Some of the grandchildren

 Our oldest son and his family were over from Melbourne for a few days and last night we had a family bbq for those who were around, we are missing some but here are most of the grand children.
Isabelle (20) and Fenella (25), Millie (5) in my hat and with her new puppy, Russell with her Melbourne aunt Marguerite. In the third photo Celina (15), Evie (15), Will (13) and Isabelle and Fenella.
Having come straight back from the Island to a lunch and then having them arrive was a delight, but also a bit exhausting. I think I must be getting old as I seem to wear out pretty quickly.
So a faily easy party last night for 14, salads and meat on the bbq followed by fruit and icecream.
Seems the middle aged group enjoyed themselves, a lot of bubbly was consumed as well as wine and beer.
I left them watching the dvd of Brave at about 11.45 and went to bed!
Most of the washing up had been done and I cheated and had paper plates which cuts back a lot on the washing up.
Now the family are making last minute decisions and are packing up and I am washing as the towels and sheets come my way.
It is also warming up and the garden is terribly dry, we are heading for high 30s and I think a 41 by the end of the week. Still things have been done, like having to buy a new refrigerator(!!) desperately needed but thank heaven for Simon as he put the door on the other side which is great, and the header tank sprung a leak, now has a temporary seal on it as no one is open to get a new one and there was nothing to be had locally.
Both John and I feel rather as if we have been on the go and one day perhaps it will stop, at the moment he has 3 for a meeting bout water matters. Not the best day but at least they are outside, just hope the flies dont cart them away but there is no where in the house.
I havent yet made any New Year decisions, we will be out for dinner tonight, but I would like to wish every one a safe, happy and healthy New Year.

Christmas morning

 We were a little slow having breakfast and opening presents, I got a kindle, a basic one so now I have to learn how to work it. I love books and the feel of books so may only use this for travelling, we will see.
Then we went to Pennington Bay for me to walk and John to fish.
Some one else had probably got this lovely leatherjacket and didnt know what to do with it so left it to die.
They make very good eating.
The clouds and sea were spectacular.
John had fun and lots of bites but only caught a tiny salmon trout! Quite a few people were on the beach, more than I have seen for a long time on Christmas morning.
Click on the photos to enlarge, you can click twice. We had our ham sandwich for lunch, I did some sketching and some hand sewing, then dinner, a good champagne with nibbles (which we didnt need but Johns pate is too good to not have!), followed by our skewered prawns and salad and then what we really didnt need, heated boiled fruit cake and yummy brandy butter. we both felt we had over eaten so today, so far, not too much.
We leave tomorrow morning so I am partly packed, the Melbourne family arrive late tomorrow and we are out to lunch and so it will be a bit of a mad rush, especially as the beds are not made!
Back to the mad hurley burley of life.
What fun.
I hope all those who read this blog had an equally lovely day.

Christmas Greetings to all my blog readers

Here is the line up on the mantlepiece and some close ups, the tree and pointsettia by the window with a corner of the view of the beach and ferry terminal.
There are ferries coming and going continuously today, and then tomorrow they stop.
we loaded P onto an early one this morning and are now catching our breath after 3 extra for drinks and then dinner last night, a very hot day and a wonderfully balmy evening with great company.
We have walked various beaches and then had to have an afternoon nap!
Age is catching up, but its a wonderful time and place to be.
Oh and those orange flower things are what I had been making from egg cartons, such fun.
A safe and very Happy Christmas to all.

We are on the Island!

 We arrived yesterday, tired and apart from packing and unpacking we did very7 little.
P arrived on the morning ferry, and we havent done a lotm went to visit a couple of galleries, went to my favorite place, Pennington Bay, and then this evening we went to the Chapman river, no fish were caught but a lovely time and the area was beautiful.
We are waiting for dinner, roast chicken legs, but the oven is a little slow.
Having a lovely time, hope every one else is too, Cheers!

It was a grey morning with the odd shower about.

 We went in for a quick walk along the beach near Hayborough, havent been there since the autumn and the beach has changed a bit. Swept clean by the last few storms.
The cockle train went past, I have to say I dont like this horrible paint job, it is a heritage train.
We delivered some presents and finally I have my missing Christmas cake back. If you want to know what happened go to my other blog in the side bar.
This will be very short as I have lots to do and not a lot of time to do it in, but at least we have had a bit of rain and it is cooler.
Off to do some ironing.
Oh and this really isnt an afterthought, not sure how to say this but I feel so terribly for those in the US with another horrible shooting.
Why do they do it?

Christmas Bush and grevillia robusta.

 The Christmas bush (bursaria spinosa) is a local to this area, It is a lovely addition to the summer browns. I photographed these yesterday as I had to take a detour and come in to the valley the back way due to an accident between Victor Harbor and the turn off to the valley. It was a great opportunity to take photos on the slow, unmade road home.
The grevillia came up in a tiny pot of a cactus I bought years ago on a stall, repotted it  and it is now several meters tall, it flowers at this time much to the delight of the honey eating birds and possums. A close up of the flowers and a shot through some of the shrubbery that it lives in in the garden near the house.
I have spent most of the last few days wrapping presents, most of that is now done and we have even delivered some.
It is warm and muggy but we had some very welcome rain, probably not much but it did vindicate John blowing out the gutters, and it was slow gentle, steady rain for a couple of hours.
I am now taking stock of what I have and havent got and will begin making biscuits tomorrow when it is supposed to be cooler.
I think John may be going fishing.
Such a relief not having to water even for just a day.

Its beginning to feel like Christmas

 I am not doing much here for Christmas as we will be away, but a few favorites had to come out, the wreaths are not yet on the doors as we need to blow out the gutters, in the hope of rain, today its terribly hot and muggy but no rain. We got up to 37 C, 100 in the old temperatures and it wasnt/isnt nice.
I decorate a tree etc when we get over to the Island, which is a week away, but I have got them out of the cupboard and they are ready to go.
This was the last of the 5 cakes I have baked, I still have to do some biscuits and John is out slaving over a hot stove making the pate. He had to go miles to get the chicken livers which was annoying but he was near Adelaide so it wasnt too bad.
There is talk of thunderstorms but I think they are more likely to be north of Adelaide.
To morrow I will start wrapping presents and sorting out what I have and what I still need to get..
I dont think I will be sending out Christmas cards this year, perhaps a letter as in this heat it is all I can do to get up early, turn on hoses, walk around the mare and stallion paddocks and retreat to the sort of cool of the house.
I am still sewing little angels.
I hope your plans are going well for this festive season.
Oh, I notice I didnt get an invite to Julia's (our PM) bloggers get together yesterday in Sydney, too old and not influential enough I suppose! Then I dont follow the mother blogs, been there (motherhood) done that and in a much more difficult era.
Oops shouldnt get political. None of them are interested in helping old farmers who cant afford to retire.

Around the back door

Here is what the garden under the bit of shade cloth looks like today, the two top photos and this is what it looked like a month ago 3rd photo.
I am so pleased with the way it has come on, although I am having to watch the watering system as stuff grows up and make sure that it is all being watered well.
I think maybe I could live somewhere where I dont have to haul heavy hoses around as I am having to do in the orchard at the moment.
We have had so little rain for so long it is becoming rather a worry.
We have plenty of 'other' water for the house but to do the washing in it means that the red from the iron in the soil from the spring turns all whites into pink and our house rainwater tank is not holding up well but due to the lack of money we havent replaced it. I think we should have as I am not sure where the rain water for drinking will come from.
The last photo is of one of the foals having a lazy morning in amongst the dock!
Thought I should put a pony photo in occasionally.
We had a lovely social day yesterday, out for morning drinks and then to friends for lunch. came home tired and really my body doesnt like me to drink at the moment, Its a terrible state of affairs and water is so boring and I dont like fizzy drinks. So love the odd glass of wine.
I have been terribly good today, John had a meeting in Adelaide so I have washed towels and sheets, made bread and now have the first of 5 Christmas cakes in the oven.
floors are swept and I have even started on another 3 little angels.
But... as I had a rotten night last night I am going to take to my bed for a little while and read my book, its quite interesting, Drusilla Modjeska's The Mountain, set in New Guinea in the late 1960's.
So now I will feel wicked again.

Northern territory Diary finished

I didnt want to bore you with page after page so these are a random few, It has been hot and finally I decided that I needed to finish off my diary and took off a heap of photos, in doing so I found I needed another group of pages so yesterday I made another set of 20, an interesting task working out where to put them but they did fit in well at the back and have made the book a better shape. Then began the task of gluing in my photos and writing captions. As you can see I did have good intentions of doing lots of paint and I did do some but not as much as I had hoped.The yellow paper at the back with a scrunched up look is an envelope full of maps and information.
It was such a lovely trip and I keep thinking of it with lots of fond memories and now I have finished the book it is easier to go back and remember.
Cool and dampish today, after a few days of horrid heat.
Hoses are on in the garden and of course my joints are not likeing me. the worry is it is a few new ones.
Off for a bit of Christmas cheer, drinks with our local MP and then lunch with friends, should be fun if I can cope with not drinking!!

Busy

I had fun making these little earrings, although I think I should have made them of slightly smaller beads as they are a bit heavy. Perhaps my ears will be like the Queen's as I believe due to the wieght of many of her (diamonds?) ear rings her ear lobes have stretched.
I should be so lucky as to wear diamonds.
My large epiphytic cactus is flowering, it took me years to get the white one to flower.
The red one was out a few weeks ago and I forgot to take its photo, well I think I did, I suppose I should go back through the photos and see.
The build up to Christmas and us going away is always pretty hectic. Add in no rain for weeks and weeks and so hoses on and being moved, some very hot, and then very cool weather doesnt make for a stressless time (once it cools down all I want to do is sleep!).
I am still sewing like mad but not a lot of that I can put up.
It has mostly been days full of sewing and nights as well and walking Max in between.
We havent even managed a walk on the cliffs or at the beach this week and next week looks pretty full as well as people get their Christmas functions and last minute meetings on.
I will be glad when I get to the Island.

I am tired

After how ever many days of doing feeds and throwing hay to ponies I am aching all over.
The weather has changed so it may be that my arthritis is also playing up.
So today I feel rather as if a large and heavy bus has run over me.
In the morning yesterday as I got half way around I had a flat tyre on the old toyota, thank heaven this time I had remembered to take my phone with me.
I finally finished the feeds and then there was a mad scramble to go out to lunch with friends.
an absolutely lovely lunch and a very enjoyable afternoon.
In between I have been playing with a few things, I think the little Santa will go in Masons Christmas presents to go on his tree, I played with the fun one from an old book I found with this little bright angel designed by Salli Lampi, I think I will make a few more of these,(whoops she has disappeared, may be tomorrow!) and finally a heart cut from copper, with rather more embossing stuff on than I meant but thats all right with a metal bow put on its the stuff that is sort of knitted and comes in a tube, Dale from The Thread Studio sent some this month for her POM, (product of the month). I dont seem to be able to connect to her site at the moment but look it up on google.
Better go, I have people here who think they can tell us how to make things profitable, that would be nice but I dont quite know how. Been there, done that!
Farming is always a gamble and the way the weather is looks more dreadful by the minute.

Doing the feeds this morning

 I am not sure how well you can see these, double click and it should be larger.
The willy wagtails have hatched out their babies down near the stables and although there are 3 I only managed to get 2 of them, they are still practising how to fly, very sweet but their parents are pretty aggresive.
I think the cows were late going out this morning as I was caught behind a mob of them, they have walk a reasonable distance to thier paddocks.
One grey pony stallion was waiting for me, but he is so fat he doesnt get fed! Poor fellow I give him a scratch as he stands by one of the gateways and I have to put the tapes down and then up again.
Huge thunderstorms were standing like sentinels over the hills.
Kangaroos! Well there were a lot of them and the ponies take absolutely no notice at all, I got a bit carried away trying to take photos of them.
Mother and child were further on in another paddock.
I am getting very tired and I am aching but the weather has cooled down a bit,
I didnt even have time to have a sit after my shower as we had to get in to do the weekly shopping.
Now that is done and put away I am doing this and then I will have a rest, until I have to do the night feeds!

Hot and bothered

I just took these three phtos from the bedrooms outside door, the clematis which is flowereing like mad, the roses under the lemon tree, the pink one isnt showing up very well, and the succulent by the door in dry as dry earth.
Not as hot as the weather bureau thought but overcast and very humid.
I was up very early this morning doing my feeds and have to go out soon and do the night ones.
I am trying to leave it as long as possible in the hope that it will cool down a bit.
My feet hate this weather and swell up.
I have been inside doing sewing but I really havent finished anything that I can show.
I think we are supposed to have thunderstorms and rain but it will be interesting to see just how much rain we can manage.

I feel a bit like this haiku by Onitsu
How hot and dusty
these sunstruck
cobwebs glisten
between dry branches

Textile play

I have spent ages on my machine this past few days, I started with the two top pieces, all in one length which I then cut in half and added some organza over the top and then machine stitched it all together. Which then became the cover for my next years diary. I am really quite pleased with it and I love the colours, very warm and central Australia.
The button I bought from an aboriginal man many many years ago at the Eumundi markets.
We had two foals born during the night, both colts but looking ok, and I went around with Sarah this morning to see where the ponies are and what feeds I am doing. Interesting! I dont think I had realised how many fillies we have, and thank goodness for this years crop of colts as we for some reason seem to sell them more easily than the fillies, even though here our preferred ride is on a mare.
We had lots of thunder yesterday and poor Max didnt know what to do with himself, a bit of rain as well which is welcome but not nearly enough.
A small Haiku by Shiki which I altered slightly.

The thunder has subsided
evening sun on a single tree
The cry of a bird.