Last for a While

New York tomorrow so loose ends today. I am so pleased with Norma's outside chair cushions, making them fully reversible was the challenge but they are all done apart from clipping the threads. So after that I can vacuum, mop, cook for my guests etc.. It has been difficult working with a stiff hand, and I hate the way the antibiotics make me feel (half of it is semantics: anti-life) but hey, I got to keep my finger!

SO I shall disappear into the ether for a while, and wish all my beloved friends and family a Celebratory Solstice and wonderful changes in the New Year.

Learning New Tricks

I am at the Apple store for my next one on one lesson. Keep watch for better visuals.

Sore Paw

I spent this morning in Emergency getting intravenous antibiotics after Suscipe's attack, worth it because the swelling is already going down. No sewing today, but I did buy some *c*l*o*t*h*e*s*.

Hartley

Stefan's grandfather was called Hartley Sargent for reasons we don't know. His grandmother married George Sargent four years after Hartley was born and there is no clue who his natural father was, but on the way back from Black Mountain we stopped and took photos at - Hartley. Could be a link.
http://www.lithgow-nsw.com/HartleyHistoricVillage.html

The Flavour of Today

Burst water main = no water

Suscipe bit my index finger over the first joint, it is deep and it hurts

Phone call and catch up with June

Breakfast and catch up with Mary

Sewing by the fire

We have been promised a storm today, not yet

Last night I woke at 2am for a confection, and went back to bed humming "Mr Greedy is having a little light lunch" with a baked sweet potato, an avocado and ham off the bone. No nightmares.

Max

After twenty three years!

Felix had a bear called Max, given to him by his doting grandparents, and every night we would wind up the music box in Max's insides and hear a strange little tune, almost like the Henley boating song but not quite.

We were with Cissy and George on Friday to admire their magnificent decorations and suddenly Cissy and I were electrified by the first notes of Max's song. It is called Toyland, listen to it here (though frankly I prefer it from Max).http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MI_ynDpX-o4

I still have Max, tied with nautical rope to the driftwood tree which holds my hats.

HIgh Tides

Full moon yesterday and the highest tides of the year, so I set off in my kayak over an abundance of silky rippling water.

The previous day we were shooting at Spring Hill in the morning, glorious golden light, working on tender green grass, setting the spacing of the new vineyard with plastic knives marking each spot - yup, apparently that's how it is done. Flags placed by laser mark each row, and then the uprights, irrigation and vines follow. In the evening we visited Jamie and Kristen for the sequence of him cold-calling to find vineyards and fruit for next season; saw some of the rushes today and the footage bowls me over, which worries me that all my geese are swans.

All this sounds as though life has been exciting and full and it hasn't been for me, I am edgy and snappy and under-stimulated. The kitchen is spotless, the cat thoroughly bathed and Advantixed after I discovered FLEAS, the table under a satisfying welter of fabrics and threads. Maybe it is just the Scrooge in me resurfacing, or maybe I feel guilty in advance for chickening out on Christmas this year. Under-socialised.

Pioneer Spirit

Today I made a costume for Cissy in sort of Victorian pioneer style - plaid, long full skirt, fitted bodice, even darts at the elbow! It made me realise how forgiving today's clothes are by comparison.

Anyway, she looks lovely in it, and I am using some of my grandmother's lace to trim it, from a box I have had for ten years and Aunt Jean probably fifty years before that. Good to be able to use it, and it is very pretty, an edging of roses.

Puppies

Dinner last night with Trip and Amy, Lief and Kyra, Freddy, Mango, Chloe and her four two-day-old puppies, so small I could fit one in the palm of my hand. Although Chloe is a pure-bred chiahuaua she had been found on the street, and her puppies are a bit of a mix: Amy and Trip are fostering.

Blissful golden autumn days, yesterday we filmed a sharp-shinned hawk release, and the weekend will be up at Spring Hill, where the new vineyard is being staked out.

So Dark

Oh, Northern Hemisphere! I wake and feel the fell of dark not day.

The weekend was bright, limpid sunshine and blue skies, and we spent about an hour filming a hawk of some kind circling, hovering, stooping, then flying back to his tree to rest or eat, before starting again. No idea what it was, the little book suggested either an osprey (but it wasn't diving into the water) or a northern harrier, as it was very pale with black shoulders. We emailed Alison at WildCare for her expertise.http://www.birdphotography.com/species/wtki.html

I light a fire at night and even one this morning, and have put a small electric heating pad in a wool blanket in front of the fire for Madam to toast herself on, plus she is living on turkey so thinks the gravy train has pulled in. Scout is up here too while Dee and Ed are in Albequerque. She made a cartoonish dog-shaped hole in the gate downstairs so is not to be trusted alone unless crated.

Do I notice a trend? after Thanksgiving my three menfolk sat rivetted to their laptops, and after dinner last night Cissy and George were showing us their latest and very good productions on their laptops. They are becoming essential to communication - I showed them Roses at Murrwillumbah and we all shed a tear.

Today I buy a new front door lock and various pesky light bulbs with Special Needs. Maybe even transformers so I can wire in the outside lights at the front. I am loath to collect the necessary rocks for my Arrangement in the front bed until I have wrecked the ladylike fingernails which grew while I was in Australia on holiday. I am not need for the editing so am deliberately finding constructive ways to occupy my time, like yoga, and thinking, and bird-watching.