Back to the needle and thread

 My grandchildren will be back at school next week, I am wondering where oh where have those six weeks gone, it seems to me  they have gone far too quickly.     On Tuesday I did a bit of a panic, I have not touched any sewing since before Christmas and I would need to have something to do at my quilt group, which started back on Wednesday,  a quick rummage through the cupboard because, of course when I had visitors stay I did the usual quick clean up and just threw everything  into the cupboard.     With  everything sorted, which took some time because I had to tidy up as I went.    I  was eventually able to  settle with a cup of my current favourite tea, Liptons Orange Jaipur on my lounge and it was back to the needle and thread.     I have just started the stitchery on block five of "Butterfly Garden" by Leanne Beasley.     I know you may be thinking, is she ever going to finish this,   well,  yes I am, at least the top because I have ordered Gail Pans beautiful Christmas quilt as a block of the month and the first month will be arriving in February, if you want to view this quilt you can find Gail and her quilt here on Face book.   Hope you pop over to take a look, another one of our amazing Aussie designers and quilters.  Well enough time spent playing on the computer, back to the stitching.

Dried roses

I'm having a hard time getting my head around the fact that we are already in the middle of January.       These last few weeks have been pretty tough, just after Christmas I became very unwell, which meant a week of being confined to the house, it wasn't difficult while I was sick but  just as I was recovering from this and wanting to get out and about we were hit with a heatwave.       Five days of extreme temperatures, and boy was it hot   41c for three days and two around 44c.      I spent all day inside with the air-conditioner running full blast.  Trying to sleep during the night was almost impossible, there wasn't much sleep happening in our part of the world.          Most of the bush fires that were started by lightening and those deliberately lit have been extinguished and the fires that are still burning around the state are now under control.      It seems so strange that people on the other side of the world have been having their share of difficulties with a Polar Vortex,  while we were cooking here,  they were freezing over there.      The cool change went through over-night and I was able to survey the damage to the garden today.    

  My roses look like they have cooked on the bush, they felt like dried paper roses when I touched them, although they look beautiful even in this damaged state.