I tried another outing into the square. This time it was the chili making contest.
I only saw two people I knew…both men from the morning coffee gathering. I put all my tickets in the one jar but found out this morning he did not win. But I did last a half hour smiling and tasting chili and pumpkin offerings.
My walk back down the hill was preferable to eating any more samples.
Past some lovely fall trees.
The night before the chili contest I went with friends to a very good restaurant in town. It was nice to be waited on, have a lovely wine and company before coming back home for more conversation.
Over the weekend I stayed home to work on the garage and locate the last of the books that needed to come inside. I wanted to locate my carving tools because I am getting itchy to make marks in wood. I am thinking that the Burke and Wills Story would be nice done in wood cuts. And now need to find enough small blocks of wood to get started.
Saturday was spent putting things away once they were moved to the house and doing laundry.
Sunday was baking a loaf of pumpkin, banana, walnut and maple bread.
And I got another drawing in the Meadow Book.
The only way to get better is to keep doing it. I photographed this favorite tree that is on my walk the other side of the meadow.
I love how it presents itself to anyone who will look at it. Every single Eucalyptus in Australia does this….leans in and spreads its branches out to get your attention. I used this one for the model of where Burke and Wills spend several years. You can see the door near the base and an upper circular window that Burke sometimes uses. I wonder whether I am more content being by myself and in the company of a good imagination than out there in the public.
I did try to find out if there was a sewing group in the area. I went to the local quilt store on their day for people to bring in what they were working on and sit and sew. Thank goodness I was smart enough to just go in as a customer looking for thread. You can tell if the store caters to hand sewers by looking over their threads. Good grief!! Only a few odds and ends of very pale embroidery thread. A few balled spools of mercerized cotton…mostly off white but a couple deep indigo ones that I selected one of and headed to the register. All the fabrics, and there were plenty, were those crispy feeling cottons for quilt making. Nothing in there felt good to the touch. There was not even a package of cheese cloth! I paid over five dollars for the one spool pf thread and was told that the store was for machine users only.
It reminded me of when I first moved to the area thirty years ago and was invited to the local fiber group meeting. I was told to bring what I was working on and talk about it. I took the first of the Sarajevo coats about the war going on there. They were passably polite, uninterested and eager to get back to their discussions on craftmanship and marketability. I slipped into the kitchen to see what refreshments were on order only to find some of their children, that they take everywhere, smearing the cream cheese they had wiped off the treats into the cracks in the floor boards. I did not go back.
Anyway, I am getting myself ready to start carving and pull out my little scraps of cloth to stitch together. I miss working on these pieces from last year.
It is supposed to get quite cold tonight so I will head inro the meadow to see the changes before I get out my necessary tools to start something new.
The crows are gathering so one might be the next addition to the Meadow Book.
I bought myself a steamer to try on my clothes. Even though I love ironing, steaming wrinkles from clothes left too long in boxes seemed a good idea.
More later