Slack week

After last week's sewing and binding frenzy I have been a bit slack in the sewing dept. All four quilts were finished and delivered to the hospital

I only took one finished photo, I am sure there are photos if the others on previous posts.

David has a new bike, a trike with a battery,  there he is disappearing into the distance 🤣

He can no longer balance on his regular bike so needed this to still get some exercise.  I have had a go up the back yard and found it really hard to steer, need more practise!! 

We have had some lovely sunny days so walking has been a pleasure

This pelican had the best spot to watch the fishermen come back in

I have visited Finn a couple of times, he is getting ready to crawl

And was ready for dinner, mashed carrots 🥕 and apple 🍎 with a side of green beans ! Looks like he is getting his 6th tooth coming through.

I got Finn some new socks, with silicon/rubber soles, he thinks they are wonderful for chewing!! 

I have been doing a little knitting, it will be for a KOGO blanket, probably will take me a long time! 

A new Christmas Tomte came home with me yesterday, he has a light inside his belly

This mess is the tea towel challenge I need to get finished. I decided to make a table cloth for outside,  it will be double sided as I have lots of tea towels to use up.

It is a beautiful sunny day today

So more gardening might happen - I did an hour and a half yesterday, gave the weeds a fright and spread some mulch. I was given 2 tomato seedlings and a cucumber plant yesterday so need to get them into the garden. Now I need to finish a letter, happy stitching. 

Finn

Is now 7 months old, the time has gone by very quickly for me

Checking I am watching 😁

He is a happy little chap and loves his Mum and Dad

And enjoys a walk

I have an appt with the cerebrovascular consultant this morning, via Telehealth, so far I have been waiting 42 minutes, much better than sitting in the waiting room because I can do this

Slowly a new jumper is being made.

Off to wait some more

Happy stitching.

FNWF and zooming with Chooky and friends

 Last Friday was Friday Night with Friends, hosted by the lovely Cheryll,

I decided to get stuck into my knitting, I was on the first sleeve of my baggy winter jumper

I didn't take a photo of where I finished Friday night, but I carried on while zooming with Chooky and friends next morning

We have a name and logo! 

These ladies were stitching away when I joined in

Later there were more. I lost connection and as I was cold decided to go off for a bike ride

Cloudy and windy but it was a good ride, until I got to the shops where there many people, I forgot it was the school holidays, so I diverted off and rode around the side streets instead of following the beach path.

A few hopeful pelicans were waiting by the boat ramp.

Back home I did some weeding, a little too much I think as I have pulled a muscle in my back, something I often do when I garden for too long! I should know better, but you know how it is when you are so close to getting an area finished.....

Sunday I drove up to Gisborne for a sit and sew with the City Girls, Tracee our host and Margaret.

Margaret's quilt Farm Sweet Farm, quilted by Tracee, stunning quilt

This is a fantastic group of ladies, we have so many laughs together

Tracee, Margaret, Gail, Annie, Anne, Robyn, Marina, and me.

We had a lovely lunch created by Tracee and lost of yummy nibbles to pick at while chatting and stitching. We all met thru blogging and have known each other for over 10 years now. We have not been able to have a catch up because of the virus and lockdowns for nearly three years so yesterday was a special day. I always come away from these catch up days feeling so happy. Photo kindly taken by Phil Tracee's partner.

Tracee's dog Justice enjoying the love!!  (Sorry for the fuzzy photo)

So with knitting Friday night and Saturday the sleeve is finished

and the second one on the way.

It has been a wonderful weekend of stitching, chatting and catching up with special friends.

Happy stitching.

This and that

 Not a lot of sewing has been happening here as my sewing room is packed up. The flooring man has been here since Tuesday and has been working like a mad man and the flooring is getting done.

sewing room before the flooring, this room caused a few blue words as apparently it is not square!!

main room with new sheeting laid and levelled,

first few vinyl planks down.

both ensuite and bathroom have been levelled again, plus we have a little ramp between ensuite and walk in robe as one floor was higher than the other.

Thursday evening, half of main floor done, kitchen and pantry done

sewing room and hallway to back door done,

and the spare bedroom done. Fingers crossed it will be completed today and then the builder can come Monday and start putting the kitchen in.

I bought this lovely wool when we were up in Gisborne, so have been knitting in the evenings. Did you know knitting can be a dangerous activity?? Last Sunday I was rushing out the door, my canvas knitting bag caught in the door jamb and knitting needles went through the bag, through my jeans and into my leg! I had to pull the needles out, one went in about an inch. There wasn't much bleeding just me in minor shock. Monday I went to the Dr had a tetanus jab and was given antibiotics, the punctures are healing well - I will be a lot more careful in future!! Lesson learned 😊

I am working my way through a pile of books from the library, this is the current read and I am enjoying it, past and present in a small Australian town that had Chinese gold miners. 

Tomorrow is the 10th birthday of Chooky's Chookshed so a zoom will be happening, I shall ready some hexies and join in with the celebrations. Might see you there?

Happy stitching.

This and that

Last week or was it earlier this week hubby and I drive up to Gisborne to collect a quilt Traceee of Hummingbird Quilting. She has done a beautiful job, I am very happy.

I have been stitching away on the hexies and have made good progress

I started some knitting in the car on the way to Gisborne, 

the colour is more watermelon  it looks very bright in the photo 📸 , this will be a dish cloth. I found two balls of wool.when packing and sorting so thought I would get knitting. 

A few more cropped diamonds have been sewn together 

slowly but surely making progress, I have lots more scraps to stamp and cut.

The footie is on this afternoon, Richmond is playing so Adam is here with the dogs  Tira is watching the world go by outside

Hank is patrolling and checking everything in the house

I had better be off now and do some stitching.

Happy days.

Care Update

Radius Matua Update: 29 May 2020

Friday is always a relaxed good vibe day at Radius Matua, I am not sure why that is but if you think about everyone looks forward to Friday during their working lives. It is probably that ingrained feeling that stays with people even as they are long retired or it could be  the afternoon ……happy hour. J

No matter what it is, it is a nice feeling to see happy smiling people around and hear laughter.

It has been building up for the week as I have mentioned in more than one newsletter this week, but today is our Kitchen Manager Dianna Cook’s last day. We have had several farewell celebrations but today we all brought a plate and had a nice morning tea for her. Penny our HR/Contracts administrator (and world-renowned walker, cake maker and Health care assistant) made an amazing cake for Diana (I hope the photo below does it justice). There were more tears than tea at the farewell, I had to be assured the sniffing was tears and not Covid!!!)

Today was definitely a fun day for the residents, this morning they had the Matua Primary school children read to them………via the Zoom technology and played on our big screen. I have put the photo of the residents watching that. Technology is great for this Covid time and has taught us all how to adapt to non face-to-face activities. Following the reading the students took the resident’s on a virtual tour of their school. Awesome thinking Matua.

 

Activities today:

Happy hour – Friday drinks and nibbles.

Van trips- The hospital and Lavender residents went on the 2 trips today; it was the “Tauranga Tiki Tour” covering most of our beautiful city.

Queen’s birthday display – residents have been able to enjoy the display in the main hall (despite our queen not having a head) ……………Henry the V111’s fault perhaps??

Well that is it for the daily updates, I will contact you all again on Fridays from here on in.

Keep safe….great news that there is only 1 live case throughout NZ at the moment and 7 days in a row with zero new cases. J

Craig Shipton

Facility Manager

Radius Matua

Nice to see the back of my mothers head in the bottom right of the above photo! Nice to see she has watched the Zoom session with the children from the local primary school.

During the week I walked down to the shops, a 4.5km round trip, it was foggy when I started out

Nice to see the pelicans have returned with the resuming of fishing

Heading home the sun had come out and it was a beautiful day.

Jenny (in NZ) has been at home for the best part of three months, she works in a bank, the banks were closed and being just over 60, it was decided she was a person at risk, I have no idea why and she is super healthy and rarely gets a cold. It was hard for her at home for so long but she did get lots of knitting done, she made this KOGO blanket and I did the crochet around the edge. There are a couple of endy bits to tidy up and it is ready for delivery.

The Aussie hero quilt, beach and all things related themed, is nearly done, just the label and letter to go, then it is ready to go in the post. The surf board fabric came from Hawaii, so fits in with the request nicely.

One of the Guild ladies made this quilt, the backing and binding to go with it, I quilted it and finished it off. It has lovely squares with Pooh and Piglet.

The quilt was made by Jill of the Bellarine Quilters, I did the quilting and binding, another ready for delivery to SJOG.

The knitting is progressing slowly...

as are the hearts, another 4 completed.

One cache I found this afternoon over near Queenscliff, it was in cutty grass, not pleasant stuff to search through.

It was a lovely afternoon at Queenscliff, I had a wander along the beach, watched a huge container ship go out to sea, watched small boats heading out fishing a sail boat glided by, while I sneakily reached into a bush for a cache!! You wouldn't know from this photo but there were a few people about behind me.

We were supposed to have a cold rainy day today but so far it has not eventuated, maybe tomorrow.

I am off now to do some sewing.

Happy sewing.