Post 411 To safety, sanity and solicitousness in 2022.

Last Wednesday I dashed into the city to pick up the brooch that has been with the repairer for several weeks and was finally finished. It belonged to my grandmother and is not a glamorous or expensive piece. The sparkly stones they have used do not resemble the original, which were, from memory, plastic beads in a range of primary colours. It was, however, the only option - and I rather think my grandmother would have liked it. 

The interest lies in the brooch coming apart to form two clips, 

which can be used on the corners of a square-necked dress to hold undergarments out of sight.

I don't know that I will ever use it, but I really like the concept. My grandmother had very little jewellery and am pleased to have it in working order.

This was the view down King William St, in the centre of Adelaide towards the Christmas tree in Victoria Square as I returned home. The Town Hall is on the left and the GPO clocktower on the right.

I posted last week on the anniversary of my mother's birthday. On the day my brother visited our parent's grave to place frangipani blooms from one of the successors of the tree she nurtured for 40 years. The magnolia tree on their grave has grown in the last year and is looking healthy. I'm glad he went. 

There was a flurry of noisy activity in the street in front of the building next door in the last few days before Christmas - what looked to be the extension of the NBN cabling underground and repairs to the road. It was finished and the road block removed on Christmas Eve. This is now the view from my balcony.

At street level the footpath is still blocked but the road is open and parking has, for the moment at least, improved significantly.

From across the Square the view is not too bad. 

Closer up the new buildings loom a bit, but it is, admittedly, a reasonable streetscape.

The sunset on Christmas Eve was truly glorious - I would not have been at all surprised to see angels.

It prefigured a lovely Christmas Day- calls with my brother and with Alison, most of the day at Katherine and Anthony's, relaxed, delicious food outside, amazing presents, great company.

I have a treasure trove of presents, a really lovely bird brooch, charming, vibrant earrings, a needle-keep, fabric to play with, a calendar of wonderful bird photos, a pouch of hand cream and an antique box for needle packets.

There might be more about some of these in later posts.

The public holiday's following Christmas Day have been very quiet. We have Omicron circulating in the community and  tightening restrictions. Friends are isolating and booked for tests tomorrow because they are  contacts of someone who has tested positive. Family work contacts and friends are also awaiting results. 

I've stayed home catching up on reading, embroidery and several friends and family. It's been really lovely to have long emails, phone calls and cards from so many friends and family who have taken the time to catch up.  This is a very important part of the year for me - the maintenance and strengthening of the web of connections spun over a lifetime, across circumstances, the country and the world.  I do my best to keep in touch throughout the year, but this fixed point ritual is so renewing and strengthening. Thank you to all who have participated.

There has been quite a bit of dove activity this week. I haven't manage to capture the four birds on camera, but they seem to be parents and their two offspring. Either the young birds are now muscling in on the parents' territory, or they are being taught the protocols of feeding. 

They arrive together and there is a lot of chasing around the seed and the ground space until they fly away, then one or two return. I'm sure this will end with only two birds visiting - but which generation it will be is not yet clear.

I took time out from the bag I've been working on to make this pouch for some scissors I had bought as a present. I have published details of this and other presents today in my embroidery blog. I could not write about them here without ruining the surprises.

The base of the Hearts and Roses Bag progresses.  It still has a central rose and a border to go, but I'm pleased with the progress. It is fairly slow work, much of it in a single strand of cotton, but very pleasurable. With a lot of incentive to stay at home I expect to make progress to the sides by next week - although there is the Guild Challenge to draw me away......

I've read some interesting books, watched the BBC's Road to Istanbul and Road to Rome series on pilgrimages and also the Sacred Isles of Scotland series. These are all helping to shape my thinking about historic embroidery. 

My weight loss continues slowly but steadily, 17.6 kg down as of this morning. 

Until next year.

Post 376 World Embroidery, friends, family and knitting.

 This week's big event was the World Embroidery Study Group meeting on Wednesday.  It was the first of two meetings on  "Mend and Make Do".  This week we had Pat's presentation, which focused on the work of some contemporary artists who use recycled materials. Pat brought along two pieces of her own recycling, one the really charming top in the top right of the photo, and the other a jacket with knitted patches, in the top left of the photo.

Lori, who is presenting her findings next month told us about the book she is using (bottom right) and also wore a jacket with knitted patches (bottom left).

Barbara Mullan brought along some of her brilliantly creative clothing, but I was too absorbed to remember to photograph! I'll do better next month.

In addition, the Guild Library had received about 5 boxes of books from a deceased estate - all of them relevant to World Embroidery. Most of the books were already in the Library, so these were made available for sale to members, and we were given first dibs. It was a treasure trove, and most of us didn't hold back. 

I was fairly restrained, only buying two items, a journal and a slim volume on Icelandic embroidery by Elsa Gudjohnson, who is the authority on the subject. The journal also has an article by her. It also has an article on Deerfield, which I love.  We managed to contribute $155 to Guild coffers through the sale, and the remaining books are being stored until our next meeting for absent members to have a look.

On Thursday I had a mammogram in the morning - a new machine since my last visit two years ago, but the same process. I am admiring of the clinic staff - so thoughtful, clear in their instructions and excellent communicators. I was in and out in no time. My brother rang in the afternoon and we caught up on his birthday celebrations and gigs. In the evening I went to a Guild friend's place for dinner and conversation. We had a delicious prawn curry and hours of shared stories and philosophy. It's very sustaining. 

 On Friday I caught the city loop bus into the heart of the city, for a quarterly lunch with friends at the Treasury. The morning was chilly and raining, so I took an umbrella but didn't use it. It was a lovely relaxed lunch. My Coorong Mullet was fantastic.

In the Square, as elsewhere, the leaves are falling. I love the light filtering through the trees and the emergence of the skeleton of the branches.I was able to take photos of the building progress next door. 

I haven't ventured into the Square for months because of the building. My apartment is the one circled in blue. The building is close to its full height. There was a further concrete pour on Friday and a crane is still lifting panels up to the top at 6.30 pm tonight - in the dark - as I write this. And it's noisy.

      

This is the front view.

On the corner of the lane on the other side of the new building is an old building whose owner refused to sell to the developer. He is hanging in there with his business.

Saturday was JEMS. Niamh went to the Guild straight from Netball and I picked her up. The Queen Street Cafe owner now knows our milkshake order without being told!

Also on Sunday, Melanie, my fellow family history researcher, had a bit of a breakthrough in our quest to find what happened to Mary Jane Noble after she retired from the Newsagency. We are still awaiting the certificates to confirm, but it now seems that Mary Jane married, at the age of 55, George Coles, a 41 year-old dog dealer, living over the shop for a few years before moving to this house.

If we are on the right track, Mary Jane Coles died in 1944. We await a copy of a marriage certificate, a death certificate and a copy of a Will.

Dinner last night was stir-fried duck with noodles and lots of great conversation. I bought a cooked whole Beijing duck and deboned it. The bones have made a rich stock for my duck soup.

 Today we had an extra Sit'nStitch, making up for one we missed last week.  Jennifer has begun some knitting as respite from Sophie's World, which is at the half-way mark. Susan B. is still loving Margaret Light's design. Barbara joined us today to learn a loose cast off for a beautiful shawl. 

I continued on my Entrelac shawl, which is looking more like a blanket, or possibly a cape. The single lounge chair on which it is spread for the photo gives an idea of the size.

Now for Duck Soup and Pie in The Sky!

Post 367 Birds, Building, Blooms and Bag-

This has been a  bit of an Embroiderers' Guild week. I spent two half days on duty at the Exhibition, took Niamh to JEMS on Saturday, worked with a friend to finalise the Guild's Child Safe Environments policy, called out to drop in my enrolment forms for three of Christine Bishop's classes later this year and today called in to pick up my pieces from the Exhibition which was demounted yesterday. I haven't heard the final attendance figures but I think they were down on previous years but respectable.

In between times I finished Sienna's squirrel (bar a few highlights to come later) and moved my hoop on to the next section, the wood pigeon.I've decided to move clockwise around the frame.

I spent a bit of time getting my threads in order, using double-sided tape to put them in number order on card. It has made it much easier to work.

On Thursday I dropped Ken's mended trousers in at their place, as they were off on a road trip on Friday. I happened to arrive at the same time as a magpie taking advantage of their birdbath.

On Friday, after Sit'n Stitch at my friend's place at Grange, I stopped at the Jetty Cafe  before heading home. It was a lovely evening and I watched the birds returning across the water while eating my Seafood Medley.

It really was a lovely evening. I was conscious of how fortunate I was to be able to sit there at this time. 

Our Covid vaccination program is meant to move into Stage 1b this week - over 70s and those who are vulnerable. It will be, however, several weeks before sufficient doses arrive and switchboards were jammed in the practices nominated to deliver the injections. My doctor, who I saw on Wednesday, has suggested I have my flu vaccination early in April, then try to organise a Covid vaccination 2-3 weeks later. I am now organising a bone density scan, a mammogram and a blood test.

To continue the bird theme, the dove pair have been daily visitors, soaking up the heat in the tiles, 

spreading seed around 

sharing amiably

and providing interesting silhouettes. 

They appear unaffected by the continuous upthrust of the building next door, which is now up to six storeys. My neighbours are fed up with the noise and dust. I haven't noticed the dust. The panels arrive by crane and are bolted on. The motor of the crane required to lift them into place is noisy but the construction process itself is much less so.

Before long I won't be able to see the top of the panels from my balcony - no bad thing. 

I'm still feeling it will be OK when built and the scaffold removed.

On the front balcony, the frangipani have continued to bloom in their small way. It's lovely to see the flowers emerging. Hopefully, they will continue to grow and bloom next year. My friend Vivienne has posted a link to a Frangipani Growers Australia, a group on FB. I've considered joining, but there were 22 posts to the group today and 812 in the last month. I'm not sure I can cope with that volume.

Yesterday I shopped at Frewville and took a photo of their wall garden. This density of cover is what I'm hoping to achieve with mine. They do have a watering system, whereas I water by hand.

As I predicted last week, the aloe flower disappeared during the week. Reckon I had a raid by the Noisy Miner.

I did finish the Turkmen Pouch. Detail of the finish can be found in my embroidery blog.

I've also been playing with the box of Scheepjes yarn that Jennifer bought for herself, Susan and I . I've been playing with a shawl pattern Susan found, just to see how it might be managed. It's promising. Today Susan and I discussed how it might work. There is a challenge carrying the yarn from row to row when the rows are so short at the beginning. I'm going to keep experimenting.

The book of the last 85 days of my daily blog arrived late last week. I had inadvertently ordered it in black and white, which is a shame, but I won't reorder.

I've spent hours and hours this week exploring further my grandmother Ada's family tree. I've now ordered some birth and death certificates. I expect it will be a while before I get them, even by email. I'm on one of those obsessive rolls that come when you find someone else working on the same bit of family as you are. It pushes discoveries forward.  

There will be more. 

The days have been warm. The floods in the Eastern states and historic sexual assault claims in Parliament House have dominated this week's news. As they should.  These stories are also far from over.

Post 366 Stitching, family history, blooms and sunsets

This week began with a morning of duty at the Guild Exhibition. The photos shows a small part of it. There are just under 300 exhibits spread over the gallery and the house. You can just see my bags on the back wall. We were quite busy on Wednesday morning with a group from the country driving up together to visit. We had plenty of helpers.

I did another three hours on Sunday, which was much quieter. This is the small garden between the house and Gallery. Helpers had time to sit and talk.

The exhibition was planned for last year. Numbers of both exhibitors and attendees are down on previous years, but still respectable.  Exhibition regulars came and clearly get joy out of  the work. Some go away quite excited, with an idea or two. There are also a few visitors who are new and also get excited. On Wednesday I met a young woman from Brazil who has an Art business in Adelaide and is interested in the World Embroidery Study Group.

I've been working steadily on the Turkman pouch. It's almost finished. The corner tassels are not yet done. I'm playing with using some gum nuts I've gilded a little, (resting there in the photos). I'm not convinced. I'll publish the story and result in my embroidery blog in the next couple of days.

Sunday morning was our Book Club meeting with lots of good discussion and ideas. I had chosen the books - Aaron Elkins' Gideon Oliver series and Sujarta Massey's Murder at Malabar Hill. Everyone liked the latter, and most liked Aaron Elkins.

The weather has been quite variable, 31C one day, but down to 19C and 20C on others. I'm not complaining. 31 is far more tolerable when followed by the low 20s. We had one night of rain so the plants have needed regular watering. The dove pair, especially Black Tips, have spent a lot of time visiting, even when I haven't put out seed - although no doubt the hope is still there!

Like me, they now indulge in a lot of sitting!

There's a new flower on the aloe, so I'm keeping an eye out for the Noisy Miner, who seems to have a grapevine that notifies of this bloom.                                                                   This Schlumbergia is also blooming, I think for the first time. So far there is only one flower but  a couple more coming.

The marigolds are going great guns and very cheering. I like to watch the buds form and open - such a contrast to the extravagance of the flowers.

On the front balcony I have two frangipani blooming, the red one for the first time. Unfortunately neither of them are scented but I'm still pleased to have them.  Hopefully the one I added a month ago will bloom with scent next year.

The building continues its steady upward rise. It is now, I think, probably 5 storeys high (four more to go).The white strip of wall close to the scaffold is the new building, the darker wall is my balcony.  There's a bit of noise, but still not enough to distress me. I avoid my living area when there is a concrete pour or the crane lifting panels into place. I can no longer see the work from my balcony except for a very rare instance of a worker climbing the scaffold.

I've spent a lot of time this week sorting out the the family history conundrums presented by the work of Melanie, whose contact I mentioned last week.It's amazing (and quite exciting) what can be achieved when we pool our work. Most importantly, Melanie has been able to visit archives and obtain documents not available online. It now appears that my paternal 3xGGrandmother, Sarah Attesley, was the sister of John and Henry Attesley who were convicted of larceny in the Cambridge Assizes in 1821, and sentenced to 7 years transportation. Sarah had two children out of wedlock, one of whom was my 2x GGrandmother.

By this morning we worked out that the two brothers were never actually transported. They appear to have served their sentences on the hulk Leviathan, Henry serving the full 7 years and John released on parole after 4 years. Their gaolers gave them reports of good behaviour which may have been the reason they were never transported. The UK Hulk Registers and Letter Books 1802-1847 for Henry and John Attersley show a few others with similar outcome. I did not know some sentenced convicts stayed on the hulks. It's a bit of a toss-up whether they were better off.

This is my grandmother, Ada whose ancestors these were. It now looks as if her line can be traced back through the Attesley's to Philip Attesley (1541-1572) and his wife Alyce Drawton (1542-1579). I have very little information about their lives except that two of their seven children survived to adulthood and by the 18th century their descendants were small-hold farmers. At no point in time does it look like an easy life.

Last night I cooked another variation of the tray-baked pork sausages . Once again, it was successful. Brigid had a 7pm netball committee meeting, so the kids and I ate just after 6. Katherine and Anthony picked them up in time to drop Brigid at her meeting and took the small cooked dish home to eat. I still didn't remember to photograph the cooked version! 

Yesterday was also the day of International Women's Day marches around Australia, focused on 'Enough is Enough' a version of 'Me too' triggered by some recent prominent cases here. I decided it was too difficult to go to the local march today but my spirit was there.

Last night's dark and brooding sunset seemed appropriate to the day.

I have changed my mind about using the Bushfire project for my Design Online project. I think it's too ambitious for the course, so I''m working on doing something with one of these linen pieces from Ink and Spindle. Not sure what yet, but using the river motif.

The post today included two books from separate sources. Each was packaged neatly in a padded paper bag that fits in the letterbox! Bravo!  One is, of course, the paper copy of Pat's book which I have already read on Kindle. I wanted a copy I can lend to people. The other is another of Shiela Payne's books. I haven't had a chance to browse carefully but it does have numerous index references to Bulgaria.

Finally, I did a repair job this morning for a friend. I have repaired these before - favourite orange trousers bought in Indonesia that split. Last week Ken sent this photo (left) of another disaster to befall them, above a previous patch. 

I stitched the tear to a piece of batik on the inside then stitched another batik patch over the top. 

They will soon be more patch than original - but that's OK.  I come from a long line of repairers! 

Later this year the World Embroidery Group is having a couple of sessions on Mend and Make Do. I might borrow them back to take along!

Until next week.