Scatterdays X

I'm getting in early this week with my Scatterdays, this weeks letter is "X" but no categories jut 3 photos starting with X, be warned with last photo if a bit sqeamish....

this for me was real easy as last Sunday when I went to our local Trash 'n Treasure market I picked up a 1964 wooden Fisher Price Xylophone which no doubt will find it's way into a sculpture somewhere down the track,
I'm looking for any old kids wooden blocks, domino's or wooden game pieces of any sort, any one got any lurking in the shed?


I'm lucky enough to have a niece called Xandri, she is married to my only nephew Gerry and here I am with Xandri and their little boy Liam when I caught up with them in Melbourne before the SCQ'ers Bendigo retreat last year, isn't he cute.

Do I win with this one ------- Xray of my new hips

Scatterdays N

Life gets way to complicated sometimes, MIL is still in hospital but on the mend and then my mother goes and has a fall and has broken her wrist and hip, she has had surgery and is also on the mend thought a little slower than Tim's mum.

Our computer hasn't been happy with very intermittent coverage since the thunderstorm a few weeks ago but we finally now have a new wireless router installed that Mackenzie (15) got organised for us yesterday, so here is this weeks Scatterdays, better late than never.....

This weeks letter is "N" and the categories are, Little Things, Human and Mineral.
So I hijacked Mackenzies Nerds before they quickly disappeared.

Here is the "Human" Nana Noeline last xmas (MIL)

Now for Mineral we need to do a little searching, in there somewhere in the Multi Vitamins is a mineral starting with N, trust me it's there

this week

sorry, the wheels fell off my wagon this week, here's an update, there was no Scatterdays this week as we had to put MIL into hospital on the weekend with pneumonia, she's OK and on the mend, so I've been slightly distracted, I'll do my best for the next one.
I've also been tagged by Susan and will eventually get to that, as I need time to put every ones links onto my blog.

This is my "official" second painting (haven't finished the first one yet) that I've been working on in painting class over the past couple of weeks, I think it's finished but the teacher wants to double check this week before we declare it finished then I can get back to finishing the first one, I'm behind as I slotted into this class after I came back from working in Melbourne.

I must have a great back verandah cause I've had another little friend come to live with us, my Sydney Swans Gnome (Australian Rules Football) now I have to work out which player to name him after...... hey Erica, who has short fat legs and big feet in our team?????

At the Australian Quilt Convention (Melb) that I worked at recently they showcased the works of the ladies from the "Kopanang Project" I bought this piece from the wonderful display of work by ladies from a small town in South Africa, do a search for the project and see the wonderful work that these ladies are doing in empowering themselves to be able to support their families in tough times.
There were 2 ladies sitting there demonstrating how they work and I felt privileged to be able to purchase a piece and help a family.

Last week

Where has the week gone........
I had photos lined up to give you a round up of last week but this is the first chance I've had to try and string more than 3 words together.

I had a very productive week at Art School last week, I've been working on a series of pieces with cut up chair legs and blocks, I had bought these 3 great old frames at a trash n treasure market and a series was born.
I've shown you the first piece "No Leg to Stand On" a few posts ago but I've put a touch of colour on a few of the pieces, so I am happier with it now.

The second piece is called "Doing my Block"
Now this is aptly named as the 2 pieces are hanging in the gallery at Art School in the International Woman's Exhibition but the powers that be..... hung this one the wrong way, it was worked as a horizontal piece, now I'm not going to go into all the boring details but there were a few obvious signs of which way it should have been hung etc etc
so, this is the way I worked it, just imagine the dangly bits hanging down

and this is the 2 pieces hanging in the gallery

opinions please, the way I worked it OR the way it was hung.......

the 3rd piece is almost finished and I will be able to show you next week when I'm back in the Sculpture studio, it is a combination of the first 2 pieces.

Friday I was up in Sydney teaching a regular monthly class, the ladies are working on a mystery quilt - I can't show you any photos cause it's a mystery............
actually the photo blogger wouldn't accept for some reason, and Gladys was in it too

Saturday saw me teaching my monthly Fun with Fibre Techniques class, actually I don't think I showed the photo from the first class where the ladies made a piece of silk paper then made a bowl from the piece, hopefully they will bring them next time so I can photograph them, but this week they were doing needle felting with their domestic machines.
Dorothy made the bright blue long scarf and Chris made the 2 pink pieces that have since been made into a cute vest with purple velvet for her 2 yo grand daughter, hopefully I'll have a photo of that soon, the pink scarf was mine that I made while demonstrating the technique.

Scaterdays V

I've had a very busy week but had all of my photos sorted by Thursday but the computer has been not cooperating, so here I am a day late but getting there.
This weeks Scatterdays is the letter "V" and the categories are -
PINK -
and here is my favorite Pink Variegated King Tut thread

next is BIG -
while in the sculpture studio this week one of the other students was doing some plaster casting and here is her "Venus" with the big boobies and belly

and also on the end of my work bench in the studio is the Big Vice

next category is SIGNS -
if only I'd know I needed a V sign while at the airport recently and I could have taken a Virgin Airlines sign and I saw a Volvo Sign while driving on Friday and not able to stop to take it, so I went searching through my photo album and found these 2.
This is a Very Impressive Sign, not sure if Callan took this when he was in Korea or Tim took it in Japan, unfortunately I wasn't there to be impressed.

and this is just to show that the look on Mackenzies face is a SIGN that sometimes a piece of mud cake CAN be to big

New boots

LOOK WHAT I'VE GOT........
these are my steel capped work boots, needed for working in the Sculpture studio at school - aren't' they fabo

here are a couple of photos from the storm we had last week that fried our computer router, look at the build up of hail on the sail outside the window and the neighbours lawn is white with a carpet of hail

look at the size of this hailstone, MIL and I were standing next to each other at the back door looking out and could not hear each other, even when yelling, the noise was so loud, I really thought the skylights on the back verandah were going to shatter, I unfortunately got a few dents in my car from the pounding

new sculpture pieces

Last week was a bit of a whirlwind after arriving back from Melbourne on Monday night then it was straight back to art school for 3 days and thrown in the mix we had a doosie of a thunderstorm that blew up our router on the computers so was without the essential "outside" contact for a couple of days, so this week I'm trying to get back on track and hopefully will even get back to doing my Scaterdays on Saturdays.
I'm off to Sculpture class shortly which I now do Tuesdays and Wednesdays with Painting on Thursday mornings so here are the 2 pieces that I'm currently working on, this piece is chair legs that were rescued off local street clean up piles - other peoples rubbish mmmmmmmmmmmmm
may put some colour to dull down or brighten up some of the light cut ends

I bought a bag full of Barbies recently at a Trash n Treasure market along with blocks and this great clock face, not sure if this is how it will stay or if I will add more arms and legs....... but she has been hanging under the clock in our sculpture studio for the last week so I'll be interested to see what the reactions have been

I thought it was easy to pull arms and legs off dolls - not this baby, I had to put her in the vice and saw her legs off

Gladys and Janine's AQC adventure

We are finally back after our week in Melbourne at the Australian Quilt Convention (AQC), we had a very busy time with me working on one of the stands and Gladys swanning (or frogging) around being a camera hog and having her photo taken at every opportunity.
Here's Gladys checking out Lisa Waltons fab hand dyed fabrics and discussing travel tips with Peter, that's me behind her.

she snuck out of my bag while I was serving and decided to check out these great silk fabrics

and here she is swimming in Angelina fibres

we had breakfast with Jasmine and Tani before we flew home and why did everyone get so vocal when I stuck my hand in the hot chocolate

everyday that we came home from the show Tallulah gave me lots of cuddles and insisted on calling me "Spotty" ?