Flame Trees

I have always wondered what a Flame Tree looks like after hearing the Cold Chisel song 'Flame Trees'. Anyway, I saw this absolutely beautiful tree in the gardens and checked out the label - yes it is a Flame Tree - isn't it sensational?

How creative is nature?

Look at this lovely spider's web. I took this photo this morning after watering the small raised garden bed in the country. This little spider has been very industrious, this is the third web he has created in the last week. He waits patiently by the side of the web and if the web moves significantly for more than one second he scuttles out into the web to see what he has caught. Sadly for him today it was only droplets of water.

Civil War Quilt - nearly finished

All the blocks are together and now all I have to do is add the final border (with mitred corners!) and it is done. This has been a fantatastic quilt to make. It has been easy with little effort and a great result - thanks Barbara Brackman!! It is a bit hard to tell from this picture but it gives you a bit of an idea.

Of course this picture is after I fixed the error you can see here in my assembly of the quilt:

Gorgeous Melbourne

 These are some great Red Hot Pokers - I just love the colours, they are growing near the new 'Volcano' actually it is not so new now so all the water tolerant plants have grown to full size and are thriving.

This is a view across the lake. Sadly there is quite a lot of algae growing there at the moment but the notices indicate that this will improve in the coming months. It still looks pretty good to me. What do you think? The black swans didn't seem bothered.

 This is the side/back entrance to the Children's garden - I just love the details in it. This entrance takes you to the wonderful vegetable patch. The vegies looked great too - they didn't have any ripe tomatoes either, so I didn't feel so bad about mine!!!

Just look at this! Yesterday was a very pleasant day, warm but not absolutely sizzlingly hot so a walk in the Botanic gardnes was called for. I can not believe how lucky those of us who live in Melbourne are - such beautiful and varied gardens all in one location just a tram ride from Glen Huntly!!

Aubergines!!

Yes, I have finally been succesful, I have grown some lovely little elongated Aubergines. I was watering the pots they are in yesterday and I noticed that in amongst the foliage were several long slender Aubergines. The plants have been very vigorous but I wasn't sure we would get any fruit - how wonderful. My tomatoes are plodding along but I did not achieve the family gold standard of producing a ripe tomato by Chrsitmas day. This standard was set by my dear old mother and I have only been able to achieve it twice before.

Now comes the fun part!

I have completed all but the remaining block from the Barbara Brackman's Civil War Quilt, which Barbara has been posting each week. Now the real fun starts as I have to decide how I will put the quilt together. It has been a great way to do a quilt as each block is different and scrappy so there is no way to get bored. I am hoping by the end of the day the quilt top will be all but finished. I'll keep you posted!!

Hopefully I will have a picture for you later today! Wish me luck!!

How gorgeous is this?

This is a metre of the most beautiful fabric that I got from the new shop in Moorabbin called 'The Quilter's Patch'. It has a real vintage, French look about it. The  Quilter's Patch will have a website but it isn't active yet. They are at 9/3 Tuck Street, Moorabbin 3189