Shoe blow out

 Since getting a bad blister on my heel, I have been wearing my leather thongs to walk in.

I have had these thongs for a few years, very comfy with quite a thick sole and leather straps.

One felt a bit uneven and thinking that I had tried on something, I turned them up. Whoops, no, bits had come off them, the left one was worse than the right but the right one had a hole in the upper.

Time for new shoes. Two shoe stores had nothing that I liked, I don't like rubber thongs so went to the internet.

I wanted something with a decent sole that I could slip on and off.

Only took a week to arrive, comfy, thick sole, leather. Walking this morning and almost got a blister on the top of my foot, need to wear them in a bit more before doing long walks.

I made ice cream!

 My favourite chef Jamie has a new/newish series called Cooking for Less and he had ice cream as one of the dishes that he made. He called it No churnable ice cream.

Very very basic. It's 600gms of double cream, I used thicken cream, beat it until it increases in size then add a tin of sweetened condensed milk, keep beating until it's completely mixed in, add some smashed up chocolate. Mine had been in the fridge and didnt smash up well.

Freezer for a few hours and there it is. Jamie used paper that he wets and places in tins to stop it sticking he also suggested putting it in the fridge for an hour or so before serving. That's in England in the dead of winter. Hasn't been an issue here although can't scoop but it cuts into slices well. 

I bought some cherries for Christmas and I took about half and boiled them with some water and a spoon of sugar. Took the stones and any stems out and it makes a yummy sauce to pour over home made ice cream.

Christmas parkrun

 First time that it has been held at our local parkrun. The director was worried that very few people would turn up. No need to be concerned as there were more there than on the usual Saturday. Average is around 90 depending on time of year, temperatures and what else is happening in the runners agenda. One hundred and eight runners/walkers crossed the line this morning. Several in Christmassy atire.

Warren couldn't run so he volunteered to hand out the time tokens, he took Esme with him, our visiting dog. Lucy and I walked 4kms.

She was waiting on Warren coming across the line.

Christmas

 We did Christmas early this year, like we do most years.

Dinner was at our daughter's with each member of the family making or preparing a dish. 

We took a pavlova for dessert, picked up from the The Cheesecake Shop.

Warren decided to dress up for Christmas.

Flowering trees

 October has the beautiful purple flowering Jaranda trees which last all month.

Then December has the red, I don't know what they are called but equally beautiful, I should know their name as we have one but I don't.

 This one always seems to be the first or at least one of the first in the area. It is opposite our local shops. It always have a great display.

This is ours. The lawn was mowed a couple of days ago and now the lawn underneath is a carpet of red from the flower petals falling to the ground.

Walking

 My monthly results from the running/walking app. 

Not that clear to read but the 30 is the number of days I walked last month, taking 23 hours to walk 103 KMs with an elevation of 727 metres.

This afternoon, I achieved my revised goal of 1350kms for the year. Last year, I did just over 1100 starting on 8 Jan so my first goal was 1200, then it moved to 1300 and then 1350.

A screen shot of my phone, this week so far 24kms with a day to go, 57kms for the month, total for the year is 1351kms and I am due to finish walking around Australia on 7 Dec 2033. Only about 12000kms to go, not much when you say it quickly.

High tea

 My weekly coffee group ramped it up a bit this morning and we went south for high tea. 

Very different to "take own coffee and chair's to the local park.

Each month we have been putting in $10 each and putting an entry into lotto, we have had several small wins.

High tea cost us $49 each but our winnings throughout the year paid for it. Yep, I realise that $10 a month is $120 for the year so more than covers the cost but hey, it felt like a bonus.

The table was set very nicely with lattice plates, cups and saucers, everything matched and had pink roses on them, very feminine. Choice of teas or coffees, served orange juice when we arrived.

This three tiered plate was just for me. Savouries at the bottom, second tier was a sweet scone and a savoury one with butter, jam and cream, then sweets on the upper tier. We all took home a doggy bag.

Funny but we all wore dresses today,very rare indeed.

The 1% club.

 A TV Program that we are enjoying. 

A hundred people are asked the same question, they have 30 seconds to answer. If they are correct, they go on to the next harder question. Each person has 1000 dollars, if they go out ie get it wrong their $1000 goes into the prize pool. 

Supposedly another 100 people have been asked the question and graded so first question is the 90% question. Last night 11 people went out of the first.

This was it.

How meny wirds are korect in theis sentense? Answer of course is 3, how, are and is.

It is a mixture of puzzles, logic and common sense but some are about out there.

We didn't get very far last night, bombed out on a picture puzzle.

It was a moose, a mouse, a sheep and a deer.

Which one was the odd one out.

I came up with three solutions.

1 deer as it only had four letters, the others had five.

2 mouse as the others had horns

3 sheep as it had wool, the others had fur.

Nope, answer was mouse because the plural changed to mice and the others didn't change.

Anyway, two people were left at the end to try for 100,000, the woman took the option of walking away with 10,000. The guy got it right.

Question was January=717, March =5315 June=4624 what does August equal? Answer 6848.

Letters in the month, then number of month then multiply. We were at a loss.

Makes one think.

Every which way fillet

 That's the name of the blanket, it was a new stitch for me.

Wool was a variety colour and I used two and a half balls, approx 500grams.

It measures 150 by 150,I could have done more but decided that was big enough.

Very easy once I got going with it, took about two weeks with a couple of other things worked on in between.

A rabbit strechable

 

I don't think it looks much like a rabbit and it appears to have two sets of ears!

The orange legs are meant to pull through to a certain extent but I did use two different types of wool as I am on a no buying any more wool at the moment so using up what I have.

I did the body twice and then decided that the legs were too big to pull through properly so they are stitched in place. Hopefully some kid will get enjoyment out of it.

I have made a second one from all cotton, it's finished just need to stuff the body and then sew the sides together, it has turned out much smaller although still with very long legs 20cms I think or 104 rows.

Share the Dignity bags

 Once a year, this charity has a delivery point at Bunnings for a few days in November.

Basically, it's bags for women who have suffered domestic violence or just doing it tough. 

I heard about it a couple of years ago and did my first drop then. Last year I had bags ready to go but the week it was available was the week we had to isolate because of COVID.

I did add a few things and ended up with four bags. I had planned for one of each category mum and bub, woman and teenager.

I had been given two quite large green bags and I bought two other bags at an op shop.

Socks, knickers, soap shampoo toothpaste and brush, nail polish hand cream, no medications are allowed or food items.

The bigger one I made for mum and bub and included baby powder and shampoo, wipes and nappies

Inside one.

I will start collecting items again soon, I usually just add a couple of things to my grocery shop.

First gift for the giving tree

 Our crochet group decided to make some things for the giving tree at the local mall.

I had been gifted our tshirt yarn and made owl bowls from it. Type of a holdall for the bathroom or dressing table. I lined them with fabric from my stash and then filled them with toiletries that I though a young girl would like. Hair ties, nail polish, brush and comb, pretty soaps and bath bombs.

The Christmas " tree" this year is like a large wooden box with a shoot on one side to put the articles down keeping them safe from prying or even light fingered harm. 

I ended up putting the owl bowls with their goodies inside in a snap lock plastic bag and "posted" them last week.

Working on some toys and PJs to add in the next few weeks. 

Cardi

 With my purchase from Holland, I also bought ten balls of orange cotton. I have a pattern for a fox that I thought the orange would be very suitable.

Then I saw a summer cardigan made in white that I liked but I had already set my challenge to not buy any more wool or yarn for the rest of the year and next year. 

Light bulb moment, ten balls of orange cotton that I have. I know that I can't wear yellow even though I love the colour it doesn't do anything for them at all. I had avoided orange as well, then someone in China gave me an orange scarf and it seemed to suit so orange is one of my colours.

I had my colours done several years ago and then I suited jewel colours, bright pink and orange were amongst my colour scheme.

I have a use for my cotton but ten balls wasn't enough, they are only 50gram balls, luckily in my stash I did have four balls of darker orange.

My summer light weight cardigan! It's not as long as I would normally wear and has 3/4 sleeves, no buttons. Just to put on in cooler evenings. Took me six days to make it 0lus 13 balls from my stash.

Second blanket

 I usually buy wool or yarn that I like and then decide what I will do with it.

One of my purchases earlier in the year was cotton from a company in Holland. I bought five packs of ten balls ranging from white to black. 

I thought it would make a great light weight blanket and set about making large granny squares using six of the colours, starting with white ending with black.

Each square is slightly different as I started with four rows in each colour but if course as it gets bigger, it takes more yarn to do a row so I had to change and do more rows in the middle so that I didn't run out of the black. Rather than stitch the squares together like I have done in the past, I crocheted these together, so much easier and quicker.

It measures 150 by 150. I was thinking of doing a border but I only had a small amount of black left so would need to be a lighter colour or order some more. Nah, think I will just wash it and that's it.

Local parkrun

 Last week, we were back to do parkrun at our local park. There was a volunteer from Ipswich who took the photographs.

Lucy and I going out the last bridge with Aidan and Lockie I told her we were not doing parkrun but she took it anyway and included the phot in the parkrun group.

Sheridan volunteered as a bar code scanner.

Aidan and I relaxing after.

Warren with some of his running mates, they are around the same age, first second and third in their age group. 

Caloundra part two

 Besides being a nice day for a drive, we went to check out the war memorials.

One each on Kings and  Shelley beach and then Military jetty on Golden beach. Golden beach brings back memories. Some Chinese students came to Brisbane and they were taken shopping, one young guy stayed back bargaining in a store to get the best price and missed the group leaving. When he made his purchase, they and the bus were nowhere to be seen. He knew they were going to the Gold Coast so he hailed a taxi and asked for Golden beach, his English version of Gold Coast, not realising the Golden beach was in the opposite direction and a couple of hours away.

One of the organisers when they realised they were a student short, went through names and phone numbers, kids were from different schools so not all known to each other it took a bit of time. Rang and ended up speaking with the cabbie, who had to turn back, still cost the student $70. 

After Golden beach we then went to an airforce museum and found a Huey helicopter.

Doesn't look that scary now but I have flown in one of these with the sliding door open. I was hanging on for grim death and the crewie was walking around and told that I couldn't fall out as the air force keeps that from happening. I noticed he was strapped to the frame, I continued to do a white knuckle hold. It was an Army exercise so probably only up a couple of hundred feet.

Caloundra

 Friday was a cooler day so I suggested we drive to Caloundra. Following the GPS we went merrily along.

We were headed for a particular beach either Kings or Shelly, they were alongside of each other.

The GPS took us up a road, it was quite steep with a stop sign right on the top. Thank goodness for auto cars and the fact that I was not driving. A couple of cars drove across the top road, when it was clear we drove on Seeley into nothing as we couldn't see any road. Across the road and down about 60 metres before we saw road.

Round abouts, pedestrian crossings, road closures and traffic, what a nightmare.

Took a couple of shorts walks then Coffee! We felt we had earned it.

Maccas

 Used to be a treat/cheap takeaway meal for the kids. We have stopped at Maccas for a rest break and meal while travelling, their toilets are always clean.

We were out this morning and had coffee at the beach.

Couple of the headlands that we walked up and along.

Lucy enjoying the beach, not hesitation these days about the waves and water.

We also went for a couple of short walks, it was an hours drive home. I suggested to Warren that we grab Maccas for lunch, it was already 12.30. 

Probably not noticed that much before but two meal deals, so burger, chips and a drink was $15plus each. Going back in time now but I remember getting a Hawaiian pack for each of us, five for just under $20. Hawaiian pack was quarter of a chicken, chips and a pineapple fritter.

Panna cotta

 One of the homesteads where we stayed on our trip to Cape York, served Panna Cotta with berries for dessert. There was no choice at this meal we all got crumbled veal cutlets and hot vegetables except Warren and Kerry, their meals were special. Warren got his cutlets plain and no gravy because of gluten. Not sure what Kerry got, sometimes she was served fried rice or an omelette.

The bowl we were given for dessert was massive, a full bowl then berries on top, I assume they were frozen. 

Warren was almost sick after the meal but only because there was so much, he said that he should have stopped eating about half way though. 

Panna cotta was a dessert that I have made before, years ago and then it seems to go out of fashion.

This was my version a few days after we got home.

Sauce, nuts and sprinkles were left over from the banana splits that I made a few weeks ago. So easy to make, half a cup of cream, cup of milk, spoonful of sugar, gelatin and vanilla. This made four small ramikins.

Lota parkrun

 What a name for a suburb. I had never heard of it but it's south of us and on the coast.

We were up at five and left home at 5.40am to get there. It's didn't take as long as we though mainly due to what other silky people are up and going at that hour of the day on a weekend.

They are trying to fulfill the alfabet and or their names so an L was good as that was what it was called. Some parkruns are named after the suburb, some the area or sports ground.

Warren followed closely by Aidan

Sheri, Jordan had been walking with her but had got in front and I couldn't get my phone out quick enough. Off to the right is the beach.

Last day

 We had a balcony at the Hilton and we had an early morning coffee out there.

We could just see the pool and lounges from our room, we were on the fifth floor

I had a window seat back to home

Our breakfast at the airport

Looking out to sea, we were wondering what would be put on the vacant block of land.

We decided to forgo breakfast, it opened at 7am and our flight was at 9.20am.

At checkout, there was a buzzer for a taxi, promised to there in five minutes, I always take that with a grain of salt but we pressed it and it gave us a number. Grabbed and bags and headed out the door. Four or five steps to the footpath and we were debating on staying by the door which had a much bigger area or going down the steps to wait, when a taxi turned in.  There was a circular drive in front of hotel. Good grief, it was our taxi.

Delivered our bags, we were early but they took them.

Cairns

 Smallish plane from Horne island to Cairns, holding about a hundred passengers. We were met by the tour company and delivered back to the Hilton. Dinner was not included that night but breakfast the following was the final of our trip.

We had had a recommendation of a Thai cafe not far from the hotel so after we booked in, we set out to find it. Not far away and we saw a lineup yep, it was for the cafe that we were wanting. All tables were full and about thirty people waiting, we moved on and discovered the night market.

Clothes and souvenirs one end but food the other, cheap and cheerful and we shared a plate of Thai food there. We had seen an ice-cream place on the way so didn't want to indulge too much. 

Many of the trees had little lights on them

Kids in school uniform even though it was 6.30pm, school had returned that day. Very holiday/festival mood for a weeknight in October.

Horne Island

 This was an island I did not know even existed. Off to the east of Thursday island, it boasted an airport, where over a thousand planes flew to and from every week. When I heard the tour guide say that, I was thinking a year, yeah about right that three to four a day but the number was every week!

It's a little round blog on a map, 575 people living there as per the 2021 census.

Our bus crew caught the ferry over from Thursday and four of us that were doing the extra day were taken to our resort, the others transported to the airport. There was a rather inviting pool but we stayed in the air conditioned room, it was hot at 32.

Next morning we had a visit to the local museum that was attached to the resort and then a tour of the island taking in the military spots.

During WW2, the island had housed 5000 soldiers and 9 nurses.

Warren and I walked to the jetty and visited the supermarket and cafe.

I liked the white bark trees

An unusual sign that it not seen on the main land

One of the guns and shells. Gun has been restored, during the wet which starts end of Oct, it is encased in heavy plastic. The shell had been made from wood and painted to look the real deal.

Pretty hibiscus that are around.

Thursday island part 2

 Time for the group to spilt up. Three of us and our bus driver were going on to Horn island and we had to get on a different bus. However we did discover that we went to the same place, the museum.

It was the King's birthday holiday so some things were shut.

Our driver on TI was Liberty, what a card he was.

The museum was housed in the underground bunkers.

There were three of these large guns on top, pointed to to west north and east.

We then drove through the cementry

Bronze soldier standing sentry at Anzac park, probably can't see but he is only wearing shorts, no shirt.

The memorial wall.

The supermarket was open until 12noon and the pubs from noon onwards. Liberty took us to the supermarket to get Moreno's, only meal that wasn't provided. Then Warren and wandered along the beach and found a cache or two. It was getting hot, hottest day of 31 so we went to the pub for a drink and cool off in a/C TAB before walking back to the jetty to catch the ferry to Horn island,

 

Thursday Island

 After breakfast we loaded the truck for the last time and some of us walked to the ferry terminal, it was only 400 metres over sandy ground, hence the truck for luggage.

We had been advised to use luggage with no wheels at first, think there may have been some arguments about that and it was changed. However some did comply with that, I had decided that I wasn't going to carry my luggage through airports without wheels. Our luggage weighed in at 7.3 and 7.5kgs each.

Our tiny bags. We did have a back pack as well.

We caught the ferry to Thursday island, I expected some dinky little thing but it was quite large, seating for a hundred and twenty people. We didn't have to pay as it was part of the tour but I looked it up and it was $12 for a return trip, taking about eighty minutes. Once on Thursday Island we were only 100 KMs from PNG.

Thursday island jetty, see the difference in the colour of the sea.

The jetty and ferry at Seisia

Turtles on the foreshore on TI.