Chicklet Update Overdue

I had a most enjoyable ride in the bus into The Bay this morning with the 'Hamish and Andy' radio program on over the speaker system.  It was a giggly way to start the day.

Vegan Chickie,  Chicklet and I met at the Bare-chested Chef's restaurant, which is part of the Wetside Water Park in Hervey Bay.  It was their first day open for breakfast.

I had a Crab Omelette for breakfast and Vegan Chickie had Canadian French Toast.  Hmmmmm it was DELICIOUS!  I think we need to do that again!

Chicklet had fun sitting on the grass in the outdoor area of the restaurant, eating sticks and leaves and grass and anything else she could wrap her fingers around.

Afterwards, we caught a taxi back to Vegan Chickie's place, where we both harassed Chicklet with our cameras and took about 400 photos between us!

Chicklet has so many facial expressions, she had us laughing our butts off, which meant that some of my photos came out blurry from my shaking with laughter!

I had a lovely morning.

Thank you Vegan Chickie, Chicklet and the fabulous Bare-chested Chef!

A giggle to end our Chicklet update for today ...

Nite all.

"rQQzy's" Creations

Another order for four bracelets!  That's nine bracelets, a necklace and a pair of earrings in the last week! I could be getting that 'arty farty' feeling any minute!

Sold!

Sold!

I used the new light box to take photos of two of the bracelets.  I think they turned out quite well ... the photos AND the bracelets!

I spent the morning by the river, where I got a couple of good shots of a pelican.  He seems to be the only pelican left in the area.  There were ten of them a few weeks ago.

Thirsty work?

Runny Nose?

Took a detour on the way home and went by Cheeli Lagoon.

Chocolate Dragonfly 

Blue Dragonfly

Every time I go there, I discover something new.  I find, quite often with photography, that if you find a spot and just sit, interesting photographic opportunities appear from nowhere.

So I was very happy with my morning camera jaunt.

One more thing that made me feel all warm and fuzzy today ...

It's almost enough to get me all clucky!!  Almost :o)

It's been a great day for rQQzy Photography AND rQQzy's Creations!

Nite all.

Things That Make Me LOL

Here are some things that make me laugh out loud and some things that make me giggle.

Get well soon Vegan Chickie and Chicklet.

Nite all.

Silly Truths

Truths for Mature Humans

1. I think part of a best friends job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.
2. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument, when you realise you are wrong.
3. There is a great need for a sarcasm font.
4. How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?
5. Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.
6. I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.
7. Bad decisions make good stories.
8. You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work, when you know that you just aren't going to do anything productive for the rest of the day.
9. I'm always slightly scared when I exit out of 'word' and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my 10 page technical report, that I swear I did not make any changes to.
10. "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means that I will never wash this - ever.
11. I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello?  Hello?  **** it!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voice mail.  What did you do after I didn't answer?  Drop the phone and run away??
12. I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day.  What a waste!
13. I think the freezer deserves a light as well.
14. Sometimes I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger, and suddenly realise I had no idea what the heck was going on when I first saw it!
15. I would rather try to carry ten over-loaded plastic bags in each hand, than take two trips to bring my groceries in.
16. I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.
17. How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear or understand a single word they said?
18. Shirts get dirty.  Underpants get dirty.  Jeans?  Jeans never get dirty and you wear them forever.
19. Sometimes I'll look down at my watch three consecutive times and still not know what the time is.
20. Even under ideal conditions, people have trouble locating their keys or their mobile phone in their handbag or pinning the tail on the donkey, but you bet your butt that everyone can find and push the snooze button from three feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time, every time.

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Adoring Husband and I are keen to get a photo of a bee in flight and have it's wings look completely still.  This is as close as I could get today.

I am a woman on a mission, so keep watching this space!

I completed three of my jewellery orders today.  Three bracelets and a pair of earrings.  I still have a necklace and two bracelets to make yet.  

It felt good to be productive in my craft area while Adoring Husband worked hard in the garden.

Truth is ... it has been a good day :o)

Nite all.

Stopping the Nation

Have you heard of the Melbourne Cup?  The race that stops the nation?

It's Australia's major thoroughbred horse race and was first held in 1861.  It's conducted by the Victorian Racing Club on the Flemington Race Course in Melbourne on the first Tuesday of every November.

There are Melbourne Cup functions held all over Australia, where people dress up in beautiful clothes and hats, play games, eat, drink and be merry leading up to watching the race at 3pm.

Every year, Adoring Husband and I attend some kind of Melbourne Cup function and we had every intention of doing the same thing this year.

As the day wore on, and we were sitting comfortably on our couch watching tv shows that we had recorded while in Rockhampton, I suggested to Adoring Husband that I might leave our function early today, because I wasn't really in the mood for a day at the pub.

He said "Well, stay at home then!"

... and that's exactly what we did.

We put $20 each into an on-line betting account and we bet on the horses from home.

I think it was the nicest Melbourne Cup day that I've had and I really enjoyed spending it quietly with Adoring Husband on our couch with our laptops in front of us and wearing our slobberdog 'around the house' clothes.

We spent much less money ... in fact, we both came out in front with our betting money and we were both sober at the end of the day ... and happy.

I wonder how everybody else's Melbourne Cup day went.

Pretty sure there were winners and losers and I'm pretty sure that the nation stopped for approximately three and a half minutes, to watch the big race.

This little family were perched in a tree in the park by the river.  Mum, Dad and two little babies.  Dad was in a branch much higher in the tree, so I couldn't get them all in one shot.

They didn't stop the nation, but they stopped quite a few people who were strolling in the park.

Nite all

Isn't it Funny?

Today would have been my first son's 33rd birthday, if he had lived.

Jamie died of 'cotdeath' or 'sudden infant death syndrome' (SIDS) at 17 weeks of age.  It's funny that I am sitting on my couch thinking about him while watching an old episode of ER and one of the characters is talking about his first son dying of SIDS.

Weird co-incidence!

I was only 18 yrs old when I lost Jamie.

It's very strange and I am about to write down something that never occurred to me until tonight ... well, I partly realised it while at Bunya Mountains, but it only became really clear in my mind tonight.

I have always felt like his death was not allowed to be important to me.

I was told that I was too young to have Jamie.  I was told that I was too young to be married.  I believed that any choices I made back then, were stupid choices because I was 'too young'.

When I was talking about Jamie with one of my flickr friends while in the Bunya Mountains, I actually said out loud "It doesn't matter, I was only 18 at the time".

She responded with "Of course it matters!  It doesn't matter how old you were, your baby died!  It matters!"

I thought it strange at the time that I had even uttered those words!

The older I become, the more often I think about Jamie.

There were many of his birthdays, or anniversaries of his death, when I only afforded him a fleeting thought.

Today, I am giving myself permission to feel sad about losing my baby.

It DOES matter that my baby died.

It doesn't matter whether I was 18 or 28 or 48 and it doesn't matter whether he was 17 weeks, 17 months or 17 years old.

His death was significant in my life and it was tragic and traumatic and heart breaking.

I am allowed to be sad.  I am allowed to cry, even after 33 years.  I am allowed to feel emotional when I talk about him or think about him.

He was my son.  I gave birth to him.  I was his mother and I loved him.

I am no longer going to brush his death aside as something that deserved to happen to a stupid 18 yr old who was too young to make all those important decisions.

Isn't it funny how it has taken me 33 years to get to this point?

Nite all.

Bird Watching

I was determined this morning, while on my trike ride, to get a couple of good photos.

If I go for too long without getting a good shot, I start to have withdrawals and then all I can think about is where I can go to take some good photos.

While we were at Bunya Mountains, Adoring Husband and I were telling people how prolific the Bee Eater birds were in our area, and one of our flickr friends showed a keen interest.

We told him that I had a couple of pics on my flickr photo stream to look at, but then I realised that those pics weren't so good, and had been taken many months ago when my skills were a bit less mature.

So my goal today, was to get a good Bee Eater shot.

I pedalled to the street that runs parallel to the national park, where I have seen and heard lots of bee eaters recently.

There were quite a few of them flying around and landing on branches, so I got off my trike and aimed my lens in their direction, snapping away and hoping for something interesting.

I spotted one sitting on a weeping willow sapling, so I turned my camera toward it and moved slowly, one step at a time, to get closer for a better shot.

Just as I felt I was close enough, I thought I had spooked him and he began to fly, so I snapped away hoping to get a good 'in flight' shot.  He flew alright, but came back to the same branch immediately, which I thought was strange.

I took a few more shots and then pedalled on to see what else I could find.

There were some Lorikeets and a Brown Honeyeater and as I rounded the corner to come home, I noticed a Bee Eater at it's nest opening.  I got a photo of the opening and sat quietly, hoping to catch one entering or exiting the nest, but had no luck.  That will be my next goal!

Anyway, here are my shots for the day.

The Bee Eater that I thought had been spooked, had actually flown up to catch a bee!!  I didn't see this til I uploaded the photos!

Pretty birds, but they eat the bees that we need for our veggie gardens

Brown Honey Eater - only about 3 inches long.

The opening of the Bee Eater nest.  They burrow into the sand.  We have at least 3 nests in the block next door.

Tomorrow, I must concentrate on my jewellery orders!  Enough with the bird watching!

Nite all.