using simple stitch and make a new cloth. Her size was 50 x 50 cms. I am afraid that I can not make something that size and finish it, at least not in a year or so so I opted to do a small, very small! 15 x 10 cm piece and this is the result, I had such fun with it I may try with something a bit bigger but not 50 cm x 50 cm.
This is all silk and is backed onto a piece of cotton backing. I thought if I didnt back it I would not be able to do it and wasnt sure if those were the rules or not, probably not, but it kept me busy over a night or two.
We are having some uncomfortable weather hot and sticky. John and I went to Adelaide today to see my mother and come back again, I cant believe how tired I feel. I only see my mother for about 2 hours, but it is tiring trying to keep up some small talk in that time.
When asked yesterday about the odd spot on my head yesterday the doctor who was one I didnt know and was one of the duty doctors took a scraping said it would take 3 weeks to get back a result if it was a fungus, which he didnt think it was, but it could be a skin cancer or just well who knows and it may need a biopsy.
All well and good but now I sit and wait with an itching head. I do see my own doctor next week, maybe he will be more forthcoming.
Is it any wonder that all faith in doctors has gone out of the window.
The dogs are barking at me and although it is early I had better feed them, I am marinating some steak for dinner, we decided to for go the fish tonight and have the last of them tomorrow night.
A bit rough when all I can think of is to write about health, dogs and food!

TAST 2 and a mix of pictures

Well first off I have put up my very poor rendition of my second TAST 2 embroidery stitch, this is knotted loop stitch.TAST 2 is part of Sharon B's challenge for the year, see her site on the side bar.
I had a lot of trouble with this stitch and still dont know whether it was supposed to have two knots or only one, but I had fun trying both, I had to look on a couple of other sites to find this stitch and even then it didnt seem to quite work the way it should. Maybe it is a new stitch!
This morning we walked along the bay, a bit late as we were caught by a friend of John's who wanted to talk and it was quite hot by the time we got going and the sea was glassy with Seal rock silhouetted , all rather lovely and around the corner there was The Bluff and Wright Island, the sea had these wonderful darker blue streaks in it, and no wind and hardly a wave.
From yesterday, a sink full of fish, a huge flathead and whiting and various other fish including Oscar's favorite red mullet.
While waiting for the boat to come in yesterday this young gull was annoying its parent in the car park, so of course it had to have its photo taken. The parent was totally ignoring it.
It has got quite a lot hotter today, oh and I bought a new hen, she seems to have settled in alright with the others, I am always a bit worried about the pecking order. I wanted two but they only had one available. Perhaps in a week or two I will get another.

Around the garden this morning

I had a quick wander while turning on hoses this morning and autumn is certainly coming, although it was hot and sticky today and we had a fiery sunrise this morning as you will see in the last photo.
The Pomegranite doesnt seem to know what time of the year it is as I have fruit ripening and flowers all at the same time and the foliage is beginning to yellow, I love the butter yellow they go in autumn.
The autumn crocus have suddenly burst into flower, I hadnt seen them before this morning and there were quite a few clumps of them, we dont grow crocus very well here and I think these are actually colchiums not crocus, we are really to warm for the others.
I think this huge succulent maybe an aeonium but I am not sure, it grows by the house in a very dry spot under the eaves, and yes we do have eaves and I wouldnt live in a house without them in this climate.
I have these cyclamen by the bedroom door on a sheltered bank and they flower at all sorts of odd times, nice and cheerful in a dark spot.
John went fishing off Victor today as the fellows didnt get anything in the gulf yesterday and came home very pleased with themselves with a big bucket of various fish, I have taken a photo but may put that up tomorrow as I went in to meet them and walked around on the cycle path for about an hour as well as taking advantage of no one in the house to do some cleaning so I am now a bit tired.
Trying to work out my stitch for this weeks Take a stitch Tuesday before Tuesday comes again and it is another slightly tricky one this is part of Sharon B's pintangle challenge for the year. If you want to know more look on my side bar.
The party last night was lovely but all my photos are pretty ordinary, the girls had pulled faces or something in nearly all of them, I will have another look tomorrow and see what I can do, loads of red eyes to get rid of. We didnt have a late night, home by around 11 which was good for us.

Parsons Beach and a bit of textile nonsense

This morning after going in to the market and buying some nice fresh vegetables we came home and then went on to Parsons Beach, normally very quiet and no one around but this morning there was a surf carnival on so we were mixed up with lots of young men and women as we walked the beach.
the first photo was rather fun, a sort of surf scarecrow with some ones flippers on the ends of his arms and a cockle bag on his head with sea weed as hair.
I had been wanting to see if my knee would cope with going down the very steep path to the beach, which it did except for the last step when I slipped ignominiously on a stone and had to be helped to my feet by a nice young man, well I didnt really need to be helped but when one as good looking as this offered I wasnt going to say no!
We walked from one end to the other which was a fair test, lots of millipedes wandering around the waters edge, I have no idea why they had a death wish but they seemed to.
I love the way my photo shop sometimes makes the wet sand look so orange, it is orange but not as bright as this one.
My textile piece is the one I put up a few days ago and is now finished I think, I have no idea what I am going to do with it, any ideas?
It was really trying to get some texture on top of the shiva sticks I had done. I quite like the way when I reversed the stitching at the bottom it gives a totally different look to the whole thing.
It is warming up and apart from the long walk we have had a quiet day but are off to a family 18th birthday party tonight, not that I expect to be very late, especially as John is going fishing tomorrow.
I have the bedroom door open and I have just heard the most beautiful sound, a grey thrush is out there somewhere singing, there always used to be a pair but I only very occasionally hear them these days so it is lovely to hear this one.