Post 423 Bats and Ballots

Continuing my theme of 'March in recent years', this is 21 March three years ago with my cousin Pen and Mark in Lynton, Exmoor. Again, I am so pleased I was able to visit them when I did. We created so many memories to hang on to. 

In contrast, "abundance of caution" has made this a very quiet week. In line with SA Health Guidelines for close contacts (7 days isolation 7 days caution), I have avoided all those crowds I usually mix with(!). On Wednesday I had a problem-solving session with a Guild member - at an outside table in a coffee shop. Seemed to work. Although my Pilates class is never more than 4 people, it is indoors and I cancelled to be safe. I did a bit of food shopping and visited Create in Stitch to replenish my supplies of DMC Etoile thread, used up on the Bush Sentinelles.

The big event of the week was our State election on Saturday. I had mailed my postal vote last week. I spent election night having dinner and watching the count at friends' place - an old tradition. Pre-polls suggested a tight result with a probable change of government. It turned out to be a landslide change. Once I might have been excited by this. Now I have very mixed feelings. I am really over the tribalism. I can no longer see the two Party system (indeed the Party system itself) as efficient, effective - or decent and honest. I don't believe the promises and claims. I want cooperation and collaboration. At least this result is clear-cut. That makes a bit of a change in SA. I'm hopeful we will all now get on with doing the very best possible for our community. Today at the hairdresser I overheard several conversations from the adjoining barber - middle-aged men born in Eastern Europe, sharing their fears, knowledge and hope in the face of the Ukraine crisis -geographically removed, but utterly connected.. It strikes me we need to draw on the depths of experience and understanding in our diverse community to find workable solutions to both local and global issues - we are in this world, this State, together.

On Thursday night I had an idea that sent me back to Create in Stitch again the next day for a large wooden hoop. 5 members of my Adelaide family were still in lockdown. Because they had isolated as a family, rather than make the infected member isolate in their room alone, they had 14, rather than 7, days of isolation. The infected member, on the other hand, was free to leave the house once negative. It was hard to be missing school, work and sporting finals. So I designed and worked a little tribute for their release from quarantine today.  

That took up most of Saturday and Sunday along with making a couple of moussaka and an eggplant parmigiana (bought too many eggplant!). I delivered them to the lockdown house in the hour that our water was off due to the installation of new taps in the basement carpark. 

My neighbour called me late in the afternoon because she had a leak in her bathroom roof - I'm not sure how plumbers in the basement results in leaks in the roof, but hopefully it will be solved soon. The same neighbour had called in last Friday to talk to me about her experiences growing up in Adelaide in the 1950s - triggered by reading Conversations with Baby Boomer Teachers. 

After she left on Monday, I was enticed again by the bats - the dots high in the sky,

 

then a discernible shape 

and my favourite - curved shape  on an almost impressionist landscape.

Today's hairdressing visit took a while but I'm happy with the result. My hair is thinning and the grey is increasing, but I will pass with a push, as my mother would have said.   

I'm now finishing off the Mosaic Carpet Bag, and setting up the Aesop Frame which I will be working on for weeks to come. It's time.

Post 422 Out of isolation with an abundance of caution

My most displayable achievement for this work is the completion of the 4th, and last, Bush Sentinelle cushion cover. I have written about its completion in my embroidery blog.

I tested negative with RATs on both my 5th isolation day  and 7th (Saturday). My daughter's family is still in isolation and all members have tested negative on their 7th day. They have another week to go, because they chose not to isolate from their Covid-infected member. 

The days tended to flow into one another. Barbara and Margaret M stepped in to manage Wednesday's WES meeting. 7 people gathered and discussed Indian Quilts under Barbara's leadership and Margaret's quick PowerPoint  construction. It's a great group.

Pilates went by the board and Friday's dinner got tentatively moved to Sunday. I spent my days reading, doing bits of research, working on the 4th, and last Bush Sentinelle - and voting. Our State election is on next Saturday and I registered for a postal vote. When the voting package arrived it took a while to work through. The lower house was straightforward enough, but in the upper house, there were 19 political parties fielding candidates.  Under our preferential system you either vote for one Party, or for at least 12 individual candidates. I chose the latter, and it was hard. I posted it today.

I emerged from isolation on Saturday evening. This week, as per SAHealth recommendation, I am avoiding crowds and "unnecessary activities".  Several friends rang and had long conversations, including one I had lost touch with - fabulous to talk to each of them. 

I had enough food to get me through this week and ordered a delivery on Friday from the Adelaide Central Markets in the hope that  I'd test negative so Sunday lunch here could go ahead with two friends. The delivery worked well (meat is in the polystyrene box) and lunch went ahead. I repeated the duck with nectarines and potatoes recipe from the City Mag a few weeks ago. I had every intention of taking a photo, but as usual, was too focused on serving it to remember. It worked well. We had a lovely relaxed meal and catch up. The birds at sunset and bats as darkness began to fall put on a good show for us.

A couple of parcels came during the week. The coloured continuous zips I had ordered to share with a friend at the Guild fitted into the letterbox as did the fabric for the cushion. I haven't had a chance yet to share.

Unfortunately, a book I had ordered was delivered on Saturday morning and I mistook the deliverer's single buzz for a birdcall. I picked the book up today. The book itself was 16x23x2.5cm. The stiff cardboard packaging was 45x36x2.5cm. Had the packaging been closer to the size of the book, it would have easily gone into my letterbox. I know I carry on about this. I have written to the retailer.

This time two years ago my cousin Christine and her husband Eddie were generous enough to come from Cheltenham to pick me up in Stratford-upon-Avon and take me for a day of exploring the towns in Buckinghamshire that had been home to my maternal grandfather's ancestors. We visited Piddington, where my 7x GGrandfather was born in 1657. His son Thomas married Margery Mukell here at St Nicholas's Church in 1697.

We also spent time at St Mary the Virgin Marsh Gibbon, where the 7 children of my 5xGGrandfather John Ray and his wife Sarah were baptised. It was a fabulous day, both in terms of company and what I experienced. Thanks so much Christine and Eddie.

I cut my UK stay short, leaving on 17 March to get home before Australia shuts its border. I'm glad I went, and glad I got home.

Having finished the cushions, I finished off the  pouch I was making from the Viking embroidery examples I'd prepared for the Certificate Course workshop. I'd left it unfinished so the inside could be examined.  I added lining and a zip. 

I find these zip pouches quite useful - as pencil cases or for tools for a particular project. 

I'm now turning my attention back to knitting the Mosaic Carpet Bag. There are lots of projects waiting to be started or finished, so I need to get on with it. I'm edging closer to continuing the Aesop Frame.

It's been a warm week - most days 30-33C with warm nights. This is tonight's moonrise, taken about 6.40pm. The 7 faint dots in the sky are birds returning to roost.

As my Adelaide family is locked down for another week, I will spend Saturday night with friends watching the election count on TV- a very old arrangement. Postal, absentee and early votes, which are up because of Covid, are not counted on the night, so a result is unlikely for several days. I'm not complaining.  I'm grateful that our community is voting, managing Covid, and functioning, that my family is able to quarantine and keep each other safe, and that I can isolate in my home yet stay in touch. None of it can be taken for granted.

Post 421: Goddesses, Glass and quarantine

This time two years ago I was in Stratford-upon-Avon, on the embroidery retreat that started this blog. 8 March, the day I'm posting this, was the last day of the retreat. Melody and I visited Holy Trinity Church which had been closed to visitors on our earlier visit. 

The retreat finished with drinks and canapes, and I won the lucky door prize.

Today, as more than 1 million flee war in Europe, and more than 2000 families in NSW have homes destroyed by flood,  I am writing in isolation as a close COVID contact. I tested negative last night and need to test again tomorrow night and Friday night. So far so good. I've cancelled all commitments this week.

I wrote in the post two years ago:

 It has been such a good 8 days. Amongst this group of people I find my tribe. We recognise each other, share not just embroidery, but values and experiences. We pick up where we left off and connect to each other in very fundamental ways.

I'm so glad I came.

I little thought, when I came home early and agreed to keep this blog going as I quarantined, that I would be still be posting, in quarantine, 2 years later and the world would be so changed. I'm still glad I went - and live in hope of reuniting physically with this part of my tribe one day, and the local part soon.

I spent a lot of time this week preparing presentations - a lot of searching for resources, reading books, articles and mining museum sites, finding threads of thought, organising and then telling the story. Much of it was done from my chair overlooking the back balcony, Next to embroidery, it's in this process I feel most relaxed and engaged. The whole dove family came on Thursday to keep me company, absorbing the heat from the tiles into their bodies, sharing the space with no sense of three's a crowd. The three were back today.

The urgent presentation was the one for tomorrow's World Embroidery Studies Group. I brought forward my Goddess in Embroidery offering from later in the year because the scheduled presenter couldn't do hers in March. This meant fast tracking my preparation, which is not as thorough as I'd have liked. Still, I have enough. One thing about ancient pagan goddesses is that they are attended by birds, originally swans, but later birds in general. So maybe the doves came to encourage me in the exercise.

In any case, I appreciated their presence. The presentation, of course, is now postponed and two other members have stepped in. The tribe again!

I mentioned last week that Margaret Adams had constructed and brought me the charts for the projects for my Bulgarian Embroidery workshop in August. This prompted me to stay on my presentation roll and prepare that one as well.  I already had the one I'd used for the WES Group last year, so I adapted it, prepared the notes, adding in the charts and sent them off to Officeworks for printing on Wednesday night. The charts need to be in colour but the notes could be printed in black and white. I also managed to print the illustrations of the projects in multiple smaller versions on 3 pages, then cut them out and paste them into the notes.  I dug out the Aida fabric I had been hoarding to use for these projects. I'm hoping to find a bit more, but can manage with what I have if necessary.  I'd have made a good Girl Guide~

On Friday I had lunch with four friends at the Magill Estate Kitchen. On the way there I stopped off at Heine's Nursery to buy another pot and another Mandevilla, this time white. A recent article confirmed my experience that they are very well suited to Adelaide. Now I have pink, red and white.

My GPS took me on a bit of a wild goose chase from the nursery to the restaurant but once I found my own way out of the maze, it was a very pleasant, relaxed lunch. 

I arrived home to find an undelivered parcel message in my letterbox.  It was the bookmarks I had ordered a couple of weeks ago, which, had they been packaged flat as I requested, would easily have fitted through the letterbox slot. As it was, each of the three bundles was encased in plastic, then placed together in a box, with bubblewrap to stop them rattling around. 

The box was then wrapped in plastic  before being encased in cardboard and placed in a padded postbag - which was then mailed inside a plastic Express Post bag!  6 layers of packaging for cardboard bookmarks that would have travelled safely in a heavy paper envelope and saved me a trip to the PO, a queue and the need to find a park! Grrr.  ( I am, nonetheless, pleased with the bookmarks!)

On  Wednesday  I had a phone appointment with me GP to report on my bloods. I took the opportunity to ask some questions about vaccinations - flu around May and 4th Covid probably sometime soonish. I am now out of the pre-diabetes range and my kidney readings are on the borderline of OK. It seems that is unlikely to change much. I continue with weight loss. 

Back in September last year I bought a second set of scales. The ones I was using were about 30 years old and gave varied readings within less than a minute. I have been using both sets in order to reassure myself of reliability. On the Saturday mornings that my cleaner comes I put the second set, which is glass, into a cupboard out of the way. This Saturday they slipped as I lifted them, and shattered on the tiled floor, like windscreen, into tiny fragments. I backed out, put on shoes and cleaned it up.

When my cleaner arrived I warned him there might be residual glass. He told me that in Pakistan there is a strong superstition that when glass or ceramic shatters in this way it is a sign that someone has wished you ill and the ill-will has been taken into the shattered object and dispersed! I'm grateful! Doubly so three days later with a negative COVID test.

On Saturday Niamh's basketball brunch prevented her going to JEMS so I managed to shop for Monday dinner and buy a bag of potting mix to move the Duranta repens, "Geisha Girl" I bought three weeks ago (another reported Adelaide-friendly bush) into the pot I bought on Friday. Hopefully, in this pot, it will grow to a reasonable balcony size.  It's very pretty.  

Dinner on Saturday was at Grange Jetty. It was windy and overcast and the wind surfers were out. I arrived home in time to catch something of the atmosphere from the city.

I tried a new potato recipe on Monday - Spanish potatoes - with the Chicken Maryland, eggplant parmigiana and greens. Very easy. Fionn and Niamh were at their respective football trainings. 

 

The eggplant parmigiana didn't brown as much as I wanted, but it tasted fine and everything else worked well, 

It was only later in the evening that I discovered a member of my family has COVID and I am a close contact. I used a RAT for the first time. It requires a UV torch which comes in the test kit, partially assembled. I completed the assembly but couldn't get it to work no matter how many times I tried. I discovered online that others had similar problems. Some three hours later, after booking myself in for a PCR test, I pulled the torch completely apart and reassembled it - voila! a UV light and a negative result. It was a huge relief, both to be negative and also to be competent to conduct a test!

I have made some progress on the final Bush Sentinelle and the Mosaic Carpet Bag, but not enough to add photos. Hopefully there will be a lot to show next week.

Post 420 Water and Vikings

 On Wednesday morning as I was having my breakfast in the chair close to the door on to my Eastern balcony, there was a loud thumping noise outside. I looked up to see a large magpie landing on my balcony rail. This rather strange photo was taken through the glass of my window. The flyscreen was across the doorway and I didn't want to risk frightening the bird away by opening it. I took a number of photos through the glass, then quietly drew my DSLR out of my sock drawer (where it lives to be handy to the balcony!) and slowly opened the flyscreen. 

I managed to get quite a few very decent photos before it flew away. They are big, powerful birds and I wouldn't tangle with them. It is a great privilege to have one visit.

 

I saw my optometrist later that morning and am now back on steroid cream, with a bit of a plan about keeping the problem under control. It has improved with the cream, so I need to eventually find the sweet spot of control.

I got home to find a note in my letterbox from SAWater to say they will be working on the water supply on Sunday and the water could be off all day.  My bookclub was meeting here that day. I can deal with the water being off, but they were likely to block off the street and make considerable noise which is less manageable. I phoned them to find out more, spoke to two different people, both of whom took my details and promised the project manager would contact me - but he didn't. I tried an online chat line with the same result. On Friday we moved the meeting. Just as well we did. The road was closed from 8am to 6pm, the digging was right outside and the noise still loud when I returned. In the meantime, we had a very engaged and interactive meeting at Pat's place. We try again here next month. 

Saturday was my Viking Embroidery workshop for the Guild's Certificate Course. I was on edge about it, because my presentation was heavily history-orientated, which is not usual for the group. I had a kit with two embroidery projects a PowerPoint presentation, some Naalbinding needles and instructions and some lucets with instructions. During the week I worked a Naalbinding wrist band- the first time I had managed more than the initial cast-on row. It is crude, but gave me the idea of how it's done.  While I like the idea of socks and hats in this technique, I plan to leave that to re-enactors. I'm planning to stick to knitting!

The workshop went really well. Those attending know my bent by now and assured me they love the history. Lucets were popular and most tried the wool embroidery and engaged with the dilemmas of historic re-creation.  I was very relieved - and exhausted.  Margaret Adams brought me two treasures - a proper chart of the exercise I'm planning for my September workshop, and an article on Namibian embroidery. They are both going to make a difference. I haven't found time yet to properly examine them.

I had a newsletter from the Quaker Tapestry in Kendal during the week. It's good to see them getting back into business and offering classes. I was also interested to read that they have finished the Dunera 

panel for the Australian Quaker Tapestry.  Like many of the stories told by the tapestry, it is one of Quaker intervention in a shameful episode in history. The extensive research behind the story can be found here.

Now that the Viking Workshop is over, I have plunged into researching and organising my presentation on the Goddess in Embroidery for the World Embroidery Study Group next week. While I had been gathering resources, I hadn't processed many of them so I've had to take a deep dive. It isn't as thorough as I'd like, but I think I have managed to get a rough timeline and framework. I spent about 8 hours on Sunday working on it, using PowerPoint as the organiser/resource organiser. At 11pm, just as I was about to quit, I lost the whole presentation to a message that PowerPoint was trying to recover it. The autorecover version turned out to be the one I had started with some 8 hours before!  About 10 minutes later, as I was coming to terms with starting all over again, it recovered! I think I have an App memory problem. But grateful!

The flood waters from Queensland and NSW have reached Lismore, where I have friends. They fortunately live on a hill, in a Queenslander - a house that is built basically on stilts. They are safe from the flood waters, but sent this photo of the bottom of their hill. They have a friend and his dog, staying with them because his house - including his baby grand piano - is flooded!

I'm sure everyone is pulling together and will get through - but it is very, very, scary. Suddenly my bookclub being moved because of work on the water pipes does not seem important.

On Monday I cooked a large leg of lamb, potatoes, greens and Yorkshire puddings. I haven't made one for at least 40 years. I don't much like roast beef and, until my last trip to England, was not aware it is now served with any roast, not just beef. (a good example of migrant culture being fixed in a past time! )I thought roast lamb was a good place to start. They worked pretty well, and I will try again sometime.

Today I took myself to the Guild to catch up with a couple of people I knew would be there. I had some money for Gay for the lucets I had sold to people at Saturday's workshop, and my Design Online coat was due to be removed from the display. It was a relaxed a pleasant group in the Gallery and I stayed to catch up and finish up my third Bush Sentinelle.  I'm fairly happy with this one and have written about it in detail this afternoon in my embroidery blog.

I'm aware that as I write this, not only are people stranded on roofs in northern NSW and Queensland floods but much worse is happening in to people in Ukraine. While nothing I say here can help those affected, I need to acknowledge that the details of my week are unimportant in the light of such suffering.

🙏

Post 419 - birthdays, bats, birds, books and a bag

 The finishers turned up again on Wednesday, appearing suddenly and noisily in a scissor lift at the front of our building. They were doing some detailing on the corners and balconies of the new building. I could have stepped on to the balcony and asked them what they were doing, but I chose not to. 

The neighbour below me on the first floor was finding it difficult. The noise is worse closer to the ground and I gather her windows are not reflective, so she also has the discomfort of workers being able to see inside.

It will be very good to see it finished.

It's been a bit of a celebratory week. Thursday was Brigid's birthday. Unfortunately someone in Niamh's class at school was diagnosed with Covid, and she became a school contact, so generously stayed home while insisting the rest of us continue to the Ky Chow for a celebratory dinner. Brigid, I think, had a good day. She is an extraordinary young woman. 

Friday took me to a new restaurant at Henley Beach for my much delayed birthday lunch with friends.  

It's quite a while since I've been to Henley Beach in the day time. It is looking very clean and spruce. The restaurant is upstairs in the building on the right. I've marked a blue cross roughly where we sat on the balcony.

I rather liked the outlook - the geometric lines as well as the sea and the open square. I really enjoyed the company, the air,  my yellow fin whiting (a form of smelt whiting found off the south coast of SA) and the geometry, as well as the open sea and sky of this view. 

Beach lunches are dear to my heart, as are these friends.

Saturday was a JEMS day and Niamh was cleared to go after several RATS.  It looked like an active and engaged session. Niamh came home with a linen she had painted ready to embroider.  Interesting.

I finished the second of my Sentinelle cushions. I learnt so much from this one - about colour and design as well as about imagery and culture. I've written about the creation of it in my embroidery blog. The imagery thinking will take me a bit longer.

I've also finished one side of the Mosaic Carpet Project Bag as it should have been knit. I like the result. I hope the wool holds out for the other side! It will be touch and go on a couple of colours but I do have some backup in leftovers from earlier projects.

The doves have visited a few times this week. On Sunday morning  one did the puffed up feathers, flattening on to the warm paving thing. 

It is way out of breeding season and the partner's reaction  appeared to be of the  'are you OK?' variety. It looks like a bird version of a hot pack on an injury.

On Sunday I spent a couple of hours creating and ordering some bookmarks from photographs to use as gift cards. I haven't done this before and it took me a while to find a company I was happy with and to get the hang of their software. I created three different ones. One used a sunset photo, one a frangipani and one birds. It will be interesting to see how they turn out. 

There have been a few spectacular sunsets this week.

I've managed to read a couple of books, read a chapter for my brother, catch up with a couple of friends by phone and progress my Goddess presentation For most of the week I avoided spending time trying to capture the bats, 

but caved in on Monday evening, after the family had gone home and I was on the balcony as the light faded.  As I finalise this on Tuesday evening, I can see them flying past in the gloaming. There were storms and heavy rain in Sydney today but it's been exceptionally clear and calm here in Adelaide and a pleasant 28C.  February is often very hot in Adelaide - frequently over 35C. It is forecast to be 31-32C for most of this week. 

I'm grateful for the mildness - and the bats will be too.