Post 405 Mostly Books, Birds and a Birdcage

Last Wednesday the dove came hoping for food as I watered the plants. I didn't quite get it in the frame of the photo against the jacaranda.  Even though it had rained the day before it doesn't take long for the sunflower to droop.

Although I didn't mention it last week (there was enough gloom without it!), for several days I had been getting continual pop-up notices whenever I opened my email, telling me my Exchange password was incorrect. I don't use Exchange regularly, but for a Sydney University Alumni account I use as a back-up, and for messages from my website. I couldn't fix it. I eventually emailed the Sydney University Alumni office. 

I then went into the city to pick up jewellery repairs - two favourite necklaces are now wearable - then on to Nordic Furniture to discuss the furniture I've ordered. My concerns were addressed when I discovered the shelves are adjustable, allowing me to have two decent book shelves and one  very narrow shelf that would take bigger books lying horizontally.I also settled on polished, non glossy Tasmanian Blackwood.

On Thursday I had a reply from Sydney Uni alumni - saying others had reported the problem and giving me some links to FAQs which in no way helped. Then Microsoft  emailed - since I use this account for my office software. Microsoft instructions worked on first go! It seems this problem was caused by the adoption of two step authentication, which requires a reset. I had to reset on each device I use, but did it quickly and easily.

There were only two of us at Pilates. Martine had prepared a few new exercises for me. Afterwards I treated myself to a late lunch of Grilled Atlantic salmon and salad at the Queen St Cafe - and a lime milkshake.

Late in the afternoon, there was a lot of bird noise, indicating the Noisy Miners were around. Most were hidden in the leaves of the trees, which are now very dense. 

One was perched high on the top branch of one of the trees. It appeared to be a young bird - almost a fledgling but had certainly found its voice.

At the same time the sunflower had recovered and was looking splendid in the afternoon light. I used my DSLR for these photos and discovered a few photos from late September that I had not processed, including several of lorikeets enjoying the buds on the same trees before they developed into flowers and leaves.

On Thursday night I finished the embroidery on the second fridge magnet. On Friday morning I stitched on the felt background and added the magnet. I'm very pleased with these. They are hard on the hands and I am not planning to make the other two in the kit, using the plastic canvas. 

I might, however, try  on either Aida or tapestry canvas. I do have plenty of magnetic strip!

On Friday I also emailed our Strata rep to find out about plans the Strata has for services using scaffolding. It doesn't look as if it will help me with the possible roller shutter repair. 

On a more positive note our solar panels are now operational and we received stickers to put on our electricity box. 

Susan and I both knitted our way through Sit'nStitch. There was plenty to talk about.

Saturday was the last JEMS meeting for the year - and the Christmas breakup. There were seven JEMS there, three tutors and lots of food. They made Christmas angels with beads, wire, a crystal and ribbon. At the end there was a group photo and promises from everyone to be back next year.  A lovely rounding of the year.

Niamh managed to fit in a milkshake on the way home - our last for the year. Anthony cooked some excellent patties and chicken for dinner. They had been spreading another load of mulch to their front garden all day. It's looking great.

During the week one of the Lagartera booklets I had ordered arrived and I have been playing with a couple of motifs from it. It's mostly counted satin stitch, requiring concentration (spot the 3 missing stitches in the photo!) and very effective.

I've got a few ideas for using it. I also checked the Guild Museum and found it holds an example, so I think we will be able to hold a productive workshop next year to meet Maria's request.

I also received the forms to fill out for my two Certificate Course Workshops next year,. The first one is in February, which means I need to have the summary and requirements into the Guild’s December newsletter. In order to list requirements I needed to prepare the kit - print the pattern on to Sulky and finalise and organise printing of the workshop notes so I can calculate kit costs. That took a few hours on Sunday, along with some food preparation and packing away the trundle bed ready for the technician to access the roller shutter controller easily on Monday morning. 

I was well prepared, but, alas, I had it wrong. I waited for the call to give me the specific time. At 11.30 I rang - to discover the appointment was for next Monday! The fault, I think, was mine. I had been very stressed about the problem, and the appointment. Oddly, the misunderstanding, far from adding to my stress, seems to have alleviated it.  Perhaps the efficiency and empathy of the staff member who answered the phone gave me confidence, or put my fears into perspective. Either way, my heart is lighter.                                                                                                                                            Altogether I got a lot done on Monday while waiting - put away the remains of numerous projects - threads, patterns, notes, fabrics. I went to the supermarket, to Create in Stitch and to Officeworks to pick up the printed notes for the workshop. I also prepared the text and photos for my Christmas card this year. I tried printing it at Officeworks and then Snapfish. Officeworks predict a week longer to deliver, so I have ordered with Snapfish. Another reason to feel light-hearted. 

I had a discussion with Taetia at Create in Stitch about a class they have advertised for February next year - two Saturday's with Di Kirshner teaching Christine Bishop's Birdcage Etui. I did Christine's class for this at BATB in October 2014, finished one panel and the scissor fob but have not progressed it since then. I've been thinking about it recently and would like to finish it. Unfortunately, the second day of Di's class is on the same day as the Certificate Course Viking Workshop. I may be able to do the first day of the class and join one of Di's Stitch and Chat mornings to finish it. Or just stitch it.            It's time has, I think, come.  Nordic Needle have a downloadable pattern for it.                                                                                                                                  Today I put together the kits for the February Viking Embroidery workshop and wrote the notes for the next Guild newsletter.  I have to pick up 18 pieces of wool flannel from the Guild on Thursday and hopefully a few skeins of Appletons wool and the kits are ready.

This week I booked in for a Moderna vaccine in early January, following the advice of my nephrologist. I later discovered only Pfizer can be given as a booster and Moderna requires some proof of immuno-compromise. I have left a message for the nephrologist to find out how to proceed. Our borders opened today and there is a fair bit of apprehension. I have now linked my vaccination status to my SAGov check-in App, the first of the new requirements.

In between organising the kits I've been reading Louise Penny's A Fatal Grace - a great treat.  Sally Coulthard's book arrived today.  It looks as if it's going to be a winner - so I'd better get on with Louise Penny. 

Post 294. From the Balcony and Sit’nStitch

I managed to get a couple of shots of this morning's dove visitor on my SLR. This is a youngish bird with a pink breast and some dark feathers under wing. He/she also has head feathers that tend to stand up - almost a dove mohawk.  I love the patterns visible up close on the wing - and the pensive look.

On the balcony the sunflower plant has produced a couple more small flowers. They will open up a bit more, but even at this size I love the yellow, and the dark somewhere in the centre. The jacarandas have largely dropped their blossom and are turning green. This is the very last of the purple on the tree behind our apartments.      

It was our last Sit'n Stitch before Christmas. Sue had prepared a beautiful spread of salad, cold meats and fresh breads. We were relaxed with lots to catch up on from the last fortnight.

Jennifer had bought an astounding gift for both Sue and I - as well as ordering one for herself! Each ball is 26 metres - so a total of 1508 metres.  enough for something like a poncho - or even a cardigan. Wow! 

And we can keep track of each others' progress on whatever we choose. 

I worked on another crocheted square. The size is consistent with the last two - which passed Jennifer's inspection. I now seem to have got the hang of this, so have a great grab and go project to work on as the fancy takes me. 

I've wound small balls of each colour  so I don't need to carry around 200 gm balls. Each little ball will make either a centre or surround for about 3 squares. I should be able to do 10-12 squares with these little balls.

This evening I began Lady Anne's Flowers. Thought I'd plunge right into the big red flower. I've worked the first two petals in four colours. I think I'll drop back to three from now on.That will give, I think, a smoother blend. It's lovely to be back to Crewel work.

Tomorrow I have friends coming for dinner so need to do some shopping tomorrow morning.

Apart from family dinners on Mondays in term time, this will be the first visitors I've had in the apartment for a meal since at least January - maybe longer. 

Perhaps I've forgotten how?  

I don't think so, but we'll soon find out. 

Post 246 Sunflowers, rabbits and lunch is back on.

 A lunch group of five women, to which I belong, met today for the first time since February. We normally meet at least 4 times a year, trying different restaurants around the city. It simply hasn't been possible to meet until now. We went to Chianti, not far from where I live.  It was closed to diners for months, serving takeaway meals to order and delivering them to cars in the street outside. 

Today it was as busy as I've seen it. Maria was everywhere - greeting, behind the bar, serving, checking, delivering hand sanitiser to our table when ours didn't work. We were in a bit of a noise pocket, but managed to make ourselves heard enough to catch up. I had Orecchiette pasta with Port Lincoln sardines, cauliflower and pine nuts, followed, of course, by affogato.  So good to see friends.

I had planned to go to Norwood before lunch but, as usual, tried to fit in too much beforehand, so I went after lunch, back to Beads on Parade - the shop that was closed on Sunday -  to try to get something to crimp the ends of the necklace that stuck in my neck.  When I arrived, the shop was empty except for the two assistants, both beading at the workbench. They immediately provided advice, found beads to fill the empty spaces on the cord and offered to crimp it for me! I was a bit overwhelmed but fell into line quickly. I strung the extra beads, one assistant helped the three customers who came in and the other crimped my ends. Can't complain about service! 

 Last night's rain didn’t continue throughout the day. The sunflower is still looking spritely with more buds and flowers coming.

Tonight's sunset had a different colour palette to most. The white spot on the left one is not the moon, but a bird. This is a live shot and the white shape moves across the sky - in a way no plane moves.

Ten minutes later the colours were more conventional - but still soft.

The remainder of the day was spent working on the rabbits. Now that I am on the third one of these I'm having a relaxed time playing with the colours. 

I now need to make the fourth set of Rabbits at Dawn match up to this one seamlessly.

I'll  block it tomorrow and start on the last one. The feathers are still waiting to be attached to the chair,  there are a lot of hexies pinned to a quilt on the floor next to one of the lounge room chairs and a bag with the shawl on the coffee table.  

Did I mention I've had a few ideas about Christmas?

Post 243 Flowers, phone, family, friends and finish.

This is not my embroidery (wish it were - I’d be very proud). It was done by Sandra, one of my stitching friends who has been in some level of  lockdown in Manchester for months. At the moment she has a 'bubble' with her son and his family but can't move outside that. 

She began these embroideries in preparation for doing a Trish Burr class in Appleby next July. Unfortunately that’s no longer happening. Seems to me that if and when you get to attend, Sandra, the class will benefit enormously from your presence. Thanks so much for sending them to me.  They are superb.

I had a slow, lazy start to the day. It was a chilly morning. The sunflower has dried out again. 

I have agreed to prepare a workshop on Icelandic Embroidery for the Certificate Course in May next year. I spent a bit of time today thinking about this and adapting the PowerPoint I made for the World Embroidery Group. The focus for the Certificate needs to be on what the Group could work as a sample, or adaptation. It also needs to focus on the surface stitchery components rather than counted. Barbara wants to emphasise creativity, so I'm thinking about how I could get students to design and work their own example. One option is a floral composition,  the other a human figure. The stitches are different in the two options.

While attending to the drooping sunflower, I was inspired to attach the macro lens to my SLR and take some photos. I'm very pleased with some of the results. These are a couple of the sunflower.

There are quite a few more of the daisies, gazanias and marigolds - for another day.

.

By these pursuits I managed to get to 2.30 pm without lunch and without threading a needle or pinning a feather to a chair. I settled in with what I was itching to do - finish the Deruta sampler.  I have (almost) squared it off so the samples are more centred. This involved pulling a new thread on one side and shifting the pulled thread on another side - not too difficult.

Late in the afternoon I called a friend to check a detail about our lunch appointment tomorrow. 70 minutes later we got off the phone. It won't cramp our style tomorrow!

Midway through the conversation a postman brought a delivery which turned out to be the first volume of my blog book. I’m pleased with the quality. 

It is lovely to have a reminder of our time in Stratford in print form.

My brother also rang. It was good to hear his voice and catch up on his news. They have been able to spend a few days in the Blue Mountains. The launch of his new book is next Monday.

I watched the sun go down at the western end of the apartment a few minutes before I saw the moon rise at the eastern end.

I have finished the edge of the Deruta sampler. I had considered adding tassels or beads on the edge to make it into a food cover, but I don't really use covers.  Once it is washed and ironed, it will become a liner for one of my bread baskets.

Happy with that.

Post 242 Adaptation

 

It was a high activity, but low photography day. This is part of the pot of sunflowers I bought last week. There are lot of buds coming out - provided I can keep up the water. It's in a 20 cm pot but is incredibly thirsty. It droops as soon as it is not damp. I'm watering it twice a day at the moment. It's not even hot at the moment. The plant is lush and laden with buds. It just seems to need lots of water.

Turtle put in a couple of appearances, finishing off yesterday's feed. I didn't have opportunity to observe bird behaviour. It was Basics to Beyond today and I wanted to get there to get some advice on the hem of the Deruta project from Saturday's workshop. I knew Gay would be able to help. 

However, I also wanted to get the pasta bake for tonight's dinner made before I left.  I had made the ragu but needed to cook the pasta, add the ragu and cover in cheese, ready to put in the oven this evening. I got it all done by 10 am and got to B2B around 10.45. 

There were only 4 students, plus Gay. After she attended to the other students (the ones actually in the Basic course!) Gay spent about an hour helping me figure out the instructions for the hem. Gay was also in the class on Saturday, so figuring it out will eventually help her too.

The linen provided has a thread drawn on all four sides. The solution to the problem became obvious once we worked out the hem is worked inside the drawn thread border, not outside it. I might have eventually worked this out by myself but was struggling. Two heads are definitely better than one.                                                                                          Brigid is home studying for final exams so I had offered to transport the dinner and the younger children to their place tonight. She was getting so much done at home on her own that we decided to feed everyone else at my place and send hers home with them. This seemed to work well. It was a relaxed meal with interesting conversation.

I've got quite a long way to go around the edge, but I completed a few centimetres in order to  see what it looked like when completed. It will take me a few hours, but I now get it. 

I have postponed my hairdressing appointment tomorrow. I don't think my hair needs cutting, or even trimming, for at least a couple more weeks. This gives me a whole day to either finish this border, or stitch the feathers on to the chair. And there is still my tax to organise. And the photo scanning.

For now I'll sleep on it.

Post 237 Foot and mouth

This fabric arrived yesterday from Tessuti fabrics in Sydney. I had ordered it last Thursday when I got their newsletter with new fabrics. It is Italian linen, called “Moroccan tiles”. I thought it would make another lovely tote bag, with a hexagonal embroidery in the middle, so ordered half a metre. It was sold out within 24 hours. Described as medium weight, it is lighter than I anticipated. I’m not sure if it is heavy enough for what I had in mind. It will certainly line something or complement an embroidery.

I had two appointments today, podiatrist at 10.40am and dentist at 3.45pm. After the podiatrist I went to Unley shopping centre to drop off my soft plastic recycling and do some grocery shopping. From there I went on to Barrow and Bench hardware to check out their plants and buy a small broom for my back balcony. They had some tubes of white and red pig face which I thought would fill a gap in my wall garden, hopefully they will spread and fill the gaps.  I also bought this sunflower that’s beginning to flower.

There wasn't really enough time between the two outings to get seriously stuck into stitching. Read a little of The Ghost It Was,  a recent reprint of a Golden Age crime novel by Richard Hull, and did a little jewellery mending.

I have been wearing this necklace given to me by the girls. It goes really well with the top I bought a week or so ago. Unfortunately, the tie-off of the thread on which the beads are strung is tied off with protruding ends that stick into my skin. I went hunting for crimps amongst my bead supplies, but no luck. I will get some at the bead shop in Norwood when  I am there on Sunday.

Amongst my beading things was a shell and greenstone necklace needing a replacement link so I fixed that one. Some progress anyway.

Luckily for me, the postman delivered a parcel before I went to the dentist, saving me a trip to the post office, since the parcel didn't fit in my letterbox. These are Snag tights, made by a Scottish company, but seemingly distributed in Australia from Melbourne. I can't work out where the parcel originated. The label had been pasted over another. I suspect it originated in another country, was sent to a depot in Melbourne, relabelled and mailed to Adelaide, travelling via Sydney. They are great colours, and claim to be vegan friendly and made sustainably but there is no information about origin on their website. I'll try one pair out on Friday for Pilates. 

It was a mild sunset, no bats when this was taken. The wide tree on the right is the top of the Morton Bay Fig where they roost. The twin Norfolk Pine looked like needle lace tonight.

I spent several hours working on the oak stem tonight, awkwardly stitching through the chair cover. Some of the stitches are hard to achieve without a hoop and the capacity to stab rather than scoop.  I'm satisfied with the result. I think I will need to dampen the cover and put it into the cushion to dry - a form of blocking

The Crewel Interest Group meets tomorrow at the Guild and I plan to go. Now this is finished (except, of course, for the two Rabbits at Dawn panels along the front face of the cushion!) I will work on the last Tumbling Feather