Weekend ramblings

It's a slightly scary thought that in about 12 hours I will off on my way to work.  What happened to the weekend?  It started peacefully enough, taking the pups for a walk at Minnippi parklands.

The pups had a snooze on our return, but there is no rest for the weary gardener...

This zinnia bud

had morphed into this beautiful flower.

While I have had plenty of summer colour from the dwarf zinnia 'Summer Brilliance', this and another slightly shaggy bloom were the first from my 'big' zinnias. I thought I would celebrate by trying a tiny arrangement with dahlia 'Marie Antoinette'. (The little jug was my grandmother's, the blue and white china two recent thrifty purchases - the box was $2 at Mount Gravatt flea market and the vase 50 cents at Lifeline!)

And speaking of thrifty finds, I picked up this table base at a kerbside throw-out...

I'm going through a bit of a 'home beautiful' phase at the moment. Although in my case this generally means everything gets a whole lot worse for a while before the transformation is completed. Case in point, my sofa...
The puppies have found it necessary to modify this to suit themselves.

Sometimes they like the one cushion option.

And sometimes the no cushion option.

They always prefer to remove the protective throw, and have eaten the cushion they don't like, so it seems a recover is in order.  I found the perfect fabric. It was subtle, elegant - and had lots of white - so we aren't having that, and have opted for a more vibrant selection. The fabric was delivered last week and looks wonderful.  It is still on the roll, but hopefully will be off to the upholsterer in the next few weeks.

With the new sofa in mind, I rearranged the paintings on the stairway and swapped a few around with others downstairs.

I think the lady with flowers by Aavik from the Eumundi markets is much better here than on the stairway. She is like a little sister to Jane Creenaune's Girl in Chinese Dress

Unfortunately the recent rain resulted in a roof leak that had water running down the wall where many of my paintings are hung, so I have removed a few and propped them against a wall until I can get someone out to repair it.

But one project keeps leading to the next. In the interim, I tried out my Turkish rug, which had been relegated to the safety of an upstairs bedroom after the pups took to nibbling its fringes, with the new colour scheme and decided it desperately needed a wash and repair. So it was off to Taringa to deliver it into the hands of the experts, and I had a bit of a wander on the way home. Firstly I ducked into the Cat and Fiddle deli for a quick lunch, and then detoured through some of my favourite streets round Toowong and Auchenflower.

Typically hilly terrain and treelined streets with beautiful classic Queenslander homes.

Pretty as a picture...

but it was the blue ginger Dichorisandra thrysiflora that caught my eye.

Here is another example.  Doesn't it look gorgeous against the green wall?




Speaking of green walls, while many Queenslanders are painted in pastel tones, I love the stronger colours.  Doesn' t this bright pink work beautifully with the green of the bamboo (and what about pink for a sofa - do you think it will frighten the pups into behaving?)

After all that gadding about yesterday and grocery shopping this morning, I spent the rest of the day in the garden, bulb planting and green ant dodging in the front, followed by serious weeding and mosquito swatting in the backyard until it got too dark. Still it was all worthwhile, I will sleep the sleep of the just: I have finally made a start to the back garden, which has been hanging over my head, and I added another handful of leopard lily seed pods to my collection.  And next weekend, I'll do it all over again, but changes are afoot.  Stay tuned...