gooseflesh

Prussian Blue and interesting accidents

Using preloved tapestry wools can mean a limited palette. When I'm restricted in the colours I have available to use........interesting accidents happen. Colours I would not normally put together sing out to be part of the composition.

Linnaeus Project wip and quandong fruit (Elaeocarpus grandis).

Photo taken on my very dry bird bath with fleshy leaves of tumeric sprouting in the background.

Quandong fruit and its red leaves. That reminds me of a lecture I'm going to on Thursday..... Andy Goldsworthy  (the master of leaf arrangement) at the Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane. Yippee!!!

Linnaeus Project wip.

Bench Monday and woolly polyps between the toes.

Morelia spilota, the carpet python

It's very hot, dry and windy. No rain for three and half months...... no words today, just images!!!

My new scythe. 

So much grass everywhere.

 

My new skirt.

Yesterday's harvest.

Mounting components onto fabric. 

Highlight........ 2m carpet python Morelia Spilota  in the grass. Stunning!!!!!

Living on the edge.........of a crater

The portal to the universe has returned and there's so much to report. I've missed my connection with everyone. It's good to be back. The move was smooth but long and exhausting. Now that I have more or less settled in, my camera and plastic bags are resurfacing from a box.

 

I've left a temperate climate and now live in a subtropical climate. It's bright and sunny and warm during the day but very chilly at night. Sunflowers grow here in the middle of winter.

A friend, from a local sugarcane farm, brought me some beautiful orange plastic bags back from a trip to Berlin, as well as tangellos from his garden. Such sunny colours. 

Also new creatures....... strange calls at night and a certain amount of destruction after a nocturnal feeding frency!

This snoozy, baby red-belly black snake was in the compost heap. Yikes! I wonder where it's mother is. Note to self: start wearing gloves when gardening.

 

So much rain has fallen here in the last couple of years and the staghorn ferns are thriving. Two of my favourites survived the drought. I used to cart buckets of shower-water out to them when the water was scarce. Now the tanks are full.... and the showers luxuriously long. This one is growing on a big basalt boulder, shot out of the old volcano millions of years ago. The branching fertile fronds are full of brown spores.

 

In an attempt to retain the gene pool of the surrounding rainforest and revegetate the land, I have been madly collecting seeds and hope to be able to germinate them. 

These black seeds came from the loofas (in the vegie patch) I harvested last week.

Straight off the withering vine......

 

.....peeled and seeds removed. Ready for scrubbing!!

The kookaburras are laughing and the horses are being led out of the stable across the road. The sun will be up soon. I'd better catch a bit of sleep so that I'll be ready for another glorious day. It's good to be back here. 

Oh I'm feeling good

Utopia beckons.........

A dream I've had since I was a small girl is coming to fruition. The boxes are being packed and are on their way to my slice of paradise. The little red house will soon be my permanent home. Oh! I'm feeling good.......

Joanne Woodward

An image from one of my favourite books which I found tossed on the side of the street during council clear-out many years ago. Jump Book, Philippe Halsman, Andre Deutsch, London, 1959. Available here

Feeling Good, Nina Simone

Found at dear dearada .

Lucy Lubilator

Lucy and I at wonderful Culburra. 

Her coat is shiny because she eats sardines a lot!

The little red house

I have been away visiting my little red house.

It's nestled in the hills of a caldera in Northern NSW. All around are rainforests, rivers and farms; sugarcane farms mostly.

The parrots are raucous, the kangaroos bold, the green tree frogs loud, the snakes abundant and the night sky seriously spectacular. 

A carpet python sun-baking on the road.

 

The sub-tropical climate is perfect for vegetable growing. The warmth, high rainfall and rich volcanic soils makes everything grow like crazy. The grass has been so high that cars disappear in it as they drive down to the gate.

 

The local town has a great mix of people. Weathered farmers talking about their crops and rainfall; ferals with dreadlocks coming in to buy supplies from remote properties; Krishna worshippers from the large local Hare Krisna community; tourists visiting the world heritage national parks and people like me escaping the big city.

It was especially difficult to come back to Sydney this time.

Here's to new beginnings.

Life without deadlines

AAhhhh!! Life without deadlines. Finally time to nurture the exciting new ideas germinating in my brain.

Photos from the opening night of the Post Chrysalis Exhibition:

That's me with the silly grin on my face (above).

Some red dots!!!!!

Edward, Susan and Nina (+ unidentified man). Dad and I in the doorway.

 

Floral Necklace, 2008

Discarded Plastic Bags.

There are tadpoles in my little pond. It's likely they are Eastern Brown frogs. There's often a very robust and handsome Kookaburra sitting in the tree above the pond with his head cocked to one side and an eye staring down at the pond. A few weeks ago I found Hairy Harry (portrait) cautiously sniffing around an upturned plastic pot. I gently lifted the pot with a stick ...... a lizard, a snake? No....... a very large Kookaburra. He flew off in a great hurry, sitting on the pergola for a while with ruffled feathers and a confused look on his face. I don't know how he got there or how long he was there. Probably the same guy.

Harry walked into the studio and I snapped him.

Yoohoo!

Hope you all had a lovely holiday.

I just returned from a blissful holiday in Northern NSW....... Aaaahhhh.

Lots of time was spent in the hammock on the verandah crocheting, chatting and drinking cups of chilled hibiscus tea. The night sky was spectacular and the frogs were incredibly loud (good thing I brought my earplugs).

Spring Bulbs

This year Sydney had lots of rain during winter and spring, after a very long drought. As a result Sydney garden are flowering beautifully. The Jacarandas, Flame trees and Bougainvilleas are absolutely magnificent. In my garden the bulbs are always fun to watch as they emerge. Spring takes me by surprise every year......... everything is dormant and looking slightly shabby; then within a few weeks the garden is growing profusely, looking fresh and lush.

The Hippeastrum.

A flowering succulent with irridescent red/pink flowers. My sister-in-law, Ali, gave me a cutting a few years ago.

Sprekelia bulbs

A drawing of my paintbrush bulbs. I found these on the side of the road. They are quite rare.

The Original Beat Poets

How incredible!

There are small pockets of remnant rainforests (cabbage palms and treeferns etc.) close to my home in suburban Sydney. They act as wildlife corridors and are full of....... ringtail and brushtail possums, bandicoots, parrots, owls, flying foxes, water-dragons, frogs and snakes. I have had a family of three Tawny Frogmouths nesting in my garden for the last few years, Mamma, Pappa and new baby. They're very strange looking birds: a big wide mouth and little whiskers.

Bandicoots

Rainbow Lorikeets

Koalas.

Illustrations from The Australian Fauna and Flora drawings 1801-1820 by Ferdinand Bauer

A few days ago I was puzzled by a humming noise and thought it was a hard drive on the blink. After consulting The Slater Field Guide to Australian Birds, by Peter, Pat and Raoul Slater, I realized the sound came from the Tawny Frogmouths........"a soft but penetrating oom-oom-oom...".

Other bird Beat poetry in my garden......

tink-tink; pseet-it; tock-swit-it. (Eastern Rosella),

pee-o-wit; nasal clut (Magpie-lark),

grut-grut cris grut (Drongo),

chock; cheery-boob; falling chung chung chung (White-eared Honey-eater).

This last week I have been very busy designing and renovating a garden with an impenetrable rainforest next door (I'm a Horticulturist/Gardenmaker a couple of days a week). A wonderful, old and overgrown garden full of old-fashioned plants. Many different species of orchids, bulbs, bromeliads, gingers and ground covers have been revealed under the truckloads of weeds. Whilst there, in amongst it all, I noticed the unmistakeable and my favourite Australian bird song...... a loud flute-like warbling and whisper song from the Magpie.

and the Whimsical Coral Garden has been started...........