Category Archives: Books

Tommorow this journal will be winging its way to Jane in Vancouver, Canada.

I had doubts about whether ‘this too shall pass’ is really advice, its more of a statement… but one that has worked well for me over many years. Bushwalking in Tasmania as a child, knowing that we’d rest at the end of the day, some dark times at university when I didn’t believe that I would get to the end of my engineering degree, doubting every choice I had made, tough months at work, you know these deadlines will come and will soon be a distant memory, the current form of world conflict and unrest, and even our lives and planet in the universe… whoa. Didn’t want to get too deep LOL.

I’m not sure my piece conveys all that, but on a more shallow (and Claire) kind of way I particularly like the tactile effect I achieved by gluing the fabric in… this is gonna be one thick book by the end 🙂 Continue reading →

Today’s doodles:

Talking about doodles. Did you know that in Australia ‘doodle’ is a common term for male genitalia. and ‘fanny’ is a common term for female genitalia. Does anywhere else use these terms in this way? Everytime I hear or read the term ‘fanny pack’, well you can imagine LOL!!

I’m going to my sewing room. Ta Ta. Continue reading →

I sat in a meeting today, a meeting I participated in quite a bit, but I also went prepared with some paper scraps and a purple and green pens. I was multitasking. Doing art while doing meetings 🙂

I was doodling around with textures and colour mainly. Being prepared with the blank scraps meant that instead of wasting my time scribbling on agenda or report pages, I could just take the little bits of paper home and stick them in my journal.

I gave blood this afternoon, now I’m feeling a little woozy. I don’t know if it would be related to the fact that I registered a low blood pressure. It’s the first time I’ve ever had a low BP, I don’t know what caused it but it didn’t seem to worry the nurses.

Talking of the nurses, I think I offended the one looking after me. She stated with total confidence that Schapelle Corby was innocent, and I responded by saying that I couldn’t tell since I don’t know all the evidence, she was a bit dismissive of me after that 😉 One thing I do know though is that I’ll be doing something to secure my baggage on my way to Fiji in a few weeks. Continue reading →

Yesterday I received a little package in the mail from my sister. We have recently been sending bits of art to each other. I love sending her stuff but even more fun is getting something 🙂

I have previously written about her status as a ‘non practicing artist’. This was totally based on my impression that she was struggling find time and energy to create art. However, I was suprised to hear last month that she has a little show happening at a hairdressers in North Hobart.

She does little paintings, between 2cm and 4cm square. Then she tapes them together so they look a bit mosaic or patchwork like. She sent me a tiny folder of her tiny paintings and here they are:

These are her ‘reject’ squares, but quite precious all the same. I’m gonna buy one of the pieces from her exhibition.

I was so tired last night after my two day trip to Omeo. I was in bed and asleep by 8:30. When in Omeo I stopped into Benambra Blue for a look and walked out with some of her beautiful handmade soaps and 250g of undyed Merino Silk Blend combed top. It was pretty expensive, but I couldn’t resist.

I also spent my lunch hour at the Latrobe Valley Spinners and Handweavers Guild. What a great bunch of people. I’m sad to say that I will miss both the Back to Back Challenge AND the Traralgon Spin In – I’ll be on a sea kayaking expedition in Fiji… so I shouldn’t complain.

Lets not talk about my quilting, or lack thereof. This week is a write off. I’ve got too much going on. I’ve just got to accept it an look forward to next week. Continue reading →

I’m going to be away alot this week, Monday and Tuesday, Thursday and Friday and then down to Melbourne on Saturday, returning on Monday. I hope I’ll have some stuff to post on Tuesday and Friday anyway, so don’t stop checking in 🙂

I have two sisters, Wiggins and I 18mths apart (I’m the eldest) then Zippy is 15 years younger than me, which makes her 13 (no that can’t be right… I think she’s actually 12). Anyway, here’re the sisters three:

An hour ago I was headed off to bed, photoshop sucked me in, good and proper.

Anyway, this is the beanie I knitted this weekend:

I’ve been bitten by this knitting thing. I should have listened to the inner voice when it was warning me not to get into knitting. I’m spreading my creation time too thinly. I listened to an audio book whilst knitting it, so all was not lost… if you are a member of www.Audible.com
then check out The Memory of Running by Ron Mclarty. It was my best listen so far.

Talking of audible, I’ve unsubscribed. I have too many books stored up. I may return when I’ve listened everything I’ve got already.

Also, check out what I’m currently spinning:

Continue reading →

Before I start this very long blog post, I thought I’d show you the painting I did last night:

Cockatiel

Today started out so good. I got up at about 7:30, read some blogs, ate some porridge, had a cup of peppermint tea.

The morning was glorious, so I headed out in my night shirt and slip on sandles and pruned back all the plants (roses and Salvias) that we wanted to transplant into the new beds.

Then I went inside, had a shower, woke Riscy up and headed off to the quilt exhibition and to get some manure for the garden.

I was an hour early for the exhibition, but they let me in anyway 🙂 My quilts looked like they had just come out of their bags, they looked ‘not flat’. Oh well, I wasn’t too stressed. Almost everything else was very country and beginner level stuff.

My trip to the garden centre was very fruitful, normally I wander around and buy very little, but today lots of stuff jumped into my basket, including a beautiful orange chrysanthemum.

Headed home. Riscy had already started digging up the roses, it was also started to get very hot and the temperature did get over 30 deg C (around 90F), which isn’t great for plants in shock.

We worked pretty steadily ’til noon, then I popped down to get some lunch as we had nothing in the house.

Riscy got called into work. I knitted ’til he rang me at about 3pm to remind me that the plants would need to be planted out otherwise they would die in the heat and that we have about 5 loads of washing to do.

Feeling guilty I headed out to do everything. Very soon after that a big storm hit, it was very windy, very wet and I worked in it until 6 this evening. I got all the beds raked, all the plants planted (7 mature roses, 2 salvias and about 40 potted plants), manure spread, lucerne hay distributed. All whilst soaked to the skin.

I’m glad everything is done, but I’m really tired now. The dog is very dirty and sitting on the couch, Riscy isn’t home yet, there is still no food in the house, the washing isn’t done. Whhhaaaaaaa 🙁

If you got this far, thanks for reading.

Continue reading →

Hmmmm, see below:

I went to the Farmers Market this morning and bought 4kg of the most yummy apples you can imagine. We spent quite some time trying to make headway with our landscaping this afternoon, then I did some spinning, then I made some print paste, then I washed some fabric… then I spun some mohair/angora blend top (slippery bloody stuff), then I drank some wine, then I did some more painting, but NO QUILTING. I NEED TO GET A GRIP.

It is totally related to the mess in my sewing room. I will NOT use this blog as therapy. I will clean the room first thing tommorow morning and then work will flow.

Right O. Thanks to Melanie. She kindly supplied the following links to me. I enjoyed, and was inspired, by each one of them:

Sabrina Ward Harrison’s journals,
Danny Gregory
John Copeland

Now, a final thought on pears before I hop off to bed. I can draw them in a fleshy kind of way. A bit like they are made of playdoh or something. I like that. You definitely think I’m a bit loopy now LOL.
Continue reading →

I love camping. My family camped regularly when I was growing up in Tasmania. Last Easter Riscy and I were back in Tas and took off camping for five days, travelling from the top of the Bay of Fires to St Helens. The weather was glorious.

This year I wanted to camp in the high country of Victoria, around Omeo. I was keen to expore some of the alpine areas including national parks. The problems is that we left it too late to find boarding for our dog. And we can’t take dogs into national parks.

So we find ourselves at home. Riscy lasted nearly a day before being drawn to his computer games. I spun a little, read a little and painted a little:

I’m feeling my way around the cheapo watercolour paints I bought the other day. It’s a lot of fun, even if I feel like my work has a definite childish quality which wasn’t intended. At least I avoided the perenial flowers and hearts.

Did I tell you I’m avoiding flowers in my art work this year. I hate the way that when ever I ‘sit down to do art’ I draw a flower. How bloody frustrating, annoying and well … stupid. So What do I do now???? Draw PEARS.

Also, today we watch a DVD. Bad Boy Bubby. We caught it unexpectedly about 8 years ago on SBS and it has stuck with us ever since, very disturbing but also pretty darn good.

I’m just about to jump into a new art quilt adventure. It’s still churning around in my skull at the moment, I hope I can start making it reality tomorrow.

Smell ya later 🙂 (damn, I hate The Simpsons. How did that slip in here?)

Continue reading →