The Sparrows of Greenlane.

A ninety minute trip up the motorway from Hamilton in the Waikato mist, in the dark; finds us at Greenlane Hospital. We have appointments starting at 8 am, and I am nervous about getting stuck in the Auckland Motorway traffic, so we actually arrive about 7.15!

We have the final blood tests, X-rays and anaesthetic clinics before Callum's transplant takes place in two weeks. There is time for "Muffin Break" in between the twelve tubes of blood they took off each of us, and the chest X-rays.

I will be nervous about the final cross match until I hear that it is all ok in a couple of days.

There are always sparrows when you sit outside at cafes. I love them, and feed them, and generally create a health hazard for those who disapprove of bird shit on the cobblestones!

I don't care. I'm not afraid of bird shit!

Lucky my friend Connie isn't here. She's not afraid of hiking in the back blocks of Vietnam or jumping out of aeroplanes, but she is most discombobulated by sparrows.

We sit outside and enjoy the sun on our faces, and the sparrows. Callum says I have to add a disclaimer like they do on films that says something like...

To protect the innocent, some sparrows are composites! I ask what this means. Apparently, to protect the sparrow's identity, in the absence of pixel fuzzing, I must use composite images of at least eight sparrows and morph them altogether somehow. ....Right......

I can see how the weeks of recovery will be filled with such conversations, which is good, because they are silly, and it makes a change from when he will be grumpy, which will happen .

And I will be super woman and leap tall buildings in a single bound within three days of giving away my kidney. Not... I'm not allowed to entertain any such thoughts because I have the pain relief police and Sister Funnell reading me the riot act about trying to go back to work early, let alone leaping any kind of buildings. Maybe I will be excellent at shopping quietly. Riding the escalator at 277 in New Market, and wandering through the Domain to the Trelise Cooper fabric store in Parnell. With the sun on my face. But probably I'll just be grumpy too!

But I won't blog about being grumpy, promise. It'll just be about the Trelise Cooper shop and the gardens in the Domain, and a few graphic pictures from ICU which may or may not be composites LOL!

And enjoy the odd cafe, outside with the sparrows.

Horizontal Pansies.

Hello Blog Chics. The thing about spring is that it can so easily relapse back into winter!


This weekend we are experiencing an ugly storm, with ferocious winds, heavy rainy squalls and it's cold again. The Magpie Cats are wanting to stay inside by the heater, night and day. Which keeps me busy at night letting them out for toilet stops. But it's so cold out there in the storm that it would be mean to leave them out in it





My pansies are horizontal and the deck chairs have blown off the deck into the garden.

The washing on the line is also horizontal, and I've given up on it and resorted to the clothes dryer.

A new House and Garden appeared in my letter box yesterday, just in time for a weekend in doors. I've got a dreadful cold, and not much energy, so I've just been a complete couch potato. Planning projects rather than actually doing any, and watching the Living Channel on TV.

I haven't even done any walking. Too cold, and I just don't have the oomph. In my previous job I gradually built up an immunity to all the old lady bugs, so I suppose in this job I'll just have to put up with catching all the kiddy bugs, till I've had them all. Luckily I have had the chicken pox, so won't have to do that one again.

This is my favourite article from the October issue of NZ House and Garden.

Only enough energy to load the dryer and dump it on a chair. None left to actually fold it and put it away!!!Just enough energy to make coffee and turn the pages of NZHand G LOL!

And have a lovely time visiting all my favourite blog chics and leave some comments and follow some links to all your favourites and recommendations. I've had such a lovely day.

I found a lovely blog by another Kiwi girl called Catalina.

She's organising quilt blocks for making into quilts for kids in Christchurch after the earthquake.

A couple of weeks ago Christchurch experienced a 7.1 magnitude quake (same as the one in Haiiti). Thankfully no one was killed as it happened at 4.30 in the morning, but the inner city is a mess, and in certain suburbs where they have had a lot of liquefaction occur in the subsoil, likewise. They are still experiencing aftershocks and a lot of people can not return to their homes. It must have been very scary for children and elderly people living alone especially.

So I thought that was a lovely idea, to donate quilt blocks to be made into quilts for kids. I've had a rummage through some of my randoms and experiments and found some that I could send straight away.

That's all for today Blog Chics. I'll leave you with my Christmas fairy who is already thinking about which window sill she'll sit on this Festive Season. She's been talking with the snow man in my linen cupboard. They get organised very early here. They'll be planning the menu as soon as the December issue of NZ`House and Garden turns up in the letter box.

I've been thinking about starting another quilt.

I haven't made a quilt for a while. I thought I might make one out of vintage sheets.

I've had this one in mind for ages, to make from 1930s reproduction fabrics, but I thought it would look fab made from vintage sheets.

I don't have that many that I could bare to cut up, but you can actually buy new vintage sheet fabric. There are links on The Vintage Sheet Blog.
I look in there often, they have some great ideas and tutorials. Everything is made from vintage sheets or pillow cases.

Or I could go and raid the stash of vintage pillow cases at my Dad's batch at lake Taupo. I don't think he he cares too much about the shabby chicness of the vintage pillow cases, or even knows that they're there. Maybe I'll have a wee look on the vintage sheet blog myself, and buy a few fat quarters. It's nice to be planning a quilt again.

A fox in socks?

No.... just a Magpie Cat in full repose. Doing what she does best. I actually did the knitting, in case you were wondering. I didn't mean that knitting was what the Magpie cat does best. In fact she does none at all. Not very good at ironing either!

I'm very pleased with how these socks have turned out. I haven't made the crocheted violas yet to embellish them with.




All photos taken at night this week blog chics because I have been busy gardening or working during the day. The lawns are growing like Topsy and require mowing once a week at least, and the weeds are not far behind.

Remind me slightly of 1980s leg warmers, but I think I can get away with it on op-shopping days. With my nana crocheted bag, I won't look out of place at all, and I'll have very warm legs!!!

Thanks for stopping in today Blog Chics. I ordered the lovely botanical fabric with raspberry hydrangeas for my couch re-cover. But it doesn't get here till the beginning of November.

Slightly disappointing, as I was so looking forward to it being done. But something to look forward to I guess.

A chicken among the forget-me-nots.

Over the last week things have begun to come to life in my garden.The concrete chicken has been ruffling his licheny feathers and strutting his stuff amongst the forget-me-nots.

And I have daffodils. Daffodils have a very powerful effect on the psyche of a light starved, flower starved gardener. They induce all manner of activities such as weeding, pruning back perennials, shifting self seeded annuals into gaps, and planning mulch and pig poo spreading.

One day in some future garden, I may only have daffodils and lawn and trees. I imagine my woolshed residence on a small rise in a vast meadow of grass, a few large trees, and daffodils. And a concrete chicken to keep the slug population under control.

I imagine that, but in reality I know what will happen. Some pansies will sneak their way in, and some violas, and they will self seed, and I won't be able to resist planting a few poppies, and a few cuttings from friends, which will harbour clandestine forget-me-nots. And the whole process will begin again.

Because I have in my head a Beatrix Potter landscape, inhabited by hollyhocks, larkspurs and poppies; which will not go away, no matter how much I try to superimpose the daffodil meadow with the trees. No matter how much I despair about the mulch of sticks and sludge that a cottage garden becomes here in the winter, and the hours I have to spend weeding and cutting back and transplanting. A cottage garden represents something safe, nurturing and dependable. It's a metaphor for the kind of Enid Blyton existance I wished for as a child. I think I subconsciously re-create it wherever I go. I do not think I can really exist without a few roses, some forget-me-nots, and a concrete chicken...

You can find me at the bottom of the garden today, looking for fairies.

Under the ever vigilant supervision of the foreman, who watches from a comfortable vantage point and waits for the catnip to need pruning!

Updating an old friend.

We've had this couch for fourteen years. It's done great service, and is still oh so comfortable, if a little faded, warn and shabby. I cover it with a patchwork throw, and plump up the cushions and try to cover the snot marks on the arms from fourteen years of children swinging off them.

I'm trying to decide weather to choose this gorgeous botanical fabric to cover the whole thing,

or to go for the plain blue with different cushions.

What do you think?I'm pretty sure I'm going to go with the blue botanical with the raspberry hydrangeas. Kind of depends a bit on the quotes.

I'm knitting these fantastic socks at the moment, from this lovely book, using the crofter wool. I started knitting one of the cardies, but it was looking a bit 1970s school cardy in the wool I'd bought, so I unravelled it and went for the socks instead. Which are wonderful.I'm going to embellish the bands with my yet to be crocheted violas.

Have a happy week blog chics.