Yumm!

Stir fried home grown vegetables with omlette pieces from our chooks eggs, mixed nuts and brown rice. Absolutely delicious!

It's Sprekelia Time Again.

Once again it's time for the Sprekelia to come into flower. These wonderful lilies are also known as Jockey's Cap or Maltese Cross lilies. They are amazingly easy to grow and look so spectacular.

Spring.

                  Well it really is Spring I think, having spotted this tree covered in blossom.

Exhibition End.

Now comes the hard part, totalling up the takings and distributing the funds. We have a weekend retreat planned, originally for some R and R after the exhibition, but I think that it will take all weekend just to work out the finances!

Latest Toy!

               Wow this little toy is wonderful, but what a lot there is to learn. It's all fun though.

Current Project.

Whilst on duty at our current exhibition have have found plenty of time to knit.  This is a jumper for little Miss 2 years old for next winter. She is very particular about what she wears, so I just hope that she likes the colours!

Wildflowers 1b

I mean to include this pea shaped flower with the others earlier in the week, but it was forgotten.

Wildflowers 3

This is a native Buttercup.

Wildflowers 2.

                 Although a similar pea shaped flower to the previously posted pictures, these are in quite a different colour. The top Hardenbergia flower was always called Sarsparilla when I was a child.

Wildflowers

These are photos of 3 different native wildflowers, but all are referred to as just plain 'Egg and Bacon'. With colours like these it's not hard to see why.

Unusual Visitor.

This is a Chequered Swallowtail and a most unusual visitor to the country garden. I've never seen one here before, or at least not in the last 12 years or so.

Wot I Saw in the Bush!

This is a very handsome Blue Tongued Lizard, and you can see why it is called that. The lizard is in the process of shedding it's old skin, which you can see is still covering part of the back area, while the head and shoulders are nice and shiny new skin.  This is a particularly large specimen and was being very fierce while I attempted to photograph it. It hissed, blew itself up with air and flicked its blue tongue at me.

Dinosaur World in the Backyard.

Silk Cigarette Cards.

 These pretty silk flower pictures were sent to me many years ago by a friend in Canada. They appear to be the fronts of old cigarette cards, as evidenced by the ones below still attached to the cardboard.

No More Elephants!

                                 How about a wire frog sculpture instead of an elephant?

And A Few More!

A Few More Elephants.

I've got an Itch!

Another Wonderful Baby Elephant.

                      This is another elephant with a covering made of recycled bits of metal.

 There are bits of cars, things from the kitchen and all manner of metal objects attached to this elephant.

                                           What a joke to have a tap at the tip of the trunk!

                             Take note of the line of keys running the length of the trunk on both sides.

Knitted Mali!

 One artist chose to cover her fibre glass elephant entirely in what looks like a hand knitted skin.

Isn't this just the most wonderful knitted elephant?

I just love the hairy chin and all those sags and wrinkles

Baby Malis.

The historic carousel that still works.

 Haven't the school children, all primary age I think, done a wonderful job with painting and decorating their baby elephants?

I love the simplicity and elegance of the blue and silver one below.

March of the Malis.

 Some weeks ago I posted about the 150th birthday of the Melbourne Zoo and how they commissioned 50 fibre glass baby elephants to be painted by local artists, which were then to be auctioned to raise funds for the zoo etc. Well,  after some time on display around the city and environs, the elephants are back at the zoo waiting for the Grand Auction.

 Mali is the name of the baby elephant born at the zoo a while back, so all of these are Malis. One was even painted by the real Mali.

I won't be showing you all 50 of the elephants, but just a selection of some of the more interesting ones. In conjunction with the big malis, smaller ones were sent to various local schools where the pupils decorated them. They too are on display here at the zoo, beside the historic carousel.

It's Red.

 I took a photo of this huge flower spike some weeks ago before the flowers opened and I wondered what colour it was going to be.  Well, it's definitely red, and I almost missed it!

Beautiful Wisteria Hedge.

Although this hedge is just past its prime flowering, it's still spectacular. I should have photopraphed it a week or so ago!

A Walk in the Park.

 I hadn't walked down to this particular park for a while, so I was suprised to see these new features. The mosaic will soon be hidden by the new foliage on the trees, but the mural below will be visible for all to enjoy................that is if the vandals leave it alone.

According to the local paper it was over painted by vandals, so now it and the childrens' handball court are out of bounds while they clean it up. It looks as if they have finished for now, so I hope the stupid so and sos leav it alone this time.

Chinese Ground Orchids.

With all the rain that we have had over Winter, the Spring flowers are exceptional this year. These Chinese ground Orchids are lovely dainty little things, and just so easy to grow, and they multiply so easily too. The true colour is a little darker than they show here.