No Photos

Well I have just paid for some more photo storage space, not sure how long it will last, but as I will be off early in the morning and they tell me it could take up to 24 hours to come through I probably wont be posting until either Saturday night or Sunday morning.
Dont forget to post a comment before the end of the 4th of October for the Give away.

Birthday Giveaway, frogs and ponies.

I have been meaning to organise a giveaway for ages so finally here it is. It is my Birthday on the 4th of October so any comments made on either this blog or my other one here up to and including that day will go into the draw.
Depending on how many I get I may split the prize, and may add some more as the time goes on.
Yesterday I went to pot up a couple of plants and when i opened the bag this little fellow was inside. I think he is the one who goes ker plog in the dams and is called a banjo frog but I could be wrong. I let him go in and around my damp pots where I hope he will be alright.
Last night I had to walk down and look at the pregnant mares, a walk my knee didnt much appreciate but I took these photos, long shadows and it is getting just a bit warmer.
We went over to Tabby and John's this morning and sat outside in the sun to have a cup of tea. Lovely.
Well back outside to pull some more weeds.

Morning walk and a bit more textile play

This morning John had to go over to the opening of the Natural Resource outlet in Normanville and I went over with him.
There were not terribly many people but we helped swell the numbers a bit.
After that we went down to the beach and walked north towards the city, the sand was pretty hard and easy to walk on but only small pockets of shells and debris along the high tide mark.
It was a bit overcast but when the sun came out it was lovely.
This is the area I had all my early school holidays at as my grandmother lived not too far away. I remember lots of hot summer days playing and swimming on this beach and sheltering from the sun under the jetty which was a lot longer then, we used to dive off the end. Many a winter storm has brought it back to this stub which is still used in summer to shelter under from the baking heat. This side, the gulf side is much hotter than our southern Ocean area.
so a pleasant walk, a bit of socialising and then home again.
I am doing this bit of textile using all the bits of material I have either dyed or transferred stuff to and am having quite a lot of fun with it. Very simple stitches with some layering.
I have no idea what I will do with it when I have finished stitching.

Another bit of play

Not as interesting as the last one, I had already sewn the middle bit onto the khadi paper so had to fit things around it.
I have been a bit slow this week, we havent had time for walking and I have been weeding the garden, doing as much as I can before the back gives out, I do have one garden bed looking a lot better but many more to come. I think I have done well if I get three or four wheelbarrows full done.
I did the weeks shopping today. I went at a different time and I found it interesting that now the nominations are out for the forth coming Council elections people wanted to stop and talk, mostly about who had nominated! There are a few quite elderly ones who perhaps should have had a rethink, four years is a long time.
Sarah has been moving ponies around, I now have to walk out to check on mares etc. I will have to remember to take my walking stick with me.
I keep sneaking back to my book, a who dun it, I like the Inspector Banks ones, and his descriptions of the Yorkshire area. I am sad the the Rebus series have stopped as I liked the descriptions of scenes around Edinburgh too.
I found an egg in with my very old hen that the fox hadnt got while doing the feeds this evening, perhaps she is going to give me a few more now her fright is over.

Textile fun and Spring in the garden.

I played around a bit today (wasted time?).
Inspired by new Cas Holmes book I did a small bit of adding this and that, Khadi paper base, rusted paper, hand dyed silk scrim, linen and fme, a precious piece of Japanese wrapping paper. All together and then some string saved from a bunch of carrots bought at the farmers market and a small hand that I made ages ago and was in a tin of oddments, to be used up 'some day'!
This morning I cut, pulled, tugged back a large Salvia bush that has been annoying me, still lots of it in the ground so not to worry and after I had done that I thought a couple of photos of the blossom along the track up to the house and the forget me not and other things I see as I go out of the bedroom window.
Still drizzling so I threw around some Complete D as well.
Came in and collapsed and made the little bit of nonsense.
On my other blog I have more nonsense as I am doing Carla Sonheim's on line class called The Art of Silliness.

Botanic Gardens and Mail!

Just a few more photos of the Botanic Gardens, the giant Amazon Lily has been moved into a new house which I hadnt seen before.
Oh the first photo, that is the rill in the Mediterranean Garden, children love floating leaves down this but the ones I talked to didnt seem to know about Pooh Sticks, what a shame, the delight of our lives when we were children.
The new but now I realise not so new glass house, a striking design and the trees inside are huge.
Yesterday in the mail came these two things I had ordered, Angie Hughes new DVD on what she does with cotton velvet, a really good, very clear and informative dvd put out by Colouricious.
I hope to see Angie and what her class does at Geelong on the 1st of October when I go down there for a day and a night.
Then Cas Homes book, I will be doing her workshop at Ballarat next year, this has lots of ideas and I love it.
So a few excitements in the offing and 2 nights away in Victoria, a rushed trip but I didnt know where I had a bed so I decided to go for the quick option. Pity John couldnt come, it is my Birthday week end, but I will be home for the actual birthday and we will do something nice.
Money is tight at the moment so even a picnic, if it would ever stop drizzling would be lovely.
NO I must say anything nasty about the rain, I will be moaning soon enough about the lack of it, but the odd day of blue sky would be lovely, just to enjoy the spring blossom in the orchard at the moment. If I walk in the orchard one tends to sink up to ones ankles!

TAST 28/29 beetles and the Botanic Gardens

Here is my very small rendering of my TAST for weeks 28 and 29. they are variations on raised chain stitch.
I didnt do them in good colours for the scanner and the first one is so small even I have trouble seeing it! Quite an interesting stitch and I am glad to know how to do it.
Then my beetles, or some of them, without legs. I am not sure if I am going to put legs on them or not, maybe just a pin back. I will see how I feel about that later on when I have some spare time.
I really like them as they are.
Nest the Botanic Gardens again, the first one is of all the activities that go on there, a bride in the background and in the foreground I am not sure except it was something to do with Alice in Wonderland.
I always rather like this statue in about the center of the gardens, and then I spied this couple walking ahead of me, so "old" Adelaide, so almost 1940's when I remember my parents wearing clothes like this. Should John and I? We were in jeans and jumpers! oh and comfortable sneakers and shoes.
Still mizzling with rain and cold, but the birds are all making nests, or sitting on them, and at the end of next week they are promising 21 degrees C!! We will need sunglasses and bathers. Better than the 10 degrees when I went in for my physio appointment this morning.

Native Orchid Show, Adelaide and Botanic Gardens

A few photos from yesterday.
First a wonderful display of Native dendrobiums, most of these would be bred hybrids, they are not as spectacular as this in the wild and they generally have a very strong perfume.
The show was a delight.
From there we went to the Art Gallery in the center of Adelaide and this is the streetscape on Saturday late morning on North Terrace showing some of the lovely old buildings.
From there we went to the Botanic Gardens, also almost in the center of the city just down North Terrace a bit more towards the hills in search of this plant and flower.
It is a Gymea Lily and this one has its flowers much further advanced than ours so we are waiting impatiently to see it fully out, the spike is about 10 feet tall.
Then the very old red gum that I spoke about yesterday, all that was left of its trunk. If you click on the photo you may be able to read what it says.
Just to show how close to the city our gardens are. I love going there, I will show more photos tomorrow. No leaves on the trees yet but some of the borders are beginning to show some colour.
It shows that we are still having a cold and damp September.

My work room this morning

You cant see it terribly well but these are the views from my workroom, wet and damp outside the window and I have to say a mess inside!
I loved the outside in view, so the first two are from my no 2 workroom (aka the spare bedroom, help! I have people coming to stay and will have to clear all of this out soon!)
The third is of the froth of plum blossom I can see out of the bedroom window.
I would clean those windows but the honey eater is nesting out there again, it is going to be a good season, 2 nestings so far, and also it just keeps on raining and drizzling.
Good for weeds especially the ones I was going to pull out this morning but now cant.

ARt Gallery of South Australia Rupert Bunny Exhibition

For some reason my camera does not want to download photos so I am waiting until tomorrow as the internet at the moment is terribly slow.
I had a couple of not so good days but today was lovely.
We set off early and after a trip to the farmers market we headed for the Native Orchid Association of South Australia's show and I bought some plants and we picked up some potting bark.
There was a wonderful display and I do have photos but well I hope tomorrow.
From there we went into Adelaide and down to the Art Gallery where we saw the Bunny exhibition. He was born in 1864 and died in 1947 but lived in Europe, mostly Paris for a large part of his life.
There were several stages of his paintings on show, some I love, some not so much.
I think his portraits are outstanding and I wish I had the book, I will buy it later when I have some money, but there were two or three I thought were fantastic. The way he painted flesh on his nudes was terrific and his ability to move things into the background in some were wonderful.
I dont think his landscapes were much and I didnt like a lot of his very idealistic stuff but these ones I have put up were among the ones I liked. His portraits of his wife, the second two were wonderful, the part painting shown of the nude was incredible, this as was the first photo were taken from the Gallery brochure, the first reminded me very much of Paul Loti whose house we visited in Rochefort a few years ago, very different and I am not sure his best work when seen en masse, this was the best. The last photo was of Dame Nellie Melba, the detail of the dress was exquisite.
I spent ages going back and forth, I have seen a lot of his work as several regional galleries have at least one of his paintings, I think he must have been very prolific. On the whole I love some, like others, not so keen on a few.
There was also an interesting exhibition of prints and etchings but I will go into them later on, It was equally interesting and I came home feeling good, I wonder if the St Johns Wort pills I am taking are having an affect!
From there John had booked a table at the gallery restaurant and we had a lovely light meal and I had a glass of bubbles. a little worried as I had had a tummy upset two nights ago but all was well.
From there we went along to the Botanic Gardens and had a lovely time wandering amongst the brides (Saturday afternoon!) and looked to see how their Gymea Lillies were flowering. Ours is not as advanced at theirs. Too cold I would imagine.
Last year September was Hot, this year it is cold and gloomy, we came home to more rain!
Tomorrow I will show I hope a few of the many photos I took .

Orchids, freesias and cloth

These big dendrobium speciosum orchids which are native to rainforests in the eastern states of Australia are all coming in to flower, at the moment they are on the front terrace above frost level, not sure if we will get some shade cloth for them for summer or do what we normally do and transfer them under the red cedar tree, they are getting rather large, some years they flower well some not so well, they will be spectacular this year.
I picked the yellow freesias this morning, not a lot out in my soggy garden but these are coming.
I am making these, beetles, they are in the latest Australian Embellish magazine, not finished, they need quite a lot more doing to them but have been fun to do, I am embroidering them and then they need legs. Designed by Penny Eamer.
Some people are so clever!
The last photo is of a piece of silk, I dont normally dye but am coming to this a bit, this one was done with onion skins and then placed in jars with some rusted objects and left in the sun. I love the different colours and patterns. I havent had much luck with cotton but silk is lovely. I have some in some boiled carrot tops and they have gone a brilliant yellow! They are still sitting there. Of course I am not sure what I am going to do with them but something will come along.
So I am being busy, and now have a lot of things to do, and unfinished things I want to finish, and I still havent done my TAST for this week or last week!!

A wonderful surprise in the post

I won the blog give away that Trace of SoewnEarth did a few days ago and in it came all these wonderful things, her lovely buttons, a painting done with bees wax, cloths done with natural dyes. A wonderful assortment I will put to good use.
I so very rarely win things and coming at this time was a wonderful thing to give my life a boost. Thank you so much Trace.
I wont go into what has happened it is on my other blog, just a bit more mayhem.
It is late and I am tired, I think tomorrow will be better.

A snapshot of the last few days.

Our walk this morning, a big swell even though the wind was from the north.
One of the new foals and her mother, wet after days of rain.
Our neighbours plum trees, almost past their best but I had to take their photo as I walked down the road to photograph the foals.
The Farmers Market on Saturday morning, the flower stall looked bright although the flowers were not cheap.
And Fridays walk along the beach and headland at Pt Elliott.
I have been filling my days a few things on my other blog ( see the side bar) and a few things that I have got started on but will take ages to finish.
Weather has alternated between grey and gloomy and warm and sunny but the grey and gloomy is still winning.
We were woken in the middle of the night by a phone call from the tanker driver to say a pony was out, the good little Welsh Mountain stallion had burst through the tapes I had put up in the bit I wanted him to eat, so there I was collecting a non too pleased boy by torchlight and taking him back to his paddock. I tried him again this morning and he is just too clever by half, he was out in the 2 seconds it took to walk away.

Orchids in my sunroom

I dont think the colour comes out terribly well but the pink Dendrobium which I think is 'Bardo Rose' is stunning and covered itself in flowers, and the smell is lovely. I have the big denrobium speciosum outside the windows and there is going to be a lot of flowers there too.
The white d. delicatum is in the bathroom and not showing up terribly well against the white tiles. Their perfume can be almost overpowering at times.
Spring has sprung in the plum blossom area as well, I rather like this small flowered self seeded one as it covers itself.
I had a couple of not so good days but I wont repeat myself, I wrote about it on my other blog (see the side bar).
Still cold but a bit of sunshine and two more new foals.