Where did June go?

and I can't think of what I've achieved this month.

Work wise, the client work continues, I've had a quiet week this week - after getting new tyres on the car, they were needed, the shuddering in the back wheel continued. It turned out to be a problem in the differential, but it took days, and a replacement vehicle seemed "too hard" to organise so I made a decision to just stay home this week. It's been an excellent time to catch up with case notes, following up, and generally catching up on paper work. I've also been trying to finish work sometime in the afternoon and taking time to relax, to read, to bake and to do some stitching.

I've been knitting scarves and beanies for the kids in Canberra - such cold it hard to imagine.
Dan, and a friend, also Dan, tells me they are planning on doing a workshop with disadvantaged kids in Darwin round street art (graffitti) and hip-hop music. I'm sure this will be a unique experiance for them all.

I guess the biggest thing for me is I've decided it's time for change! Scarey stuff - and though I'd ideally like round 12 acres on the Atherton Tablelands with rainforest, an orchard, and a magical garden, realism tells me that at my age and with my finances, this isn't going to happen! So I looked at what was most important to me - and it's family. The northern NSW coast is appealing and fits better with being closer to the kids and to Mum too. Looking at what I can realistically afford, I'm even exploring the idea of a retirement village. When did I get that old!

So I guess lots of change - time to see what the next part of my life holds?

Did I get this right?

when I was driving home on friday night, about 40km out of Isa, it was just dusk, not quite dull enough to be needing to put my lights on and I noticed an animal in the road ahead, it's smaller than a cow? not the right shape for a roo? I slowed ( I was doing about 110kph) and it just stayed in the road, I kept slowing, not a dog, not a fox..... it moved to the side of the road but kept turned towards me, I was just rolling as I passed it. And it sure looked like a dingo ( this is not my photo )

I've seen dingos in sanctuaries and on Fraser Island but never out here before. Discussing this with a friend he suggested it may be a dingo - there's lots of open land between here and Alice Springs and the lack of a wet season this year may have them extending their territory - or maybe I'd just never seen one here before.

I love the continual new experiances this area gives.

My daily stuff, work, travel, quilting and I'm creating family history albums with scrapbooking.



I took this photo as I was coming back into Mt Isa early Friday evening. I'm about 30km out and about to cross the Leichart River. It had been 30 deg for most of the day - I'd run out of t-shirts as I'd only packed 3, I'd packed more long sleeved t-shirts and jumpers, even a hot water bottle and I'd not really needed them at all. This is winter?

My quilting continues between knitting beanies for Ben, Jess and Dan. I'm up to hand-quilting Mum's quilt - for her birthday. She got a WIP - work in progress. and this is my last contribution to my internet swaps - tea cup and saucer. Today I've pieced more of Jess's Japanese quilt - but my machine is not well. I think old age is settling in- I think it's about 34 years old now. It sews well, with it's two stitches but it is clunking and grinding and making some very strange noises.

I've finally found someone to replace my front steps, so financially this isn't the best time for it to want to retire to a quieter life.



Spending even a short time with Annie is so inspirational, she is very involved with stamping and scrapbooking. I'll look up her website and add it later. I've added three examples of what I've been doing - there's a page for my maternal grandparents before they got married. When I was with Mum we went through the older photos and I had them copied. The second page is Christmas 1953 - I was about 4 years old, then one for Jess - her first dress up party she was about 10 weeks old. I have a variety of albums on the go - Family History, my history, and one for each of my kids based on their childhood. So many photos and so many memories. I try to complete about 3 pages each weekend, but I doubt I'll catch up.

It's been awhile.

I've been on leave - I took about 3 weeks to go down to Canberra, to catch up with the kids but also to join the family celebration for my Mum's 80th Birthday. The party just kept on going.

The actual celebration was attended by almost all the family and we've grown into quite a mob, as we go into the next generation.

We had a great "grazing" lunch at Pods in Pelligo. The food was great, the company was excellent, and everyone mixed and talked and tried to catch up.

This is the five of us with Mum, my brothers

John ( on the left) and Peter, my sisters - Linda (the baby of the family on the left) and Annie (on the right). It's not very often we manage to get together these days.

John and his family live in Melbourne, Pete and his partner live in Newcastle, Annie and Lin live in Canberra, Mum lives on the Gold Coast and I'm in Mt Isa. We cover almost the whole east coast of Australia.

The next photos cover the in-laws and Mum's sister Judy, and then there's the mob, which includes most of the 17 grandchildren, their partners and four great-grandchildren.

Mum had a second party last weekend for her

friends and family that couldn't come to Canberra.

Still no wet season this year.

These are "tumbleweeds" because I don't know what else to call them, you can see they are about a metre in diameter and they roll across the paddocks and pile up against the fences. This is usual for the end of the wet season, but there's been no rain. Evening brings heavy cloud, but no rain.

Cloncurry relies on the annual flowing of the Cloncurry River to fill the dam and supply the town with water - this year it rained a bit in December, and created a few waterholes, but nothing since.


The landscape would normally be starting
to dry off, not being this dry already. These tumbleweeds are amazing to watch when they are picked up by red dust devils and thrown into the air. But they can move fast and are awful if you hit one with the car, they are quite solid.

ANZAC Day 25th April, 2008.

I went to my first ANZAC dawn service today, and I think I'll make it part of the things I do. War is so stupid, and so many young lives are lost - what for? some meglomaniac need for power, revenge or control?

4:30 was a bit daunting, but even though I was in Richmond and there were maybe 35 people there, the airforce had sent in 4 young blokes to do the corner guard stuff, one had been in Iraq. They had an officer with them, and someone to blow the trumpet for the last post.

My photos arn't good but I'll try to upload them.

the local RSL then put on breakfast - sausages, bacon, scrambled eggs, sandwiches and LAMINGTONS! much too early for me but I had a coffee, though I declined the tot of rum as I still had to drive home - 500km - and being up so early was going to make it tough enough.

Over a million young lives were lost world wide in WW1, even if only 10 people grieved for each of them that is so much sadness and such loss.

Quilts progress and speeding journeys

It seems I shouldn't upload photos then wait a week to add the text, two of the photos are visiable and two have reverted to the little "X" thingy! I'll try again!

There were to be the next two stages of Jess's Japanese Quilt. I now suspect it is going to be very "busy" I found I didn't have enough material to make 25 x 7" blocks for the 50 half triangles, so I used two fabrics, I don't have high hopes for this quilt, it's kept me guessing right from the start.

This week I finished making the Dresden plates for Mum's quilt and I now have about 3 weeks to get it all together and hand quilt it - I doubt that will happen but I will have something for her.

there should also be two photos of the anthills! Darn - I just deleted the one that was visable, while trying to delete the others - oh well back to my other computer - which is dialup - ok new thought maybe I should do the transfer to memory stick and up load using my laptops broadband. I'm slowly getting the hang of switching information from one computer to another when they hold different programs.

These anthills are taken 20km east of Mt Isa - I know the exact location because after getting a speeding ticket, I sat on the speed limit and the journey was sooooo long I was loosing concentration so I pulled up and decided that taking a few photos would re-centre me.

I love the colours.