Post 274

Driving home from the Guild’s Certificate Course Workshop this afternoon with ABC Classic FM on my car radio, I heard Yvonne Kenny singing Martini’s Plaisir D’amour and was transported back about 60 years to an open air twilight concert in Hyde Park Sydney with my father and hearing it sung by, if memory serves me, Rosemary Hocking. I was used to hearing my father’s opera records - even sometimes on the beach 200 metres from our house but I had never heard anything as sad and beautiful as that song surrounding me as we sat on the grass in the gathering dark. I haven’t been able to find any trace of Rosemary Hocking  online but there are a few musical Hockings. The song still overwhelms me with its longing.

At today's class there was a pause to acknowledge the achievement of Jean, who has completed the Certificate Course. Her final submission was the quilt displayed on the back wall of the Gallery.

Today's workshop was on Large Cross Stitch Projects - meaning projects that have up to 60 pages of charts , up to 260 different colours and no fabric uncovered by stitches.

I am never going to work one of these projects, but I learned quite a lot of useful things from this workshop. The first tip was about how to draw up a grid - and the imperative to do so. It took me a few attempts before I got the grid right, but I got there.

We also looked at different techniques for keeping ordering and keeping track of work. In this example I was using five needles, each threaded with a different colour and worked one line at a time, parking the threads when not in use.

In this one I was using one needle, which I rethreaded with different colours. I worked across a 10x10 thread space, colour by colour.

There are techniques that work across large blocks of squares.

I don't intend to take this any further. but I am very pleased to have attended today.I'm sure I will use what I learned somewhere along the way.

Back at home I worked a couple more oak apples. I might finish this panel tomorrow.

What's left to do requires more attention than I can give it while talking so I didn't take it with me when I went to dinner at Katherine's. 

Instead I decided to prepare and set up a panel of Sashiko, hoping it would progress quickly. I backed the fabric with a form of interfacing and a square of cotton before starting to stitch. 

I didn't quite finish it tonight but don't have far to go. I'll finish it tomorrow and talk about what I'm planning to do with it.

Susan Monk's death notice was in today's paper.

I had a phone call from my friend Carolyn to let me know Wednesday morning's Mozart at Elder concert has been cancelled in the light of our Covid outbreak. We both admitted to being relieved. Neither of us feels very inclined to venture too far out of our current bubble.

Niamh and Veronica are being confirmed tomorrow morning at a 9.00 am service. As it's after midnight, I'd better get to bed!

Post 273 just stitching

It was hot from the beginning of the day. I had a phone call from my friend Lorraine, who I visited in August and wrote about in Post 170. She is much better, although not fully recovered. She is driving and doing her own shopping. She has been suffering for months from dramatic drops in blood pressure that lead to her briefly losing consciousness and falling down. She can now water the garden without that happening. She was bright and cheerful. Quite strong.

I managed to complete the star flower before I left to pick up Jennifer for our Sit'n Stitch. The paler pink flower and leaves was worked at our Sit'n Stitch.

I think I need to make explicit, that it is Jennifer's  partner, Susan Monks, who died last week. Jennifer and I stitch most Friday's at the home of another friend, also called Susan. I have tried to differentiate as I write, but have been reluctant to use full names for privacy reasons. This blog is, after all, in the public domain. While I write about my own life, I have no right to identify friends nor to share details of their lives. 

Today Jennifer's dog came with us in the car. She was very relaxed in her harness on her bed. I didn't think to take a photo. In fact, I didn't much think of photos all day.  Our stitching host also has a dog. The two spent a bit of time checking each other out and exploring territory, but settled down to co-exist. 

An announcement of Susan Monk's death will be in Saturday's Advertiser. There will be a private informal farewell next Tuesday and a wake at a later time.

Following Lori's magnificent Shashiko bag, I worked out what I wanted to do with the panels I dug out yesterday. I've been experimenting with colours. I just wanted some idea of what my options looked like. I like both colours on the fabric. I think, however, I need to line the fabric to get the best effect and quilted look.  A job for tomorrow

I did manage to work two of five Oak Apples after assembling the Aida and threads for tomorrow's Certificate Workshop. There won't be much time given the cleaner will be here at 8.30 am.

I'd better get organised

Post 272 crewel and birthday dinner

Today's major stitching achievement was finishing the hillock underneath the Oak Apple Tree, which I achieved at the Guild's Crewel Special Interest Group. The two of us who were there joined forces with the Thursday Come and Stitch day Group - six of us altogether, socially distanced in the back room of the Guild House. The aircon worked, everyone stitched away and chatted from time to time.  Very pleasant.

Warm again when I woke this morning, but pleasant on the balcony with the light hitting the wall garden. There is still quite a bit of the black plastic containers showing towards the bottom, but the upper part has good coverage. You get a variety of views depending on angle. It isn't easy to get a holistic view with a camera.       

This panoramic view of course, distorts the angles to give a false curve, but it does give some idea.

Lori's Sashiko bag yesterday got me thinking. I dug out the various printed Sashiko pieces I have been hoarding. The black piece is quite long and the best candidate for a bag. The white ones will make more 'desk covers' - or napkins for me to use to cover my table at the Guild when I'm there for lunch. The red one is a series of small squares (roughly 6") for which I'm beginning to get an idea.

A couple of people contacted me following yesterday's  post, with further examples of names used backwards. Judith told me of a dress shop in Kingston Tasmania  called Yeltour - Routley backwards. I checked the name, and on the 1891 census the majority of those named Routley were in Somerset, but a fair number were in Scotland. When my late husband and I taught in Scotland in 1972 Senga was a common girl’s name, often in families where there was a mother or grandmother named Agnes. Given the Scottish link with the name my brother was researching yesterday, I wonder if this practice is more common in Scotland than elsewhere? Such reversals have a name - they are, apparently, ananyms.

I almost forgot to pick up the parcel from the Post Office this morning. Fortunately I had left the notice of failure to deliver on the seat of my car and saw it when I got in. As I had figured, it was a copy of the Anchor Manual of Needlework, which I had ordered after the Deruta stitch workshop as this was the major reference. It is 497 pages of information about stitches. It has a lot of information about various Italian embroidery stitches, less about Scandinavian. It has 75 knitting patterns and diagrams for macrame, but no entry on Crewel or Opus Anglicanum. Despite the omissions, it is going to be very useful. 

I spent a very relaxed and enjoyable evening with 3 friends at a birthday dinner for one of them. It's my idea of a good time.

Tomorrow's forecast temperature has been reduced from 41C to 40C, and Saturday's from 40 to 38. I'm grateful for small mercies.

This is where I am now up to with the Oak Apple tree. Progress is slower than I had anticipated, but the result much better.

Post 271 Tutus, paintings and Oak Apples.

Isn't this lovely! It is a piece of traditional Sashiko, worked 10 years ago by Lori, a Guild friend and member of the World Embroidery Study Group, and recently turned into a craft bag with the addition of denim during Covid restrictions.  

I really like the colour and design - so rich and harmonious.  Lori is a persistent, bold and creative stitcher with a really good eye.

This is how far I got last night. I didn't include the photo in yesterday's post. The leaves and acorns take longer than I anticipate. They are, nevertheless, really enjoyable to work.

Today I went to lunch at my tutu-making friend's house, taking my supply of elastic to see if any of it would work for the tutus. It did. 

She had made a delicious prawn curry for our lunch. It was a lovely, relaxing few hours. Plenty to share and quite a bit to laugh about. 

Before I went home I swung past Elders Fine Art in North Adelaide to preview the works in their upcoming auction, which was scheduled for this Sunday. It has, however, been postponed by a week because of our lockdown last week.  I was still able to view most of the paintings. They have had people arriving all day, not knowing it was postponed. It made me realise how difficult these changes make it for businesses - especially ones that involve events.

There are a couple of paintings by Christine Lawrence in the auction. Really beautiful - but very large. 

Lot 139 left.

and (right)  Lot 242. Chris Lawrence was an Art teacher with the SA Education Department, in both High Schools and Primary Schools. She taught with Jim and then taught a couple of our grandchildren. A terrific teacher.

There are some interesting Bernard Hesling plates and a couple of Barbara Hanrahans as wells.

I arrived home to find Turtle on sentry duty and another missed parcel in my letterbox. I went straight out to collect it. Unfortunately. the postman had not yet taken it to the Post Office. Back tomorrow.  

It was 32C in Adelaide today, and building up to 41C on Friday and Saturday. 

I did a bit of checking for my brother, trying to find any family history for a Scottish painter named Victor Rolyat or an Australian painter M Rolyat. After searching Ancestry and finding about 100 Rolyats in the UK, all from 1830 onwards, and about 20 in Australia in the same period,  I discovered that  Rolyat is a name commonly used by people or families named Taylor, who spell their name backwards. Many use both, calling themselves, for example, Henry Taylor Rolyat. 

My brother had made the same discovery today. 

This is my progress this evening on the Oak Apple Tree. Tomorrow the Crewel Special Interest Group meets at the Guild and I am planning to go. I should make quite a bit of progress - perhaps getting close to finishing.

Post 270 Growth and renewal

I went back, this afternoon, and looked at some of the elements of the front balcony garden that I had photographed and talked about back in the early days of the pandemic.

The spider - or one of her descendants - is still at work, weaving ever more complex webs. 

Spiders don't have that on their own.

There's also the pruning from the begonia Jennifer had suggested I cut back. The photo on the right was taken on 11 April, four new leaves on a small cutting. The photo on the left was taken this afternoon. It's only about 20 cm high, but has several branches and shoots. 

I haven't photographed my Yukka before. It's not so easy to photograph well. I'm better with close and small than with large things that need to be photographed from a distance. I brought this Yukka with me from my old house. It was always in a large pot, but outside in a garden. I've cut it back a couple of time to stop it overbalancing. The whole view is on the left, with a pot of poinsettia hanging from it. The base of the Yukka in its pot is well below that. On the right is a closer view of the top leaves. I'm waiting for some of the lower shoots to grow a bit more before cutting the height back again.

This row of about 5 yukkas are all children of the original plant. They really like life on the balcony, and I like their fecundity and green. I don't think it has ever bloomed.

I spent a couple of hours with Jennifer this morning. She is working her way through all the necessary processes and planning and looking pretty good. 

I checked the Guild website today, and we are back to regular meetings after the lockdown, so I plan to go to the Crewel Group on Thursday and Certificate Course workshop on Saturday. I'm so pleased that the Guild has stayed with the 1 person per 4 square metres requirement. The State did go to 1 per 2 metres for a while, but reverted after the recent hotspot outbreak. The Guild's Gallery space works really well at 1 per 4 metres, and it does make me feel really comfortable to be there. I don't think I'd go if we were working at 1 per 2 metres. I feel much the same about cafes and restaurants. As we are getting very used to hearing,  out of an abundance of caution. 

I also checked out the lemon rose pelargonium that I transplanted about a week ago. It's looking robust and healthy. Whew!

I had  good catch up phone calls from my friend Robin in the Blue Mountains. Her infected leg is slowly healing, and she was able to open her pottery studio for the Open Studio Program last weekend. Great that that program could go ahead  in NSW last weekend. 

Also caught up with my brother who is pretty busy promoting his latest book and working on the next one. We covered quite a bit of ground.

Alison and Karl got a very, very cute kitten today - serendipitously on her birthday.

Finally I had a request for any excess elastic I have from a Guild friend who has been asked to make 10 tutus! I think I can oblige.  

These conversations and connections are what keep me sane and operational. They are renewing and nurturing, recharging my batteries when required. 

Deo Gratias.

Post 269 Dinner

Pasta bake was the best option tonight. With Year 12 exams over, study day for  Year 10 and working from home rosters still in effect there was some uncertainty as to how many there would be here for dinner. As it happened it was a full quota and there were no left-overs tonight.

I usually make the ragu for this dish a day in advance. Today, however, I did it all in one go after going to Frewville Foodland for some bread and other bakery.

It was only forecast to be 24C today, and only got to 23C but Niamh and Veronica agreed with me that it seemed much hotter.  I got a good breeze through the apartment late in the afternoon. The  plants were in need of water. They respond quite quickly once they have it.

I love the reds of these begonia (left) and also the variation in the poinsettia leaves (right). This one is the one I bought for the Christmas before last. Last year's one is also still going.  It's a reminder that I need to visit Barrow and Bench and get one for this year.

The Crown of Thorns centre (right) is growing nicely. It looks like leaves developing, not flowers. It may not be mature enough yet for flowers, but there's a lot of growth there.

Both Frangipani have their first leaves. I enjoy the patterns in the leaves when the sun shines through them late in the afternoon on the front balcony. 

The sunset was not as spectacular tonight, but still interesting silhouettes and colours.

Tomorrow morning I'm going to spend a couple of hours with Jennifer, talking, in particular, about a wake for Susan. Nothing can be firmed up until the Coroner has finished. There may be delays following our lockdown.

I made progress on the Oak Apple Tree. Tomorrow I shall work on the branch to the left, then the hillock, leaving the apples till last. 

I'm still really enjoying this.

Tomorrow is also Alison's birthday. I hope she has a really happy one

Post 268 Out of lockdown, with caution.

Our Crime Fiction Book Club met this morning at Norwood. Our usual coffee shop venue was not open. We hadn't been able to confirm opening because, of course, like all other cafes, it has been shut down since last Wednesday. Lots of places were not open. Cibo's, across the road was open and pretty full. Our convenor managed to secure a table for six, right at the back. 

We got through most of our discussion before a staff member gave us 10 more minutes so others could have the table.

Our books for today were Jane Harpers The Survivors and The House by Louise Candish.  I had not finished the latter but really liked The Survivors, which was pretty much in line with everyone else.

Because of the time limit in Cibo's, we finished before 11am, which is when retailers can open on Sundays. I joined a group of about 15 people waiting for Coles to open. Masks are recommended but not mandated. About half the Coles customers were wearing them.

As I left, around 11.30, the carpark was filling up. The streets were still relatively quiet both in Norwood (right) and on the Eastern side of the city centre (below).

After unpacking the shopping, I did a bit of stitching on the Oak Apple Tree in between a number of phone calls, the first from Jennifer, who is getting by with a little help from friends and family. We have a tentative plan for stitching. My friend Pat in Sydney is about to press the button on the very last final extra edits to her History of the Macquarie Dictionary. Margaret, my Guild friend with the broken humerus has been unable to see the physio during the lockdown and is still in pain. She has, however, been able to stitch using a seated frame. She's invited me to lunch on Wednesday. I missed a couple of calls from Susan B. our Sit'n Stitch host, because my phone was flat and on the charger after all those calls. Barbara caught up with me a bit later in the evening when the charge was effective.

While the phone was charging, there was a group of Adelaide Rosellas feeding in the Square. Even with the digital SLR I couldn't zoom in enough to get a decent photo, but you get the idea. They were grazing in the grass, obviously finding seeds of some sort.

It was a great sunset, first an apricot sky, lasting for at least ten minutes

then moving into the pink and grey-blue palette.

I've had a hard time choosing which ones to use in this post.

I'm very pleased with my Oak Apple Tree progress. I'm enjoying free-lancing on this one. I do have a photograph of an Oak Apple Tree as reference but with a pile of threads chosen around a palette based on the photograph I am improvising. Mind you, I have so far stayed on the familiar ground of tree and leaf. I'm leaving the Oak Apples to last!

I'm not sure how many guests I will have for dinner tomorrow in this changing world of exams, closures, working from home, working from office. Somewhere between 0 and 6 -  and it doesn't matter in the least.

I have a plan -

and any number of back-up variations. 

Almost anything is possible, and tonight I'm mindful of Julian of Norwich's mantra  All will be well, and all manner of things will be well.