Post 197 Missing my laptop

Today’s post is short on photos. This morning I took my laptop and scanner to Macworld Norwood and left it with them to fix the scanner connection. After a bit of an inspection the issue seems to be the need to update the operating system on the laptop. They were hoping to have it done today but that hasn’t happened. Hopefully it will be done tomorrow.

While I can compose and post a blog from my phone or iPad, I can’t control the layout or the size of photos so will limit what I post. Usually I shape my narrative around photos. Can’t do that today.

Myrtle turned up this morning and shared seed with her shadow. Turtle turned up later in the day. 

I dashed from Norwood across town to Pilates, then did a bit of fruit and veg shopping at North Adelaide. 

The builders have dug a pit where previously they put in cement columns. Mystery to me.

As I was bringing in the washing late in the afternoon the Adelaide Rosella was announcing his presence from the nearby tree. I got some photos in my SLR but can’t download them until my computer is back.

It still feels like a Friday. After years of Pilates on Friday it’s going to take a while to adjust.

I had a phone catch up with my brother and progressed the Caterina project.

This is fairly slow progress but I can see the open, lacey effect emerging.

Hopefully I will have my computer back tomorrow and can resume formatting photos.

Post 196 WES Group, scanning and birds

I was up relatively early to get organised for the World Embroidery Study Group meeting this morning. We were discussing Icelandic Embroidery and I had books, a PowerPoint presentation, my thermos of coffee and my Icelandic Endless knot bag to take to the meeting.

While getting ready I noticed Myrtle and a young dove on the balcony, the young one coming quite close to my glass door. which was open with the screen door pulled across. This was the best I could do to photograph the new bird. I reckon it is the young adolescent that Myrtle and Turtle chased away a couple of months ago. I reckon it could be their last year's fledgling now accepted as sufficiently adult to forage here. There may be other explanations. It will be interesting to see how it develops.

Incidentally, those delicious looking grapes I bought on Monday have not lived up to their promise - good looking sour grapes!

We had a very good WES Group meeting; nine of us, two new to the group. We had a Covid Marshal and tables are set out to ensure we stay 1.5 metres apart. It's a good arrangement and everyone cooperates. Out Icelandic embroider discussion was, in one member's word 'inspiring'. Lori had worked her own design using the two most used traditional Icelandic stitches, long-armed cross stitch and eyelet stitch in perle cotton. As Lori pointed out, these stitches, but particularly the long-armed cross, are great solid filling stitches.

Margaret is working a much finer version of the Endless Knot design, also interesting.

Barbara brought along a number of Korean wrapping cloths she had made several years ago. The large on is for wrapping a table!

These are machine stitched with a particular  narrow enclosed seam.

Back at home I attempted a bit more scanning. After I'd scanned 30 photos, the app ceased to scan. Eventually I looked for a solution online and discovered this is a common fault of the app. After 150 or so scans it frequently crashes. At least I got 233 photos out of it! The solution is to remove the scanned photos from the device you are using, delete and reload the app and then continue.  This is disappointing. Not sustainable for the number of photos I am dealing with. There is also a fair bit of discussion about the quality of the scans compared to a flatbed scanner.

So I gave in. I rang the Apple service shop at Norwood and asked if they would remove old drivers from my laptop, check the connection to my flatbed scanner and either restore the connection or let me know that it is no longer compatible and suggest an alternative. If I can drop the laptop and scanner in tomorrow morning they will do their best to have it sorted by the afternoon for me.
Nothing like doing it properly!

Late in the afternoon I heard the tell-tale cooing. There on the back balcony was the young dove again. Curiouser and curiouser.

It flew away, of course. I then noticed the unfolding aloe.






















On the front balcony this morning I noticed that the native bush I bought a couple of years ago at an Australian native plants expo  is finally blooming. It is labelled as a Meuller's Daisy but doesn't look very daisy-like. I'll check it again tomorrow to see if the flowers change shape as they open.


This evening's work on Caterina has progressed the project. The thread count, however is out by two threads as I reach the centre line. so I will need to track the error tomorrow when I am less tired and have daylight.

Post 195 Mostly photos

Today's goal was to buy photo archive boxes and begin to organise the photos I am scanning. I had found the boxes online at a company called Albox, in Manton St Hindmarsh, not far from where we lived for 30 years.

I drove past it at first. It is buried in a complex under the (literal) banner of Signarama - a franchise of sign makers. Preview plastics is also located there.  Compatible businesses.

The polypropylene box is what I had hoped, and they also make polypropylene dividers.

The reception area of the complex is full of signs - mostly about about Covid. This seems to be another of the minority of industries whose products have been in demand as a result of the pandemic.








I bought four boxes and four sets of dividers to get me started and enable me to work out what I will need.

From there I went to Norwood to pick up the last two books I had ordered for last week's birthdays.

While there were people about, and the car park pretty full, it did not seem crowded.



The weather was dull and overcast,  nowhere near as warm as yesterday.





Back at home I labelled dividers for the 203 photos I have scanned so far and placed them in a box to see how much space they occupied. They take up no more that 20% of the box, so I think the box will hold at least 1000 photos.

Next I went through all my photo albums and sorted them, putting sticky labels on the spine to help me. As I expected, there is another whole album covering the 80s.  Since I began here I have opted to scan this album next.  I removed all its photos   - about 310 in all.

I think I can cull some of these as I go. Some scenic shots, and the terrible photos of birds I attempted to take can go. There are, however, many memories amongst these photos. There are also a couple of documents that I will need to accommodate.

So I calculate this first box will hold at least two decades- but will chew up the dividers.

Now I can dispose of two albums.


I set the photo organising and scanning aside when the sun set and shifted to embroidery. I realised tonight that the name 'Serenity' which appears on the cover of Inspirations along with this project, refers to the Issue and not this project, which is called Caterina. I need to amend my blog post references to it.

I am beginning to get the hang of Caterina. It requires constant checking of thread counts and the relationship of each part, but it's possible to do this as you go.

I'm encouraged by completing the first round of the outside row for one quadrant - essentially a quarter of the stitching for one quarter of the mat!

Tomorrow the World Embroidery Study Group meets to discuss Icelandic Embroidery- should be interesting.

Post 194 Warm and windy

I went shopping at Frewville this morning for bread and a few snacks for the kids this afternoon. They had Australian grapes - not sure where from. I'm guessing Stanthorpe in Queensland. They look fabulous.















It was very warm and windy - a good drying day as my mother would have said. I washed all my merino trousers, possum wool socks and a jumper. I tried to capture them blowing around, but without a lot of success. It was good to open the apartment up and get a breeze right through.

The daisy I bought the other day is opening up beautifully. I love the pointy petals as the flowers first open. So crisp.


Niamh came around 1pm from the orthodontist where she'd had her bands fitted and the others arrived singly throughout the afternoon. Very relaxing for me.

I scanned most of the rest of the 1980s photo album - adding 69 more. I have about half a dozen left to scan, ring-ins that don't belong to the 1980s. The app is proving successful. It doesn't have an edit function for improving the quality of photos so that needs to be done separately.

I phoned an archival box manufacturer in Adelaide this afternoon and they have the photo storage boxes I want so I shall call there tomorrow. In the meantime, however, I can dispose of one empty photo album!

I did not get out of bed this morning when the coo-ing started, but I did put seed down as soon as I was up.

Turtle visited this afternoon and devoured quite a bit. He seems to have a feather out of place - or ruffled - but behaved normally.

This evening I managed to work another pattern repeat on the Serenity project. It is still tricky and requires concentration.  Fortunately I have seen (at least once) the episode of Midsomer Murders I've been watching at least once and can afford to concentrate on the stitches!





It will, I think, get a bit quicker and easier but it will never, I think, be automatic or easy. Very interesting though.

The temperature only reached 29C today, lower than predicted. It is nearly 11pm and still 25C. Tomorrow however, is predicted to only reach 19C.  Fine by me!

Post 193 sitnstitch

It was a fine Spring day in Adelaide today. A bit cool to begin with, but 24C by the afternoon.

Turtle appreciated it and visited several times for seed.

I spent the morning preparing Lemon Chicken for tomorrow. I cook the chicken whole in the liquid so like to allow it to stand  and cool overnight so I can skim the fat off the liquid and remove the bones from the chicken.


I picked Jennifer up at 12.30 for our Sit'nStitch at Grange. Susan had made a stunning cheese and onion pie for our lunch.  Both Jennifer and Susan are working on knitted blankets at the moment. I was rectifying the centre markings I had made last night on the Serenity mat. I discovered this morning several places where I had stitched over one or three fabric threads instead of two. I wasn't using a magnifier and working at night on such a loose weave fabric was a mistake. It took me a couple of goes to get it right.


Traffic was low when I got home and the Square bathed in light.

I checked out my front balcony plants.
The begonia cutting I've been nursing for months now has 8 sturdy leaves,



















and the geranium cutting I bought at the Guild Christmas market has turned into a strong plant with flowers forming.

To get these parrot shots I photographed  the screen of my television during a documentary called Australia Remastered: Parrot Paradise. I was watching it while embroidering before dinner.

The top one is a female King Parrot and the lower ones are Palm cockatoos. The one on the right is a male. They are a pair, together for up to 50 years.

If you get a chance the documentary is worth seeing.

I worked on the Serenity project for the best part of two hours and this was my progress. I found it quite difficult. The pattern is repeated all the way around so hopefully it will become imprinted on my brain and I won't have to check the pattern every stitch. The loose fabric threads are hard to count. They move.

I think this is going to take quite a while. I am going to balance it with knitting.







Tomorrow is forecast to be 31C - then 17C on Tuesday.


 Dust is forecast for tomorrow evening but tonight's sunset was clear and calm.

Post 192 scanning

I went to Norwood this morning to pick up a book I had ordered. While I was there I deposited my bag of soft plastics for recycling at Coles and did some grocery shopping.

I also bought this pot of daisies. They look so fresh and full of buds - ready to burst into bloom.



Back at home, once the shopping was stashed, I continued the scanning process, through a batch of photos of our Gawler house, taken just before we left it to live in Hindmarsh- obviously a record of the house. Also batches of a visit to McLaren Vale with Peter Forrestal from WA and a family holiday in Robe.


Amongst the photos of the Hindmarsh house to which we moved from Gawler was this one of similar daisies as I bought this morning, surrounding an elevated pot. The more things change......

There are a few photos in the album not attached to any other photographic event. Some easily identified, but others less so. At the time they were taken I'm sure I would not have believed I would ever forget the activity or event! A lot has happened since 1985 and the hard drive of my brain is not infinite!

It was a lovely day in Adelaide. Victoria Square is looking great. The council gardeners have been busy pruning and preparing for Spring.

I took Niamh to JEMS where students worked on a Father's Day gift using the cutting machine. It was a great exercise, involving cutting shapes, ironing on backing  and appliqueing. Afterwards Niamh and I had a milkshake and cake at Queen St Cafe. Very quiet today.

There was the week to catch up on back at Katherine's and delicious roast lamb.





I'm plugging away at my knitting and setting up the linen for the Serenity project, which is what I might try next. I have never used Buratto linen. It is extraordinarily soft and pliable. And it is also  8 thread count per inch!

I'm also exploring archival photo boxes to store the photos I am scanning. Most of the albums are clunky and not archival. Once scanned, they could be culled and stored more economically in boxes. The scanning itself is just the beginning.

Post 191 Powerpoint day with dove visitation

I had a postal delivery today- a book I had ordered two weeks ago. Plenty of eye candy here and good explanations in the text. It covers interesting local differences in costume. Not all are embroidered, but plenty are.

My very favourite is this traditional 'party dress' from the Chiapas de Corzo, even if the authors are  disparaging of its origin as a costume brought to the area by a troupe of itinerant actors in 1930.

I want one!

I spent most of today preparing a PowerPoint presentation based on the Elsa Gudjorisson book that I borrowed yesterday. While the Piecework magazine article World Embroidery Group members have gives an excellent overview and example, it does not outline the stitches commonly used with the rich examples Gudjorisson provides.  I needed to read the book, compare with the Piecework article, take photos and construct the narrative to close the gap. I found it interesting Hopefully others will too, and this will work for our meeting next week. There's another story about runes, but not, I think, for next week.

The doves repeated their recent pattern today - lots of coo-ing by Turtle who takes up a stand on my wall garden while Myrtle feeds on the seed. It appears very protective. He came along later in the day and got his share.













I had a chance, late in the day, to check out the progress of the buds on the aloe in my wall garden. It seems to be developing into another flower, one, I suspect, that will attract the Noisy Miner!









Another spider has added a web to the wall garden. This portion of it has captured and incorporated a small twig. Interesting to see the little strands of web used to secure it.

It was a cloudy sunset this evening.










I like these cloud formations - and the twinkling lights of the windows, which appear as holes with light shining through.



It’s Brigid’s socially distanced school formal tonight. I do hope she has a great night.








No more photo scanning today, and no embroidery. I settled for knitting after dinner. The shawl is growing. It’s about 65cm along the stitch side. I changed to a longer length needle at the end of the evening.

I’m not, however, half way yet.