Wild and Woolly

Good ol' Australia Day was wild and woolly again! Australia seems to like to take this opportunity to remind us what a tough cookie she really is. Flood and fire seem to have become the new normal in January.

The Big Fella woke very early this morning to don his new uniform and spent the rest of the day getting it very dirty. We are very proud of him and all the other volunteers who are working in this deluge tarping houses, cutting trees, sandbagging property and making tea and sandwiches and fried rice.

There's your Australia Day spirit, right there.

Back home, we got up later to find a white out over the mountains, water everywhere but the wild winds had thankfully eased a bit since yesterday.

The last day of holidays with five chillun hunkered down in the house proved to be fairly chilled out although there may have been some cyber baby sitting by day three. Pale but interesting, B1 ironically has peeling shoulders from the heat wave last week!

Others may have had too much screen already and amused themselves in other ways.

There was important bomb diving to be done to empty the overflowing pool...

and it was finally cool enough to finish connecting the squares on the everlasting radioactive rug. This is the woolly bit. When it was finally all joined up I began the less tedious job of hooking a big, wide border around it. If it stays cool it might get done this week!

For the first time in nine years I did not wrangle Contact paper and cover books. One year, I suffered two full days and a plague of flying ants to cover and label all their stuff. This year the youngest two insisted it was way uncool to cover books in year 5 and year 7. I paid them $5 each to label their own stuff and am not even going to check it. NOT!

Between loads of drying and heating pies and pizzas and cups of tea, I had my own screen time to enjoy. After some of this it was time for a fillum.

"Annie" was promptly  canned before Lala's 187th viewing and I got to choose MY film. You tell me which was more appropriate! They all skulked out within the first half hour but I cared not. For I had my hook, my three year old and Debbie Reynolds to keep the day humming along. 

Vo-do-dee-oh, vo-do-dee-ody-ody.....

Our thoughts are with all of those without homes at the moment, hoping it is over soon and that nobody is alone in this.

Hookery Pokery

There has been a little more hookery going on although it is not the most seasonal activity. My niece told her mother that she liked the big bag I made a while ago so I've made her a smaller version for Christmas. Yes it's late but it'll be Sydney-side very soon.

 

It follows the Attic 24 pattern (sort of) until it got to the size I wanted then I just went straight up. I used treble where she uses a tighter double crochet stitch.

 We used to call these dilly bags when I was a child. The draw string was an add on, just crocheting up a long piece of chain stitch and threading it through every two stitches. The flowers just look pretty and stop it coming undone. These two were left over from the other bag.

I'm thinking a black and white one in cotton yarn might be noice in a Dr Seuss kind of way.

In further hookery news, the radium rug is almost done. Only three (tedious) rows to go crocheting the turquoise border to join them up as I go. The momentum is running down. 

My crochet mojo is finally slowing after enjoying quite the revival through last year. How many rugs do you really need in the sub tropics? Regardless,  I'd like to have one for each child so there may be a stripey theme for next winter's boy rugs to come.

Meanwhile back at GOMA for some more Gomalicious indulgence.....

The way in...

Seeing...

Doing....

NOT touching...

Shooting...

Lala went Dada and was moved to photograph these visually arresting pieces...

The way out....

They got all Dr Who on me in the zombie tunnels. Rest assured, this only happens if you over Goma-ise yourself with more than two visits in three days. Normal transmission has resumed.

Purple haze

Ah, Brisbania! How I love you in Jacaranda season! 

All over town the purple glory of the jacaranda trees is signalling uni students to hit the books and the rest of us to prepare for summer. 

Everywhere you look they are bursting out like marvellous mauve fireworks.

They dot the entire landscape all over Brisbane with their joyful promise of balmy holidays and new life.

Other things are growing around here too. The next hookin' is a cookin'. Good old granny squares this time because I need something to put me to sleep at night.

The pile of rainbow wool is slowly being used up and has nearly seen me through the whole tedious ordeal of the last eight months. Treble, treble, chain, chain.... breathe in, breathe out. All those little mantras help to put one foot in front of the other closer to the end of the treatment. 

Meanwhile, something else is starting to grow around here and I don't mean the mess in the kitchen. The Tibetan nun look is very happening this year don't you know? Must be Spring!