Post206

Blush arrived on his (or her) own, ate most of the seed and left. No interference from other birds.

The little bit of seed left was gone by the end of the morning. I was at the other end of the apartment, so didn't see who finished it off.


I spent most of the day scanning or preparing to scan - removing the photos from the large 1970s album. The photos from later in the decade remove relatively easily once I lifted an edge with my handy bread and butter knife. The early in the decade are stuck fast. Once removed, I scanned about 250 photos using FastFoto. FastFoto does not cope well with damaged photos or photos that are thicker than normal - such as those with anything stuck on the back. I have about 20 photos that would not go through the scanner. Tomorrow I will either use the App or the flatbed to scan them.

I also have a number of photos removed with the help of Desolvit. It works a treat, but dampens the back of the photo which then needs to dry out. Tomorrow I should be able to scan all remaining photos in this album, hopefully remove the last of those on the early pages and file them in the archive box.  I think the (numerous) remaining albums are easier to scan, or at least easier from which to remove the photos.

It's a messy process.  The sticky album needs to be disposed of in bits - all the cellophane page covers need to go is the soft recycling, and the cardboard pages into the recycle bin. Separating them makes a mess. The photo is after I had tidied up. There are still piles of photos awaiting scanning, awaiting filing, or under a weight to straighten them out.



The Create in Stitch weekly newsletter today featured this meme, which made me laugh.

I could embroider it as a motto!

I took Niamh to JEMS and returned home to more scanning, then went to Katherine and Anthony's for dinner. Delicious as usual. Tonight chicken satay and coconut risotto. It's always good to catch up on the week's activities.









On the way there I was driving into the setting sun, which is now further to the South than it has been for a while. It was briefly spectacular.




Tomorrow is cleaning and Crime Bookclub. Better get some sleep.

Post 205 Photo Extraction,Young Doves and Friends Stitching

The young dove with the dark breast was back around 7.30 this morning, on its own, alert and surveying the scene before dropping to the balcony floor to eat the seed I had already put out in anticipation.

Once again, it was a windy day. The dove's feathers were continuously ruffled by the gusts.He or she ate quickly, consuming 80-90% of the seed in a short space of time, before flying away.

I have a feeling I will be seeing more of this bird, so I have decided to call it Stormy - because of its storm-cloud coloured breast.


There were no other birds trying to muscle in, or monitor Stormy's behaviour. I replenished the seed because I thought others might want some

About an hour later, the other young bird, with the pink breast appeared and repeated the act, eating uickly and thoroughly before flying away.  I am going to dub this one Blush. Again, no other birds interfered.Perhaps the older birds were holding a meeting and the younger ones took advantage - qor perhaps they have been anointed by the elders to visit and forage. Are they sharing or has the baton passed to the younger generation? Watch this space.



I returned to the 1970s albums and set about removing photos from the large album. with the help of my butter knife. There are batches of high-quality black and white photos from 1972/3 that won't come off without damage. Most later photos will come off with care and time.

After removing about 60 photos with great care, I thought of looking for advice online as to the best way to remove them. An archivist has a video that gives two main methods. Her first choice is to use a very fine blade, such as a medical instrument to prise them up. The second is to work dental floss under them. I hunted down my dental floss and tried it. My butterknife is better.

The third method mentioned is to lift a corner and spray underneath with one of the those sticky label removers. I tried this on one stubborn photo and it worked a treat. We'll see how I go tomorrow. I scanned most of those still stuck on using the PhotoScan App.


This afternoon was Sit'nStitch with a couple of friends. Jennifer has finished her bag, which is truly splendid. I'm thinking of writing up the story of this Covid bag for the Guild Newsletter. It is a testimony to beauty perseverance and survival.

Back of bag

Susan has finished her most recent blanket, also splendid.

On the way home I noticed the Jacaranda street trees greening up.










It was a cloudy sunset.



I'm tired writing this. It has been quite a long, but enjoyable and productive day.








I did another ten rows of knitting at  this afternoon's Sit'nStitch and this evening I managed another quarter of first pass of the inner row of Caterina.


My cleaner has asked if we can swap tomorrow morning for Sunday morning. I agreed readily. I can now sleep in tomorrow morning before I begin scanning!

Post 204 Another Day of Doves and Scanning

It began as an overcast day with the threat of rain. I put out some seed in anticipation of  doves. Around 9,30am a young dove arrived and rushed around consuming the seed. The breast on this dove was dark. Mostly it is pink. I was not sure if this was a newcomer. He/she stayed long enough to eat about half the seed, alert and checking for sound all the time, then flew away.

Within minutes, three birds arrived. I have never seen three doves here at once. Two were small and young. 

One was huge - and fat.

Although the three had arrived together, and began pecking the seed, the fat bird gently herded one of the young ones off the balcony

and then stayed as sentry while the other young bird fed.  Eventually they left together as the wind got up and brought a little rain squall









The fat bird returned a while later. As I watched he became less puffy - and more familiar. I gently opened the door, opened the seed container and distributed more seed. He stayed, less than a metre from me, and began eating the seed. It was Turtle.


By now the wind was quite wild. The air was full of leaves and dust. He puffed up again and moved to a sheltered spot behind a pot plant, out of the wind. He sheltered here until there was a lull when he moved to the rail and took off.

I don't know what is going on here. I did a bit of reading. Puffing up/ putting on weight can indicate either illness or cold. While it wasn't particularly cold today, the wind was unusually strong for Adelaide. Storm damage was reported across Adelaide. Hopefully that explains it.
As for the 'mentoring' of at least one young bird, that Turtle seems to be doing, I can find no reference. Doves mate for life, so it seems unlikely he is trading Myrtle in for a younger model.I can find no reference to doves supporting their young in any way once they have fledged, so at the moment it remains a mystery.


I am becoming a dove obsessive - for which I apologise.

I tore myself away from my dove watching post to return to scanning photos. I had an idea that it might be easier to remove photos from the second 1970s album. Although it too had sticky pages it was not as substantial in either size or composition. I got a thin bladed butter knife and found I could, with great care, pry photos off the pages. It was slow work, but in about an hour and a half I managed to remove the 80 or so photos in the album.  The trouble was, in my concentration I lost track of the time and was 13 minutes late for Pilates.

On my way home I stopped at Albox and bought another 10 sets of acid-free dividers. I am filing the scanned photos in acid-free photo boxes in decades, divided into either events or years and am chewing through dividers. Apparently most customers now want coloured dividers without tabs for labels. Their old stock is black, with tabs for labels, so they are happy to sell it to me.

I spent two and a half hours this afternoon scanning the removed photos through my new  FastFoto Scanner. Only five of the removed photos would not go through the scanner - two because some of the album page had stuck to the back of the photo which was then too thick, and three because some of the back of the photo had lifted. I will put these through the flatbed. The other 75 went through in batches at 600dpi. It is better quality than I get from the App.

Tomorrow I will have another look at the big 1970s album to see if the butter knife will help me to remove the photos. s

I went to friends' place for dinner tonight. It was lovely to catch up, relax and share a meal.  It's rejuvenating.

I did a bit of knitting but no embroidery. It seems I can't do everything!

Post 203 Days of Dove Lives and scanning

The young dove arrived this morning and began pecking very quickly at the seed. He (or maybe she) was very alert, pausing to listen every few seconds.









He ate about half the seed then hopped on to the rail and looked carefully in all directions.











While he was  on guard, 

another young dove arrived.



I think that the bird I have been calling 'the adolescent' is in fact two young birds.













They can be seen here - one on top of the balcony rail, on the flower box and the other on the lower rail

It was at this point that Myrtle arrived and scared them away.

I think I have a new pair of young doves interested in my balcony in competition with Myrtle and Turtle. Whether one of them is their offspring or not I can't tell, but it's quite likely.

Myrtle returned, briefly, and sampled the seed. The first young bird returned later still and gobbled a bit more. Still on alert.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out throughout Spring and Summer.

I looked for anymore 1980s photo albums without success. There are about 6-7 albums covering the 90s and two for the 70s. The earlier of these is a large one with sticky pages. I decided to start with this. Unfortunately, when I began to remove the photos, I was unable to do so without tearing the photos. The adhesive on the pages is very effective. The album has 50 double-sided pages, at least 600 photos that will not go through my new scanner.  The options are to lay each page on the flatbed scanner or use an App.
I decided to try the PhotoScan App, just in case it had recovered and, lo! it worked! I managed to scan, over about two and a half hours, 155 photos before the App began to slow. I am hoping that if I rest it overnight it will revive again tomorrow and I will be able to use it to scan the album in 4 batches.
I don't think any of the other albums will present the same problem, and I will be able to return to my super scanner for the others.

I did not get to enjoy much of the warm sun today but it is much more pleasant to be indoors scanning when the sun is shining in ( at 27C, not 46!). I had promised to do some research for my brother earlier in the week, so used the App crash to move to that. Still chasing some information, but have made a good start.


This evening I had to choose between Lewis and Midsomer Murders to progress my Caterina inner row. I've seen both so could focus on counting threads while listening and occasionally glancing at the screen. Lewis won, but I caught the end of Midsomer Murders.

I'm still making mistakes and either unpicking or compensating, but I'm pleased with the progress.

Rain is forecast on most of the next seven days, so a good thing I washed bed linen yesterday and my clothes today.

Post 202

The young adolescent dove tried twice this morning to feed on the seed on my balcony. The first time he managed quite a few minutes, eating seed, drinking, all the time alert, finally taking a position on the rail and scanning the scene.  Soon Myrtle arrived and adopted the same chasing behaviour that Turtle exhibited the other day complete with the three note call. They young bird persevered for a bit but was herded off the balcony.

The same thing happened half an hour later but was much quicker.




Another half an hour or so later Myrtle returned, followed by Turtle and they shared the bounty.





My plan today was to take this lace bodice to the Guild, to see if the Museum would be interested in it. It was given to my late husband's mother by his Great Aunt Gladys Lilian Dellit - who was a Home Economics teacher in Melbourne from around 1902 to 1955,  I think Gladys made the bodice which is designed to attach to a dress by a press stud.

Museum volunteers were photographing items from the collection, so I filled out a form and left it for the acquisions group to look at and discuss.




From there I went to OfficeWorks to look at enquire about the photo scanner which Choice says is the best on the market. At $A648 it is also the most expensive by a mile. It scans batches of up to 35 photos at a time.

It took me a while to find it, even with the help of an assistant, who needed to look it up. Clearly not a popular item. It turns out to be the machine that OfficeWorks uses in their Printing department to scan and print photos. The assistant assured me I could return it, with the receipt, within 30 days after trying it. With that fall-back, I bought it.

Throughout the day I was receiving phone calls from Jennifer, who had read about this great but expensive photo scanner and was thinking of buying.......We swapped information and both decided to buy.


Back at home after dropping soft plastic recycling at Woolworths Unley, I set up the scanner. The connection was pretty easy. The instructions were sparse but adequate. It took me a while to work out where the files will be stored and backed up on my laptop.

I played with it for 3 hours in which time I set it up and scanned 235 photos. I thought I was scanning at 1200 dpi but realised later it had defaulted to 300.Clearly something I need to check. I did some rudimentary organising as I went along, setting up some shared folders.

It goes against the grain for me to buy an expensive scanner when I have an operating flatbed scanner. However, I have several thousand photos to scan and this is a very efficient machine with 12 years of improved technology. The flatbed is slow

Once I got going, this was pleasurable to work with. It's also compact. I finished scanning the second 1980s album. There must be more from the 1980s somewhere. I can think of some that are missing. I'm actually looking forward to scanning more now. A day ago I was dreading it!


I'm tired tonight, but relaxed with the Caterina project. I have finished the second round of the outer pattern.



Now for the first round of the inner pattern.As you can see, I have begun the first pass of the inner row

Post 201

The morning light showed the tiny succulent flower to good advantage. I doubt I'd have put the pink and orange together in threads but it is very effective.

At the same time, cloud covered the Hills. It had lifted by mid-morning.

That was about the time the young adolescent dove arrived, closely followed by Turtle, doing his following routine again, this time accompanied by a repeated two note call. He effectively drove the young bird away - again without any violence, but the message was clear.

Turtle then ate the seed until Myrtle arrived to collect him- or that's how it seemed. As soon as she arrived they flew off together.



I went shopping at Frewville. I had four items on my list and came home with 3 supermarket shopping bags full. I do like that supermarket - probably a good reason to shop elsewhere!

There were only five of us for dinner. Anthony is in Whyalla for work and Fionn had football training. Niamh and Veronica had school photos taken today. There was much discussion about the photographer's insistence that all the girls sit in the front row in all the photos - 'for symmetry'. None of us could work out what this meant. As the tallest girl in her class, Niamh thought height would have been a better organiser. I agree.
I set the scanning aside today and cleared the table. I'll return to it in tomorrow or Wednesday.












I used my time to progress the Caterina project. I got two more quarters done. It's slow work, but is working quite well at the moment. A bit less than one quarter to go - then it's back to running stitch on the inner layer.

Post 200 : Dove stories, scanning and Catherine de Medici

I knew this morning that the whipping I had done on the Caterina project last night was not right. The instructions had not been very clear. So this morning I found a couple of YouTube videos that made it clear that the stitch was a double running always worked with a diagonal stitch, forming a cross under each existing running stitch. When I checked back with the project instructions, I found two pages of stitch description that I had missed. Mea culpa. I undid the whipping and started again with the double running.

Bird Episode 1.

As I was sorting this out, Turtle appeared, took a walk around and sampled the water in my bowl of stones and shells.

Within minutes there was a fluttering of wings and Myrtle arrived. It's unusual for either of them to fly to the balcony like this. They usually sit on the rail and drop to the floor.

They then fed very companionably on the seed before flying off together.

Bird Episode 2. Don’t you dare!
Some half an hour later there was a loud repeated dove call - three notes, the last one slightly higher.  It soon became clear it was coming from one of  two doves moving along the slats on the roof of my Vergola.






As they dropped to the balcony rail, I realised it was Turtle and the young adolescent bird. Turtle was the source of the three note message which continued

as they dropped to the floor, the young bird walking around, trying to peck at the seed, closely followed by Turtle.

The call sounded for all the world like "Don't you dare!"



The young bird eventually flew away and Turtle spent some time scanning the scene from the rail.

It was extraordinary behaviour. Both on the roof and the floor, Turtle followed the young bird on foot, repeating the three notes. He was not aggressive, didn't fly at the young bird or attack in any way, just followed on foot, repeating the message.

I read a bit more of The Bird Way  this morning. So far nothing explains this kind of behaviour. The next section, however, is on parenting, so that might help me understand.

In between preparing the ragu and pasta for tomorrow night's dinner I set up the scanner and scanned a few more photos. The difficult bit is working out how to save, store and share them, It is also greedy both of laptop battery and bandwidth. I managed to scan and save another 32 photos. It's a fairly slow process - and I have a few thousand photos to go.



While recharging my laptop battery I progressed the double running. This form of embroidery is Catherine de Medici Embroidery, or Punto Madama, ( short for Punto Madama Caterina de Medici).

The second round, once you have the rhythm, is easier than the first and pleasant to work.

I still like the open lacy look of the single running stitch, but this look is also attractive - and I want to learn the stitch.

I've completed one quarter of it in the double running.