Aaaannndddd here we are, back home again......

We've been back for a week, and what a busy week it has been......appointments, often more than one, every day......but we seem to have caught up with things, so now it's the blog's turn.

We had a good time.  Didn't make it over to the coast, but there is always next year isn't there?  The folk festival was excellent as always, the family is doing well, Euan is sprouting up, friends are happy and healthy.  There were other distractions before we came home too; a craft festival, and even a ukulele festival which was great fun.

Also didn't take many pics!  Probably because we have been going to Canberra for so long that there doesn't seem to be anything left to photograph.  We missed our chance to get a Euan photo but never mind, our son has promised to take one of him with his quilt that I made him when he was a much littler tacker than he is now.

We had some company for a few days at the pet-friendly camp ground.

Two of the team of four Clydesdales associated with an Aussie brewery - they don't pay me to advertise so I won't name them.  Makes a change from the usual dogs and the occasional cat who camp with their owners, doesn't it?  They stayed for a few days, and were beautiful.

We found a new-to-us spot on the lake in Canberra, Black Mountain Peninsula.  This is Black Mountain looming up, and the tower is - wait for it - Black Mountain Tower, would you believe?

 Some of the black swans on Black Mountain peninsula.  Black swans are native to Australia but have been introduced to many other countries who, perhaps, believed their own white swans are not exotic enough.  I was snapping away when these three started edging toward me, and as I didn't trust the looks on their feathery little faces I put away the camera and backed away.  Slowly.

 You know how much I love autumn colour......a couple of oak trees in Boorowa, a favourite stop on our trips to and from Canberra.  The white building behind is the Court House, built in the 1880s.

Autumn colours everywhere were glorious.  Not quite up to the standard of a Canadian autumn, but not bad just the same.

Sadly not all our trip was good as I came down with a nasty bug which laid me low for several days.  However I recovered, and am now back to jumping out of my skin again.

Last week there was an Occasion.  The annual anniversary of the day on which I was born came round once more; this one is probably significant because it ends in 0, but all I can think is "geez......I am really old now".  We were on our way home in Mudgee and assumed because it was a Tuesday night - normally a quiet night in a country town, one would have thought - we would have no trouble getting a table for two at a local restaurant.......but no!  Two restaurants we tried were completely full so we ended up at a pub.  The food was excellent (Mudgee has a reputation for being somewhat of a gourmet town) but when all was said and done it was still just a pub, with a large TV showing a football program up on the wall.  Kevin gave me a surprise present, a beautiful wombat brooch, which went a long way towards making the TV recede into the background.

Isn't it gorgeous?  It doesn't have a coloured nose, the camera must have caught a reflection from somewhere.  It was made by Desmond of Celtic Dreaming; I have several of Desmond's pieces, some Celtic and some Australian, bought at the folk festival over the past nearly 20 years and I love them all.

The builder brought his tiler here a few days ago, and went off promising to order the new floor tiles immediately.  We hope he has.  Once they are in hand the repairs can, hopefully, start; our weather is cooling down and concrete floors are not warm.  It's also darker because grey concrete is darker than sort-of-beige carpet, and now that days are shorter and the sun is lower in the sky we find we need to turn lights on early in the afternoon.

Never mind......perhaps it will all start to happen soon.

"We put bright colours upon our little children; we dress our young girls in light and delicate shades; the blooming matron is justified in adopting the warm, rich hues which we see in the autumn leaf, while black and neutral tints are declared appropriate to the old."

Oh dear......seems I am now confined to black and neutral tints.  Well, bugger......I don't like neutral tints.  Neutral tints are dull.  Boring.  I suppose considering lime green to be a neutral is out of the question?

Enjoy your days!