Summer 2013 'To Go' Project

Early summer I made up a 'To Go' project, something I could take with me to work on while travelling.
It had to be self sufficient, small and take a long time.
I started with a card a friend sent me for inspiration. She knows I love hens.

The bantam is a childhood memory of watching them in my grandparents' large vegetable garden and helping Nana shoo them into their coop each night.

I found a piece of even weave another friend had given me.

I found a charted hen motif in an old kit and coloured it with bantam colours.
 I picked floss colours for the hen and the background.


And packed it all in a small bag with a tiny pair of scissors.
I traveled with this project all summer, successfully getting through all airport securities without having anything confiscated.
I traveled on different modes of transport and stayed at different places without loosing any tools or thread.
 I was able to work on planes, ferries and in cars. It satisfied my urge to stitch on many occasions while travelling.
It is nearly finished, as is summer.

Signs of Spring in Victoria

I have been living in Victoria long enough now to recognise the distinctive signs of spring.
The resident geese arrived back after their winter in the south, somewhere.

The hungry deer snacked on plants that over the winter they forgot they didn't like.

I barely got the irises in the ground before they were sprouting.

The bulby things a friend gave me, saying they were peonies, that I think I planted all up side down last winter, all came up anyway.

Mid March Ron and I had a stroll around Butchart Gardens to see what it looked like in the very early spring. All of the spring plantings were in but we were too early for any spring flowers.