A hex of a lot…

I just couldn’t stop myself.

I needed holiday hand work. Well, in my case that’s usually hexies. I didn’t have a hexie project on the go, and rather than come up with something different as an alternative, I grabbed a bag of papers, a small sewing kit, poked around in my scraps and an idea emerged. We all know I have a weakness for dark blue. But I also happened to have quite a few bits of soft pink.

And there were also the blue and white scraps of lawn from the backing of Anemone. I expect they’ll have to be supplemented, but I’ll see how far the supply takes me.

And on this holiday it has rained. And rained. And rained. So instead of haring off on various activities and adventures, the three of us have hunkered down, listened to books, eaten snacks, watched YouTube, snoozed (not just the dog, I might add), and in my case, stitched hexies. Many, many hexies. The picture below is just the ones I’ve made up into flowers. The rest are still in a bulging bag of blue – with a bit of pink.

Sorry about the poor lighting. I don’t carry decent lights in the caravan and it’s very grey outside, so this was the best I could manage.

I don’t know where this is going yet, but I’m feeling a back-of-my-chair quilt or similar size, and I’ll be stitching the outer edge down onto a straight border rather than taking the hexies out to the edge or facing the edge as I’ve done with Anemone.

Still, that’s all a loooooong way off. A hex of a long way off.

Evidence of (not much) industry

I brought handwork on holiday with me.

Of course.

About 75 hexies. I have all blue & white and some pale pink scraps with me.

But it’s only enough to keep my hands busy while my ears listen to a talking book or two. Trouble is, I’m now so fast at making hexies that I have a rather large pile made for the few hours I’ve worked on it. I have no idea what these hexies and the other scraps I brought with me will evolve into. Time will tell.

We’re having a wonderfully lazy time. In earlier times, I used to pack activities into our trips to Cairns, mainly revolving around food: the tracking down, smelling, sampling, tasting, enjoying and taking home of. These days, I’m someone limited in how much luscious cheese, hand-made chocolate, artisan coffee blends and succulent tropical fruit I can actually safely consume. I choose my meals…. sensibly although not boringly (see below!). It’s not quite as much fun, and importantly, the absence of gastro-touring leaves us free to do, well, nothing very much, and do it lavishly!

‘Fishy benny’: eggs benedict with smoked salmon and sautéd mushrooms on rocket and rye, topped with a lemony hollandaise

Before lunch today, we indulged today in a spot of bogus caravan-shopping. There’s one big caravan yard in Cairns and about half a million RV, camper van and camper-trailer yards, but none of the latter are of interest to us. We took Mouse and toured the caravan yard, went into every caravan (not Mouse, he inspected the outsides) and assessed it. All very slick and shiny, but just not, well, comfortable. The kitchens had large shiny appliances and sleek surfaces, but almost nowhere to do any work. Perhaps they don’t expect people to actually prepare meals, just heat up ready meals or reheat a pizza. They certainly don’t expect people to have books, or sewing machines, or sports equipment or a large collection of spices, or even, heaven forbid, a dog. There are buttons and switches and fold out this and drop down that, but the furnishings are nasty, there’s nowhere to hang a large fluffy towel or two, and heaven forbid you should have a coffee machine. So until we win the lottery and can have our ideal caravan built to our specification, we’ll stick to Miz Lizzie, who can comfortably and neatly accommodate everything we want to bring and use.

Mouse has written about his expedition out to dinner with us last night. I have discovered that if I reblog his posts here and then want to update the original, the updates don’t carry over. If anyone can point out how to do that, I’d be grateful. In the meantime, you’ll find it here if you’re interested.

‘Raunchy huevos’: omelette with chilli,spicy beans, avocado, roasted chorizo, roasted tomato and sour cream, with tortilla chips on the side.

And now I feel a large snooze coming on. Lunch was pretty delicious, and I shall join the Husband and the dog in our small but comfy and air-conditioned home away from home.

Tomorrow we have a small road trip planned. I’ll tell you all about it then.