My neglected garden has given me gorgeous Mr Lincoln roses, filling my house with their sweet scent. 

Garden, on the list........after I finish with the mess and madness of cleaning and totally reorganising my studio. So, still not making stuff, 

but as I clean and rediscover bits n bobs I am planning, designing, mentally creating. 

The weather is changing, autumn brings lovely foggy mornings, clear air, warmer days. 

Mist and fog on the hills Friday morning on my way to town. The paddocks are so green, such a difference to the dry dust bowls they were just a month ago. 

Back to cleaning..........

Rainbow after the storm.

Roaring winds, horizontal rain, scared horses, hiding dogs, we were in a mini cyclone! Sunday afternoon, about 2:30pm, out of the west, a small, fast moving, intense storm cut a path through our property and many others for many kilometres, leaving trees down on roads and across power lines causing a blackout.

No power for 26 hours when you live in country NSW means no water because the tank water is fed into the house via a pressure pump, so no showers, and no flushing toilet (and the on site sewerage system is in danger of going off because there is no aeration pump, thankfully didn't happen). Hoses to chook houses and horse troughs were not working either, so out with the buckets and down to the horse shed to the only tank not fitted with a pressure pump. We have a gas cook top so having a cuppa and cooking dinner was easy enough. We use old kerosene lanterns on the verandah and in the garden so they came inside. 

As the hours wore on battery backup in our local telephone exchanges wore down and so the exchanges were off line. Mobile phone batteries flattened and put many more people out of the loop. 

We have 10kw of solar panels generating electricity everyday, but we cannot use this power as it is sold into the grid and we buy back from them. Annoying, but on any other day we are happy that we have a small income and don't think about not being able to use it directly.

Many years ago I lived an alternate lifestyle without grid power and had none of these problems, and now I realise how dependent we have become on electricity.

Daughter number 3 visited today and made me a peg rainbow to cheer me up.

  

Mmmm, I think our back door has been open too long! Summer and we live in the country, so the back door, which opens onto a large verandah, stays open to let cooler air in. A busy wasp has built a beautiful mud trumpet around a screw. Soon it will be filled with small spiders and insects in suspended animation. I don't know what wasp or how long I will have to leave the door open! And yes, the door is painted with chalk board paint and friends and family do leave messages on it.  

Grand daughter number 1 learning to ride on the old pony her aunt (daughter number 3) rode at pony club all those years ago. 

This is what she is aiming for, to be able to ride in the local show like her aunt (daughter number 2) does.

No ribbons this time, but they did have fun. 

And so back to making stuff.... using up bits and pieces, a 'nanna' purse,

and a little rosebud basket made from felt dyed with eucalyptus leaves, backed with linen. 

I like this shape, I will try creating some fabric with pieces of my rust and eucalyptus dyed

scrap stitched onto very stiff backing. Bigger next time, more useful. 

The Art soiree at the Show and nothing to wear! I rummaged the bag of goodies I brought back from India last year and made a sparkly jacket from a second hand saree. Worn over a dress from the back of my wardrobe and some more Indian bling.

Today is the busiest of our 2 show days, all the ring events, the goats and chooks are judged, the cavies and rabbits too. Kids pet show and grand parade in the afternoon. 

Hubby is a steward in the chook section, and daughter number 2 is competing in the ring on her large ex racehorse. She and the horse slept over at the showground last night with many others, today is an early start, there is so much to fit in. Daughters number 1 and 3, the grand daughters and I will cheer her on before we all have lunch in the CWA Ladies hall. They make the best scones and slices ever tasted, and their lunches are tasty too! https://www.facebook.com/CWA.Recipes

It will be a long day, finishing with fireworks. 

Showtime.....

One of my entries in 'any item made from paper or recycled materials', placed second. The competition was tough, I was beaten by a wall hanging made almost entirely of discarded muppet/sesame street toys!

The local Agricultural Show is in full swing, beginning this morning at 6am with Edwina from the Sunrise TV show doing live segments with excited local school students as a cheer squad. Go Gresford! More info here:

http://gresfordshow.com.au/ 

I and 3 other stewards spent the last 2 days sorting and displaying nearly 300 photographs for the Photography section. Judged yesterday they will be viewed by hundreds. I always like to see the locals' reactions to the 'People' category as they look for familiar faces in the photos. 

  

Mmmm, I sometimes wonder how the spiders get into the house. this little one hitched a ride from the chook house! He has since been relocated to the garden., or did he end up in my breakfast omelette?