Friends in DC

Jo made at least two new friends at Jean's: Harry Potter and Snowball.

 And fell for Awesome at the Scheyers. He is carrying two balls in his mouth, one behind the other (the dog, I mean.)

 I would have taken Lucky home but he decided to stay with the Scheyers and catch chipmunks.

Rosh Hashana

We were lucky enough to be included in the Berney's Rosh Hashana celebrations which included their three grandchildren. 
The three grand cats stayed out of the way.
There is Merlin who spends most of his time in Carolyn's wardrobe:

Merangue who, at 17 has perfected the art of sleeping:

And Nim who loves the garden and wants you to spend time there with her:

Not that that is a hardship.

Complex Weavers Seminars

I cannot remember which seminars I chose way back in February but was happy, like most people, with the ones that I was given:
     Looms of SE asia 
     Advanced Inkle Weaving Techniques
     Weaving fringes found in early American Coverlets
     Lituanian weaving
     Designing multishaft crackle
     Designing, weaving and wearing tartan
I don't take photos in seminars because I try to concentrate on listening and taking notes. But I couldn't resist a photo of this neat fringe.

 One evening there as a fashion show. Usually this takes place after dinner with attendees walking through the dining hall showing off their weaving. This year an auditorium was available which scared some weavers not used to walking on stage. So Grete asked me to model her scarf. In return she gave me a Lillian Whipple card. The bee weaving is 1 inch long and half an inch high. Darrly Lancaster was the MC.

I helped Janet Stollnitz display those hand wovens that were not suitable for the stage like scarves and table napery. It was hard to keep weavers from handling the exhibited works. But guarding the exhibits kept me away from the silent auction going on at the other end of the hall.

 It was lovely to spend time with my Waterford Weaver mates, Liz, Melissa and Linda. Jo enjoyed them too.

The seminars were held at the 4H centre = head, heart, hands and health.

Vienna

The reason I didn't blog while travelling was that my iPad told me that my Picasa file was full and I couldn't upload any more photos. The paper dresses that I uploaded yesterday to show my fashion/textile curators at PHM are still there today. But the animals I met on my travels are not on the Awlsome blog. Something is happening. . . .
I just checked (to get the awlsome url) and the photos are back again. Who knows. . . .

Vienna is looking very prosperous. There are a couple of McMansions in our old neighbourhood. Our old house has been stripped bare of most of the trees and my gardens have all gone. But the house seems to be in good nick and has a new front door.
The deer are a problem all over the east coast. This man has one solution:

On one street, I took a photo of an old house, they were all like this when we first arrived. Small houses on big blocks with big trees and foundation plantings.













Then across the street:

Then next door:

Then catty corner:

Paper dresses

On a free day while staying at the Days Inn on Connecticut, we visited the Hillwood estate of Marjorie Merriweather Post to see the paper dress exhibition. 
They are lovely. First you scrunch large sheets of paper, iron it, scrunch it again, iron it, paint it, scrunch it, iron it, etc until it looks right and is made up. These are the work of Isabelle de Borchgrave.

Way behind

First, I did't have a connection from my camera to my iPad. Then I didn't have a good enough Internet connection. Now I seen to have both and, because we are on the bus to New York, I have the time to blog. The scenery is only of trees planted beside Route 95 . . . still all green.

We arrived in Vienna close to Wednesday morning, so I walked to Nottway Park, maned after this house, to visit my old farmers market. We used to play tennis there with a crowd of retired locals in the morning.

 The markets have moved to Oak Marr, 3 miles away and too far to walk. But I enjoyed hanging over the fences of the community garden plot beside the old house. It had only just been started when we left 12 years ago. Now the gardens extend over two huge paddocks. Strange when most Vienna houses are on large plots and what is not house is covered in grass.

 This was the only "wild flower" to be seen in the park.

Although there was a wild man close by. Jo got a warning for jay walking on his way to the Metro. He admitted that he had not crossed the road (off Nutley St) at the crossing but objected to a second policeman, in a marked car this time, taking his photo without his permission. We carefully crossed at crossings thereafter.

Complex Weavers Seminars

We are here at the 4H Conference Centre in Cheny Chase. But I haven't had time to blog. Soon.

Home again

It was a perfect day to drive back to Sydney. We stopped off in Exeter for a cuppa with Suzy on her new terrace. In typical Suzy style, the paving looks like it has been there forever.

Her dog, Charlie didn't appreciate visitors. She barked and backed off. But she looks ferocious which is reassuring for Suzy living at the end of a village street.

We got home without too much traffic or making too many odd turns. Puffy was very pleased to see us home. She even wanted a longer cuddle than I did!

Canberra wine

We first visited Clonakilla, a winery established 40 years ago by a group of enthusiasts from CSIRO. I imagine they skied in the winter and "farmed" in the summer. The wines made here regularly fool the French experts in blind trials and are placed in the top shiraz class. They are horrified when they discover that they loved an Australian wine.

Then we next next door (but had to drive 5 K to get there) to Eden Road Wines which was also established 40 years ago. It wasn't planted as well so that the current wine maker (who has a very high reputation) plans to pull out most of the vines and replant shiraz grapes. Bruno greets all guests.

As an interesting aside, one of the sources of grapes that this winemaker has sourced in the last couple of years in his attempt to make good shiraz from the Gundagai region, just happens to be a former president of the World Bank. The retirees had a lovely gossip about him but had to admit that his grapes made superior wine. Tim, the winemaker, lead the tasting from barrels that had just been filled with this year's grape juice to wine blended and ready to be bottles. It was very interesting.

Then we went to Shaw Vinyard Estate for lunch in their very handsome restaurant overlooking these vines:

Back in Canberra we visited the Asia Bookshop which is a treasure trove of books about China, Japan, SE Asia etc. It nestles in the back of a shopping centre off Belconnen Way. Who'd have thunk it!

1818 meeting in Canberra

We left on Monday to come to this meeting of retirees in Canberra. As soon as I arrived I realised that I had left the cord that connects my camera to a computer. Today I had the time to go into Civic to buy a replacement. A sensible lady in Jay-what'it sent me downstairs to Ted's to buy a $5 USB card reader rather than sell me a $45 something from her shop. The $5 thingo works fine (so far.)


We stopped in Goulburn for lunch at the Paragon Cafe. It is amazing how different Australian towns are from Australian cities.

Lake George has some water in it . . . . way over on the other side.

We are staying at University House which is charming as usual. The atmosphere is unlike a hotel. Everybody is friendly and relaxed because they assume that you are here for the same meeting (Academy of Science meeting this week.) And the ducks are entertaining. They don't get into the water at night. Perhaps their toes get coi-ly nibbled.

On Tuesday we visited the National Museum. It is a silly building especially in the entry area where the furniture doesn't fit and the walls are useless but the area of the permanent exhibits is great as are they: all so well presented, clean, telling stories. We spent time in the Silk Road exhibition which was bought in from the US. The content is good (they even explain how an astrolab works) but the installation is flimsy. An event organiser could have done it better. I kept being distracted by the looming black of the ceiling peppered with wires and beams. The draw loom was interesting.

ANU seems to have a love affair with courtyards. Many are eating places nowdays. This one had a resident wattlebird who flew down to pick up the crumbs when people moved away from the tables. I thought they were wild birds!

Today we went, with the other retirees, to the National Gallery to the Von Geurard exhibition. (Why did they choose the only painting that was done in New Zealand to publicize this exhibition of his Australian paintings?) Lots and lots of paintings with lovely middle grounds and mountains but rather wrong coloured, formulaic foregrounds and his sky's aren't Australian (see Goulburn above.) Our docent whisked us off to the aboriginal art galleries in the new extension. They have natural light which is great and lots of space and overlook wonderful gardens. The new entry is a great improvement on the previous entry area. Of course, you aren't allowed to take photos.