River Port of Goolwa this morning

We may not have gone over to the wooden boat show last week end, too hot, too many people, but this morning we went over to look at an exhibition and have a walk along the wharf. the paddle steamer Oscar w was there and the barg the dart and a few other bits of interesting river boat history. I took a close up of the bottom of the Dart with very weathered red gum planks. It was still pretty hot but a lovely walk. the exhibition was interesting, some lovely metal work, all sold. we had been to the market and later today hope to go in to Victor to see the Second Marigold Hotel, some thing for our age group but with the addition of Richard Gere. we are expecting a cool change, at the moment it is warm and sticky, not pleasant but we did manage to have a whole 0.04 of a mm overnight. I hope the black snake that was in the hen house has gone tonight and not eaten too many eggs.

Warming up again

Morning walk along the beach this morning, warming up and very flat and calm with a low tide again. I love the way there is a reflection of the Bluff in the water as well as the clouds as we walked further along the beach. I have to say I havent done a lot today, more rabbits being made, had to unpick one set of ears three times! I am not really ready to take photos yet. I have had a few rotten nights and then doze off during the day, I am certainly not as active as I once was when I havent had a good nights sleep. Still there really isnt much to be done while it is so hot and these days John does the watering as I cant cope with hoses with my shoulder as once I could. Just hope when it is replaced I can do more of that sort of thing, feel such a wuss having to ask him to hang the clothes on the line too. Hope your weather is better than ours, I think I would almost like cold and wintry weather rather than heat. Still the early morning beach walks are a plus.

Very low tide this morning

We walked the cliffs at Petrel's this morning and then onto Depp's beach, it was the lowest I have seen the tide in ages. All the mermaids necklaces and other sea weeds were exposed. John was pretty sure there were some reasonable mullet in some of the pools too. A lovely morning for walking, cool and not too much wind. I had a terrible nights sleep so am not doing a huge amount today, have two more rabbits on the go and another 2 to start on as well. I will put up the finished ones in a day or two.

Pt Elliot on Sunday

I haave finally got some of the photos from Sunday, and more or less got my new camera going, it has far more ways of doing things than I think I want to know! The standing stones are on the site of the Harbor Masters Cottage and the stones were taken from the lintels of that and a church which is no longer there. A wonderful view of the bay, very necessary as there were so many sailing ships shipwrecked there. It was not a good harbor. I then walked down the main street and took a few photos of varying styles of houses, love houses, and finally the steam train was just passing through as I went to look at the patchwork exhibition. This is The Duke of Edinburgh. (Oh dear, is that the correct spelling? I dont know!!) Any way it was lovely to see so many carriages with people in them. The weather has cooled down a bit, in fact today was windy and positively cold on the beach. I then went over to see friend W who was baby sitting her gorgeous grand daughter, and looked at the fairies I am supposed to be making in Ballarat this year, she did Samantha Bryan's class last year. I now know what sort of wire I need and a better idea of the size of the heads to make.Now to have some idea of what I want to make, I am hopeless. never make up my mind until I get to class. So lucky to be doing a class with her. Max has decided he is a bantam herder. I have been letting the bantams out during the day, I could never do that before as the pugs always killed them, amazing as they are small dogs and Max is a heeler cross but he is very good and listens to me when I tell him to come back, perhaps he did some herding in his past life. It does make life easier, although I think the bantams (Japanese, love them) are now getting into a routine thank goodness. Just so long as a fox or the nieghbours cat doesnt appear.

Brooches

In the heat I have been sitting by the fan, (and under an air con vent) and doing a bit of hand sewing. I have been asked to make a few brooches for an exhibition. I made some of these years ago, when I was a doll maker and thought it might be fun to make a few more. Very humid today and still hot. We went over to Pt Elliot and walked and dropped in to see both the quilters and embroidered exhibitions. I took lots of photos of houses in the street and now my camera won't download them. So the new am Era will have to come I to use. For a few days the old one behaved but now it's not again. Such a nuisance.

Penelope rose

It is very hot. A day to sew and watch old films, Khartoum and now Chisum. Charlton Heston and Laurence Olivier and then John Wayne. Too hot to go out and feed up for another hour or so. I love the rose named for me, or perhaps because of me, or then again nothing to do with me at all. Never mind I really like it. One of those weeks where not a lot was done, or at least nothing to write about, apart from going shopping for clothes with my oldest daughter, oh to be you young and slim again! I have been reading or rather really reading old books, I had forgotten how good Helen Marines was,this one was Decision at Delphi. Some lovely descriptions in it. Hope for a good week end.

Red sail in the morning

double click on the red sail and you should see it better. I have been pretty busy but yesterdays walk threw this lovely scene at us, possibly heading for Kangaroo Island. This morning we were on the beach again (yesterday was the cliff walk and beach fast Petrels.) My business has been pretty mundane, house cleaning and finding that a lot of things make my shoulder hurt and I need to get it to calm down. Made a nice shepherds pie for dinner tonight, I had bought a special of mince for Oscar and there was far too much for him so it had to be made into something. This one was nice and spicy (added a chilli) and with lots of flavor. I havent been cooking much, we have been tending to have easy stuff like grills and cold meat and salad. By four o'clock I dont want to know or think about cooking anything that I have to think about. A relatively cool day so I didnt mind having the oven on for a little while.Er have had quite a lot of Pacific gulls around, once upon a time they were a rarity, I am not quite sure I like them as they are bullies but very handsome. The tides have been low and the skies have been full of interesting clouds. Warming up for the next few days but still no rain.

Yesterday and today

These are a little muddled. My lovely panasonic lumix camera is having a problem and I think I will have to get another one. I love this camera and need another in a hurry. These were taken with my old Nikon coopix which takes nice photos but not as good as my panasonic. Any way, two days, first and third photos yesterday, the others this morning. Yesterday was hot but a bit of a breeze, this morning hot and humid. I went in early this morning to go to the market and drop John off at the hospital to have his cataract off so walked before heading home, then back in to collect him> All seems well at the moment. I admit to being in a bit of a panic. Yesterday the tide was very low and in the second photo the reflected clouds were really interesting. Today it was I think what we call a dodge tide, not a lot of tidal movement and the tops of the rocks on the reef just showing. I am not doing a lot, this weather really knocks me around. I am also on snake watch as yesterday there was a red bellied black hanging around. I also want to do some machine sewing but my shoulder is not terribly happy so I am reading instead and doing some research on a new camera. Hope you are having a lovely week end and especially a nice valentines day.

Still around

I have had a busy few days and just to prove that I am still around I have done these small stitched pieces. The first just scraps found in my work room and the other the four pieces of Warrandyte that I have finished off. I am still to do a backing for them but I just need a bit of energy to get them going. we had to go to Adelaide yesterday and my friend P took me to Premier arts to get some stuff for the workshop next month. John had a meeting, not a long one but I also managed to see my sister for a short time, she is having terrible trouble with sciatica. I seem to have come home feeling terribly tired but then we did have quite a long day and this morning we had doctors appointments, nothing really just blood test results and more prescriptions. I rattle with the number of pills. The weather has been quite changeable, cool and mild, then hot and back to coolish, although the week end doesnt sound nice. We came home to find a baby red bellied black snake wound in the door mat by one of the outside doors. I think it was dead but I bashed it with a broom just in case. Maybe it got itself in a twine it couldnt get out of. Oscar and Max were both outside but seem quite ok. Of course if there is one baby there are likely to be about 5 or 6 more so I am now feeling rather wary about where I step and hope one hasnt come inside the house. Not a lot of walking over the past 2 days either as by the time we had finished this morning it was late and John had stuff to do at home. If we dont get out early we just dont seem to walk. I am enjoying just a bit of gentle stitching.

Our 56th Wedding anniversary

We looked so young, we were so young! 19 and 21, skinny and so much ahead of us. Its been a great marriage, best friends, not to say we havent had our rows, or our problems but four children, 11 grand children, one gone before us, and one great grand child. On the whole it has been fun. Getting older has its problems but so far we are in reasonable health and hope to stay that way for a bit longer. After yesterday a quiet day, it is very hot, high 30's and tonight we are out to dinner. Usually we have lunch but far too hot for that today. A change is supposed to come in this evening, I hope so, this mornings beach walk was rather warm and a bit uncomfortable.

A dreadful day

We all know when we have animals that at times our hearts will be broken. today was one of those days as we had to put down our much loved young Welsh B stallion Imperial Aden. His oldest foals are only 2 year olds, and doing well at led shows. This morning my daughter rang me to say he had colic and could I get the toyota and bring it back as she was leading him home and the dogs were in the ute. we couldnt get a vet, always a problem in our area, plenty of small animal vets but our normal vet was preg testing cows. We finally got one after 2 hours who sedated him and he made the trip to the Adelaide vets, only to be told there was nothing they could do. A heartbreaking decision was made and our dear boy is no more. Such a young stallion and we very rarely have sand colic but it is always the best who go. This photo is not a good one, taken on my walk the other day, so very much in paddock condition with his mare. He is the one on the left. Only one mare to him for next year but he left three very lovely fillies this year. So much potential. Gone.

It is supposed to be summer!

Long sleeves weather. We had a lovely walk this morning but it was pretty cloudy and quite cold and windy. Very low tide again, with ibis on the exposed reef.The colour of the sea in places was quite interesting which is why you have a photo of shallows and waves rippling in. Supposed to be warmer tomorrow.

Wandering the farm this morning

I havent managed a walk around the paddocks for a while but it was cool this morning and I had walking shoes on! I need them these days. Mother pea hen and her one remaining chick was looking to see what nice things they could find in the orchard. Then I wandered around the ponies, still some in the close paddocks, inquisitive foals, a stallion and some of his mares, these were all the Welsh Mountains. A rather nice Welsh Section B filly foal and one of the dead trees. Product of a combination of drought and the cows. People always say it is the horses that ring bark trees but here it is more likely to be the dairy cattle. Wretched things we have to be so careful not to put them in the paddocks for too long when they are looking for roughage. These trees are getting on a bit but what really didnt help was the succession of bad years with no rain for periods of months, not weeks. It has been such a pleasure this year to so far have mostly mild days and a bit of rain, not enough as spring was so dry but the lower temperatures have been wonderful. I am back in now trying to do some repairs on clothes, trying a bit of hand stitching to see how much longer Johns yukata will survive. Warmer weather is due by the end of the week.

A little more play

I am still playing with things that link to the class I had with Dale Rollerson and to finish off my notebook from her class. Here I did an embossed velvet using a stamp and paint and on the other side building on some silk rods I had fused together, painted and then added to. It is fun working out what I had done before with Dale and what was re enforced during her class.