The possum has landed ....

I have had a comment from Kathy to say that her prize has arrived, so I can now reveal the possum: I love these mugs with Australian animals and flowers, so a possum mug seemed very appropriate. There is also a piece of fabric with Australian wildflowers, some sock wool imported by Bendigo Woollen Mills, postcards from " A Cavalcade of Fashion" - I love the embroidery detail - and a Nikki Tervo thing for your scissors so you don't lose them all the time (mmm - wonder who does that?), which is, don't faint, "Made in Australia"! There is a name for those things, but I can't recall it, offhand. So, thanks again for participating, Kathy and everyone else. It was fun.

We had three kookaburra visitors this morning -

I love their fluffy chests and the beautiful blue on their wings - unfortunately the camera doesn't do them justice.

I spent today with a very dear friend , spending her money, and shamefully, buying myself a ring. I still can't believe I did it, but having done it, I intend to enjoy it (apart from the momentary senses of panic I get at the thought of having spent such a lot of money on myself). The woman in the jeweller's shop assured me that I was on the cusp of a brand new life where I would acquire a wonderful collection of "jewels" - I haven't told Grandpa Flea that this is only the beginning - ssshhhhh - not a word! he might hear!! Tomorrow - the Lyn Johnson workshop. It's probably illegal to have so much fun in one weekend!

Is that knitting content??!!

Oh yes - at last. I have at last finished the Noro Eloise cardi for the oldest Flea - this will no doubt elicit many rude words from youngest Flea Katie, and her partner FiFi who will remind me of the Jo Sharp jumper I started for FiFi some years ago - it was a wide loose fitting style, but FiFi wanted it much shorter with longer sleeves. It languished half done for months because I couldn't bring myself to make it shorter when all the cold air would just circulate up the body - when I eventualy checked the fitting, it was too big (in MHO) so despite FiFi's protestations, I frogged it - then reknitted it - and it was too small - so I gave it to my DIL. Every time I see Katie & FiFi they give me stick! When I mentioned this to eldest daughter, she reminded me that she's been waiting for a handknit for longer than we have known FiFi ...... still, I MUST do the FiFi jumper - I just don't think I can face that Jo Sharp pattern again - it was a pain to knit. Mmmm - maybe I feel another Eloise coming on in a different colour.

Eldest daughter's Eloise is longer than the pattern - I humoured her on this despite my reservations. I used knitting in elastic with the yarn because my own Eloise has stretched so much - the fact that I have worn it nearly every day for the last 10 months hasn't helped! Originally I was just going to put it in the ribbed part, but decided to do it all over as my own was getting bigger by the day. The elastic made the fabric much firmer and denser, but I like it.

Last weekend while the 11 year old little Flea was here she spotted a scarf at Cherryhills and wanted one - that instant - BUT (why do my family always want variations?) she wanted pockets at each end for her hands. The yarn is Funky Fur (or some similar name) and the scarf was done on 10mm needles, so the pockets stretched when sewn up and I had to gather the tops in, but it should do the trick. Ms 11 has just read Roxie's book - Sanna, Sorceress Apprentice. She loved it, and can't wait for the next in the series. I loved it too - Roxie writes very well (and I'm very critical), and it is a delightful story incorporating Roxie's love of knitting. Apart from nagging me to ask Roxie to give her a pre-release version of the book (which I declined to do, as I want to buy her one for Christmas so she can have a matched set - and I also want to support Roxie's foray into the world of publishing), Ms 11 was very keen for me to knit her a pair of self heating mittens, the pattern for which is in the book. Unfortunately, I flunked out of sorceress school, apart from a low grade in ESP, so I can do the mittens (if I ever get the book back - it's been reread at least once) but can't do the self-heating part. She also has a yen for a bag that is bigger on the inside than the outside - you can see it hanging from Sanna's waist on the cover of the book. I must admit to a hankering for one of those too! Guess I'll have to go back to sorceress school! I asked Ms 11 to do a book review - here it is as left on the voice mail:

"Hi Grandma - and Pa - can't forget about you, Pa - just calling and here's my book review. I finished it in 2 days which is a new record for that sort of book, Grandma. And here's my book review. It was funny, romantic and very obvious that the writer is also a knitter. I couldn't put it down and I can't wait for the next one, however I think the ending was a bit short and that it didn't finish well - it could go on a bit longer and I never found out what happened to that cape, unless I skipped some. Would you please knit me a pair of self heating mittens, thank you. That's what I've written down on a piece of paper, but I still stand by that the ending was very, very short. He arrives and then he just says some stuff and he leaves. And then you're sort of left with the impression that the horse is just standing there and you want the book to go on. So, all in all, I think it depends on the sort of 11 year old reader. If it's someone who's into books, they'd enjoy it. And if it's someone who really isn't into books and more into, like, magic and sorcery, they should also enjoy it, but if it was someone who wasn't into things like that, they should also enjoy it. I keep laughing when I think of the power gem in Sanna's mouth, with the two chains coming out of her mouth. " (There is more, but I have mislaid the piece of paper I transcribed it on. I will post it, Roxie, as soon as I find it.)

I have explained to Ms 11, that books with sequels always leave you wanting more - but she still wants the contents of the NEXT book, in this one! I think you have a hit on your hands here, Roxie.

CORRECTION
I said in my last post that the glider possum was a squirrel possum glider, but after talking to the Council's wildlife officer today, and checking the internet again, I realise it is a sugar glider.

I'm doing a workshop at Cherryhills on Sunday with Lynne Johnson - I'm really looking forward to it.

Sometimes life gets in the way of blogging ....

Sometimes life gets in the way of blogging - and the jetlag from that knitting trip around the world didn't help! But it was fun. Kathy should receive her prize soon - I only posted it last Friday (sorry, Kathy) - but there has been a lot happening. I hope you like it - a small possum is involved!
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The three big Fleas accompanied by various partners and baby Fleas congregated here, recently, to work out what they wanted to take from the various pieces of furniture that won't fit in our new, yet-to-be-completed, downsized home. It was lovely to have them all together, for the last time, in the home where they grew up. The eldest Flea was three weeks old when we moved in. The builder had gone bankrupt early in the piece, and we had lost money in the process. I was pregnant and had to work until later than we had intended and had no sooner left work than I was put to bed with toxiaemia. Meanwhile, Grandpa Flea would come home and tell me that the tiles (or whatever) we had chosen weren't available, so "choose one of these" that the builder had given him. The builder who finished the house was a darling and let some of our friends, who were tradesmen, do the electricals and plumbing, which meant that Grandpa Flea could labour for them on holidays and weekends to save money that way. We were on a short term lease in a small flat, in a house which had been sold, so we HAD to move out just after the baby was born. Again, another darling, the bank manager, came to our aid and let us move into the house before it was painted. And then our friends came and helped do the painting. So, despite the financial hardship, we were very lucky.

But I've become distracted - in the process of prowling around the closed-in storage area under the house, yet another possum guest (pictured above) reared his/her head to inspect the intruders, then went quickly back to sleep - although I suspect it was operating on the principle that if it couldn't see us, we didn't exist!

We have had a bit of a possum party recently. One night there were two little glider possums on the feeding tray with a rather nose-out-of-joint brushtail, peering down from a higher branch. I haven't seen this particular little glider possum before - it has a long tail like the brushtail, but is much, much smaller. I think it is a squirrel glider, but have to check it out further. Squirrel gliders are on the "vulnerable species" list.

Glider possums have a flap of skin between their front and back legs. There is different fur on the underside of the flap.If you look carefully at these photos (below on the right) you can see the edge of the flap - it looks white/cream along the side of the possum.




I haven't cropped the first photo so you can see the difference in size between the brushtail (the large, blurry shape reaching the feeding tray on the left) and the glider (in focus on the lower right). The other little glider hid on the other side of the tree when the brushtail buzzed them off.
Our new house is taking shape - slowly. There has been a lot of rain which has delayed things, but after beginning to believe that the end of the world was nigh, with the lengthy years of drought and the water crisis, I am not complaining. We are able to stay in our present home until the very day we leave to go to India, as the new owners wanted an extension to the settlement date so that has been very fortuitous for us.

On the knitting front - I started to knit the jacket that Kate did - have a look at it on her site archive (http://bluemountainsknits.blogspot.com/2007_06_01_archive.html). However, (does this sound familiar), in my haste, I knitted the two sleeves, then started the back - which was HUGE - and I'm no small person. On reading the pattern (notice I say "reading" the pattern - why didn't I do that first!) I discovered that the biggest size (the one I started) was in fact for a much bigger bust size than I could ever hope to achieve - my spare tyre would fit, perhaps, but they don't make bras for spare tyres! So after frogging the four inches or so of the back, I couldn't face it again. It's now on its way to becoming a jumper for Ms 11.

I finished one sidewinder sock from Nona's site, but will unpull it, and do an ordinary pair as I'm not too happy with it. I had a lot of trouble with the pattern, despite every other blogger in the world saying how well written it was. It may have had something to do with the fact that I tortuously followed the instructions - "do this and that for thousands of rows" - then when I'd begin the next part, it would say "AT THE SAME TIME ..." - get the picture? I'm a slow learner!!

I will put knitting photos up, next time. I have been using Grandpa Flea's camera and have managed to destroy the download port. The photos above were read off the card at the camera shop. It appears that the damaged port is part of the ?motherboard which costs $500 to buy! So things have been what we might call "a little tense" here. However, fortunately, I can get a card reader for only a few dollars and access photos that way. As I'm the only person who uses the download to computer feature (GP Flea always does it with the card at the camera shop), it really doesn't affect him, but it IS his camera. I will have to resurrect my smaller camera I think - but then again - his camera does take much better photos!

Tomorrow has come at last ....

Sorry about tomorrow being almost a week later - things have been busy and complicated in the FleaPa household.

So, today we fly all the way to our final destination, Fairbanks, Alaska to visit Eero. And Yes! I have been to Fairbanks - in 2005. Grandpa Flea and I had a wonderful trip via the Alaska Marine Highway - ferries to the uninitiated. We started in Bellingham and stopped at so many places along the way - Ketchikan, the salmon capital of the world, where 40 jewelry stores opened overnight when the first big cruise liner arrived (we'd arrived a few days before); Petersburg, where we didn't have enough time; Sitka, the old Russian capital where the Russian influence is still very visible and there are many wonderful forest walks, parks and an interesting raptor centre; then Juneau, capital city of Alaska. Juneau is the place where we fell in love with the bald eagle - they were everywhere and we got some magnificent photos; we caught the local bus and then walked to the Mendenhall glacier and saw for ourselves how far the glacier has retreated in recent years - on the way we passed beaver dams, a new experience for us; and we also went to the Tracy Arm Fjord and the Sawyer Glacier in a small tourist boat. On the way we saw icebergs, whales, and seals and the glacier calving - what an experience. The operators of the charter boat were bits of cowboys and in my view went far to close to the glacier for safety - and I was not alone in my concern, but Grandpa Flea thought it was all fine (men!). Then on to Skagway via Haines (where we didn't stop).The scenery is magnificent - snowy mountains everywhere and all sorts of wildlife to see. In Skagway, the ferry docks at the end of the mainstreet - it's as though you are going to sail up the road.

At Skagway we said goodbye to the ferry and caught an old-fashioned train on the "WhiteHorse Pass and Yukon Railway" - across viaducts over huge chasms, through miles of forest, over Dead Horse Gulch on an amazingly insubstantial looking steel bridge, through the White Pass and the summit with several feet of snow outside the train, then on to the end of the line at Fraser, where we transferred to a bus which took us to Whitehorse. In Whitehorse we saw an old "skyscraper" - a three storey wooden building of just one room per floor, bulit for workers on the Alaskan Highwy, to minimise heat loss. Amongst other things we visited the MacBride Museum and Sam McGee's cabin where a young person in dress, recited Robert Service's ballad of Sam McGee to great effect. I was so impressed I bought a book of the poetry to give to our oldest little Flea who was about 15 at the time. Robert Service's poetry reminds me of the poetry I grew up on - the poems of Banjo Patterson, an Australian bush poet from the early 1900s.

After a visit to the "Frantic Follies" and the paddle steamer "S.S. Klondike" we joined the Dawson City Courier for our trip to - you guessed it - Dawson City in the Yukon in Canada. In Dawson City we stayed at a B&B run by a young woman who played "Diamond Tooth Gertie" in the casino's music hall show. Again, we did walks around town, through the forest (such as it was), and along the the Yukon River, visited Robert Service's cabin, the Jack London Cabin and Cache Museum, and the casino to watch the show.

Then we joined another minivan which took us across the Yukon River on a small vehicular ferry - apparently in winter the river freezes and the cars etc just drive across the ice - and heavy movements are left until then. Then on to Top of the World Highway - an amazing experience across the barren landscape of the permafrost - the Arctic Desert. Back into the US again, through a place called "Chicken" and into Eero's home town - Fairbanks. Our hotel posted a notice each day - a typical day was "High 71F, Low 50F; intervals of cloud and sunshine; sunrise 3.41am, sunset 11.57pm; length of day: 20hrs, 16min, 2sec" - we had had long days in Dawson City too, and is it hard to sleep. I like to sleep with the curtains and windows wide open and that was impossible, of course. Thank heavens for sleeping pills! So more walks around town, along the Chena River, and a trip on the riverboat to the Chena Indian Village. I was so impressed with the beautiful traditional clothing - the embroidery is magnificent.

While in Fairbaks we took a light plane trip up through the mountain range called the"Gates of the Arctic National Park" , across the Arctic Circle to the Nunamiut Inland Eskimo Village at Anaktuvuk Pass. This was supposed to be a "mail run", stopping at a number of small settlements along the way, but as it was a weekend, there was no mail to deliver. So we flew direct to the village, landed, got out of the plane, gawked at a few kids who arrived on bikes and gawked at us, got in the back of a pick-up truck which took us to a large hanger type building where we could use the toilet then returned us to the landing strip, got back in the plane and went back to Fairbanks. I have to say it was not my favourite activity on our holiday - it seemed to be a lot of money to pay for an uncomfortable flight over a long distance. Sure, it was interesting to see the country from the air, but we were disappointed in the experience and do not recommend it.

Leaving Fairbanks, we travelled by the Alaska Railroad to Denali National Park and that is where we shall leave this long extended story which has no doubt, bored you to tears. I hate long texty blogs without photos and as our photos are not stored in the computer I can't post any - easily.

And the winner is .....

Kathy from Indianapolis, Indiana, USA - congratulations! Grandpa Flea did the honours, closing his eyes (I don't know why!) and picking a tightly folded piece of paper from the knitting basket. Thank you to everyone for entering into the spirit of fun and sharing your location with us all. Kathy, if you would email me your snail mail address (stellathestar"AT"bigpond"DOT"com) , a little surprise will wing your way. I'll put photos up here after I know you have received it.

The magic shawl is now stretching itself out to whisk us even further out to the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney. No prizes for guessing why they are called that! Again, when I worked in outer Sydney, there was one point in my drive when I'd come to the top of a hill and see the Blue Mountains in the distance - it never failed to make me feel better about the drive to work. It used to be a place where city people went for holidays - now it's a place where people can live and enjoy the benefits of small community life but still commute to the city to work or for pleasure.

This is where Kate hails from. If you read Kate's blog you'll see some wonderful photos of the recent falls of snow there.

When I was a child - more than 50 years ago!!, we went for a holiday to Katoomba, one of the furthermost towns in the Blue Mountains. We lived on the Central Coast then, about (now) a couple of hours drive from the Sydney CBD. We didn't have a family car, and made the trip by steam train to Sydney, and I assume, by another steam train to Katoomba. We had a rented house, which was bitterly cold and I SO wanted it to snow. All our things were packed in a large metal trunk which accompanied us in the goods van. My mother was almost paralysed by the cold and I can't recall us doing much walking as a family, but every morning I would get up early and wander all around, blowing clouds with my breath. I remember starting to go down the Giant's Stairway near the Three Sisters, but getting a bit scared and turning back. I am horrified, now, to think that I was running around those cliffs and things without my parents' knowledge. We stayed there for a week - and it didn't snow. I was 21 before I saw the soft white stuff.

Now we are off to visit Michelle, flying high above the Blue Mountains and the Great Dividing Range, across the central west of NSW which has just had some relief from a seven year drought, across Mungo Lake National Park part of the Willandra Lakes Region World Heritage Area. We then cross into South Australia, down towards Adelaide and west across the Nullabor Plain and into Western Australia. WA is one of the most beautiful states - and it has great yarn shops! What more could you want? Michelle lives in Perth, the capital city of the State. Perth is a beautiful city, well set out, wide, spacious streets and with little free buses that tootle around the city area. Last time I visited there, we stayed in an apartment in east Perth and the lttle bus stopped opposite our door. Perth is home to King's Park Botanic Gardens - a must see for lovers of Australian native plants. WA is known as the "wildflower State" for good reason. I will never forget smelling the intense, sweet perfume of brown boronias when we were on the south coast. We looked everywhere for them, and eventually discovered the source of the perfume hundred of metres away in the bush around a little lake. If you have ever smelt brown boronias, you'll understand why the memory is so strong. Perth is a great place to go for a holiday - there are so many unique places you can visit as day trips, and for a longer stay, it is a great place to use as a base for longer trips. I have never been to the north of WA, but it's ON THE LIST!

One more stop to visit Eero - tomorrow.

Competition - Around the world on the magic shawl ...

I'm not too sure what time it is elsewhere - it is 1 July here, so midnight tonight will be the cut - off for the knitting trip around the world competition.

I am a bit disappointed that more people didn't leave their "where do you come from" details. A friend down south (Hi!) told me that she doesn't leave comments because of privacy concerns. So I suppose that a lot of people are worried about revealing too much information on the www. I hate to think what sort of a profile the CIA, ASIO, MI5 and any other secret monitoring agency has on me by now! Probably I should be more worried about the internet advertisers who now know all sorts of things because of the number of surveys I've filled in and competitions I've entered. Some months ago, now, I received a Yazzii needle roll and knitting bag in the mail -no information on who had sent it. The padded postbag and computer mailing label and franking made me think that it must have been a prize from some competition I had entered - but who knows? (Stop Press! I know now - when I was looking for the Yazzii site so I could post the link, I read a "testimonial" on the site that referred to the same prize that someone had won in a "Creative Knitting" magazine competition! I haven't put the link to the Australian "Creative Knitting" here, as it has become a clone of the English magazine "Simply Knitting")

Back to the topic. Today the magic shawl is landing at inner Sydney, Outer Sydney, the Blue Mountains, - INTERRUPTION:
would you believe it - having just written about my disappointment in this draft, an email arrived fromEero who lives in Fairbanks, Alaska! I wondered how she had wandered into my blog, but saw a comment by Carson on her last post, so I guess that's how! - RESUMPTION :
Perth and Fairbanks, Alaska.

Miss Fee hails from the Sydney inner city area. I have had the privilege of visiting her at home. The inner city is densely populated and like the suburbs, each area seems to have a unique personality. Miss Fee is close enough to walk to the CBD if she wishes (I'd get the bus!). The streets of inner Sydney are a mix of the old and the new with old terrace houses, shops, blocks of apartments, and an increasing number of high rise residential units. Many of the inner city areas were once regarded as "slums". My parents and I (only a little person then) lived briefly at a place called Surrey Hills after WWII. Mum regarded it as one of the low points of her life - a place infested with cockroaches and rats and all sorts of strange people. An aunt lived at nearby Paddington and when I was about 9 and stayed there for a few days, I was not allowed to play with the children in the street - they were not "nice". These days, Surrey Hills and Paddington in particular are expensive suburbs - too dear for the likes of us! I haven't followed the real estate market in Miss Fee's part of town, but anywhere in the inner city is now a highly prized place to live. I don't want to reveal too much about Miss Fee's without her permission, but her place reminded me, in a way, of old New Orleans, where many homes present a blank, unprepossessing front to the street, but magic lurks within.

Now we're whooshing over the suburbs to the outer north western area where Janette lives. I don't think Janette actually put her name down for this, but as she left a comment or two, I'm assuming she knows that I know where she lives. (You should see her knitting room!) I used to drive through Janette's general area when I worked in outer Sydney. I used to pass many open, grazing areas, a huge paddock full of cut firewood for sale, small roadside stalls with veggies for sale, a feedlot for cattle which you could smell before you could see it, and a few houses usually well set back from the road. There was the odd pub and service station, but it was basically a semi-rural area. The road was a double lane in most places (i.e. one lane in each direction) and if there was an accident, the delays were enormous. These days, Sydney's suburban sprawl has reached Janette's area and there are new suburbs by the dozen. The open spaces (and the feedlot!) have been replaced by new streets, a mixture of large homes, townhouses and duplexes, children's playgrounds, and small shopping centres. The road system has been widened and traffic lights placed at many of the intersections which used to be "take-your-life-in-your-hands-if-you-want-to-turn-right" territory - much to my relief. The one great disadvantage of living there is that there is NO yarn shop. Not that that stops our Janette from maintaining a substantial stash!

The Blue Mountains, Perth and Fairbanks will have to wait until tomorrow.

Two days left to tell me where you come from ...

There are only two/three more days until 30th June (depending on whether you live downunder or in a different timezone where foreign languages are spoken - the US for instance!) for you to leave a comment telling me where you come from - see my earlier post for details -I'm going to the Craft Show at Darling Harbour on Saturday, so who knows what goodies might be in the surprise for the lucky blogger. At midnight on the 30th, your names will all go into the knitting basket for the lucky draw.

I haven't forgotten the magic shawl ride to Kate, Miss Fee, and Janette - I'm just a bit short of time.