Lots going on in the past few weeks. Just been too busy to post. This past week brought lots of rain to our area of Australia. Here's a snap shot I took.
I had been trying to make my way to the neighboring town to pick up a friend who was being released from the hospital. Guess I don't have to tell you the friend had to spend an additional night in hospital as I couldn't get there to retreive said friend!
Not much sewing happening lately. I hope to change that this coming week.
This is the view from my back deck this morning. Earlier there were 6 black swans right near the shore. It was too dark to get a picture of them.
I'm glad the move is all done. Now if everything would just unpack and organize all by itself. Somehow I doubt that will happen, so my next few days will be spent unpacking and organizing. I'm moving slow as I have lots of sore muscles!
Spent most of my week packing and cleaning. Moving day is tomorrow, and the day after that is final inspection of the old apartment. I will be so relieved to have the move behind me! I did find a few minutes here and there to sew a few stitches, but I didn't take any pictures as I accomplished so little. Since I have no new pictures of sewing, I will share a kangaroo picture I took last week as I walked with DH while he played golf. I think this was most likely a young mom and her toddler. They were just off the fairway and they kept an eye on us as we walked by. I wonder what they were thinking! Maybe....silly humans following a little white ball.
This week I managed to get some stitching done and some pictures taken of my project. I know there are many ways to put a Cathedral Windows quilt together. This is how I have chosen to do mine. I'm putting it together in squares that are comfortable for me to work with. I'm setting it together like a 9 patch first. Here's one in progress.
Then....as I join the squares together, I will go back and stitch the colored squares into the windows. These are not stitched together, but you can see the windows I will have to fill in when I do stitch them together. I think I have more than 40 squares like this completed. I still have a long way to go.
In addition to stitching, I like to watch birds. These little birds are one of my favorites that I often see in the local area. DH and I went for a bike ride on the weekend and this little guy was nice enough to pose for us.
Australia Day is this next week. It will be a long holiday weekend for many folks. I will finish up with the packing as we move apartments on Monday and have final inspection on the old unit on Tuesday. It's going to be a busy two weeks so I may not post next weekend. I will try to get back as soon as I can.
Thanks to those of you who e-mailed and welcomed me back to blogging! I truly appreciate knowing I was missed. I will try to do better at posting. Please realize that I may not be able to show much new on the quilting front since all my work is now done by hand, but I will show what I'm doing and the slow progress I am making. That said, it won't be this week since I lost my camera on the last trip home for the holidays. Our little town of 6,000 doesn't offer a lot of shopping opportunities for cameras and electronics, so yesterday DH and I drove 1 1/2 hrs. to a bigger town where those things are readily available. DH found a replacement camera for me. Next week I may be able to post a few pictures of my Cathedral Windows blocks.
In addition to sewing, I am preparing for a move. We have been living in our current apartment here in AU for 2 years. Our lease was up in October and our landlord wanted a sizable increase in rent, so we elected to move rather than pay the increase. Our unit was completely furnished, but the bed has given us a backache since we moved in. We offered to pay for 1/2 the cost of a new mattress, but the landlord refused. We can't see paying a rent increase and still having a bed that gives us a bad backache. The new unit has a nice bed, is larger than where we now live, and has a view of the lake. It will cost a little more, but it's a price we are willing to pay for a bed that doesn't give us a backache. The new landlord is a nice person who will work to keep his property in the best shape possible. We are the kind of renters who take care of the property we rent as if it were our own home. The unit we are leaving is in better shape than when we took possession. We have repaired some things that were not working (at our own expense), but I guess the fact that we took care of the place means nothing.
Since I don't have any pictures of sewing related projects to share this week, I will share a photo I took in September. We are in a farming area and this is what the country side looked like in the spring. The lovely yellow you see in the photo is fields of canola in bloom. They raise a lot of it in this area and the yellow fields are beautiful in the spring. What is really difficult for me is the fact that I took this picture in early September........it was early spring here.....but my mind keeps telling me that it should be fall since I have always lived in the northern hemisphere. September is my birth month and my birthday was always in the fall! Next week I promise something sewing related.....that is if I can figure out the new camera.
March 2010 to January 2012....that's a long break from blogging. Life just got in the way and I lost the desire to post to my blog. I'm hoping 2012 will be a good year and I can again work on posting updates. I am still living in Australia. We were sent here on a 2 year assignment. Our 2 years was up in October 2011. At that time, DH signed us up for 2 more years. I'm OK with that as people here are nice, but I do miss my house, family, and my sewing room.
I brought only hand applique with me when we came. I worked on that until a trip home in September 2011. I brought back a Cathedral Windows quilt that I had started way back in 2007. It provides a nice break from the applique. I do love applique, but I was wanting a change. I don't do a lot of shopping for fabrics here in AU because the price is so much more than in the US. Here most fabrics in quilt shops are about $20 to $25 per meter (39 inches). With the prices like that, I have only bought a few pieces that are uniquely Australian that I will use in special quilt to remember our time living here. I would promise to post a picture, but on our last trip home I lost my camera. I'm going to have to buy another.
We have seen lots of interesting sites in the time we have been here. Being out in the bush, we see more things about Australia than the usual sites of the big cities. I can drive about 30 miles from my home....walk along the banks of a creek.....and see these little guys in the trees.
It amazes me to see the koalas in the wild! I didn't know they grunt and sound much like a pig. I make a trip to this area about once every two months just to see how many of them I can count. The fewest I have seen in a visit has been 11 and the most was 28.
This week I managed to get some stitching done and some pictures taken of my project. I know there are many ways to put a Cathedral Windows quilt together. This is how I have chosen to do mine. I'm putting it together in squares that are comfortable for me to work with. I'm setting it together like a 9 patch first. Here's one in progress.
Then....as I join the squares together, I will go back and stitch the colored squares into the windows. These are not stitched together, but you can see the windows I will have to fill in when I do stitch them together. I think I have more than 40 squares like this completed. I still have a long way to go.
