Joyce’s Quilting Quandary

I went to see the film ” The Kite Runner” on Friday night. I found it very powerful, but sad and confronting. I wish them Peace!  I watched a video when I got home about Homeless Youth in Sydney.  Again most confronting, but I was overwhelmed with  the  dedication of the Salvation Army staff and the positive outcomes which they can achieve.  Earlier in the week, a professional colleague of over 20 years had died after a battle for four years with cancer. A real character who had lived life to the full,  but not for long enough. I wish him Peace. I feel for his wife and two daughters, 22 and 24!  The kite was hand appliquéd on using the shape of the kites in the film. The background fabric behind the lettering is a rather pale fabric so I overlaid it with some black net and some organza. I have machine appliquéd the word Peace in Persian ( I hope it was from an authentic web site).

I am determined that, at the end of year, the quilt will be complete! So I am quilting as I go and after the completion of six blocks (one row), I join them together and finish off the back, ready for the next row to be added. I think that I am getting better at taking quilt photos! The blocks, because of their size, I scan and import. I find this works quite well and is quite speedy.  

We had a dust storm this week. The wind on Wednesday the wind was terrible, gusting up to 110kph. This was due to the remnants of a cyclone travelling across from Western Australia.  Due to the drought, any strong wind contains huge amounts of red dust and grit. As a result , all the cars and windows are now covered with numerous red splodges. There was a lot of damage due to tress coming down. Some people were without power for five days!  In the block I used the weather maps, some of the photos of damage and an article about the origins of the storm with red and brown organza to represent the wind blowing.

Busty ( Whoops, I think I mean busy! ) week this week as usual. Drove to Port Fairy, near  Warnambool to see an old friend who is not very well. This is a two hour drive from Ballarat, across the Western District to the coast. The farmers in this area have planted many wind breaks which provide stock with a shelter from the westerly winds and also can be harvested for timber. For me, they are visually wonderful, with long straight trunks and pom-poms of leaves on the top. I was annoyed that I had not taken the camera with me to capture the light and shade. I have used the trunks in the design, plus a cut end. On Friday night I went to a concert by John Williamson, who sings True Blue and A Home Amongst the Gum Trees amongst others. My favourite song  which he sings is Shelter written by Eric Bogle.  He is a wonderful musician and sings from the heart. It was an interesting crowd, much different to the usual Ballarat theatre crowd.