Glorious sunny day

Today is beautiful. I am not going to spend much time at the keyboard because I want to go back outside. I haven't felt that keen to be outside in a long time. I have to be careful and wear a hat since the surgeries, in fact I should always wear a hat and would not have needed surgeries if I had been in the habit. Australia did itself a disservice when hats went out of fashion. Primary schools(elementary) have a sun safe hat policy across the country but the moment most of the children reach their teens, hats become anathema. Maybe some celebrity needs to be pro hat and make it part of their beauty routine for it to catch on again.

I spent the morning wandering through two magnificent gardens. It was an open garden fundraiser for the Warrnambool Coast Guard. http://coastguard.com.au/ I was perfectly content to wander the dappled shade and watch the sunlight dance across the water.

 The flowers were in full bloom. The first house has an orchard and a long lawn with a hedge leading down to the jetty, vibrant garden beds around the house and plenty of shady well established trees. This gentleman has also built palaces for his chooks and aviary. The fronts of both are gable roofed cabins with the wired in fly zone behind the cabins. A lovely timber and galvanised iron fence creates a semi circle separating the bird palaces from the lawn. This is a garden worth seeing just for the work that has been put into making it an interesting place to visit. I suspect the grandchildren love it.

 Both properties have the Merri river running behind them and the owners make good use of this with their own little boat sheds and jetties.

A man made dam in one property had remote control miniature boats on display.

 The boat display showed a high level of skill from the boat builders and enthusiasts.

 This is the view from the verandah behind the first house. The garden rolls gently down to the river directly ahead and is quite extensive with the bird palaces and shetland pony paddocks to the left and large shady trees lining the border between properties to the right.

 The second property had a stand of silver birch. I am not a big fan of having non indegenous species in a garden but I must admit I do love silver birch.

 Both garden owners had provided plenty of shaded seating to relax and listen to the abundance of bird life and watch the river lazily rolling by.

I include pictures of ponies for the 'awww' factor that I am sure my daughter darling will say. 

Behind this jetty and just to the left of where I was sitting under a shady tree is a small boat house that is decked out to be very livable. The owner said that he and his wife have often slept in the boat house on very hot nights to take advantage of the cool breeze across the water.  How delightful. These are the kind of gardens I dream of. Plenty of smooth soft lawn, big shady trees and cool bubbling water flowing nearby.

I am so grateful to have the privilege of wandering through these little bits of paradise and for such a good cause.







Writing and art.

Nanowrimo started off well with 19000 words in the first week. Piboidmo had an idea for every day and skadamo was skidding ink and pencil across paper. Week two I had my little grandson so not one word was written as ti is difficult I discovered to juggle a baby, a bottle, a nappy(diaper) and all the rest of the household and type as well. Week two slid by with all sorts of other things going on the highlight of which was attending the  Regional Design Awards night
http://www.regionaldesignawards.com.au/

I attended the evening with my friend Wendy Coyle, a fellow writer who had entered the design awards with her 'app'. She was not a finalist but she entered and that is the biggest step and she had some awesome competition for the awards. The venue was terrific for such an event although i would have preferred a seat to standing for almost two hours. The crowd was made up of trendy designers and would be designers, sponsors, organisers and me.

It was at: The Artery, 224 Timor Street, Warrnambool
When: 7pm Friday 21 November 2014
I was able to meet the guest speakers  who were

Kane Hibberd (aka Kanye Lens)

With over a decade of experience working within the music industry in various roles, Kane Hibberd is well educated in music. He created "The Art Of Capture" which has quickly gained the attention of the international music community. In 2010 he was recognised as one of the leading rock photographers in the world by British music magazine NME. Hibberd was announced as the second place-getter in the rock bible’s first annual Music Photography Awards.
With his focus set on producing captivating, inventive and emotive images as well as capturing those one-off rock’n’roll moments, Hibberd regularly shoots commissioned work for music publications such as Rolling Stone, Metal Hammer, Blunt, Rocksound, Alternative Press, and The music – his work has often graced the covers of many of these publications. His busy schedule has led Hibberd to work with a diverse array of top international and Australian artists such as, Cut Copy, The Living End, Paramore, Hilltop Hoods, Birds Of Tokyo, The Temper Trap, Gotye, 360 and Them Crooked Vultures. His services are in demand around the country with clients that include EMI/ Universal Music, Warner Music, Eleven, Mushroom Group, UNFD, Sony, Street Press Australia, Next Media and Future Media.
Hibberd is the official tour photographer for Soundwave Festival, Harvest Festival, Stagemothers Aussie BBQ SXSW, Pyramid Rock Festival and the Melbourne leg of Laneway Festival.
2013 saw Kane independently publish his first book under his alter ego, Kanye Lens. A nickname given to him on tour many moons ago. Kanye Lens Vs Soundwave Volume 1 is a 454 page hard cover coffee table style photography book presenting an in depth look at his work with Australia’s Soundwave Music Festival.
2013 also saw Kane speak at the annual AgIdeas conference, Big Sound Music & Design as well as being selected as a finalist in the Moran contemporary photographic price.
To view an online portfolio:
www.theartofcapture.com
www.kanyelens.com

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Mark Haynes

Mark worked at various ad agencies and studios before establishing Haynes Design in 1989. Mark is passionate about community, education and generating social change by sharing his 30 years of skills and knowledge gained through the design process, problem solving, innovation and design thinking.
Mark is the co founder and chair of Cultivator Inc, a community focused non-profit organisation established 2010. Cultivator is a dynamic annual event that brings together inspirational guest speakers from varied backgrounds both nationally and internationally, encouraging design thinking and problem solving to create better communities. www.cultivator.net.au
In 2012 Mark assisted the establishment of the first regional branch of the Australian Graphic Design Association. As the chair he provides leadership and governance to the local design industry.

 Then the awards were presented.  Finger food circulated and glasses clinked quietly. Someone had the good sense to turn down the ambient music so we could actually hear the speakers and I found a nice wide window ledge to lean against. it was too high for me to actually sit on but it did provide a nice ledge for me to sit my glass of juice and rest my back.  I was fascinated by the various designs for the different categories and I recommend you take a look at the website. There are some very clever people in the world and I am always on the lookout for ideas for my own art. Ohh and there was a particular finger food which involved Yorkshire pudding, slivers of roast beef, caramelised onion relish and hollandaise sauce. It was scrumdiddlyumtious and I have purchased some dripping to make the Yorkshire puddings. Louis is you read this we need a cook off.

So art I have done over the past non writing time has mostly been for the 52 week challenge. We had the theme New York and since the only things I know about New York come from movies, TV and magazines I managed to make a montage of images that capture what I don't know.

New York comes across as busy, brash, egocentric, aggressive, loud, crowded and interesting. I would like to visit it at least once in my life. I have had several young friends visit and fall in love with the place so it certainly must have something going for it.

A young friend and her mother decided to make a memory quilt for her son's first birthday. She asked all the guests to create a calico panel with wishes and thoughts for her son to be made up into a quilt.
(here are a few links on how to melt crayons to use in various projects but there are hundreds... http://kidsactivitiesblog.com/17374/wax-crayon-art   http://www.instructables.com/id/Melted-Crayon-Art/   http://crafts.creativebug.com/use-color-crayons-fabric-1536.html  )  and here are the images my family made.

friendship begins in amazing places and this is the square from one small boy to another.

 something cute and circus from 'da  nerdy boyz'

Pop culture references which my daughter darling filled her calico square with.

I love making art for specific people especially birthday cards.

I am also doing sketches every day for SkaDaMo so my folders are filling up with art. I love doing any little tutorial I can fit into my day so I am learning a lot of things from generous artists around the world who youtube their skills and my thanks go out to them but now for words and words and more words.


Next week I intend making my 50k word count which will require huge word counts daily so I managed to get ahead with my art. The theme for next week is Fox. Life is always busy and it pays to get ahead and be organised so I will just go clean the bathroom... kidding.

Happy birthday to my favourite twin girls. Paula and Adele. I enjoyed myself at both of your parties and I am so happy to be part of celebrating your coming of age.

and congratulations Dana and Joel, may your future together be filled with love and joy and plenty of adventures.


A special thought came through one of the many speeches I have heard this week. Celebrate the small successes. Take time to be in the moment and simply enjoy each one before moving on. I need to do that.


May you have a wonder filled time until next we meet. <3 Love and hugs.