Have 2 words

New Zealand.

It's a breath of fresh air when you need it most.

See what I mean.

Green, even in drought.

Spectacular scenery

Fabulous art

Hobbits

Did I mention the scenery?

A great survivor attitude

...and old world charm.

More to come; I promise.

trailed some scarecrows

A glorious Brisbane Spring day; time to relax and have a drive in the country.

We've been trying to visit Tambourine for their Annual Scarecrow Festival for years now.

Yesterday was the day!

Here are my favourites, in no particular order.

Scarecrow Festival - tick!

I have a very tame 'bucket list' don't I?

Visit the Gold Coast

Every year in September the Swell sculpture exhibition is announced.

Every year we're taken by surprise and have to scramble to get there before it finishes.

It doesn't ever matter if we don't love every one of the sculptures, it's a gorgeous day out in the fresh sea air.

This creature atop Elephant Rock at Currumbin beach.

Strange the things that one seas on the beach. Note the iconic Aussie surf lifesavers to the right of the photo.

The friends we travelled with had never been to Palazzo Versace, so afternoon tea there was a must.

I wonder where its other 3 tentacles are?

went for a walk in our garden

Here's what I saw.

'

All green thumb kudos to Paul.

Make up for lost time

The week's fly by. I thought time would drag when Paul and Myles were away. Ha ha. 

Here's some snapshots of what happened between work, sleep and other boring stuff.

I finished this quilt. It's called 'Navajo Water Table'. Paul nominated me to make a quilt using this pattern when we were in a quilt shop in Colarado in 2012. That gave me permission to purchase the native american print fabrics from same quilt shop. Yes it's taken this long to finish it. Thanks for noticing.... But it was just in time to respond to my quilt group's challenge of 'Water'.

A long weekend away with my 'broadstrokes' quilting cronies to Caloundra assisted in waiting for the critical contact from the Kilamanjaro mountain climbers saying that they'd successfully made it up and down.

This view from our lounge area made things bearable.

And inside the house, we quickly set up the sweat shop. Even losing power for 4 hours didn't slow down productivity much.

It was a trifle cool to stitch out back, but we'll definitely use this area on our next stay.

What goes on on quilting retreat stays on quilting retreat!

...and then they returned, tired but happy. The stories of the dangers and treachery are getting better by the day, but I guess they've earned the right.

Things are pretty much back to normal with household running repairs. Some restyling the Man Cave to a Guest bedroom is required now as we await the arrival of very special housemates.

... And the social whirl continues with a quilting meeting at a frind's place in the country. I'm still wondering why we seem to do more eating than stitching on these days?

Glenys, Merody and Aina on their best dining behaviour.

Bronnie, Bev and Chris got straight on with enjoying the spread. Thanks Bev! 

.

These guys kept us in line.

Big weekends coming up with Father's day, Birthdays, and WEDDING ANNIVERSARY.

Cheers until then.

think about our family travelling

Being the type of family who cannot live without travel, I need to update on who's where in the world.

Annabel and Jessica (seen here with a friend in Prague) have recently returned from their school's incredibly successful music tour of Prague, Vienna, Salzburg, Venice, Florence and Rome.

Standing ovations all over.

Colton and Jen spent a week in Beijing with Dave, who's currently residing there.

Paul and Myles are in Africa. Here's Paul, the week before they left, having conquered another fearsome peak in the Scenic Rim. All part of his training regime for the big one.

Here he is at Whistler training for the frigid conditions they're expecting on top of the big one.

Contact from the intrepid travellers has been good up until 2 days ago, when they moved into the safari  phase of the expedition.

We know that all was well when they were in Kampala visiting with Nick and Mey who are still valiantly saving the world from Uganda.

This what Paul really really wants to see. He might have to make do with a few stragglers.

Here's what they'll definitely see.

.....Not sure about this?

I'd like to thank all family members from whom I've shamelessly borrowed images.

Couldn't have done this post without you!!