Back To Ballarat

My father is in hospital in Ballarat, so today I went to visit him. The first part of the day went to plan. I caught the train heading west:

I amused myself on the train with some sewing:

When I got to the hospital, I was relieved to find Dad sitting up in a chair, reading the newspaper. He is making a good recovery from a bout of pneumonia. In fact he looked in pretty good shape for someone who is hospitalised.

During the after-lunch rest period, I wandered around the town. I walked past the house which featured in last night's episode of "Who's Been Sleeping in my House?", which was interesting. I sat beside this fountain until the rain forced me away.

There were a lot of bees enjoying the flowers. I think the plant is some sort of Nepeta (catmint). It looked fantastic mass-planted like this.

After lunch, I had a frantic afternoon running around trying to get hold of a couple of drugs Dad had run out of which the hospital pharmacy doesn't stock. If only someone had mentioned it before the enforced 90-minute break! Finally got the drugs, but in doing so missed not only the train I was intending to catch home, but the one after that. I ended up having to either buy another ticket to get home on a coach that wasn't stopping at the station I had a ticket for, or waiting in Ballarat for another 2 hours to get a train to the station I did have a ticket for.

Here's part of the ceiling at Ballarat station, which I've never noticed before.

I had time to sit and look at it while I waited for the coach.

On the coach I read my Kobo most of the way back to the city. There was no room to sew. About half-way home I looked up and noticed this sign, which I had to read a few times to work out what on earth it meant:

I think my brain was rather tired by then. But did whoever approved that sign have the same excuse?

Delicate

Dietes bicolor blooming in my backyard. It looks delicate, but it is pretty tough really.

Sometime after 7:30 last night, one of the blackbird babies disappeared. The youngest and least developed is gone. I don't think it would have been able to jump out of the nest, so perhaps it was pushed, or maybe someone sat on its head and suffocated it. Whatever happened, now there are only 3 hungry mouths to be fed.

Feathers

The three largest baby blackbirds are well-covered with feathers now:

The one at the back is their mother, doing a bit of nest maintenance.  Between eating and sleeping, the babies spend a lot of time preening their new feathers.

I'm amazed by how fast they are growing.

Wet Saturday

The rain fell steadily.

The garden didn't mind the rain.

It was a good day to stay inside quilting.

But what about those with hungry mouths to feed? Mr and Mrs Blackbird had to keep flying in the rain.

Here Mrs Blackbird takes a bit of a break under cover. There's no room for her to sit in the nest, the babies have grown so much. Can you see their feathers? There's even been some wing-flapping action today.

Whose Mouth Is Big Enough?

Mr Blackbird showed up with a berry of some sort. (Just where did he get that from? I think all the berries here are safely bird-netted.) Which of the baby birds has a mouth big enough to hold a large berry?

He tried to put it in each of the baby beaks, but it was just too big. What a shame! He had to eat it himself.

Still Quilting

Back to the machine today, to do a bit more quilting:

For the hexagon kaleidoscope blocks, I'm quilting following the fabric design. I'm nearly half the way through this part, then I have the border to do. I'll have to get a bit more creative in the border, because there is no design to follow on that fabric. These might help with ideas:

"72 Ways Not to Stipple or Meander" and "72 MORE Ways not to Stipple or Meander", which arrived today in the mail. I bought them from the author, Dijanne Cevaal. They are both packed with ideas for quilting designs. More quilting practice coming up!

Looking, Looking

We look at the birds:

That's the webcam and the nest viewed from below. Note the grapevine branch which has been across all the previous pictures has now been pruned.

The birds look back:

It might be a bit hard to see unless you click to enlarge the picture, but there's a baby on the left with its eyes open, looking as if it is looking at the camera. Three of them seem to have their eyes open now.