A Day in May

 It's that time again. When strange welded creations appear:

And new plants:

And books and goodies:

And cake!

And the postie brings cards and packages containing fascinating publications:

Published in 1951, so a bit older than me. This is exactly how I will look next time I'm pressing a seam while dressmaking:

No more sewing in my "blob around the house" clothes!

In the afternoon I went off to have the 2nd covid booster that my advanced years now make me eligible for. Hooray!

Lockdown Lottery

Two weeks ago I won the lockdown lottery when Moorabool wasn't locked down and I could go orchid hunting. Today I lost the lottery, and Moorabool is going back into lockdown from midnight for 7 days. In general I don't mind staying at home, but Monday is my mother's 93rd birthday, so this lockdown means I will not be able to visit her. My sister and her family are not in a locked down municipality, but none of them are fully vaccinated. That means no-one will be able to visit Mum on the day.

Fortunately I had her birthday gift ready, so this afternoon I was able to pop over and give it to her before the lockdown starts.

She was in the dining room ready for dinner, so I couldn't give her a sneaky hug. I know the pandemic has caused much more pain and suffering than a missed birthday, but I'm upset about this one. I hope we will be able to have a family gathering at Christmas time.

As I left I took a photo through the fence of the pot of bulbs I put outside Mum's window so that she would have something interesting to look at during previous lockdowns. There were some daffodils, but they flowered during a time when we weren't allowed to visit. Spring stars and tulips are out now:

The tulips haven't grown very tall for some reason, but Mum can see the red of them from her window. 

Who Could Ask For More *

 It's that time of year again:

I had been planning to spend the day with quilting friends in Melbourne, but our new covid outbreak (after 3 months of no cases) put an end to that idea. Then came today's announcement of a 7-day lockdown starting at midnight tonight. Here we go again. At least this time, having had my first vaccination, I don't feel quite as worried about catching the virus. It would have been good to be fully vaccinated before winter, but I've still got 9 weeks until my 2nd dose. Hopefully the first one gives at least a bit of protection.

Other much more welcome gifts included a welded rusty metal creation :

A rosebush:

"Elizabeth of Glamis", named after the Queen Mother.

Some gifts arrived by post yesterday and I saved them to open this morning:

Thank you, friends! You made me feel very special.

After lunch I went to visit Mum, as I won't be able to do that for the next 7 days. Sadly, she wasn't too well today. My sister and a niece arrived while I was there, and I came home with a few more goodies:

The glasses case is from my sister, and the scarf that everything is sitting on is from my mother (courtesy of my sister buying and wrapping it for her). Thank you sister!

The book is another story; that was my present to myself. When I was recently asked if there was anything I wanted for my birthday, I nominated the companion BlockBase+ software that allows you to print out patterns for the blocks in the book.  And lookie, here it is!

Screen shot.

I have been spoilt today!

(* - line from a relevant Beatles song)

My Day

It has been a while since I posted, but when you don't go anywhere every day feels the same and it doesn't seem like anything is worth mentioning. However today was a bit different.

Here's today's block for the Laundry Basket Quilts mystery which I am making one block a day:

And here's what a corner of the quilt looks like so far:

I haven't made the block 5s yet, which complete the outer round. I wanted to first get some of the inner blocks done to get a feel for how it was looking.

My last post was about grocery order anomalies. This week's was even more remarkable. When I went to collect the order yesterday afternoon, their system was down and the order wasn't ready. They weren't sure when it would be, but offered to deliver it rather than have me wait around for an unknown amount of time. Later in the evening a car pulled up at our front door, with the grocery order and these bonuses:

A box of "Favourites" and a $20 gift card, to apologise for the inconvenience. Thank you Woolworths for the amazing service, and the early birthday gift.

Nearly 2 months ago I was given another early gift:

It is a large planter box made of rusted metal, which is now in the outdoor living area. I guess I can officially start using it now!

Not a great picture because I forgot to photograph it in daylight, another gift:

And some more:

A beautiful hand-woven scarf which I had seen progress shots of, such as here, but had no idea I would be the lucky recipient of! And a Tuckfields' bird card album, with all the cards! Lots of childhood memories there. Plus some nice warm socks.

A chocolate cake:

No candles, of course, due to the new pandemic-altered lifestyle we are living.

My next-door neighbour brought me a bunch of flowers, all from her garden:

Plus a nodding-violet plant (Streptocarpus caulescens) she propagated from a cutting for me:

So it was a good day all round. I even got a phone call from my son, a very rare occurrence.

I'm told there is another parcel on the way as well, but the post is very slow at the moment. It gives me something else to look forward to though.

Ninety-One

Today is my mother's 91st birthday. We took her out for afternoon tea by the lake.

I almost forgot to take any photos, but remembered as we were heading back to the cars. That's my sister and her husband and their youngest daughter, along with Mum and Dad.

Candles and Flames

Rhubarb and ginger cake I made this morning:

I've made this before, although not in this oven or this shaped pan, so I was a bit nervous about how it would turn out. It turned out fine, and as yummy as before.

If you would like to give it a go yourself, the recipe is from here:
https://www.riverford.co.uk/recipes/view/recipe/rhubarb-ginger-cake
However, due to ingredient availability I made the following changes to the recipe:
I used 200g self-raising flour instead of the flours and bi-carb that they use.

I used golden syrup instead of treacle.

I used dark brown sugar instead of muscovado sugar - and I didn't have 110g of it, so it was only about 80g.

Plus I had 4 sticks of rhubarb which only weighed 250g, rather than the 340g in the recipe.
And because this oven is fan-forced, I initially set it at 170, and then during cooking I dropped it to 165 and then 160 because it looked like the outside was cooking too quickly.

But apart from all that, I did follow the recipe!

Then I had to carry it up the hill during a break in the rain, for a special birthday lunch with the neighbours.

Blowing out the candles:

Later in the afternoon we started to get emergency alarms about a fire in Lal Lal:

That was a bit surprising given the almost non-stop rain we've had for the last couple of days. We couldn't tell from the map which building was on fire, so we popped down to have a look. It was the demolition yard, which we have visited a few times but which I seem to have only shown on my blog when we were looking for gates. We couldn't get close due to the number of firetrucks blocking the roads, so here's a couple of screen-shots from the Ballarat Courier story about the fire:

It will be interesting to hear what they decide caused the blaze.

Afternoon Coffee

Today is my sister's birthday, so I met her and her family here

 for coffee decorated with a swan:

It was a bit wet for a walk around the gardens, but the Craft Council of Ballarat has a display in the conservatory

 With everything from jewellery to beautiful furniture made from old fence posts.

The quilt on the right was handy. One of my nieces had asked me earlier if I would teach her to make a quilt, so I used this one as an example as I explained what is involved. She said, "That sounds like it would take a long time." So maybe she has changed her mind about making one.

Wonderful Day

The day started with an almost traditional tractor delivery:

Fantastic giant welded flowers for the garden!

More for the garden:

Two fringe flowers (Lorepetalum chinense rubrum), "China Pink" and "Plum Gorgeous", and a rose, "Eiffel Tower".

And then we had snow!

Melting as it fell, but it was actual falling snow.

Later in the morning I went to visit my parents. On the way home we saw this:

Picture taken through the rear view mirror, so not brilliant. But that is a wedge-tailed eagle! It was eating a poor kangaroo that had been hit by a car. There were two eagles but one took off as we stopped the ute to get the photo. They really are huge when you get that close to them!

In the afternoon some friends and family helped with the celebration:

There is no significance to the number of candles. As we ate cake we watched spinebills in the salvias outside the window.

What a wonderful day!

90

I obviously have some sort of mental block when it comes to family occasions and photographs. I either have flat batteries in my camera, or no camera, or forget to take photos until everyone is leaving. This time my camera had been put away at the other end of the house, which I only realised as the candles were being lit on my mother's birthday cake. Fortunately my phone was close by, so I grabbed that to get a couple of shots. But that meant taking pictures without a flash of people sitting in front of a bright window.

So I ended up with photos only slightly better than silhouettes. I've lightened these up as well as I can, but they are not brilliant.

Time to blow out the candles:

Fun Day

First thing this morning two giant frogs arrived by tractor at the bedroom window:

which freaked the dogs out, but I laughed my head off.

I admired this pair of cute/ugly frogs in a junk shop a couple of months ago, but I had forgotten about them since. And now they are mine!

A bit later in the morning, a garden bed was also delivered by tractor:

A literal garden bed! I think I will plant it with succulents.

For lunch we went to Kambei Japanese restaurant. It is the first time we've eaten there, but I'm sure it won't be the last. The food was excellent.

Green tea ice-cream for dessert:

Yummy!

Then there was some family visiting. A steam train that was running between Ballarat and Lal Lal all weekend chuffed past us too quickly for me to grab a photo.

But I had plenty of time to photograph these critters:

A herd of cows being moved from one paddock to another. There were some quite young calves in amongst them. And a dog having a great time riding on the back of one of the quad bikes. The joys of country living! I don't miss living in the city.

It was a fun day. And apparently there is another gift to come tomorrow!

The Big Day

The day started with deliveries by tractor.

A ball of harrow disks!

Trees!

These will both be planted in the walled garden behind the house.

Wrapped presents!

Inside the wrapping:
Bare-rooted Lorraine Lee climbing rose, which will be planted to grow over the arbour.

Australian Home Journal  - patterns included!

Hand-forged garden tools:

The top one of which was actually hand-forged next door, then had its handle added right here.


Followed by sparkly pancakes for breakfast:

After that I had to rush off to open the hall for our regular Ballaarat Quilters Sit and Sew day. I also provided this for everyone to enjoy:

When I got home at the end of the day, there was another gift which had been forgotten this morning:

A welded dog! Dot doesn't really think it is a dog. But this is a reminder that it is exactly 2 years since she came to live with us.