Scatterday N

My contribution for Scatterday this week is my dear old friend Noel Nome (we all know it's meant to be Gnome, but Noel wont have it, he's thinks he's definitely Human). Noel and his fishy pal Nigel have lived with us for 20 years, they guard our garden with great diligence.

Noel has HUMAN characteristics, from his looks (ignore the funny hat) and he displays HUMAN qualities, such as kindness. Every year he used to make Nigel hold an easter egg in his mouth for the children to find.

Noel and Nigel are also SMALL, standing about 25cm in height.

And they are also made from MINERAL. Now, I define mineral as not animal and not vegetable - with mineral being something created from the forces of the earth. Noel and Nigel are made from some sort of stone, which is probably a MINERAL AGGREGATE.

Next week we have another free-for-all, take three photos of things beginning with the letter X.

Scatterday L

Ello Ello Ello, it's Scatterday and it's the letter L!

I was sitting there, flicking through the dictionary looking for an inspiring choice for the category of Household Item, and there is was - LEXICON - the very thing I had in my hand has another name! Did you know that LEXICON is another word for dictionary? I certainly didn't, and as my dictionary is very definitely a household item then what more perfect thing can there be for the category of household item than LEXICON! :-)

For the category of Round Things I chose a LIGHT GLOBE. Not entirely round but certainly round at one end. I was playing with the photo trying to capture something interesting in the morning sun on the glass.

And finally for the category of Tools I went for LINO CUTTERS, artistically presented along with an example of what lino cutters can do. I made this leaf stamp some years ago and used it to stamp on fabric. Must have another play with that....

I have an "L" story for you.
When Meshell was a wee girl of about 4 we were driving along in the car playing "Eye Spy".
"I Spy with my little eye something beginning with L" says little Meshell.
We went through everything we could think of in the car to no avail, and she sat there very pleased with herself.
Finally we gave up.
"We give up Meshell, you're too clever for us, what's the answer for something beginning with L?".......
"Elbow"

Next week we're looking at the letter N with the categories of Little, Human and Mineral - a nice diverse bunch to ponder.

I'm A Lucky Girl

It was my birthday yesterday, 48 years young. And I had the nicest day, I was surrounded by lovely people both at work and at home, I received emails and cards from friends and family, and I was thoroughly spoiled (or is it spoilt?) by my family. Would you like to see my goodies? Some were surprises and some were things I ordered and then had to wait impatiently for. :-)


First my Koigu yarn - isn't it to die for! My children bought this for me, but I had the joy of choosing my favourite colours off the internet shop, gosh it was hard to choose but I'm really happy with all of them.


This one is my favourite, I just love turquoise. Not sure exactly what I'm going to do with it yet - it's sock weight merino yarn that's hand painted so the colour variations are divine. I'm thinking I'm going to make another mitres squares cushion.


Next is another fantastic thread holder that my dear father-in-law made for me. He made me the other two a few years back, and they are so useful but as you can see I've rather badly run out of room. So he made me two more - wonderful.


This is my surprise present from Steve. Isn't she gorgeous, at least I think it's a she - what do you think? She stands about mid-thigh height and weighs a ton. We're not sure what she's made of - sandstone or limestone perhaps. She's outside my kitchen window now, under the outside light - which shines on her at night and makes her look like an angel. :-) I love her little fat tummy.


Mum and Dad surprised me with a digital photo frame - I shall have fun with that. I've taken loads of photos but they just sit on my laptop and I rarely see them, so it will be nice to have them cycling through up on a shelf in my house.

You may be wondering what those two tubes are in the front of the photo. Well, Mum has a good memory - ages ago she ordered a huge floral sticker that are specially designed for the big green wheelie rubbish bins we use outside, and I've always admired it. So she ordered me a couple - thanks Mum! I'll post a photo when I've stuck them on the bins so you can see how nice they are.


This is the present that I ordered "from Steve", with his okay of course. I swim laps regularly and for years I have longed for some sort of waterproof MP3 player to relieve the boredom. Well, I have found one after extensive searching. It's called a SwiMP3 (good name hey!) and it a very fandangled thing indeed in that it doesn't have horrible ear plugs but instead it sits against your cheekbones and conducts the sound through the bones in your skull into the fluid in the inner ear which turns it back into sound. Isn't that amazing!

I'm dying to try them out when I next swim on Monday, but in the meantime I'm charging it up and choosing loud, fastpaced music to upload to it. I have even swallowed my pride and put on a wee fashion parade so you can see what it looks like on. There are slots in them that the straps of my goggles go through and that's what keeps them in place.



Haven't I been the luckiest girl ever!

Scatterday V

For the category of Pink, I've gone with VASE. My aunt gave me this vase some years ago, it's been in the family for a wee while I believe. I'd love to know more about it. It's very strokeable... lovely and smooth on the back.

Next was the category of Signs. I went hunting for a "vote" sign, a leftover relic from the election, without success. So instead here is the sign for a noice bag shop called VICTORIA STATION.

And finally, the category of Big. Had there been a volcano handy that would have been fabulous, however I settled for VINES. This is a lovely vine covered walkway at a big shopping centre nearby and I love the twisted gnarled stems of the ageing vines.

Next week it's the letter L, and the categories are Household Items, Things That Are Round and Tools.

I Made Something!

You were right.
To the people that commented that the fabulous new craft room would be hard to be creative in because of its pristinity (do you like that word, I just made it up) - you were right.
I spent all of last week just wandering through the room, sighing with pleasure, stroking surfaces, delighting in the clean tidiness and fabulous organisation of our stuff. Which was very enjoyable I might add, but have we heard the chugging of a sewing machine or the clicking of knitting needles - alas no.

So anyway, I had this lovely pine frame that originally housed a very nice dried flower arrangement that eventually disintegrated, so my plan was to devise some natty new thingy to decorate the frame. And yesterday I made myself sit in that lovely room, make mess and create something. And I did! :-)

"Come On Baby Light My Fire"

One of the things that annoyed me about myself last year when I was heavily into embroidery, was that I couldn't figure out how to use the finished pieces. They are all sitting redundant in my sewing basket. So that was my challenge, to use an embroidered piece, along with some of the polymer clay faces to pretty up the pine frame.

I frayed the edge of a piece of dark brown hand dyed fabric and glued that on to the frame, and I also rolled up the top and bottom ends to give it a scroll type appearance. Then I sewed the faces onto the embroidered dragon hand-made felt piece I had squirreled away, then needle felted some strands of yarn around the faces to soften the edges a bit. They look kind of 'witchy' to me now, slightly sinister and taunting that dragon just a wee bit.

It's on the wall, I think it looks ok, AND I cleaned up the mess and put everything back in its place. Hallelujah! :-)

Scatterday O

Something Found In A Library - I've gone with OPAC, or more specifically Online Public Access Catalogue. I don't know about you, but I love online library catalogues.... no longer do I spend ages wandering shelves in a fruitless search for books, I access the online catalog of my local library, find the books I want, request them online and only venture to the library when they notify me the books are waiting for me. Easy peasy!

Something Hawaiian - this one has me stumped most of the week. Finally I was on a website looking at Hawaiian facts when I discovered that the State Team Sport of Hawaii is Outrigger Canoe Paddling. And as I don't have any outrigger canoes handy to photograph, here is a drawing of one in our ancient encyclopedia.

Something Sweet - Oranges of course. Navel Oranges to be precise. I love navel oranges, I don't like valencia oranges very much as they are not as sweet as navels.

Next week Scatterdaisies, we have the letter V and the categories of Big, Signs, and Pink. Should be a bit easier I think!

Spanky Craft Room

We have a big room at the back of our house that has always been called the Games Room. The plan was to have a pool table and a bar and other such stuff. We've had the pool table in it for years, but gradually everyone lost interest, and due to lack of space it tended to become the room to store junk in. I also set up my sewing machine in there. And so the transformation into a Craft Room slowly began. For years I only occupied a wee corner of that room, then Meshell caught the craft bug too and between us and our stashes, we took the room over completely.

But what a disgusting mess it became, not enough storage space and grotty old wooden boards sitting atop the redundant pool table for work space just hasn't cut it. It got to the point that I hated being in there. And I don't even have a photo for you - it was too obscene - mess like you wouldn't believe!

Thus began the makeover. As usual with my procrastinating nature it has taken a lot longer than it should. Firstly I designed a work station to sit in the middle of the room, with stacks of storage underneath and an overhang at one end to sit at. While that was being made we sold the pool table - and to appease my slightly miffed husband who lost not only his pool table but also the room it was in, I gave him the $300 we sold it for - smart huh :-)

And then, the clean up - oh my lord what a clean up it was! Meshell cleared out her tons of stuff she accumulated during 4 years of textile arts study and we both went through every single box and cupboard, culling our stuff. You would have been amazed at the amount of stuff that was tossed! The end result of it all was that when everything was put away again it was all in logical piles of related things, not just stuffed into random cupboards. It's amazing what you can find that has been tucked away for 20 years - what do you reckon about THIS pattern for a natty little knitted item - eek!


This is my corner of the room, a couple of the walls have feature brick which I'm rather fond of, so that's my area. The Indian Orange Peel Quilt and the smaller picture quilt of the ocean are my 'works in progress', and they have had that title for quite some time now! Note that the ironing board is in my territory - and it has a snazzy new cover. It had to have a nice new cover to go with the nice clean and tidy room.


And, ta-da! Here is the new work station, all white and shiny clean and lovely. I'm really happy with how it turned out and it has so much storage! It's 1.8 metres long and 1.2 metres wide and stands about 90 centimetres high, nice and tall so as not to break our backs when leaning over pinning quilts and the like. It sits in the middle of the room and we have assorted benches and cupboards around the walls, gathered over the years. The easel is Meshells, as is the giant knitting sitting on top of the tall cupboard! It was one of her university pieces. On the right of the photo is an old dining table that Meshell and I share to use our sewing machines on - we have one side each.


At the far end is an overhang area for us to sit at, and down the centre is a void, which I planned as a great place to store cumbersome things like cushion inserts and quilt wadding. It has worked out really really well, and we've also added a rubbish bin there too, to avoid the temptation to just sling threads and offcuts of fabric on the floor. :-)


Our final mission was to find two stools to sit on, preferably with adjustable height. Are these not the bestest most fabulous stools in all the world? We were so excited when we found them - they are just perfect and really comfortable.


Right, now that's all done, and we have a clean, tidy and very spanky craft room, there is no excuse for lack of creative output eh!

Scatterday H

Phew, finally made it! What with our network down this morning, followed by a fish pond disaster (I couldn't just leave those poor gasping goldfish to gaily be a scatterdaisy now could I?) and also visitors, I've only just got here on Scatterday by the skin of my Scatterdaisy teeth!

H is for Colour, Games and Pointy Things.
For Colour I've gone with HELIOTROPE, which according to the blurb I read is on the pink side of purple. This is a cushion Meshell made way back in Year 11 at school - it's painted and beaded. She doesn't like it any more and donated it to the dogs to rest their weary heads on.

For Games I've decided to show you the cover of HALO 3, which is an XBox game that I don't myself play, but hear the constant sound of gunfire from while Steve and Paul run around like cyber Rambos! :-) They enjoy themselves immensely.

And finally, my pointy thing is my HAIRBRUSH, which has lots of points!

Next week we are working with the letter O, and Michelle has chosen the categories of In A Library, Sweet Things and Something Hawaiian.

On A Meme Roll

Oh, what the heck, why don't I just spend the whole blog day talking about myself. :-)
Kate has an interesting meme on her blog and I thought I'd do it too. You use just one word for your answers. Takes a bit of thinking to come up with a single word that encapsulates your thoughts!

One Word
1. Where is your cell phone? handbag
2. Your significant other? asleep
3. Your hair? overgrown
4. Your mother? lovely
5. Your father? generous
6. Your favorite thing? wit
7. Your dream last night? forgotten
8. Your favorite drink? tea
9. Your dream/goal? hobby-farm
10. The room you’re in? family
11. Your ex? non-existent
12. Your fear? trapped
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Albany
14. Where were you last night? home
15. What you’re not? dishonest
16. Muffins? blueberry
17. One of your wish list items? skinnier
18. Where you grew up? suburbia
19. The last thing you did? Bloglines
20. What are you wearing? nightie
21. Your TV? insignificant
22. Your pet? varied
23. Your computer? laptop
24. Your life? relaxed
25. Your mood? stable
26. Missing someone? no
27 Your car? Hyundai
28. Something you’re not wearing? balaclava?
29. Favorite Store? Bunnings
30. Your summer? hot
31. Like someone? craftswomen
32. Your favorite color? aqua
33. When is the last time you laughed? dinner
34. Last time you cried? years

Tagged!

I've been tagged by Michelle and Lindi.

Here are the rules:
1. Once you are tagged, link back to the person who tagged you
2. Post THE RULES on your blog
3. Post 7 weird or random facts about yourself on your blog
4. Tag 7 people and link to them
5. Comment on their blog to let them know they have been tagged.

It's taken me a few days to think about this!

1. My most favourite treat to eat is nougat. My particular favourite over the years was made by Callard and Bowser and I almost wept when I found out that production had ceased a few years ago.

2. I can sweep/mop/play pool with either hand.

3. I have slept in a water bed for 25 years. Steve and I always have trouble sleeping when we go on holiday cos there is nothing more comfortable than a water bed in our opinion!

4. I have a tragically bad singing voice. When I was 8 and was singing in my house choir at school, I remember the lead girl walking up and down our rows listening to each person while we sang as a group, and she asked me to mouth the words! I was most indignant! :-)

5. I absolutely detest coffee - both the taste and the smell. Give me glorious tea at least 6 times a day, with no sugar and double milk.

6. Whilst I make quick decisions and multi-task at a furious rate at work, at home I am very methodical and set in my ways - to the point of driving my family mad. This is very evident in my craft life - I take things slowly and deliberate over things for ages.

7. I have always wanted to do a tandem skydive. I'm thinking seriously about it when I turn 50 in a few years.

I'm not going to tag anyone specifically as it seems most people I know have already been tagged. So, I'm tagging anyone who hasn't been tagged and would like to do this! :-)

Scatterday S

Good Morning! Okidoki, it's Scatterday, and it's an S!

For the category of Gold I chose a golden SUNRISE. Specifically a beautiful sunrise in Palm Cove, North Queensland where we had to pleasure of visiting back in September.

My Fruit is the small but delicious SULTANA. I add a few of these to my morning cereal every day to give it a bit of zing. They are being carefully weighed at present, what with calorie counting and all... which is going well by the way - I've kissed goodbye 2Kg so far and already feel the difference :-)

Lastly is the category of Things That Make You Itch. Now, you're just going to have to trust me on this one, it's a photo of SAP. I had great plans of a lovely close-up of a broken dandelion stem with a bead of sap on the end, but it's so dry here that most of the weeds are dead and the one that I did find was almost sapless. But trust me, there are a few molecules of sap on that stem! If I do weeding and I touch these dandelions, my arms get itchy and my lips and tongue go all tingly and I sort of 'prickle' - good excuse not to the weeding eh! ;-)
Are you proud of me sacrificing my comfort to set up this photo? My arms are itching as I type!!

Next week you can be tantalised with the letter H and the categories of COLOUR, GAMES and POINTY THINGS. Interesting, hmmm .....

Who's A Gorgeous Girl Then

Here our baby - Asta Cat. Well, actually she's Meshell's baby. She's a blue tortie Burmese and we adore her. She rules our dogs with an iron fist.
And she is an evil fiend, with a mouth.... if you tell her off, she does this mouthy meow at you, which I swear is cat for "Get %$&^ed"!
But she is also the cuddliest most people orientated girl and she shares her love around with all the family.



She is an inside cat, but we take her into the back garden on supervised outings occasionally. She and I were hanging out together yesterday on the lounge chair under our enormous fig tree. Which is the local drop-in centre for about 15 wild rainbow lorikeets. Who all arrived while Asta and I were there. You have never seen such a motionless pussycat, except for the enormous eyes that swivelled back and forth, incredulous that these feathered things were dropping bits of fig on her.

So, Who's A Bloody Idiot Then?

Yes, it is ME. I am the bloody idiot.


You see this skip? The one chocka block full of detritis, garden stuff and assorted crap from our house? The one that is absolutely stuffed full right to the top of its 3 cubic metre self? Have a guess what's in it - somewhere? Go on, have a guess....

.
.
.
.
............. The television remote control ................!!!


Halfway through the toil and sweat of filling the skip I thought I'd be terribly useful and go and grab the pile of newspapers accumulating in the house. After ascertaining that Steve had indeed finished with today's paper, I piled that on top of the rest, staggered out to the skip and flung the lot in. There! Good job done I thought, and onwards I went, pruning like a mad woman, determined to fill every little cubic that we paid $154 for.


Later in the day it became apparent that the remote control was missing. After interrogating all household members as to its whereabouts, the awful truth slowly dawned on me - it was with the newpapers that I chucked into the skip - about a metre down. Oh bloody hell!


There was only one thing for it, I had to grovel through all the crap in the skip until I found it. It was an interesting task actually. As the skip came up to my shoulders I couldn't reach into it to fossic through stuff, so I hoisted myself up and sort of pivoted on my stomach so I was leaning in and my legs were waving in the breeze (I know, I should have got a chair).
At this point it did occur to me that passing motorists must have wondered what that crazy woman was doing - that bag lady pilfering people's rubbish. And the fact she had a camera must have raised the odd eyebrow. Anyway, back to it..... eventually after moving aside cuttings, old wood and a dead computer I spied the corner of an old newspaper..........


And what is this I spy!! Eureka I have found it!


And the world is once again a happy place. :-)
And I must say that I feel quite proud of my hunting skills - even though I was the culprit that lost it!

Scatterday Week 25

The I's have it, Scatterday I that is. :-)

For the category of Yellow, I chose the INSIDE OF AN IRIS. This is a photo of the one and only Iris I've ever managed to grow, boy was I excited when it flowered! Blue Irises with the yellow inside are my very favourite flower.

Moving on to the category of Something Australian, I took a drive to the beach and photographed the INDIAN OCEAN (Australian waters of). This particular section of the Indian Ocean is Cottesloe Beach, isn't it beautiful. Perth beaches have the whitest most gorgeous sand - we are very lucky here.

And finally, Something In The Air. This is INCENSE, and I had great plans to do magnificently detailed photos of incense smoke - I found out that it's actually quite difficult to do! This shot involved a black cloth in the background, lighting from the side and the camera on a tripod. You're supposed to use a fast shutter speed to catch the smoke crisply, but I didn't have bright enough lights so it ended up a bit fuzzy cos I had to slow the shutter speed down.

Can you believe we've been doing Scatterday for half a year! It's been really great to see how many people have joined in - thank you for helping to make it fun! As of next week Michelle and I are throwing all the letters and categories back into the pot to start again, making sure we don't have any combinations the same as last time around. We wont use Z this time, but we will use X, and we'll do a free-for-all with that one when its turn comes round.

But for next week the letter is S, and the categories are FRUIT, GOLD, and THINGS THAT MAKE YOU ITCH.

Visitor In My Fig Tree

EDIT: The bird has been identified - it's an Indian Ringneck Parakeet, grey mutation (thanks to a very kind person on THIS Flickr group for solving the riddle). It's not native to Australia and on doing some research it seems that over the years these exotic aviary birds have escaped and become established in the wild and are a declared pest here in Western Australia! You learn something new every day. I'm thinking that because this one was alone that maybe he's recently escaped from someone's aviary - I'll have to check the Lost notices at the local shops.

I've been hearing a new bird call in the back garden over the last few days, and I spotted the owner of the voice this morning. Here it is, having a snack of figs at the top of the tree. Does anyone know what this parrot is? I've hunted through my Australian Bird Book to no avail.... I wonder if she/he's escaped from an aviary?



It's a beautiful parrot.... soft grey feathers and a red beak. Not very big, and fairly quiet as far as parrots go. I'd love to find out what sort of parrot it is, so if you've got any idea could you please leave me a comment, pretty please! :-)