Monday, December 28, 2009

White Christmas

We went to see the stage show White Christmas. It was wonderful: not the deepest story I have ever seen but the music, singing and dancing were great.

There is snow forecast for next weekend, maybe even New Year's eve, not good for the people who will be standing out in Times Square for the ball to fall.

I will try to put up a couple of pictures of Central Park with snow. It was a few days after the snowfall but it has been cold, so it had not melted. It is gone now as it rained ALL DAY yesterday (I was very jealous on behalf of Melbourne).

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Whitish Christmas

Well, I arrived safely in New York last Sunday, just after the snow storm. We had a wait on the tarmac before we could disembark from the plane but at least we could fly in.
New York was covered in snow, looking lovely. It wasn't so good to walk around on the icy footpaths but mostly the snow had been cleared away and only some intersections were tricky.
I have taken photos of people (they all seemed to be men) clearing the snow away from footpaths, intersections and making spaces for people to get to the road from buildings. All very ho hum for people used to the snow but fun for me to look at.
When the snow is built up alongside the road, it is very hard for cars to find parking spaces. I would not like to try to find parking in any part of New York. Actually, I have no desire to try to drive here at all. It is fairly easy to get around by public transport. We have been using the buses mostly because we have not been in a hurry and you can see lots from the bus.
I went for a walk in Central Park and the snow was beautiful. I have taken some pictures but haven't tried putting any pictures on my friend's computer yet. Will maybe try later, or not.
We are going to see the stage play White Christmas - very appropriate.
Best wishes to my thousands of readers, Happy Christmas!!

Saturday, December 19, 2009

White Christmas - perhaps

I'm sitting here, all packed to go to New York for Christmas. I am lucky enough to have a good friend living there and she has invited me over for a few weeks. I have just checked the weather forecast and it looks COLD. Perhaps there will be a payoff of a white Christmas, something that we do not get here in Melbourne.
We had a hot day here on Wednesday, about 39 degrees celsius (or should I call it centigrade?), with the last few days in the low 20s. But the HIGH forecast for Sunday (in New York) is -1 degree!! I hope the snow doesn't mean that the plane can't go to New York. One of the joys of travel, I suppose, the uncertainty.
I am hoping to go to the new medieval display at The Cloisters to see, among other things, the tapestry. I have heard that there has been a 5 year renovation going on, so it should be good to see.
I went to K Spoering's blog and she tells me that there are more tapestries to see at the MET, not that I am only going to look at tapestries, but it does give me a focus for my 'touristing'.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Pink quilts!

I don't usually wear pink and I rarely have it in my quilts. I used to go to patchwork and applique classes and the teacher there hated pink! So I was interested to see the 12x12 group's pink quilt exhibition. There are some lovely ideas there, some pinker than others.
I am also using this blog to see if I can get it to post at a date later than I am writing it - it is currently December 15th so I'll see if I can delay it till the 16th, I don't want to have to wait too long to see if it works!
I have realised - someone told me - that I have to click the Publish Post button to have it scheduled. I think I only save the draft last time. Time will tell if I have done it right.

RMIT tapestry

While browsing the web and thinking about what I am going to do next year, I came across alink to some tapestry work designed by one of the teachers at RMIT.
Tapestry is beautiful but is often huge and takes such a long time to complete. I wonder how tapestry weavers ever make a living from such work, I can't imagine many people being able to afford to pay for the amazing amount of work involved. No wonder they are often commissioned by big companies.
There is currently a communal work in progress at RMIT that students will be able to work on next year. I think that it may even comprise part of the course for students who are doing Tapestry as a major subject, that you are expected to participate in a community work. Other people, who are not doing the tapestry major, are also contributing time.
It has four parts to it, four separate tapestries. Two are currently in production, although I think they are not being worked on at present, just for the summer holiday break. When I find out more about it, I will post about again.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Trying to get my head around blogging

I thought I had very cleverly arranged my posts to appear on consecutive days but have been disappointed to discover that they kept their original posting dates and that when I publish them they go into the order of my original writing of the post, not the order I wanted them to appear in. I'll have to read that help item again, more closely.
I also tried playing around with images for my header. I kept getting huge pictures and eventually thought I had made a good size but it has turned out to be much smaller than I had expected. AND I thought I had deleted it anyway, but I notice it is there.
Maybe I should do my blogging at sensible times of the day, not late at night when I am tired.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Finding tapestry blogs

Here I am, sitting inside on a beautiful day, looking for blogs about tapestry. I have found several today, very interesting and inspiring.
The first two sites that came up when I did the search were a computer site and a reading site. Then I came across a tapestry crochet site, I am not sure what that is, exactly, but it was also interesting to browse.
You can spend so much time looking around on the internet!
But then I found several interesting blogs on the topic I was trying to find.
I can see that I need to learn heaps more and to actually set up a studio, even if it is just a consistent place to work. As I am enrolled to learn tapestry again next year, I hope that I will be able to show some work in progress also.
I also enjoyed the post about PhotoShop and its usefulness as a design tool. I will have to practise with that also.
These two sites have useful tips as well as showing some beautiful work. They also have links to even more useful and interesting sites but I must go and do some other things, make use of the beautiful early summer day.