Goodbye Mum

I have posted this sampler before. It was the last one that I gave my Mum a few months ago for her birthday. Unfortunately for my family my Mum passed away just before 6 a.m. last Thursday morning. She had been very ill for a long time and was fighting her 4th bout of cancer. Although we knew that she was very ill and she would leave us soon when it actually happened it was a shock to all of us.

She had a terrible time from when she was admitted to a local private hospital on the Friday . She signed herself out on the Tuesday but we had to have her admitted to a public hospital on the Wednesday as my Dad and Sister couldn't lift her when she collapsed.

Thankfully for all of us that "The God's were Smiling on Her". From when the ambulance people came we met the most wonderful and caring people. She was admitted to Calvary Hospital which is a hospice on Wednesday afternoon and she had the most wonderful care from the nursing staff and Doctors. We think that she was so happy to be there that she decided that this was it and she left us.

I have been down with my Dad and Sister since Tuesday. Mum's funeral was yesterday and I came home last night to be with my DH and sons.

When I came home I had the most beautiful surprise. I love old fashion roses and everyone of them are currently in bloom along with poppies and other flowers. I have so many roses that I could supply a florist.

Also on the day that Mum passed away we had a lovely visit. My Mum used to love to feed the birds on her back veranda. Over the last couple of months she had been so ill and hadn't been able to feed them so that had stopped calling. On Thursday afternoon we were sitting around the dining table looking through the sliding doors when 2 Kookaburras came and landed on the veranda rail. They stayed with us for about and hour and a half and my husband and sons were feeding them. They allowed them to get right up close to them and I suppose that they could have touched them. My husband has a photo of them on this phone and if I can get it on the computer I will put it on my blog.

Sisters

I'm in a bit of a reflective mood today as I await news from my sister in regards to my Mum who has been re-admitted to hospital this morning. Mum has lung cancer and for the last week or so has been on oxygen at home. This morning she couldn't put up with the pain in her back any longer and had to be admitted for stronger pain killing help.

I thought that I would show you my collection of girls. Some of these reminds me of my sister and my self. The above one is by Carriage House Samplings and is called "Sisters".

The next three are my French Doll collection. I did these a long time ago when I was expecting one of my sons and they are very important to me. They all hang in my bedroom and I love to look at them. The first one always reminds me of my sister and I when we were little. I was a flower girl when one of my Aunts was married and my Mum has a photo of my sister and I dressed in pink and blue dresses.
These two are worked on very fine linen. Possibly 40 or higher, I can't remember. They are both done over 2 with one strand of DMc thread.
This one was done on 32ct over 2 with 2 strands of thread.
The following ones are of a piece of needlework that is also from Cross Stitch and Country Crafts Magazine. I like this because it always reminds me of a American Primitive Painting. I also have the graph for the little boy who matches her but I have never got around to doing him.

I tried to take close ups of this one as it not only contains cross over 2 but also over 1 and other specialty stitches, such as satin stitch french notes, lazy daisy, eyelet stitch etc. I always love her eyes as they and her brooch are done over one.


Suzanne at Squazi and the Chicken has nominated me for a "You make me Smile Award. I am greatly humbled by this and it made my day when she told me. When my head clears and I am able to sit down and work out who make me smile I will publish a post. (Also I have trouble linking them).

Thank you for all the lovely people who have been visiting my blog and leaving lovely comments. I love to travel around the world via my blog. I used to travel around the world with my sister before I was married and I have been to some beautiful places. Unfortunately I haven't been to America (she has) but I love England and Europe especially France and Italy.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Update on WIP and more Parrots in Bird Feeder

This is my process on Karen's Long Dog Sampler "The Token". It is moving along nicely and hopefully it will be finished late next week. I think I have 3 half motifs on the edges and a few small things to do along with A Token of Love motif. It is stitched on 40 ct linen and when it is finished and framed Karen is going to hang it in her shop Dragonfly Dreams. I hope she likes it.

We have a lot of beautiful birds fly into our garden. On the weekend we had a visit from about 12 Galahs. I was lucky enough to be able to photograph two of them in the bird feeder. The rest were on the ground. Sally our dog unfortunately likes to chase them every now and then. But we have to be careful of our neighbors cat who comes and stalks them. Luckily for all of the birds the cat and dog are too slow.

The one on the bottom is a Sulpher Crested Cockatoo. Lots of people usually have them in a cage. Usually we have a couple fly in and visit us every day, although if we have to many of them we go and chase them as they are a bit destructive. They will come into a garden and cut the stems off the flowers like poppies etc. half way up a stalk. They are notorious for destroying wood work around houses. Wooden railings on verandas are a particular favourite. My parents had to get a new steel railing around their veranda because of them.
A lot of the larger parrots usually fly in flocks and we often see them among the trees eating gum nuts or fruit in our fruit trees.

Most of the parrots that we see in our garden are the crimson Rozella's and King Parrots, Galahs, Sulpher Crested Cockatoos, Yellow Winged Black Cockatoos, Major Mitchells, Lorikeets. We have a Bower Bird down the back of the garden and occasionally we see them but they are very shy. We also have Gang Gangs but you don't see them very often. They are also parrots and are very beautiful.are really lucky we get to see Gang Gangs.

The Postman has been

I had a lovely surprise today. After I can back from rushing one of my sons up to the rural fire station for an urgent call out I discovered that the postman had been and left me a lovely surprise.

I had sent Joanie an old JCS magazine with the Virtue Sampler in it and she has sent me back 2 samplers that were on my wish list. They are both from Scarlet Letter. One is Margaret Gibson 1839 and the other is Marion Robertson 1834. They are both Scottish samplers and I have admired them both for a long time. She also sent me a couple of smaller charts which I quite like

After I settled down from all the excitement of rushing to catch fire engines which by the way turned out to be a false alarm. The fire was supposed to be somewhere near where I live, which at the time was a real worry. When I sat down with a cup of tea I had a real good look and thought how amazing they were. I don't know which one to do first although I am leaning towards Margaret Gibson for some reason.

I would just like to say to Joanie (I have sent her an e-mail) how thrilled and excited I am to receive her generous gift. I hope that she enjoys working on the True Virtue sampler as much as I did.

I thought I'd show you my small collection of Just Nan ornaments. I have made them into Christmas ornaments. I think I have another one to do somewhere. I think they are lovely. My favourite is the one with the fairy in the front.
My youngest son took this photo of the parrots in our plum tree the other day. The big beautiful one with the red and green feathers is a male King Parrot. The female is just plain green. They usually mate for life. The other one is a Crimson Rozella. We always have lots of parrots in our garden. I have a few fruit trees and they like getting amongst them although I have 2 cherry trees and we have to fight them to get a feed.

Sampler from Sampler & Antique Needlework

This is a sampler that I did a few years ago. It is from Sampler & Antique Needlework Magazine from a few years ago.

I like the Rhode Island style samplers. I have posted the above sampler before. This one is from Treasures in Needlework and is called "The American Sampler". It is one of my favourite samplers.

I have another graph of a Rhode Island style sampler and it is called "The Wisdom Sampler". It saw it quite a few years ago as a kit and it is only recently that I have been able to get it. It is on my "to do list". There is just something about them that I really like.

Have you checked out the new Needleprint website. All I can say is that it is beautiful. The website to check it out if you haven't is www.needleprint.com.

Today in the mountains we are having extreme fire weather again. Its very windy, the humidity is dropping and the temperature is rising. All the Rural Fire Stations all over the State are on standby. On Wednesday we had one of these days and we ended up with a few fires. One was at Wentworth Falls not far away from here. It was started by 2 - 11 year boys playing with matches. They are in BIG trouble. It was in the bush but a lot of houses were in danger. I suppose thats what happens when you have children on school holidays and with not much to do.

Its amazing the fire season is only 6 days old and already we have had quite a lot of serious fires. One poor person has lost his house up at Port Stephens and a lot of sheds etc. have been lost also.

Christmas Decorations

These are some of my Christmas decorations that I have made and collected over the years. I love angels, sheep and Father Christmas's. The angel and Rudolf are from The Stitcher. The sheep us from JCS Christmas Ornaments from a few years ago. (I'm too lazy to go and check which issues,

And the Santa's are both from an old issue of The Stitcher.
I love both of these one is fat and the other is skinny. I usually put these out at Christmas with my growing Nutcracker Collection. Unfortunately my house is not that large and where I used to put my Christmas Tree my husband has put the computer. I'll have to get a small tree so that I can put it up on my coffee table. I usually try to decorate the house with other things. But I have to admit that I do miss my tree. Last year I made a couple of ornaments to put away for "whenever" but one of sons kept asking me for them to give away to people as presents. I had these beautiful red angels with lavender inside that he gave away. I'll have to make myself some more before Christmas this year.