A third little angel

 I wasnt sure I liked this when I embellished the blue scrim onto blue felt but as she started to be made I rather like her.
A piece of handmade felt for her dress and scrim for flowers, beading and embroidery and some silk roving embellished on for her wings.
I like my embellishing machine.
We have had more showers today, we had our hair cuts and came home by early afternoon.
Collected my car which bunny hopped home, they forgot to do something to the springs so it has to go back in tomorrow and my shoulders and neck are aching.
The joys of the modern age when things dont quite go right.
A lot to do tomorrow so I will probably not blog until after we get to Coffin Bay.
My collection of' 'to do' bags to take with me is growing, and I mustnt forget my sewing machine.

Around the garden

 We have had some rain, not a lot but enough to start things off we hope.
The garden looks refreshed after such a long dry time and what autumn leaves I have (most fell off during the long dry) are looking lovely.
The self seeded plum is a beautiful muted colour.
I just managed a peacock in the photo as well.
Lots of seeds and flowers on the palms, although they wont much like the cold weather now.
Max is always there when I let the chooks out, he can look but get no closer!
My day has been rather mucked up, but when hasnt it! My car is not starting so it had to go into the garage to see what the problem is. I needed it yesterday when I had a Drs appointment but luckily Johns car was home.
Today I had set aside to do some baking and I finally have the biscotti done and the anzac bisuits but I am so tired. How silly to be so tired.
I am also trying to get stuff together to take away to Coffin Bay and organise the house sitter and I am so far behind with that.
Hair cuts at Glenelg tomorrow and then straight home.
I think I will make a cup of tea and go and sit by the fire!

A walk and another angel

I really like this angel, the colours work for me, they are fun to work on.
I seem to be getting my photos at a bit of an angle, the photographer not the blog!
We went for a walk this morning after going to the market.
We are supposed to be having a cooler change although at the moment it is still t shirt weather and we hope some rain tonight.
It has been a very odd few days.
As you can see there were some interesting clouds as we walked on the beach this morning, and sea weed piled up.
We havent managed a walk for over a week, so nice to manage one this morning, although I think the change may be coming as my knee was most uncomfortable, which it hasnt been for a few days.
John has once more cleaned out the gutters and blown away the leaves that are all over the place, I love autumn but the glory vine makes a huge mess. I know some people dont like blowers but I bless ourts.

This and that

I have been playing with my embellisher and this is one of Annette Emms angels that were featured in Stitch magazine. I had a lot of fun with thisw one and another is under way.
I havent used the embellisher for so long and it has been a lot of fun.
On Tuesday night we went up to Adelaide as John had a meeting and stayed with P over night as he had another meeting in the morning.
P gave us a lovely dinner and her son was there as well, it is nice to catch up with the younger generation, although they are not so young any more!
P and I did a little bit of important shopping and then went up to Carrick Hill to see the Jaqueline Hicks exhibition, I found it interesting as the paint in the 1940's must have been terrible as it has mostly gone to an over all mud colour but the later paintings were lovely, especially her aboriginal one of a figure with dogs.
I do find Adelaide tiring and so today I walked Max early and have done another angel figure but it is not finished yet.
It has been terribly hot for the last 2 days, over 30degrees C yesterday and nearly as hot today. With no rain until Sunday we are trying to water again.
So frustrating.
What has germinated in the paddocks is looking very sad and sorry and the garden looks awful.
Another difficult year for farmers here and so many being driven over the edge.
A couple of photos of the hills and houses taken from the Mitcham area.

A week end workshop

 I spent most of the week end at Hahndorf , about an hours drive away doing a workshop with Glenys Mann.
As usual I have no idea what I was doing or even going to do as the week before had been such a mess with back aches etc.
I only had one and a half days as I had a Welsh foal show to go to as well.
Luckily that wasnt far away and our Rivington ponies did very well, almost embarrasingly too well. All the foals we took came home with a broad ribbon as did my daughter Tabbys Pen-nant cobs and we ended up taking out the Supreme Welsh of show with our little section A Rivington Posy, Sarah did a brilliant job and so did all her hlepers and as Posy had a few early traumas and is very special, it was lovely that she did so well.
 We were on the top floor of the Hahndorf Accademy, a lovely old building with a great space upstairs, but there was the crunch, upstairs! very steep narrow old fashioned stairs that I found a challenge, I didnt take photos while I was there but I did take this one out of the window at the lovely trees in Hahndorf overlooking the main street.
There is not a lot you can do in such a short time but we had fun rusting papers and using shellac and I made a sort of scroll, as you can see from the few small pieces.
we started with making 6 to 8 postcard sized collages, I am not at all good at collage but there you go, I progressed from pretty to not so pretty and then the tea bags came out .
I wont say I am pleased with these, I may do more to the scroll, using thread but it was a great week end and took me out of my home bound depression and made me think, a little bit!
I hadnt rusted papers for ages and I must say I love it and must get out my rusting stuff so I can go and make more papers, they make such great backgrounds.
It was great having a workshop with Glenys, and I met up with lots more forum friends who were there as well asmaking some some new ones.

This week so far.

 John went fishing on Sunday and caught this lovely legal Mulloway which we have been eating, we baked the front half and filleted the back bit it was far too big for just the two of us in one go. Both ways were delicious.
We went to Adelaide to see the Turner from the Tate exhibition at the art gallery, the chimney tops were taken as we walked down the lane behind the museum to get to the art gallery.
We had organised to have a light lunch as well and I always like eating at the gallery.
I enjoyed bits of the Turner, not so keen on the oils but did enjoy the fact that there were a lot of watercolours and sketches and paint trials and preliminary sketches for the larger paintings. I couldnt afford the book but may have a look on the net to see what is on offer.
We had a good walk on Tuesday, the tide was right and my back and knee only started to ache towards the end of it when we wlaked on the bike trakc, the bitumen was rather hard!
I loved the shag on the post, although it is a bit blurry.
I have had more physio on my back but the poor girl doesnt quite know what to do with someone who cant get bits of her in the right places and whose upper back spasms when you work on the lower back.
It will eventually come good!
John has gone to a funeral today, one of the local aboriginal elders has died and John worked with him when he (John) was mayor, I would have gone but it is over at Meningie, a couple of hours drive away and I dont think my back would have enjoyed it, although it is a beautiful day and it would have been lovely by the lake.
Instead I walked down to the stables and around some of the mares and foals and took photos in the garden, the mares and foals look about their worst at the moment as the foals are due to be weaned and we are still having to feed them, a ting of green in the paddocks but that is all.
We need more rain.
The smoke bush is turning yellow and the early sasanqua camellia is out, the rest of the garden looks pretty unkempt I am afraid.
I just hope by spring I will be able to get back to doing some more in it.

Damp morning

 John has gone fishing and yesterday when we walked on the beach I saw a dead gannet, so this morning with a plastic bag and gloves I went in to collect it.
Why? I just love gannet skulls so it is now out with I hope lots of 'things' eating away at it.
It had begun to drizzl, in fact the road around Victor was quite wet and yet we were dry at home, bummer, we need more rain.
I went around to the car park for the Kings Beach walk and in the drizzle walked down to the cliff edge and took some photos.
There is aslo a new sign up on the heritage trail.
If you double click on the collage it should enlarge.
Lovely big rollers coming in and breaking on the rocks
The cottage on the hill looked lovely and wintery, I often wish I lived there.
It was nice to get out of the house even for a little while, sometimes I feel a bit lonely when John isnt home, silly I know but there it is.
I am now home making soup, adding to last nights casserole for tonight and I need to make bread and bake some biscuits.
I will see about the biscuits.
I may find a movie to watch on tv and quietly do some more of my knitting.