Ups and Downs

This week I took a trip to Maryborough to visit the Golden Textures exhibition. Since my last visit in 2021 the gallery has had a complete make-over.

The architects have kept the history of the building (a former fire station), while updating and extending the display areas. One welcome addition for those on a road trip is that there are now toilets (no photo, but they were nice). A garden is planned, which will be good to see next time I visit in perhaps another 2 years. I liked this view through a skylight in the reception area:

We have had a bit of wild weather this week, and the wind created a view through the roof of my shade house:

The shadecloth ripped right across and left half the roof uncovered. I was a bit worried about my orchids being unprotected from potential frost, so I moved as many as I could to the greenhouse, especially this one which has a few flower spikes developing:

 I hope it will be happy in there!

Last week at work I was quite disturbed as large machinery was working across the road, demolishing what has been a pedestrian mall:

I was particularly upset at trees being smashed down:

 

It was shocking. 

When I got home I did some searching to find out what was happening. It turns out they are not completely demolishing the mall. There will be one lane of traffic through here, but there will still be a playground, and seating areas. But I couldn't see why they needed to just smash up what was there, particularly the trees! However this week when I went to work I found that lots of the trees are still standing:

It was still noisy, as the digger was pulling up the paving and dumping it into the big skip. I wonder what I will find next week?

I have not managed to do any sewing this week, so here is a tiny fairywren that hopped almost up to me as I stood very still one morning:

And for contrast, a pelican I saw when I popped out of a meeting for some fresh air a couple of days ago:

Growing Things

 Look!

The hippeastrum flowers have opened in time for Christmas. They are a little ragged around the edges - I think a slug or snail had a nibble on the bud before I brought the pot inside to protect it. 

Meanwhile outside this is happening:

Remember all the boxes on the back of the ute earlier this month? Yesterday a cement mixer delivered the concrete for the footings all those bits will be assembled on, and now the assembly has begun.

Assembly

 Top assembled:

Some assembly required:

Life Goes On

Thank you to everyone for your kind comments on my last post.

Last Sunday we went on a orchid hunt, and for the first time in my life I saw helmet orchids in flower:

Two different species of helmet orchid.

They are teeny-tiny things, but fortunately we had a guide who know where to look for them.

Lunch among the trees:

It was a fantastic day out.

On Tuesday on my way to work I stopped to photograph these swans who have newly-hatched babies:

A couple of times in recent months I have thought I've seen a swan on this dam as I was driving past. But a lot of the water is hidden by an embankment and long grass, so I could never be sure. 

 On Thursday some heavy-duty machinery showed up:

to make a large delivery:

It was cold and rainy so I didn't stay out to watch how they managed it.

Yesterday I attended the quilt guild AGM and found myself with a new job for the next 12 months. It was good to see people again after a long absence. When I got home we tried to take the dogs for a walk, but we didn't get very far before we had to turn around and run home:

That's hail.

So I had to do most of my daily step count on the treadmill instead!

Floor

 The new shed got its floor today:

Concrete delivery.

Admiring their handiwork many hours later:

The dogs found a little patch of sunshine late in the day, and both snuggled up waiting for the fire to be lit:

They weren't allowed to run across the new concrete.

What's Been Going On?

How many times have I walked through this door without ever looking up to see the magpie stained glass window above it?

 

Late in June I had been called up for jury duty. I wasn't sure whether to be happy to get that insight into how the system works, or unhappy that I might have to listen to some horrible things and make difficult decisions. As it turned out I wasn't needed, so apart from watching the online orientation videos I didn't learn anything new about the justice system.

On the first of July I noticed the first of the jonquils was open:

On the 3rd of July we went on a field naturalist trip to Pittong and Happy Valley, areas about 30km west of our home.

Happy Valley got its name from the amount of gold found here. In the photo above you can see the effect of gold mining on the landscape. Despite the degraded landscape, we found lots of interesting native vegetation and fungi.

Stopping to take in the views across the volcanic plains.

On the 4th of July, I was driving to visit my mother when my phone rang, and it was the nursing home advising me that Mum had just tested positive for covid. Fortunately I was still able to visit her, I just had to wear the full PPE. In discussions with the nursing staff and the doctor, the decision was made to try Mum on one of the new antiviral medications. They weren't sure if she would be able to take it, as apparently the tablets are quite large. But she did, and as of today (6 days later) Mum is still with us, and has no fever or cough or other covid symptoms.

Some time during the week I made another hexagon rosette:

I've cut some purple squares for this month's RSC blocks:

Smaller ones for hearts, larger for "sprouts" blocks. But I haven't done any sewing of them yet.

The extra shed is progressing:

 

For various reasons I have not been to a hairdresser for nearly nine months. My hair has been driving me crazy, and this morning I decided I couldn't make it look worse than it was, so I did this:

The end result is probably a bit mullet-like, as it is easier to cut the hair at the front than at the back! At least it is not in my eyes any more, and if it does look a bit weird, I'm not the one who has to look at it. One day I will find a new hairdresser and they can turn it back into a proper hairstyle.
 

Today has been a lovely sunny winter day, so to finish off, here is a part of the garden glowing in the sun this afternoon:

 

June Happenings

Catching up with the second half of June (so far).

We were lucky that the monthly trip with the Field Naturalists Club, which is normally at the beginning of the month, was postponed due to dreadful weather. By the time it was rescheduled we were out of Covid isolation, so could attend.

Highlights of the day included a swan on its nest:

It could be the male or the female, they both incubate their eggs.

A wombat burrow:

We were in the Wombat State Forest, so it was nice to see evidence of wombats, even if we didn't see the actual animals. You can get an idea of the size of the burrow if you notice the field naturalists at the top left of the photo.

Slime moulds!

We saw several different coloured slime moulds. I was pretty excited by that, as I have never seen one before.

This cutie is an Eastern Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria australis):

The main focus of the outing was fungi, and we did see many many different species of them. I'll spare you the photos, though.
 

At home this is happening:

Who knew we needed more shed space?

I finished the Scrappy Mountain Majesties quilt with a blue-grey binding:

It is nice to cross something off my list. Then I took it to the guild's Sit and Sew day on Saturday, but the person who collects the donation quilts was away so it came home with me again. It was my first Sit and Sew day for a long long time. I wore a mask the whole time but no-one else did. We made little hexie rosettes as a gift for a member whose husband has just died. Here's mine:

I may do a couple more before they are collected next month.

My other sewing for the month has been blue bits for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I have not been very productive so far:

Given that I made one of these last year, this is not impressive. I do have the parts for two more hearts nearly ready. I have some squares and triangles prepared for the Scrappy Sprouts blocks, but haven't sewn any of them at all yet. There are a few more days left this month... next month is going to be purple, but I may be sewing blue as well to catch up.

I don't know what Blogger are doing with the comments process. It is frustrating when they keep changing things (seemingly for the worse) without warning or explanation. Some people's blogs still have the normal comment box, and I can easily comment on them. Others have a new process where there are 3 choices, Anonymous, Google Account, or Name/URL. I can comment on those by the Name/URL option. But some blogs have only Google Account as the method, and for those I cannot make it work. Unfortunately mine seems to be in this third category. I cannot comment on my own blog! I am logged in to my google account for my email, my calendar, and for blogger itself. But I just get an error message: "Unable to sign in to comment. Please check your browser configurations to allow sign-in."

If you are also unable to comment on my blog, I am sorry! I don't know if there is anything I can do to solve this, but I will look into it.

Shed Floor

Early this morning a cement mixer arrived:

Then there was a lot of this for the rest of the day:

Shed Progress

It is a month since the framework of the new shed went up. Today I arrived home to find some progress:

I was a bit freaked out by that man standing on the roof, so I ducked inside and left them to it.

New Shed

This happened this morning:

It's the beginning of a shed for all the tractor bits. I wasn't very complimentary about it. The word "eyesore" may have been uttered. I hadn't realised it would be so tall. But apparently it has to be so that the tractor can fit into it to collect its attachments. Once it is finished it will probably look better than having tractor attachments spread all around.

And in case you think it's been forgotten:

The pizza oven got another coat of render tonight.