Post 260 Counting stitches and figures

I began relatively early this morning because the cleaner was coming. While he did all the work I sat down to try to to finish the Counted Sashiko. It is a really interesting process. It reminds me of Sudoko.

You lay a geometric foundation and the pattern emerges as you add the stitches in various directions.  It's very mathematical, very beautiful and very satisfying.

It also requires great accuracy. I didn't get by without unpicking.

It was a lovely Adelaide morning, bright and warm with a little breeze. I took my stitching and lunch out on the Eastern balcony. 

Before long I had company.

Blush made herself comfortable on the balcony rail. She stayed quite a while.

I spent a bit of time photographing some of the succulents. Yesterday at our Sit'n Stitch we discussed embroideries of succulents. This is certainly a harmonious colour palette.

When I finished lunch round 3 pm I decided it was time to focus on gathering my tax information together. It took me nearly six hours - adding up small amounts, trawling through emails for receipts. I think I finally have it together, except for my private health cover summary, which is usually mailed to me, but hasn't arrived in print or electronically this year. I will have to log on to their website - a tedious job for tomorrow or Monday.

I recovered from the six tax hours by finishing the Counted Sashiko bands. It is straight - I can't do better with the camera angle.

I would like to have finished the border too, but I am not sure about the instructions, So I'll wait to sort this tomorrow. 

I need to cut a couple of fabric and 4 cardboard circles - but I think I'll do that tomorrow morning before I go. Tomorrow is forecast to be 37C and windy. Good day to be stitching in the Guild's air-conditioned Gallery.

Post 259 Sitting, Stitching, and a bit of flying.

First job this morning was to check the blocked shawl. Yes, it was dry! Pins removed, it came up well. I wove in the two threads at the beginning and the end and there were two places where I made a minor adjustment to the tension using a thread of the wool.

I'm very happy with the result. It would definitely pass through a wedding ring. That isn't likely to be an issue if Katherine wears it to a wedding tomorrow!

Myrtle seems to have found a new way to indicate she would like some fresh seed. This morning she took up a position beside the seed container, right outside the door. And waited. There were still a few grains of yesterday's seed on the ground, so I resisted. 

I gave in when she brought reinforcements.

Seemingly contented, she settled in for a long rest.

Sit'nStitch again today. Jennifer has finished the needleroll we cut out last week. It is really good. We've suggested she add a little pocket on the outside for the gauge.

She already has demand from the craft group at her apartment complex for a workshop to make them.

Today Susan made an Armenian nutmeg cake for our afternoon tea. Delicious. These are the pieces I brought home!

I watered the plants on my balcony when I got home this evening. The trees and plants looked so lovely I tried to photograph them. As I pressed the button on the photo, Turtle flew into view and landed on the roof above. I had actually captured part of the flight.                                             I am mightily pleased with this photo.

This afternoon, and again this evening, I worked on the counted Sashiko piece for the second workshop this coming Sunday.  It isn't fast work but I managed to work two more bands. There is now a chance I can get another two bands worked tomorrow, so I have the embroidery finished by Sunday, when I can concentrate on construction at the workshop.

We'll see.

Oh, and the Aesop Frame was available this morning. I had a few issues with money transfer but eventually got it ordered using a funds transfer after trying unsuccessfully to use a debit card. The bank sent me an email to say they were concerned about transactions on my account, which they had frozen, and asking me to ring them, which I did immediately (11.45pm here!). The transactions, as I suspected, were my attempts to pay using a card. They have now unfrozen my card.  Good service though.

I was able to use my Lucky Draw Prize from the Retreat to off-set the cost of the Aesop Frame. It isn't quite as large as I had allowed for, so I think I might need even one more piece to finish the chair!

I'm in no hurry I still have two pieces to complete (well, actually to start) for the front skirt and the feathers to attach. I won't be running out of crewel work any time soon.

Post 258 Shades of purple

Before I left for Pilates, Turtle arrived and scoured the wet balcony for seed. He stayed a while on the rail, puffed up and looking like an old bird.

The third volume of the printed version of this blog arrived this morning. I was fortunately in, heard the courier buzz (just!) and retrieved the package. This takes the printed copies to Post 217. I plan two more, one at the end of December and the final at the end of February.

I managed a couple of rows of knitting before it was time to go to Pilates. I got to do some balancing on the vibrating circulation pad - very scary.

This is today's photo of the Jacarandas on Carrington Street taken on the way home. They make quite a good colourway with the grey sky.

The one below was taken later this evening on my way to friends' place for dinner. It's the Jacaranda at Adelaide High School.

I had another visit from Turtle late this afternoon. He watched for a while from the roof, ate a little seed (wet from rain) then took up a position on the rail for quite a long time. He's puffed up in the rain and relative cold. Just waiting. Or resting.

It took 39 minutes to drive to my friends' place just before 5.30, and 18 minutes to drive home at 10pm.  I guess I should expect that and leave home earlier, instead of photographing birds!

They have a lovely pot of pansies outside their front door.

I took my knitting with me and finished a couple more rows. I still have probably close to half a skein of wool left, but think I have done enough to make a reasonable size shawl.

At home I knitted one more row, then finished using an elastic cast-off. 

I then blocked it to about twice the size. I chose not to use the blocking rods. I think it will look better with scalloped edges. The trunk behind the shawl is about 90cm long.

We'll see what it looks like in the morning. 

I really need to go to bed - shouldn't have had coffee after dinner tonight! I'm hoping when I wake in the morning the Crewel Work Company's Aesop Fable kit will be available for me to order!

Post 257 World Embroidery

Today was the monthly meeting of the Embroiderers' Guild World Embroidery Study Group. There were ten of us there, which is pretty much a pre-Covid attendance. We are still socially distancing, sanitising our hands on arrival and wiping all surfaces before we leave.

Barbara Mullan, who has spent a lot of time in, and taken tour groups to, Gujarat, talked to us about the various embroideries of that region. Several members of the group have visited the area and there is a lot of interest.

In the absence of the light pointer, Maureen's walking stick proved useful!

Barbara has a substantial collection of embroidery collected on her trips and brought along a large selection to illustrate her talk.

The photo doesn't do justice to the detail and fineness of the work, but I am conscious of not breaching Guild rules of photography.

Barbara provided a demonstration of shisha mirror embroidery. There was a lot of informal discussion and people stayed around talking for quite a while. 

We also discussed our next year's program and some textile exhibitions coming up or already on in Adelaide.

I took another Jacaranda photo on the way home. It's interesting to see so many at such different stages of flowering in the same town. The temperature was much lower today but there are asthma warnings as a result of the thunderstorms last night.

It's taken me several hours this afternoon to write up the summary of our meeting to send out to members. I'd been hoping to progress my shawl - so now's the time to get on with it.

Post 257 Hair Day

 

I took my car to the Central Market this morning for my hairdressing appointment. I could have caught the city loop bus but I'm still avoiding public transport. The Market carpark was quite full. It seems many other people are also avoiding public transport. A year ago there would have been plenty of spaces on a Tuesday morning. While there were customers in the Market itself, the numbers weren't sufficient to fill up the carpark.

I had put my haircut off for two weeks, but remembering all my UK friends who have had to go without haircuts, I didn't put it off any longer, even though it didn't seem very long. My hairdressing Salon has one entry into the Central Market and another into the Adelaide Hilton Hotel. It's a pleasant salon overlooking Victoria Square. The salon also boasts a 'hidden barber' - a barber who operates from a room at the back of the salon that you would not know was there unless told.

Talia, my hairdresser did a good job of shaping the back and bringing up the curl.

After my haircut I bought coffee beans from my usual suppliers. There were shoppers around but no crowds. The Central Markets are a bit of an Adelaide tradition. There are a plans for a very major upgrade with a multilayer building over the top, and some fears for the disruption and change. 

It has been 36C here today and back at home this afternoon I watered the plants on the Eastern balcony. To my surprise, Myrtle arrived and sat on the balcony about a metre away from me. I stood still for the duration in case sudden movement scared her away. I wondered, had I had seed in my hand, would she have taken it out of my hand? I took these photos when back inside. 

Maybe one day I'll get to take a selfie with her, but not yet!

I finished reading Jane Harper's The Survivors which I thought was really good. I also prepared some suggestions for the 2021 World Embroidery Study program for the group to begin thinking about tomorrow. 

Yesterday the Frewville Foodland had Tommy Ruff fillets so I bought some for my dinner tonight. Just pan fried and mixed with salad of avocado, cucumber, tomato and sugar snap peas.

The promised storm came around 8pm. A lot of thunder and lightning and some rain squalls. I managed to photograph a couple of lightning bursts in between progressing the shawl and watching Pie in the Sky and Morse.

Post 256 Birds, birds, birds

A strange short ‘peep, peep’ sound took me out on the balcony early this morning. It took a while to locate the birds in the Jacaranda and longer to find an opportunity to photograph one of the pair. They were, I think, Wattle Birds- a species of honeyeaters. They had a dash of yellow on their tail and lower body. They’re fairly large; I'm guessing about 30-40cm long .

It's interesting to have another variety of bird in the trees.

A bit later a pink-breasted dove arrived, explored the space, allowed me to distribute seed and ate someof it. Blush or Myrtle - I wasn’t sure. Five minutes later a plump bird I assumed to be Turtle. arrived, joined her, then appeared to chase her away.

This, however, soon changed into affection and ‘kissing’. It ended in a clear invitation from the female, mating and a kind of lingering parting. 

It took me by surprise. Given doves mate for life, this was most likely Myrtle and Turtle. The male was large and mature, the female smaller but not necessarily young. Both were pink-breasted. She was comfortable with me around. I checked my previous information about longevity, and consensus seems to be 8-10 years, not the 2 years I'd found before, so I’m going with Myrtle and Turtle. 

I went shopping for chicken Maryland’s for tonight’s dinner and some bakery items for after school snacks. Processing the bird photos took a while but I managed a few rows of the shawl. The pile of works in progress beside my afternoon work chair is growing.

Dinner worked fine. This time the potatoes were more successful than last time. I put them on very early, turned the oven off when they began to brown and back on again with enough time to finish crisping. Control freak!

It was 34C today. The washing dried quickly and the apartment was reasonable with the balcony doors open until about 3pm when the sun hit the western windows and I put the aircon on. 

Tomorrow is forecast to be 36C but Wednesday drops down to 26. The heat is much easier to manage when it’s in short bursts.

Consistent with today's insistent bird theme, my sunset shot tonight captured a bird high in the sky, the tail end of a flight returning to roost.

World Embroidery Study Group meets this Wednesday. I need to send out a reminder. I’ve been thinking about topics for next year. There's a lot of possibilities.