Hanging in there

How is everyone doing this week?  I hope the "social isolating" we are all practicing isn't doing anyone's head in, it could be a bit lonely if one lived alone.

We have discovered an internet radio station which plays folk and blues - just our kind of music, so we are happy.  It makes a change of diet from our usual classical station.  If folk and blues are your thing, try this - it has presenters and programs from different parts of the world.  Currently it's Celtic music from somewhere in the U.S.A. which sounds very Irish to me.

Right now it's the only folk music we can have (apart from our own CDs) as the festival in Canberra has been cancelled.  Our son's band also had a gig booked that we had planned to attend while we were there but it, too, is off.  Sigh......

Stuff has happened in the sewing room, the block for Yukon is done.

Early in our Canaussian son's time in Canada (this was way back early in 2005 when he was still only intending to stay for one year, he hasn't come back yet) he spent a few weeks in Whitehorse, Yukon, and one night was lucky enough to see the Northern Lights.  That is the one thing on my bucket list, but I am realistic enough to know that I will probably never do so - while I can cope just fine with winter in Australia, I don't know if I could survive those wintery temperatures!

A whole heap of oak leaves cut from one batik fabric......

......and the result.  It is still spread out on the ironing board to cool, I'm not game to move it until it has cooled down.

"Hanging On", pattern by Edyta Sitar.  Once I know everything is stuck it will be layered and quilted; the quilting holds the applique down.

We cancelled our market gig this morning.  Much of the audience is on the shady side of 60-65 (as are we!); we didn't want to make any of them sick, and we darn sure didn't want any of them to make any of us sick either.  While we can we will continue to meet on Mondays at the golf club as we are a small group even when everyone is there, and the room is large enough that we can keep far enough away from each other but still be heard.  Humans are social animals; we need that contact, and we need our music.

We did manage to get out for our anniversary lunch on Thursday, our anniversary, and were one of only two or three couples in the restaurant.  We had a really delicious meal with great service, and on leaving were presented with a bottle of bubbly - wasn't that nice?  It is chilling in the fridge as we speak.

We have passed the equinox, so summer is officially over (although it is having a last hurrah this weekend). It can take its heat and bugger off somewhere else. Sadly it takes apricot season with it.

"Presents after engagement.
When a couple become engaged, the gentleman presents the lady with an engaged ring, which is worn on the ring-finger of the left hand.  He may also make her other small presents from time to time, until they are married, but if she has any scruples about accepting them, he can send her flowers, which are at all times acceptable."

We didn't use an "engaged" ring, or an engagement ring as they are now known.  It was my second marriage, so the whole engagement thing seemed a bit superfluous.  Nearly 20 years later I was given a lovely emerald and diamond ring instead.

Enjoy your days!

One almost-finish for the week

The next block for my Canadian mystery quilt has been stuck down, but is not quite finished.

The polar bears both need eyes and the cub needs a nose, but they will be done by machine.  This is the block for the Northwest Territories, where it probably doesn't ever get very hot......certainly not as hot as we know it here.  The next block is currently being prepared.

Like a lot of the world, our life is in limbo due to the current plague.  We are waiting to hear if the folk festival at Easter has been cancelled - which will be a difficult decision for the organisers, but is probably the correct one.  If that is the case we may still go to Canberra; we have booked and paid for accommodation on the way, but if we have to cancel then we have to cancel. 

However, one now has a wonderful excuse if there is a function one does not wish to attend, or if there is a person one wishes to distance oneself from.

"Oh no, I'm self-isolating".......

At least here at home there is fabric to be sewn, yarn to be knitted, books to be read and music to be played.  Never a dull moment here, folks.

With the current cool weather (today has a distinctly autumnal feel) my thoughts have turned to the next knitting project.  There is still a skein of yarn bought on the last trip to Canada which hasn't yet been knitted, and which will probably become a scarf - sock yarn which is way too gorgeous to be hidden away inside shoes.  Yarn was also bought last year for a new cardy, a deep mustard-gold.  It will probably have plain sleeves and back with fancy cabling on the fronts, the fanciness of which is yet to be decided.  Decisions, decisions......

A big occasion coming up, on Thursday it will be our wedding anniversary.  44 years, my goodness - how time does fly!  Add to that two years living together beforehand (quite a radical thing to do in those days, although it was slowly becoming more common) and we are heading up toward a whole half-century together.  Does one get an endurance medal for such things, I wonder?  Because we probably each deserve one.

We never thought of ourselves as trend setters at the time.  Due to a mistake made when I was young and silly (marrying a bloke I should have kept well away from) we had to wait until I was legally able to marry before we could tie the knot.  It was a minor scandal among older family members for about five minutes, but all was well once we were legal and had started producing children.  In any case it's so long ago now that, as the song says, it really doesn't matter any more.

"Mutual trust and confidence are other requisites for happiness in married life.  There can be no true love without trust.  The responsibility of a man's life is in a woman's keeping from the moment he puts his heart in her hands.  Without mutual trust there can be no real happiness."

A lesson learned when I was young and silly.

Enjoy your days!

Big MUSIC is done!

Finished......completed......whatever.  It has now moved from the sewing room to the dining room table.

I used a black and random spot fabric from my stash for the binding after finding out that my original choice (tiny black spots and stars on a white background) clashed horribly.  Its background was dazzlingly blindingly white, this background is off white, and never should those twain meet.

Even the backing has spots to match the front fabrics, I was thrilled to find it at - guess where? - our local Spotlight store, known to Aussies as 'Spotties'!

Minimal quilting - in the ditch around the letters, and two rows of wiggly stitch (I think its proper name is serpentine zig zag stitch, but wiggly will do) in the border.  It will never win prizes at a quilt show but it was a fun project, a souvenir of our trip to Canada in late 2018.

The latest news on every web site and news bulletin is, or course, the dreaded virus sweeping the world and making otherwise sane people act like idiots.  Therefore, in the interests of your sanity and mine, this blog is hereby declared a virus free zone.

Do really obvious errors in spelling and grammar leap out at everyone, or is it just me?  I don't go looking for them, but some are so obvious they are hard to ignore.  Our town has a paper published every day except Sunday, and once a week a free paper with gleanings from the almost-daily paper, plus a few other articles - a local historian has an interesting article, for instance - makes its way round town.  It also contains the real estate insert from the previous Saturday's paper.  While browsing through said insert a few days ago I happened across a listing for a two bedroom unit near the centre of town which, and I quote, "epidermises lifestyle and convenience!"

Those conveniences are probably only skin deep, you know......

Does anyone name their sewing machines?  I don't.  They are inanimate objects, so as such don't need a name.  Never in my life have I seen the sense in naming a car, or a machine, although many people do.

We are now in my favourite part of summer, the wind-down stage.  Trees are starting to look a little faded and less bright than a month ago although it will be a while yet before leaves change colour, and temperatures are actually quite pleasant.  We don't need to sprint from shady spot to shady spot when out and about as it's now possible to spend a short time in the sun without worrying about frying.  The only sad note is, apricot season is over.  I lurve apricots.  Dried just aren't the same as fresh.  Sigh.......

"Ostentatious display of knowledge.

In refined and intelligent society one should always display himself at his best, and make a proper and legitimate use of all such requirements as he may happen to have.  But there should be no ostentatious or pedantic show of erudition.  Besides being vulgar, such a show subjects the person to ridicule."

This is true.  I do, however, know enough to know that there is quite a difference between "epidermises" and "epitomises", and how to use them correctly.  If in doubt I would consult a dictionary for spelling and usage, not my computer's spell check.

Enjoy your days!

There is a lot of Stuff not finished this week

But - as I plan to still be around next week that doesn't matter, does it?

One quilt block has been made.  Some quilting has been done on big MUSIC, some is still to be done.  No more Canadian blocks have been made.  A lot of music has been played.

This block is called "Carrie Nation", and was first published in the 'Kansas City Star' in 1940.  Carrie Nation was quite a woman; after her first husband died from alcohol-related conditions she made it her mission to rid the world of the Demon Drink because, as she saw it, society was to blame for her husband's love of alcohol rather than addiction or illness on his part.  Mrs Nation travelled around saloons and taverns with a hatchet that she used to break up barrels and counters, and her followers (the temperance movement was really getting under way at the time) used to wear a hatchet pin or brooch to show their solidarity with her.

I like the idea of using light, medium and dark black and white prints with one tone on tone colour forming a diagonal chain.  This will be my request to my quilt group for our Saturday BOM at the end of this month; the blocks can be kept for our own use or used to make charity quilts.  I haven't yet decided on the fate of this block - I just might keep them for myself.  Instructions still need to be written.

Hopefully this will be simple enough - look, Ma, no triangles! - to keep the whingers from whining too heavily, although the black and white may set Madame Presidente off.  She 'hates' black.  Most emphatically.  Mind you, she 'hates' a few things......but there is a difference between disliking and 'hating', isn't there?  While I dislike the fiddly-diddly cutesy-poo applique that is occasionally trotted out, I don't 'hate' it.  I am, however, pleased to get it out of my sewing room once it's done and handed over.

I don't like tomatoes either, but I don't 'hate' them.  Should they be served to me I leave them on the plate

Last week's gig went well, our audience enjoyed singing along with our songs, and many nice things were said to us and about us.  Now we have a few weeks until we play for the Sunday markets at a small church just out of town, a regular gig.

It has been said your day is wasted if you don't learn something, and yesterday I learned that it was once possible to rent a pineapple to impress your guests.  Pineapples were expensive and as such had become a symbol of wealth in Europe and the U.S.A., so people who couldn't afford to buy would hire one for an evening. It would be taken back the next day and probably sold to someone who could afford to eat it.  Fruit didn't always come sliced in tins, you know.

"Whom to invite.
Those invited should be of the same standing in society.  They need not necessarily be friends, nor even acquaintances, but, at dinner, as people come into closer contact than at a dance, or any other kind of a party, those only should be invited to meet one another who move in the same class of circles.  Care must, of course, be taken that those whom you think agreeable to each other are placed side by side around the festive board.  Good talkers are invaluable at a dinner party - people who have fresh ideas and plenty of warm words to clothe them in; but good listeners are equally invaluable."

Sounds just the occasion to display one's rented pineapple, doesn't it?

Enjoy your days!

600 posts!

That's a lot of words, a big milestone for celebration.  I started blogging sometime in October 2008, and am still here.  There have been times when I wasn't here - when we've been away - so no words were written for a while.  The best part is, most of me is still in pretty much the same condition as then.

That row of tumblers that I was so pleased with last week......

well.......

it was too long.  Note that I said "was".  It isn't now.

According to my design in EQ7 it was to be 65 inches wide, plus borders.  Not 75 inches.  I then checked out EQ7's tumbler template only to find out that, while they are both three inches high finished, theirs is skinnier than mine so 35 across was ten inches too wide.  The border fabrics were bought with 65 inches in mind.  Bugger.  Double bugger and triple bugger.  So out came the fine-pointed scissors, four tumblers were taken out of each row, then the rows seamed together again to finish at 67 inches.  As they have been made in blocks of four that wasn't as arduous as it might otherwise have been, and these extra blocks will find a home on the back anyway.

Still......having to unpick all that hand stitching then sew it up again......sigh......

Nova Scotia is done, block four of the Canadian quilt.

Sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean would be quite a sight to see, if one was a morning person.  Which one isn't, so this will have to do.  I am loving these batik fabrics, they give such a wonderful texture.

Bianca the White Cat and I are having a very quiet weekend as Kevin has gone to a town several hours north-west from us to play lawn bowls.  He's not all that noisy when he's here anyway (except when he's watching sport on TV), but it is very quiet without him.  The TV has stayed off except for one hour last night when I watched a music documentary, and will stay off tonight too.  Even the news.  I am not watching the news, it's mostly murder and mayhem and never anything good, and very little in the regular programming appeals.  Doesn't matter how many channels there are, there is seldom anything worthwhile to watch.

The uke group is playing for a seniors concert on Wednesday morning, so this afternoon will be a good chance to run through the songs.  "Bye bye love....bye bye happiness....." etc.  I can let you have the rest of the words if you like......

"Requirements for a happy marriage.
Respect for each other is as necessary to a happy marriage as that the husband and wife should have an affection for one another.  Social equality, intellectual sympathy, and sufficient means are very important matters to be considered by those who contemplate matrimony."

When these words were written in 1885 they didn't have to put up with noisy sports on television.  We have reached a compromise - the sport is on TV with the volume off, the radio still plays its gentle classical music, and everyone is happy.

Enjoy your days!

Green, green, it's green they say, on the far side of the hill.......

You'll be singing that all day now, won't you?

We have lots of rain, and more is forecast.  These pics were taken a few days ago and since then the grass is even greener, if that's possible.  It's also quite a bit longer.

Yes, that's our wash line.  Most Australian houses use an outside line rather than a dryer; in all my (very many) years on this earth I have never owned a dryer.

The rise you can see in the far distance of this photo is now also bright green - a sight for sore eyes, if ever there was one.

There is, however, a slight drawback to so much moisture - the humidity, normally not something we need to worry about, is very unpleasant!

17 more HSTs made, plus their trimmings.  Trimming is quite tedious, but necessary.

Block number three in the Canadian mystery quilt, Alberta, is stuck down.

Last night the final stitch was taken on this panel, four tumblers deep by 35 (plus half-tumblers for the ends) wide.  There are another five of these to go.

It measures 75 inches long - I'm nowhere near that tall! - so had to be photographed in two sections.

My method to keep the rows in the order I want, is to write numbers with a fine marker on small pieces of scrap fabric and safety pin then to the left-hand edge. 

Row 1 is at the bottom; they were spread out on the spare bed and it was easy to start numbering from the bottom first.  Those tags will stay in place until it's all together.  The blocks for one row are held together by a tacking stitch in the top corner, one at a time is slipped off and joined to the right hand side until the row is done.

You have no idea how good cutting the thread on that final stitch felt last night, this is quite a mammoth undertaking!  It has given me the courage to dig out the flower basket blocks and finish them, too; it seemed a bit too big a mouthful at the time.  

We don't celebrate Valentine's Day in this household, when I was a Sweet Young Thing (and still slender......sigh) all the hearts and flowers stuff hadn't yet been invented.  We do, however, celebrate Kevin's birthday which is on the same day, so we took ourselves off to a restaurant for an excellent lunch.  We were so stuffed that we couldn't eat another thing until breakfast on Friday morning.

"Dining should be ranked among the fine arts.  A knowledge of dinner-table etiquette is all important in many respects; but chiefly in this: that it is regarded as one of the strong tests of good breeding.  Dinners are generally looked upon as entertainments for married people and the middle aged, but it is often desirable to have some young unmarried persons among the guests."  

Perhaps lunch would at a restaurant could also be considered among the fine arts?  The youngest unmarried person we could see was a young baby whose mum was lunching with a group of women.

Enjoy your days!

Is done!

We have new electronic gimcrackery for the fancy-nancy new computer, so now pics can be downloaded from my camera card.

Some finished half square pieces for what is hoped will be a gorgeous quilt.

 Block number one from the Canadian mystery quilt - New Brunswick, with a covered bridge and a black-capped chickadee.  We've seen those little birds in Canada, they are very cute with a sweet call.

Block number two - Nunavut, snow, ice, glaciers, an inukshuk and a ptarmigan, a bird which is white in winter and brown in summer.

These are 'lick and stick' applique using fusible web, the pieces still need to be stitched down.  The cunning plan is to do these quilt-as-you-go, a process I haven't tried before.  Two are done, several more still to go.

Some of our own white birds, a flock of sulphur crested cockatoos on the hill.  As you can see there had been a little rain so there were small patches of green......and now it's green all over, because we have had more rain!  Had to zoom in on these.

 A spectacular sunset last week, rubbish bins, neighbour's car and all, taken from our front verandah.  The faint lights in the far right distance are from the airport.

The best news is, we have had rain and there is more to come!  Not as much as we would like and nowhere near enough to break the continuing drought, but each and every little drop is welcome.  People are feeling more optimistic than they have done for quite a while.

Fires elsewhere in the state are still burning but some are out, and people are coming to terms with what has been lost.  The rest of us are being urged to visit these places and spend-spend-spend to help local economies......but there are still fires burning, and many people aren't inclined to travel for that reason; none of us want to be suddenly evacuated or possibly trapped.  Also, while there is enormous sympathy and both monetary and practical help being given to those communities, a lot of people just don't have extra cash to splash around.  At the end of the day we all get to decide where, when and how we spend our money and no amount of emotional blackmail will change that.

My passport has been renewed.  Merciful heavens......if the person in that picture is really me, then I certainly need and deserve a holiday!

"Use no strong expression either of delight or disapprobation at anything presented for your inspection.  If a picture or a statue please you, show your approval and appreciation by close attention, and a few quiet-well-chosen words, rather than by extravagant praise."

That passport picture certainly elicited no extravagant praise from me, I can tell you.

Enjoy your days!