One of these days....

....this quilt will have its borders pinned ready for quilting.

It seems that every time I have a block of time to get it done, something intervenes....it is so frustrating....time had been reserved yesterday but we went shopping for a dishwasher.  By the time we returned home, had a cuppa, fiddle-faddled around for a bit, there wasn't enough of the day left for something I prefer to do in natural light.

Oh well.  The coming week doesn't look too hectic....fingers crossed....

Just because I love autumn pictures:

Taken on a cool damp day outside our B&B in Goderich, a small town in Ontario.  If I ever moved to Canada (not much chance of that; I don't think I would survive the first winter) I would live in Goderich, it's a very pretty town.

How have you all been this week?  It's still winter here, not much has changed, life for these two Olde Phartes drifts along.  

A few of us from the ukulele group provided some entertainment on Friday for a Refugee Week function, which was interesting; it makes you realise how lucky we are to live in a safe country free from conflict.  When I was a child we heard about 'displaced persons' as European refugees were called after World War II.  Many came to Australia in search of peace; most found it, although life here in what was still considered a colonial outpost would have been so different from the life they were used to.  

When I think about the bland boring food we grew up with - lamb chops served with mashed potato and peas, every week - I am so pleased times have moved on, driven by people who have settled here from other countries.  My mother didn't like cooking, it was a chore she did from necessity, and as a result she was an unimaginative cook.  A pinch of curry powder in the savoury beef mince - always boiled, never browned in oil - was the most adventurous dish she served.

I remember when convenience foods started appearing in shops, and my mother seized the opportunity with both hands.  Packet cake mixes were her favourite, she made two double-sized cakes a week because my father took lunch from home.  'Smoko' (morning tea break) was not considered complete without a large piece of cake for those doing manual labour - including bricklaying, my father's occupation.  Many older Ozzies still call the morning tea break 'smoko' even though a much smaller number of people now smoke than used to, and many of us (myself included) have never ever not once lit up even one surreptitious puff.  Not ever.

Something else which pleased her was the advent of synthetic fabrics, fabrics which advertised themselves as 'wash and wear', no ironing needed.  However Ozzie summers can be fearsomely hot, and the last fabric you want to swathe yourself in is a non-breathable fabric; we have gone back to realising that cotton and linen fabrics are more comfortable.  If ironing bugs you, then don't do it - who is going to care if you are wearing wrinkled clothing?  Not me....

Continuing on with General Rules for Balls:

"When dancing a round dance, a gentleman should never hold a lady's hand behind him, or on his hip, or high in the air, moving her arm as though it were a pump handle, as seen in some of our western cities, but should hold it gracefully by his side."

Yes indeed, gentlemen.  I have danced with blokes whose dancing style is....shall we say.....creative.

Enjoy your days!