A Day at the Zoo

Last Sunday, we spent the day at the Zoo. As you can see the girls were amazed with what they saw. Tessa loved the Elephants, Sophia the Lions, and along with the Orangutans here is one of my favourites

The Giraffe, I love their color and beautiful markings.

We visited the Australian native animal section as they were just about to be fed. One even had a little Joey in her pouch
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Before we left we headed over to the Ape section. We stood at the glass window and listened to the Zoo keeper chatting. As he did, one of the females came over the hill and straight down to Tessa to have a little look. I started snapping photos into reflective glass and scared her off, and didn't get any shots. Wish I'd just taken in the moment!
"She wanted to cuggle me" was all Tessa could say, wrapping her little arms around herself.

Pop on over to my flickr site for some more (better) photo's.

Uncle Lance's Gold Medal

On Thursday Sophia was honored to take her Uncles 'Special Olympics' gold medal to Kindergarten. He won in the national games, in Basketball, in 2006. I think she looks very proud.
The kids loved seeing the medal and all of the photos from the game. They have also been making their own medals. Sophia's said "she was good at hopscotch" and Riley "was good at digging"!

Father and Daughter

Here is a pic. of my brother Tony and his daughter Leah in Sendai, Japan. Tony has lived in Sendai for nearly 10 years and Leah lives in the U.S. Leah went to live in the U.S. with her mother when she was 13months old* and apart from two very brief visits, they have not seen each other until now.
Leah is now 18 yrs old and loves Japanese culture, so she's loving her time there.
Here they are attending a Tanabata parade in traditional dress. Michi's (Tony's wife) parents gave Leah her Yakata as a gift. They have been so busy with visits to Temples, shopping, sporting events .. Sumo, Soccer e.t.c. She has also spent some time hanging out with some Japanese girls. Now they are in Tokyo for a few days before Leahs return home.
Hopefully Leah will be able to make it to Australia soon, but for now we enjoyed seeing Tony, Leah and Michi on skype a couple of times. The girls were so excited to see their one true cousin.
For me it is such a joy to see them together, words cannot describe, and are not even flowing properly as I try to tell you about their visit.

*A difficult situation to explain!

Another Quilt, Another Birthday Party

Hurray! I've just finished another quilt, this time for Doll Quilt Swap 4. I really enjoyed this one, it was a pattern I'd wanted to try for a while. I'd like to try it in 1930's with the red patches scrappy. I used some of my Japanese stash again! It's like the Magic Pudding, I never seem to run out of it, and it looks so good in this style if I do say so myself.


Here's a closeup which also shows the hand quilting. Please remind me to wear a thimble next time. That needle was living inside my finger by the end!!!

I just had to add this shot of Sophia at her very 1st Girlie party. We seem to always be going to boys parties, and it was such a joy to see all these little fairies. Happy Birthday Sian.

Quilts and other projects

I have finally finished my 'Summer' Four Seasons Quilt. I have named it 'Bushfire Sun' as the colors remind me of the unusual color and haze of the sun, and the quilting reminds me of the radiant heat. This is the fourth season I have participated in. Once I receive my quilt in return, I will have to 'post' all four together.

Here is a photo from our "'Little People on the Move ' swap. Sophia is holding Birra the wombat and Pinta the Koala. They are spending July with us, and sharing many adventures. At months end, they will wing there way to the U.S.A. passports, scrapbooks and bags packed to live with 2 little people there. In return there little buddies will head our way to live with Sophia and Tessa. (nice bottom there Birra)

They came two by two

Finally, here is a photo of the finished 6 1/2" quilt I made for my partner Tine. I actually made it for her son Ask , based on a gorgeous animal quilt that she had made for him. If you know me well, you will know I can't pass up the chance to do something in a Noah's Ark theme. I LOVE Noah's Ark! I have been told it will be hanging above Ask's bed.

We went for our first drive along the tollway today. It was chockers! It was fun to see how quickly we could get to different places, quite the novelty. I even got a trip to Chadstone S/C out of it and a new pair of shoes for Miss Tessa (so cute I will have to post a picture soon).
The funniest thing came to mind as we were driving through the tunnel. My Mini quilt swap specialty group for June have been doing English paper piecing, so as soon as I looked at the entry all I could think of was hexagons, and my quilty friends

Open Day at Eastlink

Look what fun we had today at the new Eastlink tollway open day. Tessa was pictured on the big screen, dancing away to the Big Band. We took a bus tour along one side, whilst cyclists rode/raced the other. Over 100 thousand people visited.
Here are but a few of the cyclists resting after their tour.

And off we head into the tunnels. The one on the left is named after the Opera singer Dame Nellie Melba, the Melba tunnel . The one on the right is named after the creek whose flow it disrupted, the Mullum Mullum tunnel. You can also see the fume chimney in the middle, I think its quite pretty.
The tollway will open next weekend, Daddy is very excited as it will cut about 20 minutes each way from his work travel time. And, in the other direction it will whisk us to the beach!