Lost cat found, Rainy days and a Pink Knit-woven Jacket

I am very happy to report that the cat which had appeared at our doorstep on the last day of April
and our guests took to the Lonsdale RSPCA , belongs to our neighbours two doors up the road from us. They had been away in their caravan in WA and I guess Smokey ,which is its name, wanted some more human company and so wandered down the road to us. So they were able to pick him up from the pound and welcome him back home. He is a hunter my neighbour told us and very hot on rabbits.

Perhaps I could suggest they lend him to my friend at Port Willunga whose garden is over run with rabbits and Council won't do a thing about them.
The rain today is still welcome. We have had over two inches of rain so far and it is still soaking in. The pond is overflowing and the fish are enjoying the fresh algy they can reach with the new water level.

The wet weather of course dislodges all the rodents and they come inside to look for a dry place and something to eat. So we trap them as it isn't very nice to have mouse droppings sitting on the benches and stove. We had a lot of trouble with mouse traps since the good old wooden ones are now no longer made like they were. The ones from China were hopeless I found and the new plastic ones not much better for a while as the spring wasn't strong enough. They are better now but sometimes the mice are so small they actually fit inside the trap and you have to drown them, poor things.

I have been busy designing another Knit-woven jacket.
It took quite a while to get the swatch right.
I am inclined then, to design as I knit-weave on the knitting machine (or knitting loom as the Americans say and I must say it sounds better) and add or subtract colours as I go along.

I had some very interesting rayon ribbon yarn which was used as a contrast and to add some interest to an otherwise boring fabric.

The lighter stripes are my handspun ,hand dyed merino wool which I still had on hand. I don't usually stock much pink yarn
so I ordered the two ply background yarn and the wool/bamboo
eight ply weave-in yarn from the Bendigo Woollen Mills.

I still had some fine cyclamen coloured yarn and I mixed that in too. I like mixing yarn colours as it brings greater interest
to the eyes I find and livens up the whole fabric.
I wanted to do a different closing as well as I loath doing button holes in knitting. So, instead I made separate holes, five stitches
apart and threaded fine cords made from the two ply yarns through on opposite sides and they can be used to tie up
or left as is.

On the back and sides I added godets so as to give more
drape and room as well and to have the jacket sit better
and move better.
It has been a challenge doing this but it seems to have
worked out reasonably well. I hand stitch all my garment pieces
together as I feel they sit better and I have more control over
matching the pieces together.
Now it is waiting for its owner.....

Wildlife in our Garden at Willunga

 What an exciting surprise tonight while we were having our evening drink and sitting in the sitting room as the mosquitoes are so bad outside ... something was knocking on our patio door and I thought "oh,no, not another cat or kitten dumped on us"..but when I switched on the outside light, there was an Echidna, hiding in the potplants, how exciting was that! We had seen one many years ago in the orchard but not since then. For my European readers an Echidna is not a hedgehog.....it is one of the rare animals left in the world. It is a monotreme and lays an egg which takes 23 days to develop when it gets moved to a pouch on the mother's belly and is suckled for two to three months. When the baby develops spines it is moved to a burrow. The mother suckles it for another three or so months. The babe is called a puggle...

It will be lovely if he stays around (Is it a he? or a she?) and eats all the trillion of ants we have here. There are ants nests in the ceiling as the little critters fall out of the pine ceiling at certain times of the year and the Studio has litter made by them at the edges of the skirting boards.
If you are on your knees in the garden weeding or planting things you are immediately chewed on by ants to see if you are a corpse or not and need cleaning up.

 I have been raking up a lot of bark and gum leaves the last week or so ready to burn and I did see an unusual patch which looked as though something had been making a circle in the litter.
I know one year I startled a bearded Dragon hiding under the bark when I was raking up the litter and it looked at me with it's beady eyes in a rather accusing fashion. Sadly we never see the Dragons any more, I think the vineyards have probably destroyed their habitat.

 I found this rather lovely and startling red gum blossom too when  I was raking up yesterday,
such a contrast to the grey and brown leaves and bark and wondered if it may not have been a fairy's substitute for an ostrich feather used in a dance......
It seems a shame to rake up and burn all this litter but we have to prepare for next summer's fire danger season I suppose

This very handsome grey water cover is in our verge. It is where the grey water for the vineyards is piped from.
The water people have made an absolute mess of our verge and it is very difficult to keep it mowed in winter as there are rocks embedded in the top soil now and doesn't do the mower much good....not much good complaining though, authorities don't take the slightest bit of notice.....

Willunga Pastoral Scenes

We spent yesterday afternoon, Sunday the 18th May, looking around Willunga and close by where we live. A friend had sent us an e mail to say there was a free, photographic competition being held in South Australia to get people to see what is interesting in their own piece of deck and the only condition was that the photo was taken between midnight and midnight on Sunday.
We thought how interesting to go and look close by home and see what there is to photograph that might be worthwhile. I suggested we start at the Willunga look out up the hill on the left of the Victor Harbour road.

 When we got there, the trees blocked most of the view of the whole basin which is a bit disappointing. So we moved up the hill and then along to Taylors hill road where we found this interesting ruin. You wonder at all the energy which would have gone into the quarrying and carting the stone up this huge hill and then building the cottage. What dreams were shattered there to leave it so sad and broken.....

 It was actually rather a dull and murky sort of a day and the view across from this cottage showed the distant sea and two huge tankers. Perhaps if you click on the photo you may just be able to pick up the two ships on the silver water near the horizon.
The whole basin is now a mix of golden autumn vines, bare paddocks ready to be seeded as soon as we have more rain and buildings half hidden by trees.

We drove up to the underpass of the Victor Harbor road which gives an interesting view of a gumtree near the Ross Roses Nursery. I am pleased to say they seem to be back in business as we picked up some new roses there last week which we have planted out straight away. I think the roses here do much better when planted from pots in the autumn as they have all winter to get themselves acclimatized ready for our hot and dry summers.

The photo of the Victor main road was taken from the overpass on Malpas road. I was a bit disappointed with that one, as it doesn't show up dramatically at all. But looking East towards Taylors Hill road you can see the rows of olive trees someone planted years ago. Again you will have to click on the photo to see the whole effect better. I often wonder how the people get on harvesting the olives as the site is rather steep.

Finally, while waiting for a dramatic sunset, which didn't happen, I took a photo of the Mount Lofty TV towers we can see from our back gate.
The day being so murky was a bit of a drawback as nothing showed up particularly well. No doubt there are ways and means one can cope with this if one knew ones camera capabilities better than I do. I hope to have some tuition in this in the months to come as the instruction book is so scattered in its information and while the writers know what they are talking about, I do not........
Needless to say, I don't think I will send any photos in.....

Lost Cat and Black Dogs

Dramas invariably happen when someone is staying with you.
Our guests had been over to see friends on Mundoo Island for the day and came back early evening, asking, since when, had we had a blue cat? Well, we don't have a cat because though I like cats, I like little birds about the place better.
We ,or rather I, did not encourage it in and hoped it would go back to where it came from. In the morning, there it was meowing at the glass door when I got up to make the morning cuppa.

 I felt obligated to give it some food of course and gave it a mouse I had caught in the trap.It wolfed it down and so I gave it a bit of mince as well.We went away for the day and when we came back it was there again, waiting. So of course we let it in and that was the end of it. It settled in.I rang the neighbours to see if any of them were boarding a cat but no, no one was. In the morning though, our guests decided since we really didn't want the cat, they would take it to the Vet and see if it was microchipped. It wasn't

so they had to take it all the way to Lonsdale to the RSPCA who would hold it and find a home for it.
I do like black dogs. The one above was saved from a terrible home life by friends whose dogs had died recently and they were ready for another dog. It is taking them quite a while to gain its trust but it is coming along well. It loves the beach and is getting used to having strangers in its home.

The dog above is a black Labrador whose mistress is our neighbour and who brought it over for a visit and  to teach it to lead and sit and have some manners. It is a lovely dog.
The Border Collie on the right was having a wonderful time at Formbe Bay. I was a bit worried it might tumble over the cliff into the sea in its exuberance, they are such active and bright dogs, but no, it stopped when asked to have its photo taken...its master was taking his paddle board down to the beach and the dog followed
I am not sure what it would do when left on the beach while the boss paddled out to catch a wave......