all of April in one go

 

 Well - just where did April go?  I had every intention of writing often in April - my blog is a wonderful diary and as I have them published every year, it has been fabulous to go back and see what I did and where we went. i need to turn over a new leaf on this one. One of my problems has been that when I post away, it either doesn't work or I get these huge out of control photos and I cannot work out why.

Anyway - I went to Ballarat to teach at the Autumn Leaves Seiner for the Embroiderers Guild - fabulous ladies in my class and generally a really nice event - well run and everyone was so very friendly. Every day they knew my good taste and we had sandwiches - lovely. My classes created some wonderful work - I love seeing how people run with my ideas - they are always polite and say they have enjoyed themselves so I always hope that is how it is. I loved them anyway and I didn't take many photos but suffice to say - it was great.

If you are wondering what a giant dog is doing on the blog of a cat lover - this is George - he is a lurcher and I have to say he lurched across the table and stole my cheese on toast, ate it all and then farted somewhat badly.  I had a wonderful host - Jo Maxwell who owns The Elephant Patch in Ballarat - a delightful little shop where, if she didn't sell Cottage Garden threads, we wouldn't clash at all. Loved her work and trying to work out how I could be more involved with her. It is ever so good for me to get out of my comfort zone and see what others are doing.

I also traded on the Friendship day and of course delighted to show people our new threads and needles and other excitements. My suitcases were pretty light coming back. I was also lucky to be collected from and returned to the airport by Alison Cole.

It was my birthday on the last day of the seminar and it was a surprise (and embarrassing) to be sung to at morning tea and presented with a little cake and candle - and autumn leaves - I did say a few times how much I love autumn which we don't get in Perth. Anyway, despite the plane leaving late, I arrived back in Perth with a few minutes to spare and a bunch of lovely roses plus from Ian.

Then as a reward we flew off to Broome for a few days break. The amazing thing about having cancelled our Broome Retreat is that people keep getting in touch about wanting to book and being disappointed. Sadly there is a moment when you have to make a decision. one such call was from NZ at 6am while we were sleeping in Broome. This is the back of our villa - we love coming to this place - have our own Weber Q and the pool and relax and there was almost nobody else there the whole time so we had the pool to ourselves. We even have our own outdoor light

 Plants are simple but sit the surroundings - I did lots of sketches this round - mostly of plants like this

 Love the way the frangipanis hang down - the frangipanis were very evident this trip - trees packed with flowers -

You don't always think of them as having long stems

On Saturday we went to the markets at the Court House - got ourselves lots of mango goodies and plenty of new soaps.

Several nights we indulged with fresh Exmouth King Prawns cooked on the bbq - these were marinated in yummy ingredients - so good we had them again the following night.

I did some weaving from a hank of hand dyed chifon sari ribbon - in readiness for stitching a slip or so on the top.

our last night and day was very wet - lovely - the skies were exciting and the camels were out as always

Behind the villa we stay in, there are these wonderful root structures

 This one in particular becasue I am working on a twin needle - pin tucking project (actually part of it will be my article in Issue 9 of our e-mag threads.In-fusion and perhaps the idea of wrapping and pintucking will feature.

 the tide was out at Cable Beach so went for a walk along the beach (actually Ian had deemed that we were going anyway) - I collected a heap of shells and while they don't show so well here, was interested in the strong orange colouring and of course the pintucking/twin needling ideas.

No way could I bring these rocks home but all these pintucks screaming out to me - how could I avoid them? Watch this space.

When I got home I succumbed to some strange illness - maybe a strange flu - maybe a bit of Ross River Virus - who knows?  Anyway I went to bed with an extremely painful foot and woke up with a fever and a headache like no other - for two days. All back to normal now. the few lost kilos were a bonus.

 but I have started on my playing - brought back Broome newspapers - of course - and twin needled them - layered, - stitched - burnt and some to start a slightly different book - this is the cover - right now loving exploring what I can do with these lovelies and expect to see them developed more.

My aim for May? To blog as often as I can