When I started blogging my thoughts over what to call it was brief.
I like stitching. Every day. A stitch a day.
I started finding it bland. And not really reflective of my personality.
So please please join me in my new digs at A Giraffe in a Scarf.
Bye little Stitch a Day, I’ll miss you!
I’ve spent the last 2 days in bed, my tonsils are the size of golf balls and I can’t sleep for long without waking up coughing. Needless to say, I didn’t get myself together for the Ramblings and Photos scavenger hunt. I’ll still be checking out everyone else’s entries though!
So since I have no new photos to share, I’m posting my photos from a wildlife park I went to a couple of months ago. I didn’t share them at the time because I was at my childhood home in the middle of nowhere, and the internet was painfully slow. This is pretty photo heavy, but everyone loves animals, right?
Look at that gorgeous plumage. When we were leaving, after my camera battery had died, he started wooing a lady hen. It was so impressive to see him shimmer and flip his amazing tail around. I was kicking myself for not charging my battery before we left home.
The meerkats are a new attraction at the park. It’s nearly all Aussie animals except these guys, and a few monkeys. Meerkats are always to entertaining to watch, I love how in the second photo two of them are using a third one as a pillow.
Every wildlife parks needs an albino animal.
That’s my little brother’s head. I use the term ‘little’ lightly, I really should start calling him my younger brother since he’s a head and a half taller than me.
The Grampians make an awesome backdrop.
I’m annoyed that I couldn’t get the birds in focus, they kept flitting around. But I still wanted to show the amazing colouring of the dominant male. I always used to think that the little brown wrens were his wives, but my Mum shattered my illusion when she told me recently that they are his sons. He kicks his daughters out and just keeps one wife. The sons help raise the next generation.
The wildlife park have just started a breeding program for the Tassie Devils. They are are only found in Tasmania and are quickly disappearing due to a facial cancer that is spread between animals when they fight over food. It causes huge painful tumours on their faces, and they die from starvation when they can no longer feed. It’s so tragic, it would be awful to lose such a unique animal, especially after humans caused the extinction of the Tasmanian Tiger. Many zoos and wildlife parks on the mainland are now starting up breeding programs to ensure their survival.
This little guy was my favourite animal, he ate the food pellets out of my hand very sweetly. He’s a brush-tailed possum, I have a soft spot for them because they used lived in my roof when I was a kid. I would feed them bits of apple and stroke their tails.
This is where we had lunch. I haven’t seen the river so full of water very often.
A gorgeous background for lunching.
And a gorgeous friend to lunch with.
This weeks You Capture theme was ‘Photographers Choice.’ I didn’t end up going out to specifically take a photo for You Capture like I usually do, so this is just a random assortment of photos from the week.
This is a Cowslip Orchid, or Caladenia Flava. I took this, and the next photo, at my old place of work, Kings Park. Kings Park is totally awesome and is only a few kilometres from the Perth CBD. It’s home to the botanic gardens, but the best bit is that it has a good-sized area of natural bushland. I don’t know of anywhere else in Australia, or the world with that kind of natural resource so close to the city.
Anigozanthos manglesii. Or Kangaroo Paw, the floral emblem of Western Australia.
This flower isn’t from Kings Park. It’s from my humble vegie patch. I’m not sure if it’s a garlic or onion flower, my garden is what you might call ‘free form,’ so things grow where they feel like it.
Busy little bees making my beans grow.
I love little anthills. Ant are such industrious creatures, and so clever!
I love nougat so much. I really want to try making it at home, because it always seems to be so expensive!
This is probably my favourite photo for the week. I don’t know why, it’s nothing special, but I like the reflection of the bottle on the table, and it’s from a lovely breakfast with my boy, so that makes it even better.
‘Oink!’
I hope I’m not the only Australian who’d never heard of a Whoopie Pie… I sure hadn’t until I read My Girl Thursday‘s recent blog post about them! I had to try them!
I used this recipe, but I replaced the plain wheat flour for Orgran gluten free flour. Mine didn’t work out quite right, they tasted so rich and delicious, but they weren’t flat enough. The recipe said that they would spread but mine didn’t much, so next time I’ll smoosh them down a bit and make them a bit easier to eat.
And next time I’m making half of them choc-mint. Matt doesn’t like choc-mint… I don’t know what’s wrong with his brain.
Matt took a bite and said, “Whoopieeeeee.”
Thank you My Girl Thursday for introducing me to this tasty treat!
Zelda is still here, she’s growing as fast as she can. She needs to be a kilo to get all her vet work done, and then she’ll be up for adoption. Sigh.
Maisie and Daisy mostly ignore her. She tries to chase their tails, but she usually gets a clip round the ears for it. Maisie and Daisy’s new sleeping spot is on the arms of the couch. It makes me laugh how they line up, and one of them always has a face full of kitty butt.
My love affair with linen continues. I think I’m going to make some felt backed brooches with my little stitches. When I can afford a badge maker I’ll get one, but I like the flexibility of making felt backed brooches, they can be any size or shape I want. Here’s a better representation of how big it is.
I had a good chuckle at Daisy’s expense yesterday, she was sleeping in our bed and I did a double take when I walked past. Her sister was being very rude! I love the look on her face!
I can never think of anything to write to start these posts, so let’s just get into it.
Landscape.
This is an archived photo from my trip home to Victoria in July. I probably shared it at the time, but it’s perfect for ‘landscape.’ The mountains are The Grampians, the tallest peak is Mount William, you can just see the phone towers on top.
Powerline.
I spent all week looking at power lines. I guess that’s how the scavenger hunt affects my brain, everywhere I went I was looking for interesting power lines. And it was only for that reason that I noticed this piece of graffiti. The story of Mr Ward is tragic, the Aboriginal elder died in the back of a police van in 47 degree heat. The temperature inside the van was likely over 55 degrees Celsius. That’s 131 degrees Fahrenheit. There was no air conditioning and he was given one bottle of water for a 4 hour drive. His crime? Driving under the influence. It makes me furious and kind of ashamed to be Australian. You can’t imagine a white man being treated in this way. Anyway, kind of off topic, but a story that needs to be told.
Newspaper.
A couple of nights a week Matt delivers papers, and sometimes I tag along. It completely screws up my body clock, the hours are 1-5-ish AM, but I kinda like being able to talk to Matt with no distractions. Other then him chucking newspapers out the window. We talk about politics, sport, climate change, religion, evolution, taxonomy, weather, plans for the future, childhood memories, music, food, history and so much more. Matt’s so busy all the time, so I really love this time together.
Pose.
I love this photo, and I couldn’t have posed them better if I tried. The contrast of their eyes is beautiful.
Hobby.
Pretty little stitches.
Confession: I forgot about You Capture this week. To be honest, I’ve been wrapped up in Ramblings and Photos weekly Scavenger Hunt and apparently my brain can’t cope with more than 5 things to remember.
It’s after 11PM in my part of the world so I was limited in my options. The only sign I could find in my house was this one that hangs on my door.
It says, ‘My cat is not spoiled… I’m just well trained.’ It’s a bit false to hang it on the door, since my kitties aren’t allowed outside, but that’s just where it ended up.
So there’s my 5 minute You Capture effort. Click below to check out probably better thought out entries.
I received a wonderful parcel from my mum today. I love getting parcels from her, she buys pre-paid satchels and stuffs them full of all kinds of things.
My favourite thing that arrived today was this apple fabric. It’s quite a large piece, I think I’ll try making a skirt for myself with it.
There was also a pile of assorted cottons for me to play with.
What a great incentive to teach myself how to sew better!
Matt and I picked a little gremlin up from the airport yesterday. She’s from a town in northern Western Australia and was sent to SAFE in Perth to be rehomed. She’s 6-8 weeks old and I’m cherishing my kitten cuddles because I know she won’t last long when all her vet work is done! Here’s maybe an excessive amount of photos. I still haven’t got a good clear shot, she wiggles too much and it was overcast today so I couldn’t get any good light. Still cute though.
After some discussion we named her Zelda. The other names on the short list were Eleanor and Clementine.
These photos don’t really show that she has a smokey grey undercoat. Very sweet and fuzzy.
I’ve never had such a young kitten, all the cats I’ve adopted have been 11-12 weeks when I took them home, and the fosters I’ve had have all been older kittens. She’s so much fun.
I’m holding her as much as possible without neglecting my girls. I don’t know why she’s not with her Mummy and siblings. I’m no substitute but I’m doing my best.
She loves people, when she sees Matt she tries to climb up his legs. He doesn’t like it.
Kangaroo care for kittens. She likes to sleep tucked into my dressing gown. And ‘sif I’m going to stop her.
I found a nice big piece of linen on the weekend when I was going through my fabric stash. I’ve been thinking of trying some cross stitch on linen so I thought I may as well just do it!
This is only about a centimetre wide. It was so fiddly at first but I quickly got used to it. It’s about 28 count, so twice as fine as my usual 14 count Aida. I can’t wait to try something bigger! But I have plans for fabric stitched badges, someone just has to buy me a badge maker.
In other news, we picked up a tiny 6-8 week old kitten today. She’s so small! I don’t know what her circumstances are, but she’s come into SAFE care, so she’s pretty lucky. I’ll post photos when I can get one that’s not blurry. At the moment she won’t stay still!
A stitch a day 