Post 52

Aside from playing around with dove photos, today I made a concerted effort on the Mellerstain Firescreen.




The dove is a bit of a distraction. It rained on and
off this morning, but that did not deter the dove from returning several times to  drink from the waterbowl and clear up every last piece of grain .






I created the fantasy photo by accident - but rather liked the result. I might even redo the heading photo for this blog. It seems more appropriate to where we have ended up than the current view of the Thames and the Mitre.
I rang a couple of friends to check they were OK.  Late this afternoon, after watching the Western Australian Premier's news conference, I managed to speak to my friend Susan in hotel isolation in Perth. Jennifer is still seriously ill in ICU in Perth, neither, it seems, better nor worse. From the Premier's press conference. there are still 33 Covid patients in hospital in Western Australia, 5 of whom are in ICUs.

Susan is largely recovered from Covid19 but is very worried about Jennifer.

By early evening I had finished as much of the parrots as I could without scrolling the frame.
I'd have liked to have finished a few more acorns but was too close to the roller.
















 
 I have just spent half an hour or so unlashing the frame, rolling it on to the second half of the piece and re-lashing. Those lovely parrots are now out of sight. The centre of the next section is a squirrel.  I am hoping that members of the squirrel family do not start visiting on my balcony!

Unfortunately I will need to scroll the frame once more before I finish. I was a bit tempted to put it into a sitting frame, but have stuck with the roller. for the moment.

I also got out the linen and threads I gathered in early February to work a piece on the bushfires. The fabric and the threads are all Australian. I have sketched a design but need to revisit it and have a good think. A job for another day. 

I did manage another 6 rows of the Fair Isle scarf. Progress is not sufficient to justify another photograph.

Take care to stay safe.

Post 51: Still on dove and parrots

Well, it looks as if the seeds are the secret to the dove's return. I sprinkled a few seeds on the balcony floor this morning and very soon the dove turned up. She pecked around, eating maybe a third of the seat, then took off again from the  rail.

She came back twice during the day. to finish off the seeds and drink some water.


In my first online grocery order there was no pasta. I bought this package of 'Fettuccine' without knowing what it was.  Last night I used its contents with a Bolognaise sauce I had made. It turns out they are Konjac noodles - made from the root of the Japanese Konjac root. They are translucent and are said to have no taste. There are warnings that they can cause stomach pain, bloating and diarrhoea. The active ingredient in pure form is banned in Australia.




Covered in Bolognaise sauce they were pleasant to eat, and I suffered no ill effects. It won't however, become one of my staples. The current crisis leads us to try and learn about new things. In future, it might be better to investigate before I buy but I was in a hurry and in self-isolation when I ordered.  Je ne regrette rien.

Today I placed another grocery order for delivery next Wednesday. I went with Romeos' again, partly because of the way the manager handled my bungled delivery last Wednesday and partly because they have a good selection of both fresh fruit and vegetable and meat - including ham hocks. A big pot of soup coming up.

I have also managed to get an appointment for a flu vaccination . I had a booster in February before I went to England and my doctor recommends I wait until May to have the new one. I now have an appointment for 1 May.
It was overcast and cooler today - 21C -. There was enough sun for me to spend a couple of hours embroidering on my Western balcony this afternoon.

Once again, the Square is being used by a personal trainer and his student.  They use a range of equipment - as well as the tree and bench.   It's a good use of open space now that gyms are closed.

The spotty fabric in the top right hand corner of the composite photo is part of the bunting I bought before Christmas from The Fabric of Life.




I hung it from my balcony rail and have not yet taken it down. I find it cheerful and a reminder of more stable times.

I have no further news today from my friends in Perth. I figure no news is good news. I will try calling Susan tomorrow.

I made reasonable progress on the parrots before moving inside. I'm really enjoying this stitching.


I had a long conversation with my brother and sister-in-law. Robyn spent the day making more little videos for her young PE class. It's an effort, and I'm sure it will pay off. My brother is still working out the consequences of cancelling his gigs, including the Stone the Crows event that would have just concluded in Wagga Wagga this week.


I've worked steadily on the parrots this evening while watching Gardening Australia and several episodes of Great British Railway Journeys - including the one that visits Dunrobin Castle - evoking memories of the visit we made on the first Crewel Work Scottish Highlands Tour in 2015.

I'm too tired to do more. I'm pretty sure tomorrow will finish what's in my frame and I will be able to roll it on. 

Post 50 :

I did wake just after sunrise this morning, but, after taking the photo, read and dozed until, around 9.15,  I found a message from my son-in-law telling me there was a ‘small delivery’ at my door. It took me a few minutes to work out it was not an addition to my muesli, but some seeds for the visiting dove!

I sprinkled a little on my balcony before doing anything else. 

I don’t share much family information in a blog. I don’t believe I have licence to share much about others’ lives. On the other hand, today I feel the need to acknowledge the life and loss of my Canberra  daughter’s much loved  18 year old cat, Kalia. She was a vital part of their lives. She has been ill in recent weeks and this morning died peacefully at home as her Magpie frenemy appeared and sang her to sleep. I’m grateful for having known Kalia, and for the joy she brought to those she graced with her presence. Her loss will be long felt. 

I sang a quiet lullaby to mark Kalia’s final sleep and within a few minutes my dove appeared, enticed, it seems, by the seed. In between cautiously pecking at the seed, she went back several times to the balcony rail to check out the scene. She also drank from a bowl of stones I keep there.

Not long after, I received unwelcome news. My friend Jennifer in isolation in Perth had tested positive to Covid19 last weekend. Since then, she has been admitted to hospital and is now in an ICU. Her partner has been released from hospital back to the isolation hotel.  It is a serious situation. 

Jennifer is in good hands. Western Australia is currently listed as having 33 Covid19 patients in hospital and 11 of those in ICU. The hospital system is equipped and coping. We wait, hope and pray. 

The news was enough to prompt me to take my Lowery stand out on to the balcony to catch some afternoon sun. The showers forecast are some way off. The spider has added several layers to her web. 















The sun provided great light, which showed up where I had missed a stitch or two, which I can now rectify. My stitches are meditations on healing.

It was a very gentle sunset.

I have continued working on the foliage around the parrots. One or two more long sessions of stitching and I will need to roll the frame on to the bottom half of the linen. It’s been quite a day. 
Our national Covid 19 figures are trending in the right direction, but there is no room for complacency - and the story strikes a sharper note when the statistics take on the face of a friend. Each one is a face, a friend, a relative. 

I stay home and stitch in tribute to life and in hope of health and healing. 

Post 49

I began today by hanging out washing on my Eastern balcony. Although it was a warm day today in Adelaide -29C - the tree in the apartment garden  is exhibiting all the signs of autumn. It will not be long before the leaves are on the ground rather than on the tree.  It's a shame. Although the bare trunks are interesting, I love the screening effect and the birds that the leafy cover brings.

Speaking of birds, my dove friend did pay a brief visit. I think I need to try some birdseed.

This succulent also seems to be darkening its edges in sympathy with the season!


Since it was such a warm day, I decided to wash bedlinen as well. I had another delivery coming today from Romeo's Foodland North Adelaide, the order I put in last Thursday. The confirming email arrived about 8am. The delivery included the ingredients for my muesli and the kefalograviera cheese I needed for the moussaka a couple of weeks ago (yep, a bit late I know, but one day....). The delivery was due between 12 and 5,  so I had plenty of time to get a few jobs done without worrying about listening for the buzzer.  Fortunately,  around 10.45 I did manage to hear it, even without my hearing aids in.

It was the delivery man, to tell my my parcels were outside ready for me to pick up. When I asked him to bring them up to my door, as per my instructions, he said he wasn't allowed to do that, and I should come down and collect them from where he had already put them outside the door. I was taken aback.  He sounded scared and anxious to get away. I had no choice but to quickly make myself respectable and to down to the apartment entrance door, where I found the delivery at a respectable distance from the door.

After I had put the food away, I used the feedback link on the 8am email to send a polite indication of surprise and disappointment. To my surprise late this afternoon the store manager rang me to apologise and assure me it will not happen again. Any future order will be delivered to my door, and be delivered within the chosen time frame. I was very impressed. The call made a big difference in how I felt about both the shop and the delivery. I will order from them again.

Included in the delivery was half a cooked chicken, still warm. I took advantage and had a portion for lunch with salad, and a portion for dinner with even more salad. Both delicious.


Andie, a member of the World Embroidery Study Group, had put together a PowerPoint of her researches into Embroidered Books. This was to have been the focus of our May meeting. There is no point, however, in keeping to a physical world timeline in an asynchronous, online world, so I sent it out today. It's interesting to see whether this opportunity changes the way we operate longterm. 

It has not been much of a photo opportunity day. I spent much of it working on the parrots. Before I stopped for dinner I managed to finish the second parrot and insert the beads in the eye of both birds.










I haven't done much exercise today. I missed the ABC radio dance class in the rush to retrieve my groceries. This is my knee today. Still sore to touch, but not impeding movement.

After dinner I tightened my frame, which was getting a bit slack and got stuck into more leaves. I was hoping to do more, but my eyes are giving out and I'm tired. I'll need to tidy up my leaf tomorrow!

Post 48: The pigeon is a dove

A message from a friend with a science background this morning assures me my avian visitor yesterday was a dove, not a pigeon. I’m delighted to be wrong. I’d rather have a visiting dove, for symbolic reasons if no other. My friend Melody, in the USA, had also made a comment on my FaceBook page, that a pair of  mourning doves  have been visiting annually since her husband died.  I had not heard of mourning doves, and did a bit of investigating.  We do not, it seems, have mourning doves in Australia. My dove appears to be the spotted dove,  
Streptopelia chinensis and I think female.

She paid me another quick visit today. I had no time to roll back the fly screen before she departed, but a visit is a visit.

The episode has called to mind a gag from The Goon Show in which Neddie Seagoon, on a visit to beach, comments on the 'nice pigeons'. His companion (Eccles, maybe?) replies "They're not pigeons, they're gulls" and Neddie retorts "Boys or gulls, they're nice pigeons"!  It must be 60 years since I heard this, and it is the only specific gag I remember from The Goons. I'm not certain my dove is a girl, but it is not a pigeon!

While waiting for my dove to revisit, I progressed my counted piece a little, and sketched in the next stage. 


My bruises are still fairly fierce and sore to touch but I thought it time to take a short walk around the Hameji Garden. This time I drove there. The garden occupies a relatively small section of Adelaide’s South Parkland.

The garden is a gift to Adelaide from the Japanese city of Himeji.






I should have realised that on a fine warm day in the school holidays others would have the same idea. Just outside the entrance a mother was playing a kind of skittles game with her two children. There was plenty of room around them for distancing.

These bicycles outside the entrance turned out to belong to what I guess was a grandmother and granddaughter..

The Hameji Garden is beautifully landscaped for contemplation and rest. There are narrow, winding paths, water features, open spaces, rocks, stones  and  sculptured plants.

Usually when I visit I meet no more than one or two others. Today there were probably another 10-12 people there, all keeping respectful distance, but I decided not to stay.  It is great to know the garden is used and appreciated. I'd rather, however, walk where there are fewer people, or more open spaces.

Instead I did a short circuit around the outside and returned to my embroidery.

I made good progress on the parrots. I really like the way they are shaping up. I'm looking forward to completing the second parrot tomorrow.

Post 47 Pigeon and parrot

A leisurely beginning to the day. It was a sunny morning So I took my breakfast out on the balcony. I moved inside when I’d had enough sun and in time to take a call from my brother that moved from phone to FaceTime so I could see the apple crumble he was about to take out of the oven. It did look good! 

I must have left crumbs from my breakfast on the balcony because I had a visitor. She was very persistent, coming back twice to check for more. In the four years I've lived here I've had birds sit on the balcony rail, but haven’t seen a bird walk around the balcony like this. Odd that it should come now - an anti-isolation bird!

I observed the pigeon from a chair just inside the balcony door. It’s a favourite of mine. From here I can see the balcony and sky, but also some favourite art works. I love the play of light on them






The two paintings at the top are of the Fauldings factory behind the West End Brewery in Adelaide. They were painted by Holly McNamee, an artist and art teacher in Adelaide in the 1980s and 90s. She has now moved back to the Maitland area of NSW where she grew up.  I bought the one on the right at the opening  night of her exhibition at the Greenhill Gallery in North Adelaide in 1987. I was principal at Gepps Cross Girls 'High School at the time, and a few days before the exhibition,  a fire in the early hours of the morning had caused over $1 million damaged to the school. I had been called in at 4am and was taken into the burning building.

These paintings of Holly’s seemed to be a symbol of all that had happened that week. We couldn’t afford both of them, but I bought the one on the right, and years later was able to buy the other one.





I bought this Wangina by Waigan Djanghara at an Elders auction in 2018.. Wangina are cloud and rain spirits in the Kimberley region of WA. I love the simplicity and solidity of this one.





This Sepik River story board Jim and I bought in 2011 or 2012 at the StrathalbynAntiques Fair. Tim Wannacott opened the Fair and as fans of Bargain Hunt we went to catch a glimpse.


In the afternoon I followed the sun to the Western balcony. I don't like moving my Lowery frame with the Crewel work parrots out on to the balcony, and I wasn't in the mood for the concentration of  Fair Isle, so I picked up a project I've been working at the Guild's Basics to Beyond Group. I can't see that group meeting for months, so I progressed the counted work I'm doing there.

I'll explain more about it one if and when I take it further.



My brother and sister-in-law had been asking me about how people were exercising in Adelaide.  I get a bit of an idea from my balcony.  One woman walked her dog around the Square, then sat on a bench and let the dog walk in circles around the bench on its long lead.











This young woman did resistance training in a harness against the pull of her partner. There was much mirth.













It was hard to photograph this group of five who formed a very wide circle, 2-3 metres between each participant, and did exercises with ribbons. Unfortunately, there was a tree in my way but if you look carefully you can see three of the five participants.

From time to time a parent would cycle or walk around the Square with children on scooters or bicycles.

It was certainly not crowded and everyone appeared to be practising distancing.



Margaret sent me the photos of her lectern fall in place in the Glenelg Catholic Church on Saturday night's video vigil. It looks even better in situ.

Earlier in the day Andie, a member of the World Embroidery Study Group, had sent me the PowerPoint she has prepared on Embroidery for book binding.  I'll send it to members in a few day's time.





It was a bit of a Disney sunset tonight, whether viewed from outside










or in.


I've been working on the left Parrot and nearly finished it tonight. There are a few bits to finish which I think will be better done in the morning.

I wonder if the pigeon will be back then too.