Steam Train Sunday...

On the first Sunday of each month, the Railway Museum runs an excursion using the lovely old engines and rolling stock owned by the museum. Most Sundays during the year, DH plays golf, but on the first Sunday of August we both went on the excursion from Roma St to Pinkenba. Not a long trip...the round trip took just over an hour...and the journey passed through stations no longer operational as passenger trains no longer travel on that line.

When we arrived on Platform 10, this was the train waiting there...

Each carriage had an attendant  standing there at the door...

Not ours apparently! The tilt train heading off to Rockhampton was due to leave just before the steam train arrived back from its first trip of the day...

We waved goodbye to the passengers on the  the  tilt train!

 Here's another train arriving at Roma st Station...the city buildings loom in the background...

And here's 'our' train!

A massive water tender is a necessity I guess these days, as the big tanks of water at various larger stations/junctions are a thing of the past, so water has to be taken along.

 The lovely old carriages...

I love the timber work of these old carriages...and even the utilitarian luggage racks are beautiful!

Our journey to Pinkenba (which on the river and is situated downstream from the CBD) went via Bowen Hills and continued on to Eagle Junction where the line branched off on to the little used line to Pinkenba.
The next photo was taken as the train went through the Bowen Hills Railyards...the Ferny Grove train is on the elevated section of the line...

Suburbia...out near the suburb of Clayfield...

See! There is an Ascot in Brisbane as well as in the UK! The little Ascot Station...

And just like in the UK, we have a racecourse at Ascot...

The racecourse hosts popular Sunday markets...

The steam train attracted the attention of some of the market goers...

 Crossing Racecourse Rd...

Our journey takes us through the industrial areas, east of the CBD...

The line travels beside the large Army Supply Depot at Meeandah

 I believe this is just a small section of this depot...

There are still some port facilities at Pinkenba...

At Pinkenba, the line loops around on itself , so the train was then facing the right way for the return journey...

In some places on this little used line, the boom gates and related signals are not automatic...there was a man in a 'ute' (utility truck) who drove along the roads to the various level crossings to manually lower the boom gates...sometimes we had to wait for him to get to the level crossing...

 Being in the Pinkenba area meant we were close to Brisbane Airport...what a treat for a plane spotter fan like DH :-)

One of the old railway bridges on our journey...

 It was a lovely excursion and obviously very popular with young families as well as the older generation such as DH and myself! :-)

DsD3 in Canada...

Way back in March this year I wrote about my youngest stepdaughter heading off to Canada for a 2 year adventure. 

She regularly sends me messages about places she has visited in Canada that she thinks I will like...she is planning the itinerary for our proposed visit next year! Lol. 

Well so far she has worked as a waitress, but found it to be not the best job she's ever had. After that she has been doing 'Nanny' work. The first few positions were quite enjoyable...then DsD3 took some jobs where the children were not polite and nicely behaved as she had expected. Oh well, we know she still has her sense of fun, as in this photo which she posted 2 weeks ago on Facebook. 

Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi! 

FNwF...

It's the first Friday of the month, so that means Friday Night with Friends! So as Friday night rolls around to all the Time Zones, bloggers from all around the globe join in to work on their individual projects. The Sign-up is over on Cheryll's blog and I'm sure it's not too late to sign up for this month's FNwF. http://stitchingcubbyhole.blogspot.com.au/

Tonight I did some more work on the knitting project that I wrote about in FNSI last month...remember it's a secret project so you don't really want to see another blurry photo of the back of the project...but I will say that the project is nearing completion with just 2 more horizontal blocks of colour to go...

The other project that I worked on tonight was that I finally made a start on another dog quilt for DD2...well not for her exactly...for her partner's dog, Missy. Apparently Missy was a bit jealous of the quilt I made for Jimmy, DD2's dog, and tries to take Jimmy's quilt. So I offered to make Missy one of her own...as you do! Lol. 

The block I made tonight is a free pattern on Craftsy, called the Bow Wow Kennel Quilt, except I made it smaller, as I want to add other blocks...the Craftsy pattern block makes up as a 24" square quilt. 

As you can see in the photo, I also have some 'puppy' fabric to 'play around with' too. The ideas for how I'm going to continue with this project, are swirling around in my brain at present. But I'm sure Missy will be happy with how it all turns out! :-)

Use the link in the first paragraph to visit Cheryll's blog and then use the Sign up Widget there to visit other FNwFers...

Angel Babies

Last Sunday in the Sunday Mail, there was an article about an ongoing project of the Queensland Smocking Guild. The ladies are making tiny smocked outfits, specifically for tiny still born babies. That reminded me that I had some photos that I had taken a month ago at Sisters of Stitch.

 I have previously written how Nicky had been accepted by NICU as a sewer of outfits for 'Angel Babies', the little ones who are stillborn or who die soon after birth. 

The outfits are made from donated wedding gowns and I was able to take photos of Nicky at work, cutting out a number of outfits that afternoon.

The donated gowns often feature beautiful embellishments, which Nicky uses by careful placement of the simple pattern pieces...

Beautiful dresses that were possibly bridesmaid outfits, are also donated and made into Angel Gowns.

Nicky also sews little 'pouches' which are for Angel Babies of 20 weeks or less...

All very sad, but I think we all have to agree, that the way such family sadness and tragedy is handled today and acknowledged is so much better than it used to be...is there anyone else who was also told by hospital staff to 'go home and have another baby'??

At last Wednesday's Sisters of Stitch, Nicky said that coloured outfits are becoming more popular, so donations of bridesmaid dresses and ball gown/ formal outfits are urgently required. 

Read more about this program here:- https://www.facebook.com/angelgownsaustralia

Sunday Stitchers; July Meetup...

The Sunday before last, this group met at the Ormeau Community centre...

There was the usual table of food goodies...

And lots of stitching, chatting and laughing...

And of course some wonderful items displayed during the usual Show and Tell Session...

The group made July the month to collect items for the Dream a Little Dream Premature Baby Support Packs...

This is a cause close to the heart of one of our members, Debbie, who organised the coordination of this collection.

Debbie checking out some of the items that had been brought in

The boxes and bags holding all the items that we collected...

Kat, from the Dream a Little Dream group came to pick up the items...
here is the hand over...including a card that we had all signed.

Kat was overwhelmed by the amount of items ...
Some of the ladies gave her a hand to take everything to her car...

We didn't have any photos of the actual items, but the lovely people at Dream a Little Dream photographed all the items and shared the photos, along with a big thank you, on the group's Facebook page...I've made a collage with some of the 17 photos...
The items include tiny baby clothes, personal items for the mums, gifts for siblings of the premature babies, drawstring bags to carry baby 'stuff'...etc

These items will be used to make up the Support packs that are given to parents of premature babies. (Knitted items came from Knitting for Brisbane's Needy)

Street scenes in Warwick's JJJ Festival...

As promised, here are some more photos from our visit to the Jumpers and Jazz in July Festival in Warwick.

We arranged to meet our friends at the Town Hall...

The Warwick Town Hall from the other side of the street...note the palm tree in the foreground dressed in its hula skirt :-)

Warwick State High School band was giving a concert outside the Town Hall

Knitted/crocheted  post covers and crocheted bunting

Up and down the street were trees that had been yarnbombed...

The Ladies Lingerie/Sleepwear shop had decorated the tree in front of the shop, quite cheekily :-) (large photo and bottom right photo in the collage below)

Some more...

This tree was dressed in a jumper of bottle tops...

The next entry was from Knitting Nannas Against Gas...obviously an objection to the practice of 'fracking' to remove natural gas...

 Vandals had damaged this entry...we were told that if it was some local who did the damage, they will be found via CCTV

 Close up of the damage on the left chin...

 This was the charming Red Rooster Entry...those 'chooks' were just so cute!

Most of the shops entered into the fun...

Even the statue of Thomas Joseph Byrnes  12th Premier of Queensland, had been yarnbombed slightly! lol

But wait...there are more yarn bombed trees!!!

One tree was dressed in op shop jumpers...

Above hung lots and lots of odd socks...there was a suggestion that these were socks which had gone missing from washing machines and washing baskets...wink wink!

DH and I only had a day trip to the festival but as you can see, we certainly saw lots of delightful things. (There are a number of excellent craft shops in Warwick as well but I didn't check them out on this visit)
On our way home to Brisbane, we heard on the radio that a traffic problem that had caused morning peak hour chaos near our home was even worse in the late afternoon. So clever DH worked out a way of getting home without going near Alderley and the broken water main. We detoured and went across the river in the Moggill Ferry...

We were one of the last cars on..we had arrived just in time :-)

Glancing upstream...

So then it was a lovely drive through Moggill, Kenmore to Gap Creek Rd and then home. It had been a lovely day.