Off to Central Western NSW

In my late teens I was a member of a Junior Farmers Club, pretty much the equivalent of the 4H Clubs in the US and Young Farmers in the UK. Years later the Junior Farmers Club was renamed Rural Youth Club but the educational principles remained the same - learning by doing, teaching young people about agriculture. Surprisingly there were several very active clubs around Sydney, catering to young suburban Australians who loved the land, many of whom later became farmers or worked in some agricultural occupation. I lived on my family's flower farm, and belonged to Epping Junior Farmers Club. Educationally I learned to cook and sew, to change a tyre, debate, chair a meeting, judge cakes and cattle, and my major interest was economic entomology. Socially we built amazing exhibits at agricultural shows, went to show camps, conferences, dances and balls, and along the way learned excellent values and social graces. Lots of us married fellow members. It was a fabulous organization.

Last weekend I went to Dubbo to a reunion of 200 Junior Farmers and Rural Youth members. What a great occasion! Luckily we all had large-print name tags so there was no problem recognizing friends perhaps not seen for 30 or 40 years. The years fell away as we hugged and laughed and shared reminiscences. After an excellent dinner and a quite late night about 80 of us fronted up in the rain for a most generous breakfast out at the showground. It was sad to say goodbye but email addresses were shared and photos will be passed around. This is just one photo, of old and loved friends.

 One 'must see' in Dubbo is Taronga Western Plains Zoo so a few hours were spent (just before the rain set in) wandering along bush paths to see the animals. Taronga is a no-cage zoo so is set out in large paddocks of grass and trees and moats, a great way to see the animals. There are some carnivores but mostly herbivorous animals.

Asian Elephant

Black Rhino

Giraffe

Susie the Hippo

Dingo, Australia's Wild Dog

I was at the Dubbo Farmers' Market, where like all such markets there were many dogs on leads, when a man ambled past with a most magnificent Dingo in tow. The Dingo was very alert, ears and nose sussing out the surroundings, and apparently he is a frequent visitor to the markets. The Dingo is not a domesticated dog so seeing one as a pet is quite rare, but this one was obviously considered trustworthy to be in the company of other dogs. I felt privileged to be in the same company as the Dingo, much as I did when I met a Wolf in the US.

There is a camping area in the zoo with a permanent tent site, available for school groups, tourists or anyone who fancies sleeping to the sound of the roaring carnivores. I saw a Sumatran Tiger feeding, but my photos were from too far a distance for my iPhone to get a decent shot. The tiger, named Inda, was small (at 82k) if compared with a female Bengal Tiger (approx. 139k) but she was sleek and muscled and quite threatening even from a very safe distance. And very, very beautiful...

I've just received a parcel from Gracia & Louise, some brass rods I bought from them, and as are all parcels they send out, it was almost too beautiful to unwrap. Not only were the rods (very exciting stuff) carefully packed, but there was a note on one of their lovely cards, and included one of Gracia's zines. This one is 'Johannesburg to Genova' / 'Genova to Johannesburg', featuring collages from the artists' books 'In search of a time the heart does not recall' and 'Before all colour faded'. Thank you Gracia and Louise.

I think winter is finally here. I've dragged out the oil heater and put a wool underlay on my bed. The children are in winter uniforms for school and the dogs are wrestling for the warmest spots in the house. My thoughts are with all those in European floods and especially the 1000 animals moved to safety in the Prague Zoo. Did you see them carrying tigers on blankets? Between tornadoes, floods, war, drought and all the other disasters that feature on our nightly news I am mightily thankful for  my peaceful life and never take it for granted. 

Glorious May

The school holidays have ended but we certainly had a great time. Lots of art and craft, picnics every day, friends over for play dates, and some adventuring in the undergrowth of the garden borders.

Cilla and Eddie clinging to the rope which led them through the wilderness that borders the tennis court.

Eddie making an autumn leaf angel in the Crepe Myrtle leaves. This is the only tree in our big garden that changes colour well, in spite of the many Liquidambers, which are consistently disappointing year after year. Admittedly, we are on the coast and the climate isn't all that cold so I'm not really complaining.

Fancy dress time for Sophia.

[I found this photo on the internet and haven't been able to find any attribution for it. If the photographer asks me to remove it from here I will, of course. ] For ages I've had a plan for a garden house/studio in my Secret Garden though I only envisaged a timber structure. When I found this photo I sent it to Andy, just commenting that it was lovely. Andy has now collected a motley pile of windows and doors and is prepared to work his magic on them. I'm thrilled to bits - it won't be a copy of the house pictured but it will be interesting, and knowing Andy, it will be beautiful. I've decided where it will go and have started clearing the space, which entails moving lots of bulbs, which will be no problem at all. I garden on the principle that most things will thrive but if anything dies then that's just too bad.

Messy but things are happening. The house will go from the pathway up across to the left and the doorway will look up the garden to the crab apples, frangipanis, hydrangeas and azaleas. And the natives of course including an enormous eucalypt. Windows and doors with coloured glass are stacked against the fence. The rather strange looking tree at a slant in front of the windows is a magnificent old jacaranda which slopes halfway across the side of the garden.

This is William, one of the Macleay Museum's rare papier-mache anatomical models. William was made in France in 1861 by Auzoux (1797-1880). The Museum, in the University of Sydney, has the most wonderful collection of scientific models made for teaching purposes. This next photo is a model of a horse's heart, I think my favourite piece in the exhibition.

The exhibition goes until 9 August and while the Museum is quite small it has a wealth of treasures worth checking out. I had been spending a couple of days in Sydney, went to lunch with Australian Museum friends and then we went on to the exhibition. One of the best things (apart from catching up with friends) about going to Sydney is the train trip, one and a half hours of great scenery and time to read on my iPad Mini.

Taken from the train window, just before the train pulled into Gosford Railway Station. Views like this feature much of the way.

One of my favourite Australian trees - this Wattle is in the grounds of Wamberal Public School and I walk by it daily as I take the girls to school. Speaks of pure sunshine to me. Does anyone remember the wattle song that I learned in Infant's School?

The bush was grey a week today,
Olive green and brown and grey,
But now the spring has come to stay,
With blossoms for the wattle.
It seems to be a fairy tree,
And dances to to a melody,
It sings its little song to me,
The graceful swaying wattle.

Different Wattle trees flower from about now in autumn right through summer, so there is generally a wattle tree flowering somewhere in Australia. Always a little piece of sunshine somewhere.

Another ramble through my days; surely soon I'll be able to devote a post to books or metal.  Fingers crossed...

New Zealand passes Gay Marriage Bill

Bless those New Zealanders who have had the courage to do what our political leaders in Australia are yet to come around to. Same-sex marriage will become legal in New Zealand on 19 August 2013. 

"A Bill for the legalisation was passed by the New Zealand House of Representatives on 17 April 2013, 77 votes to 44 in its third reading and received Royal Assent on 19 April 2013, with entry into force 4 months later to allow time for the Department of Internal Affairs to make the necessary changes for marriage licensing." Wikipedia

At the news of the  77 to 44 vote win guests in the Gallery of the Parliament burst into applause and then into the beautiful Maori love song Pokarekare Ana. See it here.

I've known and loved this song all my life and still join in with gusto when I hear it played. Though on this occasion I was crying with joy rather than singing.

Easter weekend

Happy Easter everyone, if chocolate is your thing I hope you've done well this weekend. I spent my Easter Saturday with friends at Patonga, the most southern beach on the NSW Central Coast, and about a one hour drive from my home, also on the Central Coast. My friends' house can only be reached by water so after a wonderful and very long lunch we chugged back to the beach in their small boat so I could return to Wamberal. This was the beginning of the sunset.

Last post I showed photos of my "new" 19th century photo album (see here) and Mo asked me to show some more pics to demonstrate the binding. The binding is brown leather with blind and gold tooling and all edges are gilt. The pages are on stubs and I think the best way to explain that is to show a photo. If you click on the photo you should be able to see that each page joins the stub by two pieces of book cloth which is also used as the hinge between the end papers. You can also see the glued on head bands in this photo.

I'm not much on explaining so I apologise in advance for a garbled description. If anyone has a web description of this binding I'd love to see it. Each page and stub is heavy cardboard (board) and is made up of a layer of white paper, the brown book cloth, the board, the brown book cloth, and then the white paper again. And that's just the joining to the stubs! The book cloth forms a very narrow hinge on the actual photo pages but forms the hinge and join between each pair of stubs, holding the spine together. I can't see any sewing so I imagine that glue, probably animal glue, keeps it all together. There is mull glued to the spine. I'm not keen on looking too closely in case it all falls apart.

This is a photo of the white moire paper endpapers. You can see how the endpaper just covers the hinge material. Each page is joined in this same way.

The photo pages are layers of heavy paper, then heavy board and more heavy paper. The paper has oval or rectangular openings to contain the photographs. There are slits below the openings to allow the photographs to be inserted on both sides of the page. You can see on the left the silhouette of the full photograph. Just a point here: if you are ever making slits like this, first punch out a tiny circle at each end, the cut the slit. This helps prevent the slit from tearing at the ends.

The decorated pages don't have slits but the photos are inserted through the corresponding slits on the reverse of the page. The illustrations are perhaps chromolithographs; I don't think they are hand coloured lithographs but I could be wrong. Any further ideas on this binding will be passed on with gratitude.

Last weekend we had friends over for dinner by the fire ring and Sophia and I made naan bread to cook on the barbeque. I made the dough (from River Cottage Veg every Day) and after an impressive rising, Sophia punched it down and pulled and flattened it to go on the hot plate. It was good that evening and even better when the leftovers were re-grilled on the barbie the next morning for breakfast. My oven is (at long last) installed so I'm looking forward to making bread this winter.

The Super Heroes were too busy to cook!

After a trial of no word verification I think I must go back to it. The Anonymous comments are coming so thick and fast that I can barely keep up with them. 

I have a request. I am only able to keep up with blogs that I can subscribe to by email. Some of my favourites (this may be you) don't have this so I rarely get my act together often enough to keep up. Please, I would love you to do this ...

A most generous gift

To be blessed with dear and close friends is a wonderful thing, and when one of the dearest and closest arrives bearing a treasure, well, I was delighted and very grateful. This 19th century family photo album, leather bound and gilt edged, is full of unidentified photographs, now destined to remain a mystery for all time. Such albums constantly appear in estate sales, second hand or thrift shops and many go straight to the tip. A sad state of affairs but in this case my friend knew his album would find a good home with me, at least for my lifetime. Thank you MJM.





















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Wonderful photographs, taken with such promise, now tinged with sadness because their subjects are lost in time. Safe with me for now...

Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Wamberal NSW

Rain, rain, go away...

It's raining, it's pouring, the little dog's snoring...  Oh, to be a little dog sleeping on a pile of cushions on this miserable, wet and rather scary windy day. Not that I want to be sleeping - I'd rather be outside in the garden looking at the Naked Ladies. The Amaryllis belladonna is a favourite of mine. They just magically appear as a stem from the ground and a few days later produce these stunning flowers. This one had 19 buds on the single head!

Eddie found a new friend in the garden last week, chomping on a grape leaf. This is Hippotion celerio, a Hawk Moth caterpillar found world wide. This fellow delighted Eddie - as he moved the caterpillar to a safer place it reared up its head and enlarged the two scary pretend eyes on the back of its head. We were eating outside and the Magpies were watching with interest for any dropped scraps, and they would have made short work of our caterpillar, hence the move to a safer place.

May I show you something a bit creepy? It's not the actual animal that's creepy (at least I think they are okay) but it's what they do that you may not want to know about. They are Gordian Worms, harmless to humans, about 30cm/12", and they come out in the rain. So don't click on the link if you are having breakfast or are the least bit queasy about nature red in tooth and claw. There are two in this photo and look like thin spaghetti, only moving. Gosh, I love nature.

Why we still have any invertebrates in our garden is beyond me when we have these busy girls rummaging around, never leaving a leaf or stone unturned. Aren't they gorgeous?

Now for something completely different. I've been asked what I learned in Keith Lo Bue's Waxed Linen Sailor workshop. I learned a lot but I only finished one piece. Several others are started, just waiting for me to act on them. This is a piece of very old bone which I covered in waxed linen thread in one of the patterns Keith taught us. I used my waxed book  binding thread which has a very satisfying tension and really stays put. And I love the pattern.

I recently bought a bundle of silver plated napkin rings - 10c each at Spotlight! I have no idea how I will use them, they may be too cheap and nasty for hacking up or hammering but I sent a couple up to Barry Smith in Maleny Qld in the hope that he could use them. Nice patinas.

Barry is making wonderful jewellery from recycled silver, brass and copper, and I have recently bought a fabulous Peace Book Pendant from him. I love it so much I can't bear to take it off. Look at Barry's work here. And here are just a few of Barry's items that I am treasuring. (Hoarding!)

For far too long I have been in a not-very-creative state of mind. I certainly haven't made a book for yonks, which is so out of character that I wondered if I would ever be able to make one again. Now I'm not about to tell you that I have had a sudden burst of creativity but I suddenly have the desire to create. I feel I should bottle this feeling while I can. I think seeing this introductory video about Jody Alexander has inspired me. I love her books and her use of paper.  Here is more about her.

And here are the school girls going off on the school bus. So brave, full of confidence. And the little girl is SO little. But just bursting to learn...

The last word is DeMengian. Yesterday I read this post from Michael De Meng, and I felt it applied to all of us who are artists, who love art, who wish to support arts and crafts. It's long but it's relevant, especially in NSW where art teaching is facing horrendous cuts. Michael gives some ideas about how to support art and he also lists people and places of importance to him in his artistic life.

I hope you got past the Gordian Worms.

My Peace Book Pendant made by Barry is inscribed "Peace is every step" which I think will be my mantra from now on, and that is my wish for you.

January, month of fires and floods. And a snake alert.

Two weeks ago we watched in horror as Victoria and southern NSW were engulfed in fire. Today dreadful floods engulf Queensland and northern NSW. Our Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, is today visiting Victoria where fires are still burning, and at the same time she is explaining measures the government is taking to support those losing their homes and businesses in the floods. Between the fires and the floods hundreds of houses, many thousands of hectares of forest and pasture lands, possibly millions of animals, both farm stock and native wildlife, have been lost.

Eucalypt shedding bark, providing fire fuel but looking really beautiful. Stunning colours.

During the extreme heat it was impossible to be unaware of the fire danger. Living surrounded by bushland, with huge eucalypts towering over our house, makes me uneasy. I wouldn't live without them, of course, because they are so beautiful, but I did find myself checking my NSW Rural Fire Brigade app "Fires near Me"quite often. Not only for my own area but those of my family and friends. We didn't have a fire, but temperatures of 46C/114F have scorched the garden and it all looks rather sad right now.

Monstera, Agapanthus, native ferns, Begonias, all burnt. Even plants in the shade were singed, the air was so hot. As if that wasn't bad enough, the orchard was attacked by the Red Shouldered Leaf Beetle (Monolepta australis) and in a very short space of time they skeletonised all the new leaves on the stone fruit. This was a new pest to our garden and we weren't impressed. Tiny yellow beetles swarmed over us when we moved in close enough to look.

Yesterday the rain moved down the east coast of Australia and is giving us a generous drenching. This coastal region is quite swampy (read mosquito ridden) and enough rain causes local flooding. We should be okay, but the university campus grounds will probably go under. A dragonfly has taken refuge on my screen door, safe from the rain. Wing span of 12cm.

I generally welcome the visitors, including this little Krefft's Dwarf Snake. We often fish them out of the swimming pool but this fellow was just curled up in the sun. Snakes are protected in Australia so we put them in the bush with admonitions to stay put. The adult Krefft's Dwarf is small,  only about 30cm/12", as this one was, and although venomous, will not strike, even when provoked. I'm not sure who provokes a snake deliberately, but I'm quite pleased to know that this little snake isn't interested in biting anything other than a food source, such as lizards. I know snakes creep some people out but trust me, this one is a sweetheart.

The children were blessed with a little dog at Christmas time. The two younger kids were very nervous with dogs so this was quite a lot for them to cope with but after a couple of days they fell in love with her and she with them. Her name is Peggy and she's a Jack Russell, very fast and absolutely so busy looking for ... anything that moves, really. Our concern is that she will nose out a dangerous snake, like a Brown, and that could be terrible, but hopefully all her snuffling and digging may make the snakes move elsewhere. Fingers crossed. So here is Peggy, and Eddie on the tennis court. The children are learning ball skills. And whacking skills.

I have a tenor ukelele - a Christmas present from my girls. Now I need to learn to play it... I have a few apps that explain chords etc., but I suspect I need Ukelele for Dummies, which I think also comes as an app. There are Uke groups all over the place, obviously a very popular instrument. My parents could play guitar, banjo, mandolin and ukelele. Why did none of that talent rub off on me? Perhaps it did - I won't know until I try, will I?

Now, I seem to have turned my blog into a personal stream of consciousness, with illustrations. Not really what my plan is for this blog. In future I'll try to get back to creating - whether books, art or rusty stuff. I'll leave you with a link to Seth Apter's fantastic Art Blog Directory.