A Different Way of Looking at Things

One of the great things about travelling is that you always have your camera handy to snap every pretty thing you see.

One of my favourite things about having the camera handy is that it changes the way I look at things.

I look at things more closely,

and from a different angle,

and notice things that I would not have otherwise seen.

Jen

To What?

Livestock... the wind... imaginary vehicles travelling on an imaginary road?

Adventures in Tasmania

I am a super slack blogger! Rather than a catch up, lets just go with most recent happenings and I'll try to be a better blogger from now on... I promise...

Tasmania. We just got back from a wonderful week in Tasmania. I was a little worried about how Coen would behave while we were waiting in airports and flying in planes. I really didn't want him to be one of those annoying shouting, whingeing, horror kids because that has a tendency to turn me into one of those horrid shrieking, nagging mothers. It turns out my fears were unfounded. Aside from a couple of fatigue induced whinges he was wonderful!

He managed to keep himself (and us) entertained!

We stayed just outside Launceston in a great little unit.
On our first day we checked out the museum. Free, and awesome! Coen did some scientific experiments on viscosity and we played with the whisper dishes.

They had a fantastic dinosaur exhibit!


At Tasmania Zoo they have goats, bowls of goats


with freaky robot goat eyes that try to get through the fence to steal your soul!!! I have goat issues alright.

Of course they also have the all important and exceptionally cute devils.



We went on a cruise up the gorge, some of the houses perched on the hillside are just stunning!


We rode the chairlift over the First Basin,


then we walked back down again, stopping on the way to chat to a skink.



We took a drive in the hills and visited Tasmazia...

Turns out Coen's not the king.


Across the road form our unit we noticed there was a big old house. It turned out to be Entally House which was built by Thomas Reiby. Grab a $20 note, that's Thomas' mum Mary, a horse thief and convict turned shipping magnate.


The house and grounds are beautiful, I could have spent hours wandering around.



At Beauty Point there is a place called Platypus House. If you're ever in the area, go there!


You can get up really close to the platypuses, see them frolicking and eating giant worms and yabbies!

You can get even closer to the echidnas,


close enough to get echidna spit on your chucks!

Everywhere we went Coen managed to pick up another toy animal. Here he is with one day's haul!
We had a wonderful trip, ate way too much, came home and went straight to the gym!

Jen

He's Lucky He's So Cute...

That face gets him out of a world of trouble!

Playing With Colours

I got bored with spinning my practice plain old white with a grubby stripe in it so I cracked out the food dyes and made some pretty colours. Here's what I started with:

Then I unwound some bargain Merino Bambino to make pretty as well.

The yarn went in with some orange and yellow,

Half the roving had some bright green,

and the other half extremely blue. (Note to self: check that the dish fits in the oven before filling with wool, water and dye!)

And this is the finished product! Well nearly finished, just need to re-skein the yarn and braid the fibre once they're totally dry. I can't believe how bright the colours came out with just a little bit of food dye!

Jen

Practicing Spinning

These are the first three bobbins of yarn I have spun on my new wheel!

I love being able to see my improvements in just under a week of spinning on it!

My first bobbin is thick and thin, underspun and overspun.

The second is slightly better.

And by the third I think I'm getting a much more even yarn. Just thought I'd share, I'm a bit excited by this whole spinning business!

Jen

A Musical Prodigy?

Whilst cleaning out Coen's wardrobe last week we came across his guitar on the very top shelf. It had been confiscated some time ago for a long forgotten rule infringement. He was very excited to have it back and has been playing and singing all week. I managed to catch a couple of his beautiful little songs on my mobile phone camera on Sunday morning. I spy a future song writer!

Jen