my beautiful girls

I just had to post this photo of Zara and Amity. Many more to come, no doubt.

Adelaide

Capital of SA, 5th largest city in Oz. Last Sunday morning - very windy, but still sunny and dry, and pleasant for walking along the Torrens River that runs through the city.

Barossa Valley

Last weekend we ventured forth to the Barossa Valley in South Australia, my first trip to SA. The Barossa is known for its shiraz wines. The valley has a lot in common with California vineyard regions. The hills aren't as high, but the parched late-summer fields dotted with bushes and trees in contrasting deep green are very reminiscent of Phil's mom's Santa Ynez Valley. We stayed in a holiday home with 2 other couples (friends, and friends of the friends). On Saturday we visited Angaston, the home of yummy dried fruit and English influenced, in contrast to other areas of the valley which were settled by Germans. Lunch was at Maggie Beer's Farmshop, a mecca for foodies, in Nuriootpa. Last stop was Rockford Wines, in Tanunda. A gorgeous, warm, sunny, dry day.

First MS submitted!

After nearly a year of intermittent work, last Sunday night I uploaded the manuscript for my first paper, "Prevalence of work-related upper quadrant musculoskeletal disorders in midwives, nurses and physicians" to the target journal, Journal of Advanced Nursing. Two days later I realized I had made two errors that needed to be fixed. So it's temporarily "unsubmitted" until I get the errors fixed, then I'll upload it again. The first problem was their fault for not saying that I should put the email addresses of the co-authors on the title page in the instructions for authors. But the second one was all mine; on my diagram of the body parts that comprise the upper quadrant (neck, shoulder, upper back) the key says that shoulder is upper back and vice versa. No worries though, she'll be right, my graphics consultant will fix it.

Amity's quilt

Here she is showing off her quilt. The pattern is called Attic Windows. Usually the corner where the two sides of the window frame meet the pane (where the purple and gold come together) involves tricky piecing but this pattern just has you make a half-square triangle for each corner. Too easy! In the border, as with all my baby quilts, is her name and birthdate. Amity means friendship, and I wanted an appropriate quote to stitch on the other 3 sides of the border. Zara's quilt has Peter Rabbit fabric and I used the opening lines of the Tale of Peter Rabbit, but I didn't have a ready literary source for this one. But the internet came through after some looking. The source is cringe-worthy -- Kahlil Gibran -- but I think it expresses the hope her parents have in naming her Amity: "In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter and sharing of pleasures."