Norway...

 B and I are just back from a quick trip across to Norway!  My brother and his wife were travelling there and it seemed too good an opportunity to pass up - to hang out together on the other side of the world to usual.

We arrived in Bergen and it was beautiful, especially the old town of Bryggen. We wandered around and poked our heads up alleyway and side streets, admiring the weathered and worn timbers and buildings.

Before we left, we saw some most beautiful cherry blossoms.

The weather was not as kind in Voss - and it shows!

Luckily the next day dawned bright(ish) and we went for a magnificent ferry cruise through a fjord; and then an alpine train trip amongst the snow tops. Stunning. 

And then back to Bergen in the sunshine!

It was a glorious few days and we would love to go back. 

Of food and flowers and friends and family

 It seems to me that this December is fuller than I remember a December being for quite some time.  Last year we were all so tentative about gathering and travelling and moving around was not so easy.  As I think about this year, for us here in Queensland, I think it is almost like the social calm (= frenzy fun) before the storm.

We have been fortunate to have lived with very little circulating virus for a long time.  Our border opens again tomorrow and what follows of course will be our first real attempt at 'living with the virus'.  I imagine things will be and feel, quite different when we experience first hand what so many other places have been living with for ages.

Interesting times, and for that reason alone I think I am being a bit livelier and more social than I usually am, as I expect things will get trickier down the track.

So this post is really about food and flowers and friends and family and gathering...

Out for Tapas on a school night!

Flowers and herbs prepped for a visit to Brisbane with friends.

A gathering of the four of us who held The Red Thread - birthdays and Christmas to celebrate.

The magnificent colour of hydrangea and a gift of heart urchins from friend Susan.

The drifting of magnolia centres to be gathered and held in a petal vessel.

And light on the remains of a magnolia flower.

Lots of moments of friends and family and food this week; and flowers, always flowers...

Other worldly...

There's nothing much creative about this blog post but it has some rather lovely images in it.

For starters - the sweetest blush of dawn yesterday morning.

A few weeks ago now (March 8 in fact but it feels like a lifetime ago), the family all headed to Canberra to celebrate my Dad's 80th birthday. We had outings and dinners but the main game was a ride in a hot air balloon.

Whilst a tad on the nervous side when I arrived, I soon forgot myself and delighted in the slow gentle movement through the sky and over the landscape.

It was stunningly beautiful and serene and I would do it again in heartbeat if I could.

Flying high over the city centre and Australia's Parliament House.

It was also the second day day of the fortnight-long international balloon festival and you can see some of the novelty balloons being blown up by the lake.  The winds were a bit too frisky for the dinosaur to go up that day, so they tethered it and let people play in it I think.

I followed this balloon for as long as I could - I love the dreamy image of a heart floating by in the sky...

The landscape looked so wonderfully different - we were close enough to notice lots of things, and slow enough to be able to really look...

The four different 'curves' of fence lines, road and cycle path...

The geometry of an industrial area

And then to a rather rough landing and packing the balloon back up!

The bottom of the basket - it falls over on landing and you all get tilted on top of each other and clamber out sideways, but it was fun!

And then to finish with more other-worldliness, yesterday morning, looking up our driveway as the sun rose and the mist evaporated...

It feels so long ago to have been able to stand next to each other; to spend an hour or more in close proximity.  We have all remained well since the adventure and with three weeks or more gone we were lucky to have had the moment.  Even the next weekend I don't think it would have been possible.

And I feel so fortunate to still have beautiful moments like the ones on our block.

Embroidering a bonnet

I recently got the loveliest request.  In a round-about-way, in lieu of payment for something I had asked my friend to buy on my behalf, she asked me if I could embroider a calico bonnet for her.  It will be part of an ongoing display at the Female Factory in Hobart, celebrating the lives of women convicts.

The bonnet had been made by another of her friends and it arrived in the post ready for me to add my bits. The job was to embroider the woman's name on one side; and the name of the boat she arrived on and the year, on the other side.  On the inside I was to embroider my friend's name.

So I sketched out a few ideas, wondered about how I would actually embroider the words - my handwriting or a fancy font?

I do love those magic new pens where you can draw on fabric, then rub it out when you don't need it any more. Also note to self, ironing will also remove the pen marks.

I trialled some fancy writing on a remnant and tested two colours of thread - cream and white. And decided on cream.

So I traced a fancy font onto the fabric.

And before committing needle to fabric on the front, I thought I would head to the inside and stitch my friend's name in my handwriting.

I pressed the bonnet a bit where I had done the hand stitching; turned it over only to discover that the ironing had happily removed some of the magic ink on the front! Laugh.

 But onwards. The hand stitching over the purple pen.

And then once, it has been pressed, the purple pen has disappeared. As mentioned - magic!

I thought about how to add a little bit of something. Originally I planned to do three rows of running stitch along the bottom edge, but once I had begun, I thought a single row of running stitch down both sides and along the bottom was just enough.

And just in passing, all I can say is that photographing a bonnet is almost impossible!

I look forward to it being on display in Hobart and am so thrilled I was able to help my friend's family history investigation take a tangible form...

Stitching and the art of orchids

As for everybody right now, the world is busy and focused. I am trying to finish a couple of commissions before the end of the year and they are taking a fair bit of dedicated time. Which I may say, is kind of hard to find in amongst our other commitments to places and people, but slowly slowly we will get there.

So I don't have much to show for my art at the moment, which is why this blog post is all about the art of my dad's orchids, with a little bit of stitching.

My dad is an amazing grower of orchids. He tries to always have at least a couple in bloom all year round and at the moment, they are excelling themselves.

They always make me smile when we visit.

This tiny wee white one is a stunner. The flowers are about 1-1.5cm long.

Lots of lovely gorgeousness to go around...

Dad has the art of growing orchids down pat; I think it's best if I don't try to emulate him but just stick to my own art and just enjoy the results of his!