I went photo hunting, exploring and on a walk down memory lane yesterday. I wore a woolly jumper and trousers but despite the nippy breeze which at the start almost made me wish I have worn one of my scarves and a jacket the warm sun soon made it a most beautiful winter morning.

I walked into a nearby paddock and on, going where I had never gone before. Mostly because I trespassed across the corner a paddock belonging to someone else. The main paddocks I walked through are land that is not really owned by anyone in particular (I think it is Crown Land owned and managed by State Government.) and so anyone can walk on it. But I found a place where a huge gum tree had fallen over the fence and squashed it. Obviously no one wanted to move it so they just built the fence again around it. It made a perfect stile to cross the fence with. So I did. Then I adventured across that paddock and two huge mobs of Kangaroos bounded away before me. 

Then I came to another fence, It had much tighter wires and all the strands were of barbed wire, but in one place a creek must sometimes flow so I ducked under there and entered another world. From a vast open almost treeless paddock the land changed to a forest of whispering casuarina trees. The morning sunlight shone of the needles and the wind blew through the trees setting them swaying all around me and making the calming whispering sound that the trees do in a breeze. 

I followed A little creek into the trees for some distance, lichen covered rocks poked out from under scattered pine needles.  All around grass grew greener until I could no longer tell where the creek really went. In fact, everywhere began to look the same, green springy grass among the lichen covered trees, only one large tree behind me marked my path. So I turned back. 

I walked along at the edge of the whispering wood. Until I came back to the first paddock, it is large so stretched the length of the other easily. I also found a small spiky native wattle bush. 

I had met a heard of black cows with calves on my way there and got quite close to many of them. On the way back I came across a different heard of colourful cows with sharp horns, they bolted when I came near, thankfully away from me.

 Before I made my way home, I went searching for a house that a friend and I and one of my sisters built many years ago. It is still standing, and as you can see quite impressive! We built a lot of cubby houses over the years but that was our last and greatest achievement, all the others eventually fell apart or were knocked down. 

 We called the house "The Two Chairs" because we had found a set of chairs dumped in a valley the paddock and managed to dig out two that were not in such bad condition and carry them into the house. They are still there, kinda, just tipped over outside and far more rusted and worn than last time. But it was quite nice to see that our 'house' is still standing. It was hard work of many days to drag all the logs there and prop them up.

We had  a name for this interesting tree too, but I no longer remember it. We used to walk in the paddocks quite regularly, but now no longer do anywhere near as much. It brought back so many memories of fun times with friends and all the crazy things we did together.

Can you see the kangaroos? 

Did you ever build cubbies outside?

How many tags/awards are there? And why do most of them get awarded for no particular reason? This one is called the Infinity Dreams Award but what does it have to do with dreams? I cannot answer these questions.

 Well, as you may be able to guess I was awarded another award thanks to (you would not have guessed) Lydia from C'est La Vie, so thank you Lydia. And this award has rules which I have kinda broken as I often do.

Here are those rules: 
Use the Infinity Dreams Award picture
Thank the blogger who tagged you
Tell us 11 facts about yourself
Answer the 11 questions
Tag 11 bloggers

Eleven Facts About Myself:

• I like using my own pictures for things. So I googled Infinity Dreams Award trying to find if the original picture was any better. Which is the original though? As you can see I found lots.
• I have a pet peeve about photos that are not clear or are pixelated or even just almost pixelated. Hence I could not while staying in my right mind use the "Infinity Dreams Award" picture which is probably not the original anyway. SO I used six...aaannd made my own.
• Anyway I spent hours on Friday making the picture at the beginning of this post. And this is a perfect excuse to show it off because is it cool.
• I made the picture out of seven separate images

• I am currently wearing a dark purple cloak for no reason whatsoever and also a purple and white check shirt and jeans.
• I now have my own computer which is so convenient.
• The person in the photo is me and that me has almost published 500 posts on her blog! And want's ideas for what she should do for the 500th post. (I have a few draft posts which make it look like there are already 500)

• I can really walk on spiderwebs...... oh okay, but I can.... they are just squished and trampled in real life.
• I did not take any of the photos deliberately for the picture, I just decided I wanted to make one and looked back through my photos to see what I had.
• I am currently reading: The Roots of Endurance by John Piper
• I can sew shirts, well I have made two (tunic shirt things) one of which I am wearing in the photo. Obviously it would be difficult to wear two at the same time. (and now that is eleven or I can't count)

Lydia's Questions for me to answer:

1. What is your biggest hobby?
Photography, it is a lot bigger than a hobby now and yet it still is that too.

2.Who is your biggest inspiration?
Ah...God and his creation, and his everything.

3. What is your favourite piece of music (can be either classical or modern)?
Whatever I want to listen to at the time... I do rather like the song "I Still Call Australia Home"  I am not musical in a lot of ways but I can sing I don't know how I do I just do and according to musical people I sounds really good, and they are the musical ones, so I believe them.

4. What is something you wish you knew more about?
A Time To Rise..... I want to know what happens but it is not published yet and so I wait. Other than that I just wish I could remember stuff I already know.

5. What is your favourite quote?
My favourite! I have no favourite, too many, but here are the ones I have added to my goodreads quotes place most recently.

6. What is something you look forward to doing each day?  
Eating breakfast .

7. What is your favourite way to get exercise?
Um....walking... playing badminton...neither of which I do often enough.

8. Describe yourself in three sentences:
I am thoughtful, and like to know things, but I am good a keeping secrets, probably because I forget them. I stand and watch and don't like large groups, but I really like talking in small groups or one on one; I am better at listening than talking unless you get me onto a subject that I am passionate about. If you wanted to know what I look like then use your eyes and look at the photo of me. back near the beginning of this post, or the one on the sidebar.

9. What has been your biggest life achievement so far?
Having my own photography business.

10. What is something you learned recently?
Sometimes things are not worth doing if they are not worth dying for. "If it is not worth dying for it is not worth doing" If you know it is right and biblical you should be doing it even if you may 'die' (or be heavily persecuted) for it. I was struck by this one because it has come up in my lectures on world view things, and on a video we watched and possibly some other place too.

11. Where is the most interesting place you have ever gone?
Well there was this time I walked on spiderwebs, and another when I went to Elsewhere and I found that I could change whatever I wanted, but I also wanted to to be believable so everything has to happen so that people would still have enough suspension of disbelief  (Elsewhere is the world my novel is set in). I don't know which was the most interesting, but recently I was just sitting on a lounge babysitting and I drifted off to a far place or cyborgs, princes and Luna queens. So I suppose I have been many kinds of interesting places. 

Okay now I need to tag/award other people if you don't want to do it that is fine, but if you do have fun:

Sarah @ Novus Papilio
The other Sarah @ Trusting in the Lord
Emily @ Amity
Jessica @ Dreams Really do Come True
Julia @ The Barefoot Gal
Sophie @ The Techno Maid
Zach @ Zach's Abode
Rosie @ Rosie's Treehouse I will tag you just so see if you are still alive there, I have't heard from you for so long.
Hannah,Anna,and Emma @ The 3 Musketeers That actually makes 11 if I count each of you as one :D

Here are your questions:

1. Do you often dream when you sleep?
2. What is the scariest dream you have ever had?
3. What is one of your dreams for yourself for the future?
4. What is one for your dreams for the world?
5. How many tags/awards have you done?
6. What is a question you want to answer?
7. Can you answer it for me now?
8. What is your favourite dreamy/relaxing music or soundtrack?
9. What is infinity times eleven?
10. What is a dream of yours that had been fulfilled?
11. What place have you been where the scenery seems to go on for an infinite distance?

Have fun!

I realized the other day that I have not done a 'crafty' post in ages, but then I have not really made as much this year as other years either. A week ago I made these little fellows, and took some photos of the process. So here is how I made and how to make a little owl on a stump.

I drove past a house the other day and it inspired me to write, this;

Once this was not a sad little house, I am sure. Once a man, or maybe more, laboured on its foundations. Each wooden slat, cut and placed by loving hands. With joy and laughter, looking forward to a brighter future, this house rose up from the steep hill. Finally the wife arrived, the furniture, and the corrugated iron for the roof. It rumbled up on a slow moving wagon, drawn by a team of oxen, maybe. Maybe they had trudged the tree boarded track up the mountains for days, weeks.

Once, maybe once, the young wife ran up and into her husbands arms,  so glad that they were together again. So glad of the beautiful house, a house of her own, with wooden boards to sweep the dust from. Together they would make this their home, possibly.

As the rain fell, it drummed down on the roof, horrendously noisy, but they sat together, knowing that the house was solid built. It would not blow away, or collapse like a tent of canvas. Maybe soon after that children could have come.

Once they could have leaped off the bottom step and run down the slope, crossing over the fallen tree that bridged the creek, and jumped into their fathers arms as he arrived home. Did he come from taking their cattle to market? Or selling the furs of the animals he trapped? Or from the homestead where The Boss lived? 

Other times the children could have run with buckets down to the bubbling mountain stream and tried to catch the little mosquito fish, that darted through the clear water. Little trousers, or skirts, hoisted high. Maybe muddy little feet ran back up the hill to show Mother their prizes. Or maybe they fished out the fat black tadpoles, and kept them in a jar, watching as they grew legs, squiggly tails shrank and then disappeared. 

Once upon a time, long ago, many things could have happened in and around that happy little house. House of promises, hopes and dreams, once. Now though, it sits a weathered grey. On a hillside, far from anywhere, a dull house rots, silent except for the clatter, bang, and scratch of the rusted iron roofing, that has now come loose. Each gust of wind, pulls at the house, and it succumbs, sinking away, slowly returning to dust, and memories.

What memories it must hold though, if only I could hear it speak. If only the creaks, could, be interpreted, or the language of old things found out. But the people who lived there once, have gone, grown old and died. Maybe the children still live on somewhere, I wonder have they forgotten, the once happy little house on a hill. Or are they no longer, here to be able to remember, have they too passed away. I do not know, but I wonder, what does that sad little house remember?

To read of and glimpse the first part of the day read this post. For the second part, all you have to do is continue on. 

I have no photos of this event so you shall have to imagine it from my words, and really when it is as dark as the other night, even I can not take a really good photo. 

Motes of hay drift up, hay that has the slightest dampness to it. We leave our places, by the warm fire crackling behind us. We leave the orange glow and settle down on the hay and lean back against another bale. All along the trailer people talk, I am too far away to hear most of what is said. Wordless voices rise high and fall. 

Rumbles of the tractor engine drown out some of the voices. It lurches forward throwing us all sideways and against one another. Red taillights flash, the head lights cut a bright swathe through the grass as we turn and bounce on. We leave the flickering flames behind. Not a trace of their warmth is left. Chords, strummed on strings. Upon one of the topmost bales a shadow sits strumming her guitar. I reach out and touch her as she plays. 

Music wafts through the star spangled night. Overhead the Milky Way stretches, stars glow brighter as we leave other lights behind. The two pointers shine bright, I follow their pointing with my eyes and find the Southern Cross. It shines right overhead in the middle of the misty streak across the heavens, the  Milky Way. I wonder at the vastness of he who names the stars. His Glory is plain if we only but look. 

We rattle past round bales, fences, a dam. Six wallabies start up in surprise as we rumble towards them, fixing them in the tractors headlights. They flee in all directions, we give chase. "Kangaroos" comes the shout, "Look, there!" Voices exclaim, hands point. Some of the wallabies hop along a fence, trying desperately to get away. They bound through the grass and melt into the darkness.

The tractor and its heavy load rattle away to into the darkness. Back to the fire, back to warmth. As we go voices are raised in song from the rear of the trailer. As those in the middle can't make out the words we begin our own. Song, laughter, hay, starry skies, a beautiful memory, a beautiful world, a great God.

A light rain fell, speckling my already damp clothes. There were no shadows, just blackness, and one spot of light. The warm gold light, spilled a little way out into the darkness from the hall behind us. A wind blew straight through my damp clothes and lifted my heavy denim skirt off my legs. The wind brought a chill as it passed straight through me almost as if I were not there. Music swirled through the blackness. Making its way from the hall and out into the perpetual shadow of night, it also passed by me, as did the wind. The beat of feet on wooden floors thrummed faintly, mingled with the music, and came to me, out in the night. Shadows, rain, wind, light, and music all combined and caught me in their spell for a moment, holding me for eternity. Then a voice called me away. I left.

I have always wanted to take photos of  aisles of trees, I have seen photo shoots done in them and other photos and thought how cool they look. Then on the way to the bush tucker camp I drove past a forest of these trees and knew I'd have to take some photos there. On the way back we got out just for ten minutes, but I can take quite a few photos in that time. The sun had already gone behind the hills that surrounded us, but I had enough light.

As I got out of the car I saw something that would make the photos even better... horses... if you don't already know I will tell you now that I have always loved horses. They are the most beautiful of Gods creatures and here were three of them... well one being a pony. I took a photo that has gone to join some of my all time favourites.

 My only problem is that I can't decide if it looks better in Black and white or colour. 

I found that a lot of the photos look lovely in black and white since they didn't actually have many colours to start with, mostly just grey and bright green, as you can see in the photos I left as they were.

The only pity is that the trees are in Martindale (few hours away), so it is not likely I will be going there again just to take photos any time soon. But I am so happy that I did get to take these, and that the horses were there!

I made some of them black and white because of a problem... if that is what it is with my camera making some light look purple. As you can see in the above photo the light around the top branches of the trees has turned purple, and I have not worked out why it does that. 

Do you like the colour or black and white photos better?

Which is your favourite photo?

I have just finished making some, well two coasters. I suppose they are coasters, well they are now anyway, they didn’t start off as that but that is what they are now. In fact I’m not even sure I can remember what they were going to be.

I started with a limp lomp lump of fire wood.  Then I got a saw and cut off the end of it........ sounds easy, well when I had got less than half way through I already was having second thoughts. But I hate starting things and not finishing them so I cut the rest of the way through. Then I started to sand it. Does that sound easy..?....... I did it by hand ........... Then I forgot how long it took to saw through the wood and decided to make another one. Then I decided the first piece was too wonky and scraped it. Yessss all that work.  Then I thought I need at least two so I cut another. It still took a long time.  Now thinking I’m really going crazy. I sanded them.....by hand.

Then I showed my dad. He went ‘they look nice and have great potential but you should sand them more to get every mark out of them’. Whaat! But he also mentioned he had an electric sander in the shed. I used it. Electric sanders are sooooooo much easier, wish I had thought of that before. Then to finish them off I rubbed some linseed oil into them. Walla the finished product. hmm what am I going to use them for.......