Enjoying a sense of peace one stitch at a time
1 cup of friendly words
2 heaped cups of understanding
2 cups of human kindness
4 heaped teaspoons of time and patience
Pinch of warm personality
A dash of dry humour
The spice of life
Add the words and understanding to human kindness.
Sift together three times before using.
Use generous amounts of time and patience and cook slowly.
Keep temperature low.
Do not boil.
Add a dash of dry humour, a pinch of warm personality and season to taste with the spice of life.
I’ts been a very long time since I’ve completed a Photo Hunt post, so I’ll be aiming to catch up with some previous photo hunts that I previously missed, as well as trying to keep up with the latest ones once more … not sure how long it’ll last, but here goes …
This week’s theme is ”Busy” and here is a very Busy photo of colourful balloons at the Auckland annual concert, Coca-Cola’s Christmas in the Park.
Back on 12 March the theme was ”Machine(s)” – here is a gentleman in the Port Douglas outdoor markets cranking out sugar cane juice on his industrial strength juicing Machine … seriously delishimo (in my eyes) with a squeeze of lime added to offset the high sugar content!!! I’m salivating just thinking of that icy sweet nectar!
I heard from Marie that my snowman ornie arrived safe and sound and didn’t melt on the way to it’s new home. Here is the ornie I sent to my partner Marie – I really really love this one, and definitely need to re-stitch it for myself, I just adore the colours used!:
“All Dolled Up!” by Little House Needleworks
stitched on 32ct hand-dyed Lugana by Countrystitch ~ colour Pipi or Haystack (can’t remember!!)
with recommended threads
Last weekend I managed a quick finish before succumbing to a shocking tummy virus that was followed by a serious throwing-up migraine … but a bucket-load of Hydralite (yuk) later, and I was back at work with my nose to the grindstone again on Tuesday. Alas the tail end of my bug is still hanging on, but that just means I’m feeling tired and headachey, and nothing like the doom and gloom of last weekend! It has meant, however, that I haven’t put a single stitch into anything since last weekend because I’ve been too tired … not sure if I’ll remedy that this weekend or not, but the day is young … um, kinda … who stole those last 3 hours of today and snuck them past me??? 😛
Anyway, here is my other teeny finish from last weekend:
“Fall” by Lizzie*Kate
stitched on a mystery 28ct Cashel linen – looks like a lambswool kinda colour in real life
with recommended WDW threads
The rest of my non-stitching time has been spent doing some serious spending! Over the last fortnight I’ve managed to join the iPhone revolution (still learning how to use it, although I did manage to create my own ringtone on the first night, which only took me almost 2 hours!) and replace my PC monitor with a beautiful new Samsung one – my old monitor is still technically working and while it’s not suiting my own needs anymore it’s much better than Mum’s existing one so it will be heading over the ocean with whoever travels first. It was starting to drive me crazy when editing photos etc, so it was time to update. My final splurge was to pick up a duvet cover in the half-price sales – I’ve been looking for a new one in darker colours for a while now (even dragged Mum through a few shops on the lookout during her recent visit), and popped over to the sales tables in Harvey Norman not expecting to see anything worthwhile … it’s now about to jump into the washing machine so I can get it ironed and on my bed for the rest of winter 😀
And on that note I suppose I should drag myself away from the PC seeing as I’ve already wasted the entire morning playing with my blog template, and start getting that laundry done … then I think I may just have time to pull out some finishing fabrics for a teeny spot of finishing tomorrow … maybe … if nothing sidetracks me in the meantime … 😉
My blog is currently looking like it’s totally screwed … hopefully by this time tomorrow it’ll be in a readable format once more!!! 😦
Just in case you want to update your bookmarks (if you have one), I’ve updated my blog URL to more accurately reflect the blog name – I think there’s a redirect in place already and should be in place for a while yet, but just in case this blog ever drops off the face of the earth, you can find it at:
And that’s all from me for now … getting over a bout of gastric bugs and a throw-up migraine, so not feeling too chatty … can’t even say I’ve been stitching since Sunday either – never mind, I’m sure those needles will be flying once again soon enough 🙂
And the only other news to share is that I went to the Sydney craft show on Friday with my best stitching pals Amanda and Alison, and had a BLAST!! I think it was the best day out at the shows we’ve had yet … always a laugh and a giggle, and for once no budget for moi, although even so I didn’t do too much damage to the wallet. Once I’ve charged up my camera battery I’ll take a photo of my craft show spoils 🙂
And the last bit of news is that I have applied for a new job at work – highly unlikely that I’ll get it, but I figure it will be good experience for the whole interview experience … if I don’t get it, it’s fine, ‘cos I enjoy my current job on the whole really, but if I do get it it will be a big challenge work-wise and might limit stitching time even more – either way I’ll be happy 🙂
So much for not being chatty, huh? 😛
As I mentioned previously, we started off our day 3 quite leisurely sitting for a while at the edge of a beautiful misty and chilly beach, and feeling at one with the world – afterwards we opted to stop off at Ulladulla and filled up with petrol, where I spied a notice for a car mechanics … my right indicator light had started flickering at the speed of light, so I opted to play safe and get it checked out – within half an hour I was back on the road with a new indicator bulb installed, and a paid-up mechanics bill of an entire $5.00 – yep, “we’re not in Sydney any more, Toto”!! Bless the NRMA mechanics, is all I can say! The last time I had to have a headlight bulb replaced, and my engine VIN number sanded back slightly, it cost me $120+ … I think the next time I need mechanical work done, I’m going to drive down to Ulladulla!!! 😀
The majority of our day today was spent driving south of Bateman’s Bay to Mogo Zoo – it’s only a small private zoo, but what a wonderful time of it we had!! We ended up being there for about 3-4 hours, and loved every minute of it! There weren’t a huge number of animals to see, but what there was to see was really good quality, and you could get quite close up to most of the exhibits. The autumn colours were also very much present within the Zoo grounds, adding to the wonderful atmosphere (for us anyway).
I personally have an exceptional fondness for tigers, so I went a bit snap happy at the tiger enclosure, where there are more tigers in one place that I’ve ever seen in one zoo (mainly adolescents). We also had the opportunity to see white lions and could pat a dingo as they took them for a walk around the park, not forgetting the deer that we drove crazy with deer food! I also spent a considerable amount of time with a beautiful female chimp who was chattering away to us at the window of the enclosure, while hugging a plastic Shrek doll in her hand (apparently her birthday gift) – it was quite amazing being up so close and personal to a chimp and actually having interaction … I didn’t want to leave!
Seeing as we had spent more time than expected at Mogo Zoo, we opted not to go shopping at the beautiful and quaint Mogo village where a number of artisans had shops – instead, we retraced our steps back to Bateman’s Bay to follow the coast road down south for a while. Eventually we ended up at Narooma, where we spent the night at an even nicer motel room, and a so-so dinner at the Narooma Golf Club.
I forgot to include in our previous day’s write-up that we drove through Gerringong and Geroa on the way to Berry – this was one area that was recommended to me for a short break away, and I have to say that I agree with their recommendation. This is definitely one area I’d really love to return to … sitting on Seven Mile Beach for a few days would be such hardship 😉
Day 2 of our trip was probably the worst we had weather-wise, it bucketed down with rain all day. We decided to retrace our steps marginally to visit a Haven & Space warehouse that had been recommended by Amanda – where we saw large cushions that would be great on my sofa. Unfortunately they didn’t have the size we wanted, but I remembered there were more cushions at the Berry store we had previously been in … for some reason we hadn’t taken much notice of those the previous day, so we figured we might as well take the short track back to Berry once more, which also gave us more time to wander around the shops properly this time. We started off by buying a few little gourmet deli goodies from The Emporium (yum!), as well as finding the perfect cushion from Haven & Space (I’m now kicking myself that I didn’t buy two though!). We were also highly amused by a little booze shop window display, which had tasting notes on various items … including the following one that tickled my fancy!
Before we left Berry we managed to find respite from the rain for a few minutes in Berry Patchwork … where I managed to fall in love with the following BOM quilt – alas my credit card will shortly to winging its way down the phone lines to them, and I’m going to start receiving the blocks from the beginning of July. I think it’s all the beautiful blues and creams that made me fall in love with this one (called “Piece & Plenty”) – and the photo certainly doesn’t do this piece justice (this was taken from their website, not taken by me). Looking at the various blocks, I think the large variety of techniques will make this a really good learning project 🙂
The rest of the day was spent in a small shopping centre in Nowra, trying to find the local NRMA which was no longer there … but it also gave us chance to pick up some cheap polar fleece jackets and trackpants to fight the drop in weather temperature. We did finally find the NRMA and had a lovely chat with the lady behind the counter about our hideous accommodation, and she kindly gave us a free map of southern NSW which turned out to be absolutely fantastic value and we used it every day when planning our driving.
After we finished our shopping at the NRMA we hit the road once again, although we didn’t get too far on the road before nightfall – we ended up finding a lovely motel at a place called Mollymook. We were nervous about the accommodation room when we were told it would be $95 for the night (our decrepit fleapit the previous night was $90), and it was a total palace in comparison. Mollymook is yet another place I’d be more than happy to return for a long weekend away, it’s just lovely 🙂
Before we started driving on Day 3, we picked up a big cappuccino for me, and sat on a park bench on the beachfront watching the waves roll in and a solitary surfer heading out for a morning surf. It was a beautifully peaceful way to start the day 🙂
Our entire plan for our road trip was to just keep driving until we felt like stopping, figuring it was the middle of winter and most motels would have vacancy signs up – I had a list of places that I really wanted to visit, but all the bits inbetween were totally open to suggestion.
The first leg of our journey was to drive down the scenic coast highway to Kiama – with a couple of detours along the way. The first detour was that I wanted to drive through the Royal National Park and see Wattamolla, as it had been recommended to me. It was a lovely drive on an early wintry morning. It was deserted at Wattamolla, so I opted not to take the bushwalk over to the beach, and instead just explored the area around the carpark – I think I’ll definitely have to return again in better weather and explore further afield.
After Wattamolla we headed over to the coast, and had a pit stop at Bald Hill Lookout where we were greeted with a treat of seeing some tandem hang-gliders … watching them getting ready for launch really brought back memories of when I did this myself in Queenstown, NZ. It was a real treat, although the wind chill up at the top of that hill was really bitterly cold. Mum was very wise choosing to stay in the car while I popped out for 1/2 and hour and took photos … then came back and attacked her with my cold hands to share the love LOL. My Mum would never fail to do that to me growing up, the evil sod she is, so it was time for some payback haha.
We eventually followed the coast past Woollongong and on to Kiama, where we were really fortunate that the wintry weather and high winds meant that the blowhole was performing quite well – it’s really difficult to get good photos of the immense spray of water that plumes high in the air, but we were intrigued by it and stood there for quite some time watching the spectacle and taking in all that lovely sea air.
After Kiama we continued to follow the coast road and had lunch at Shellharbour beach – we were well prepared with some sandwiches and snacks readily made up with a lovely thermos of coffee … there are definitely some benefits of taking your own car from home! I really loved the mosaics on the walls of the local public toilets (of all places), and we enjoyed watching the local surfers attacking the surf before we headed off on the road once again.
Our final sightseeing stop for the day was to make a quick visit to Berry, a picturesque village that has a relatively good needlework store (our key reason to visit Berry). While we were browsing in Sew and Tell, we ran into our good friend Amanda so we had extra time to catch up while we continued to wander through the various stitching stock. We bought a couple of things, mainly some JABC buttons for Christmas ornaments, plus a couple of Mill Hill ornie kits, some replacement Qsnap snaps and Mum bought a wee Lizzie*Kate chart. We didn’t find a great deal of items that we really wanted buy (perhaps a sad realisation that your stash is already out of control?!), but at least we can say that we’ve finally been! We also wandered around a couple more shops while we were there, then decided it was time to hit the road again as it was starting to get late.
By the time we reached Nowra, it was getting quite dark, and we figured it was a good place to stop … unfortunately we had trouble here finding a motel on the main road, finally resorting to one we found in a little side street … O.M.G. is all I can say here!!! The damned motel should be condemned! I have now learnt to ask to see a room if you’re unsure of the room quality before they swipe your credit card!! You couldn’t sit on the sofa because it was falling apart (literally!), the toilet didn’t flush properly, and there was no hot water running through any of the taps (guess who just had a strip wash the next morning … neither of us were brave enough to attempt a cold shower). The only good thing about it is that the beds themselves seemed OK and clean … and it turned out to be the only motel that actually had internet access the entire week we were away! While I had internet access, though, we tracked down the address of the local NRMA office so we could go and pick up an accommodation guide … worth every cent of the $20 book cost!!
I’ll continue on with Days 2 and 3 together shortly …
Before mum and I headed south for our big road trip, we headed into the city and took a ferry over to Sydney Zoo – we were lucky that the rain held off while we were out, though sadly the downturn in weather was just the start of what was yet to come for the rest of our holidays. I took quite a few photos that day, so here are just a handful of my favourites – especially the view of Sydney cityscape from the Zoo, what a stunning view that is!
Sydney Ferry Terminal, Sydney Harbour
Sydney Harbour Bridge
Part of the historic Rocks area of Sydney
A view of Sydney Opera House from the water
Above are a small selection of animals on display:
Giraffes, Bongo (antelope), Striped Lemur, Lioness,
Red Tree Kangaroo, Gorillas, Otters, Meerkat
One of the main drawcards of Sydney Zoo at the moment is the little baby elephants – and they sure are cute to watch while they’re playing! 😀
We had a lovely day out – and now, after more than 3 years, we can say we’ve seen Sydney Zoo! Mum was a bit embarrassed at seeing the otters being very voyeuristic by attempting to increase the otter population in full view of the viewing window … 😉
The next morning we headed over to Alison’s for a stitching day with my some of my closest Sydney pals – then on Sunday we jumped in the car at the crack of dawn to commence our week-long road trip. Thankfully I’d already investigated a shuddering steering wheel the week earlier, and found a bulging tyre so after having that replaced we were ready to rock and roll and hit the highway safely 🙂
Today I finally managed to get to my PO Box during opening hours so that I could pick up my post as well as pop my own parcel into the mail – I was very excited to see that as I sent off my own Snowman ornie exchange parcel, my very own squishy mail parcel was sitting in my PO Box. My exchange partner this time round was Elisa, and she put together an exquisite ornie using a fantastic pattern (which has been on my wishlist for stitching for a while now), a great choice of fabric (never would I have thought of using yellow linen and I love it), and the perfect pom-pom edging … all-in-all yet another exchange received that I will treasure. I have to say that after having a couple of exchanges ‘go wrong’ in the past, it’s been a distinct pleasure to be part of this group and having exchanges run smoothly for a change 🙂 Anyway, thanks again Elisa for a real treat in my mailbox! If my exchange partner likes theirs even half as much as I like mine, I’d class it as a perfect exchange 😉
The small finish I referred to in the title is a freebie from The Stitching Parlor, Inc. I have to admit, I can’t say I’m totally in love with this design. After wanting to stitch it for the longest time (it’s been kitted up with the fabric since having all my stash in storage when housesitting years ago), I’m really disappointed with the colours and the overall look – I was originally going to finish it off as a little gift for someone but now I really don’t know what on earth to do with it!
“Proud Peacock” freebie by The Stitching Parlor, Inc
stitched on 28ct white Cashel linen
with recommended DMC threads
I now understand why KarenV changed the colours when she stitched it for me for an earlier birthday gift … I totally adore Karen’s version of this design, and kinda wish I hadn’t bothered to still stitch one myself – but on the positive side, I now have one kitted-up piece of fabric/chart that is off the “to be stitched” pile! I’ve copied another copy of KarenV’s version below so you can compare … Karen’s version is so, so very much better, I’m sure you’ll agree! 🙂
And on that note, I think it’s time to go back to getting a few more stitches into my extremely overdue PIFs that are currently in progress – I never ever received my PIF that I signed up for (nor ever heard from the person running it), but I still fully intend fulfilling my end of the bargain, albeit (the way I’m going) a year late!!! Mind you, I have to admit to having second doubts about one piece … I guess I’ll wait until it’s finished before I decide whether to rethink my choices!
And now it’s time to go plug in disc one of Band of Brothers (from Quickflix) and chill out with needle in hand for a wee while before catching a few zzzzzz 🙂
PhotoHunt
Feather Stitching 