Happy New Year

I wish evryone a happy new year. This post I am sorry to say I have not got around to adding any photos, yet, hope to do it later.
I have had a great christmas with family and lovely food. But with the good also comes a few trials to overcome. On christmas day, while cooking the lunch I was drawn outside by one of our dogs only to find our beloved cat struggling about and unable to get up. We moved him up stairs to the bathroom and tried to make him as comfortable as possible. I checked for snake bite, ticks and any wounds but could not find any. I had to race back to the lunch and finish cooking.
We had a great lunch and we talked to our vet who thought it was a stroke. He told me he may recover, or he may not.
The next day we all packed up and headed off for the beach, Having to seperate the dogs and our poor cat in the car. We had a great enclosure for the cat so he could be outside for the holiday. But in the morning he had dissapeared. I could not believe that our boy had enough strength let alone escape from his enclosure. We put up posters, asked neighbours but there was no luck. I thought I would not see him again and he had dragged himself away to die.
That night before heading to bed I thought I would search again, just in case. And there came a cry from his enclosure. He had returned. I was totally baffled. Not only did he vanish but he also turned up again. I have no idea where he went, why he did not answer our calls and how he found his way around an unfamiliar place.
I tried not to think about it too much but to just be thankful he returned.
He is doing so much better now, he can walk by dragging his back leg a little and has a little movement in his tail, but his purr is as loud as ever.

Not wanting to be left out the poor dogs who had a great holiday playing backyard cricket, running on the beach and swimming decided to get tummy bugs at the end of the holiday. And poor little pepper was not able to keep his food down either. The old girl seems to have missed this bug though.

Walk against warming, upper florentine

 

We had a really great day today going to the upper florentine for the walk against warming rally. The bush is being protected by some great caretakers. Some of them were found on the platform many meters up in the trees. Others were camping in the forest to do their best to save one of Tasmania's wild places.

 

As you can see from these photos the forest is just a spectacular place and well worth saving. I spent much of my childhood exploring the forests in a small town near the florentine. It holds so many great memories for me. Walking through such magnificant areas filled with moss covered trees, ferns and fungi of all colours is like food for the soul. It is impossible to be unmoved by such pure beauty.

 

 

mitered mozart

 

 

Well here it is.
I have finally finished my cardi. The pattern was from the knitter's magazine, spring 2000. The mitered mozart by Candace Eisner Strick. This is just a big mitered square with a picot edge.
I am really happy with the way it looks and with the way the colours work together.
Now I can start something new.

what warm weather holds.

 

I have just read this book. It was the title that grabbed my attention first, as anything to do with purple usually does. It is a fasinating read, all about the man that discovered the artificial colour dye mauve. I found it interesting as it covers the artificial dye history of England and I learnt lots about the world of dyes. Made me stop and think about all those great colours we use and take for granted.

 

I spent the other day at the southern schools triathlon with #2 child. What a great day, and as you can tell from all these bikes there were 2000 children taking part. It was just so great to see so many children having a great time.

 

And of course now that there are some hot days around it has been time to do a bit of swimming. This is my favourite local beach. How luck are we to live so close to such a wonderful beach. Safe for families and with such a great view, and there are often dolphins swimming past. I always complain about how cold the water is when I first get in, You would think that after a life time of swimming in these waters I would just get over it and realise that once your body goes numb the water is really very nice. It definently cools the body temperature. While I was standing in the water waiting for the water to warm up a bit before swimming a had time to admire the many tiny fish that swim around your legs if you keep still enough. Then there was a huge starfish, doing not alot.
I really am a fish at heart, there is always something so calming and peaceful about swimming. I cant wait for the weather to be even warmer so I can take on the waves at the surf beach too.

 

country shows are soooo coool

Today we headed off to the local country show. And it was such a great day. The weather was awful at our place but by the time we headed over the hill the sun was shinning ang made for a brilliant day.
We watched the dog jumping trials, with the winner jumping 2 meters with lots of excitement and joy. Nothing gets a crowd going like the cheer of encouragement for a dog trying to scale a wall 2m high.
Then there was the heavy horses, draught horses to us old folk.
And the great display by the australian light horsemen. What a show, what horses and such a captivating show of skill with horse, knife, sword and lance.
There was also all the dog showing. Ohh I just love the dogs.
And then of course there is the alpacas, sheep, cattle along with all the fantastic spinning and knitting exhibits.
You cant go past a country show, even with all the side show fun and excitement.

 

 

 

 

A happy Pepper

 

 

This is the face of a happy Pepper. These are photos taken by #1 child playing with him. Pepper just adores #1 and thinks the world revolves around her. Needless to say if she leaves him, he feels his world has ended. It is just typical poodle behaviour, but we love him anyway.

halloween fun

 

 

 

As you can see we have been celebrating halloween in our house.
I had a week of fun getting the house ready to look all spooky, and it was so much fun. Then on all hallows eve the children dressed as, well lots of spooky black things. I was a white ghost. We also had a witch and a ghost knight and a grimm reaper in the family.
I had read a great blogpost by Amongst The Oaks about labels for halloween potion bottles and had fun putting some together.
We all had a great night with wonderful food, conversation and energetic kids. Even if I dont really know what we were celebrating. I will have to go out and research the meaning behind this great night for dressing up and having fun.