Spring

Spring has sprung. We had a relatively warm weekend and spent it out on the beach. I can't believe I get excited by 18-25 degree days!

Queensland

I am about three weeks late in posting this. Lets blame it on the copious amounts of sewing I have been doing. The school where I am teaching is putting on a production of The Wizard of Oz. I volunteered to sew some poppy costumes, which turned into 26 poppy headpieces, ten poppy costumes and six snowflakes. I had a few nights of sewing into the wee hours of the morning. Due to my usual 11th hour effort I forgot to take any photos of the costumes. Hopefully this week I will be able to.

Anyway back to Queensland. Three weeks ago we flew back to the Sunshine State for a brief visit with family and a wedding. We celebrated our mothers birthdays. We squeezed in a family shot, blurry and crooked, I still love it.
We ate fish and burgers by the sea. With short sleeves on! Oh how I miss the northern warmth.
And we attended a wedding.
A very quick update. I am tired from all the spring cleaning (not to mention the copious amounts of sewing!) that I have been doing this weekend,I think an early night is in order.

Camp

I have just come home from a two night three day camp with 85 teenage girls. I am tired and glad to be home and showered. The girls definitely tested my patience but the scenery made it all worth while. After one day of freezing cold rain we had two day of beautiful clear skies, sun and deserted beaches.

::We visited a tiny historic village run by a few old locals who were so proud and ready to tell stories for hours.
::We went to the wind farm and got to go inside one and press the pause button.
::We visited a lime kiln and an old graveyard
::And of course we did we did all the normal camp things, such as walks on the beach, team building exercises, eating too many lollies and being sick on the bus.

Now I want to go back and explore more. However, I would like to do it minus 85 teenagers!

Sky

I love photographing the sky. Have you noticed? Cloud watching is one of our favourite pastimes. Seeing shapes in the clouds is so satisfying. I wonder how many people have watched the clouds, and imagined stories in them, throughout the years.

A knitting bag

One thing about being an Art/Textiles teacher is that I am so often inspired and itching to create something for myself. However by the time I come home and do all the chores and extra work for school I feel to tired to do any creating. Yesterday having finally finished at Vacation Care, and having two glorious days to myself at home, I decided to whip something up to fulfill my need to create. It was a disaster! I tried to make a top, it was looking good for the first three steps and then disaster struck. The facing wasn't working for me and the instructions were confusing. I finished the day without any finished product and a whole lot of frustration.

So today I was determined. I decided to make something I knew I could do: a bag (I wonder how many bags I have sewn in my life? It must be a lot!). I have started knitting, I am not knitting anything in particular just a bunch of squares, but I love the rhythm and the bit of warmth it generates for my cold, cold hands on these freezing winter nights. Plus, a group of ladies at work are starting up a knitting group for next term which I am excited about. Therefore a bag to hold my knitting supplies was essential!
The fabric is all repurposed: A sheet and a tablecloth from an op-shop and some scraps from my Textiles classroom. It is a bit rough but it I love it none-the-less. The colours make me happy and it does the job.


It feels so good to have made something, now I can go back to chores and preparing for the beginning of school next week.

Day Trip

I am a firm beliver that a day trip can be as good as a holiday. Hopping in the car and driving to a new place to explore for the day brings Adam and I such happiness. It also helps you appreciate coming back home at the end of the day. So off we went to the the Yarra Valley;








We drove on a brand new highway to get there.

We stopped in at tourist information to talk about the region and got a map which was circled with many, many suggestions and recommendations.

We did a short walk up the Dam wall and through a lovely park filled with colourful flowers,tall trees and miles and miles of green. So much green everywhere we went and blue skies and sunshine. Oh and beautiful wispy clouds,I just can't resist whipping the camera out when there are wispy clouds around.

We ate and drank at a winery and visited a dairy.

We finished the day at the Beechworth Bakery Healesville for a cinnamon doughnut and hot chocolates with marshmallows.

Then we came home exhausted and happy to snuggle up in front of the television with a bowel of soup.

End of Semester

I have come to the end of a busy Semester at school. I enjoyed it a lot and the student's created some fantastic work. I am extremely grateful to have been offered the opportunity to work there again next term and am looking forward to the challenges and inspiring work that is created.

Now I am on to my holiday job at Vacation Care. It has been cold and blustery which is a challenge when you have 60 kids inside a hall who are itching to run around outside and explore the play equipment.

See that ominous sky rolling in, this was taken just before my first shift from the balcony. However (luckily!) there were patches of sun, not many but enough to keep thee leaders and the kids happy.

I managed to catch some of that wonderful sun in the kitchen as I was preparing my lunch. Ah, how I miss the sun. I am off to the museum today which is a blessing as the weather man predicted wind gusts of 100 kilometres per hour! I can just picture a 5 year old being swept off the monkey bars and blown down the street!