Quirky, quite bizarre? and random...

Today I'm just going to share a number of photos:-

We parked next to this ute in Bendigo. DH remarked that 'the owner must have won the lucky door prize...'

Our hire car in Victoria

During our recent holiday in Victoria, 2 Queenslanders drove around in a hire car which was registered in the Northern Territory!

A little steam engine , a Thomas the Tank engine lookalike, parked at the old station at Maldon, Victoria.  The tracks under it go no where.

A few days after we came home, I was reading the newspaper on the verandah, when I heard a 'cluck cluck' sound. It kept on so I went to investigate...this is what I saw under our house...

I called out to DH that there was a 'chook' (Aussie slang for a hen or chicken) under our house. He thought that I was hallucinating but he came and had a look eventually...

She stayed for about an hour and then headed off to peck around the front garden of a house across the road.
Now for the quite bizarre...
This is what I dug up in one of my vegie patches last week...

It's a sweet potato (the orange variety Kumara) Somehow I think this one was left in the ground from last season. It was very big, very gnarled and pitted.

Some bits and pieces...

Haven't blogged for a while; no particular reason...just been busy.
Firstly the Giveaway from a week or two ago for the Peter Walsh book ,'It's All Too Much'; The lucky winner is Linn, so if you'll email me Linn with your postal details, I'll get that in the mail for you.

One of the buttons on my blog is for Friday Night Sew In (FNSI) which is organised usually by Heidi but this month her cousin Crafty Vegas Mom (link for sign up) is organising things. The idea that all over the world, women are organising to just be able to sit down after dinner on Friday night and work on a project which doesn't actually have to be sewing. Read all about it over at Crafty Vegas Mom's blog and maybe sign up
 :-) ? At the moment my plan is to sew up some of those teddies that I picked up from Sharon the other week.

Now earlier this week I wrote about getting out my old school uniform and hat and I said how I was planning to take it to a gathering (just 5 of us) of old school mates last Saturday. So I put the uniform in a shopping bag and waited till we were all sitting on Ali's deck and then I pulled out the dress. Should have heard the squeals of delight and disbelief! They couldn't believe that I still had such things stored away...I think it is a fluke that I still have them. None of us could  probably  fit into the uniform (well Maybe Chris could) so we took photos of each of us holding the dress against ourselves...Talk about laugh...we did plenty of that!

Alison

Val

Chris



Jane



 

A bit hot lately...

For the early part of this week, my part of the state experienced heatwave conditions. Stifling hot days followed by very hot uncomfortable nights were the norm for 4 days. When I worked, and high temperatures were predicted, the school had a number of procedures such as showing movies in the aircond library at lunchtime, more breaks for drinks, extra rostered time at the school pool, art lessons and quiet, free reading activities on the concreted areas under the buildings etc.
And it's a bit like that at home too with routines adapted. Extra hot days means more showers taken, ceiling fans on, doors and windows open to get cross breezes, salad meals and cooking meat on the BBQ, fresh bedding and night wear after a hot humid night, lots of chilled filtered water, I wear sarongs around the house and the minimum of house work gets done! DH and I don't have a pool and we don't have airconditioning and the number of days when it is 'super' hot is a very small precentage of the whole year so we do 'survive' quite nicely.

DH and I walked on the Redcliffe Pier

The view from the cafe

Seagulls lined up 'waiting to catch a wave' perhaps?

We do sometimes go to the movies or the council library to use the aircon there! lol Where we live is also fairly close to beaches and going the other way, we are half hour from the mountain range areas behind the city with their cool rainforest parks and picnic areas with cold creeks flowing; so we're pretty lucky! So on Thursday, just gone, DH and I took a 30 minute drive north to Redcliffe, one of my favourite places. We went  for a walk enjoying all the lovely cool seabreezes and then had a coffee at Banjos, a cafe chain which we first discovered in Tasmania in 2010.

A cool change has come to this part of the state so I'm now working on the myriad of jobs that need doing around the house...and in the garden.

Ouch, still sore!

Yep! my right shoulder and arm are still really sore today after my pruning work on Tuesday. As luck would have it, I already had an appointment with Desley, my 'Bowen Lady' today. She was able to concentrate on the problem areas and now nearly 5 hours after the treatment I can feel an improvement, albeit small. I've promised to not do any more pruning with the long handled loppers until the pain goes. Desley actually recommended that I use a pruning saw for the thicker 'bits' or get DH to cut them.

So no knitting or sewing today, just a bit of reading and internet surfing/trolling for fabric with motor bikes on to make some storybook bags. I realised though that I don't need patchwork fabric necessarily, so next week I'll check out 'East Coast Fabrics' and maybe even Spotlight.

The Census work for DH finished officially yesterday. The trucks collecting the boxes of materials started on that job today but they won't be at our place till next Wednesday. So then the second bedroom can become a guest room again! I've taken over the third bedroom as my sewing room and the 4th bedroom is where the computer and printer reign supreme!

Even the bed is covered with census 'stuff'!

DH is now getting started on his next contract. This time he will be the Returning Officer for the state electorate of Everton. No one has any idea of when the election will be called (except maybe the Premier herself) but ROs have been authorised to rent office premises from October 1 until the end of April next year. That's what DH is looking for now, a suitable office space in the electorate.

Tomorrow will be another relaxing day for me as well. A friend ( we've been friends since the mid 1970s) is coming over in the morning and then we're heading off to a (fairly) local cafe called 'Cafe Urbano' for lunch. Tricia is a teacher but is on 2 weeks long service leave which she is using to help get her house ready for sale. Exciting times for her!

One of the friendly 'faces' at Cafe Urbano

Just another magnificent Monday...

Today, being the first Monday of the month, I headed north to Scarborough for a Knit and Natter group there. It's about a half hour drive and very pleasant as peak hour is well and truly over. Scarborough is part of the Redcliffe Peninsula and I  always love going to this area with it's lovely coastline views. Springtime here is a beautiful time of year.

Today I handed in the 2 throws for K4BN as well as my very modest contribution to the Christmas Challenge which was last weekend. The idea was to make items with a Christmas theme, which charities and community groups could use as small gifts for the needy in the community. We were told that there was no need for little knitted Christmas stockings as there were hundreds left over from a drive last year. Another K4BN member, Laraine, offered to send me a pattern for a simple knitted teddy which I eagerly accepted. The challenge started on Friday night and went through to Sunday night. I procrastinated...'Would the pattern be easy to follow? Would the bear be easy to sew up? Would my bear look like a bear?...Eventually on Sunday I had no option...I had to make a start...actually, I had to finish the bear. Once I got started  I really enjoyed making 'him' and then was sorry that I left it so late otherwise I would have made a few more. The teddy is knitted all in one piece and he is about 5 inches tall. The other ladies at Knit and Natter this morning thought he looked quite ok and Karen even gave him a little cuddle! lol

His Christmas bow is nearly as big as him!

When I arrived home early afternoon, DH said that a parcel had arrived for me. It was from Fiona of 'Designs by Fee' . This is what was in the parcel...

A parcel wrapped in some gorgeous gift paper with dogs on it (so cute), and inside the parcel a novel and a couple of little goodies and a little note from Fee.

And, glued inside the front of the book, is the explanation about this book's journey...

When Fiona finished reading the book, she offered readers the chance to be next in the Pay It Forward Giveaway. I was lucky enough to win the draw so now my task is to firstly read the book...
When I've finished reading the book, I'll offer people who read my blog the chance to be the next person in the Pay It Forward Giveaway. So it's a case of 'Watch this Space'!

A closer view of that lovely paper