Photo a Day 14 - Red Hats

I snapped these colourfully attired ladies in Hahndorf, South Australia. They belong to the "Red Hat Society and although I had heard of it, I had never seen any members before. Apparently there are thousands of groups in USA and in other countries around the world.

Originally the society was formed for women over 50  to get together, socialise and support each other. Now it is open to women of all ages. They wear red hats and purple clothes to their get togethers. The Under 50s wear pink and mauve.

This poem says it all.

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple With a red hat that doesn't go, and doesn't suit me, And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter. I shall sit down on the pavement when I am tired, And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells, And run my stick along the public railings, And make up for the sobriety of my youth. I shall go out in my slippers in the rain And pick the flowers in other people's gardens, And learn to spit. You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat, And eat three pounds of sausages at a go, Or only bread and pickle for a week, And hoard pens and pencils and beer mats and things in boxes. But now we must have clothes that keep us dry, And pay our rent and not swear in the street, And set a good example for the children. We will have friends to dinner and read the papers. But maybe I ought to practise a little now? So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised, When suddenly I am old and start to wear purple!  Jenny Joseph

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 13 - More on the fire

I went for a quick drive today to get some shots for my previous blog and also took these of a couple of very lucky householders. How these houses were saved from the bush fire I will never know, but thanks to the bravery and skill of our CFS (Country Fire Service), they were spared.

Look below at the house on top of this hill.  The fire would have raced up the hill towards this place.

Liz Needle

TUESDAY

I am linking this post with "Our World Tuesday" and with "Rubbish Tuesday" as I think the subject matter fits with both.

This shot was taken nearby, but it is a sight we see all too often in our countryside. While the old wrecks have a certain charm when seen like this, they are frequently en masse around a farming property and certainly add nothing to the beauty of the country.

Here is an example of what I am talking about. It was nearly burnt out by the recent bushfires. Pity in a way that the fires didn't reach it.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 12 - My Mum

My daily photos have no pattern or purpose. I let my mind wander where it will and something usually crops up. This photo is my favourite photo of my mother, Laura Wilhelmina Hornblower nee Heyne. I have written about her elsewhere.

 Laura was born in 1905 and died in 2003 a few months before her 98th birthday.  I think about her every day - there is always something that brings her to mind.

She was an amazing woman, a teacher for most of her life and a friend to many people,

 Mum's greatest joy was that she  lived long enough to hold her first great grand child who was born 2 years before Mum died.

This photo shows four generations.

In her younger days Laura was always beautifully dressed and I spent many hours sitting on the floor of the local dressmaker playing with fabrics while Mum had fittings.

If I remember rightly this black dress had exquisite beadwork on the bodice. Many of her clothes were made by her mother who was an excellent seamstress.

In her early years she was a bright young thing, teaching in country schools on the Yorke and Eyre Peninsulas. Having come from a strict Lutheran family, she found the freedom as a young country teacher most exhilarating.

Here she is bottom right, dressed for a fancy dress ball or similar. In fact several of these young teachers were rapped over the knuckles and moved because some of the staid locals objected to their having fun.  Mind you this was back in the twenties, so I imagine their fun was pretty harmless.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 11 and Weekend Reflections

One of the Christmas gifts I received last year was a digital photography course held at the Adelaide Zoo. Didn't take many photos that day, but learnt a lot - most of which I have forgotten. However during the morning tea break I did snap this one using one of the new things I had learnt.

While the reflections are not obvious, they are still there, as are shadows.

Linking with "Weekend Reflections".

Liz Needle

Sepia Saturday

This week's theme is about hair, weird illnesses, unflattering pictures, imagination run riot, whatever. In my family collection I have a lot of strange hair styles and unflattering portraits.





One particular style always amuses me. Its the clean shaven above, under the chin beard.  I suppose it has its uses.


 1. Keeps the neck warm

2. Hides the neck wrinkles

3. Keeps food scraps on the chin and out of the beard

4. More pleasant for kissing

I particularly like the hair style in this one. I wonder what they used in those days before gel  to get that effect - beeswax?

In this younger version, the hair has not quite receded below the chin and he has a slight fuzz above the upper lip.

His hair style would make Elvis envious.

Personally I think if you are going to grow hair on the face and your wife doesn't mind the tickling effect, then you might as well go the whole hog, so to speak.

Liz Needle linking with Sepia Saturday.

Photo a Day 10 - Bush fire

Today we went to visit our daughter in a tiny town called Kersbrook. This town was in the centre of the horrific bushfires I wrote about earlier. The fire came to within 100 metres of there house on several sides.  Strange that a week ago we were packing our car to evacuate our house because we were in a danger zone, now a week later we are having extreme weather warnings that in the next 48 hours we will receive torrential rain - the heaviest falls in 30 years and the possibility of flooding. A country of extremes indeed!

These photos were taken on Checkers Hill Road.  In a week or so this road will feature in the cycling "Tour Down Under" which is telecast around the world.

Checkers Hill Road

 Sadly at the top of this hill the fire destroyed a house and outbuildings.

Looking to the left as far as you can see the country has burnt to a cinder

There is mile upon mile of similar country that will take years to return to it's natural  beauty.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 9 - Our Boys

Some other members of our family - very important, very indulged members. In fact they think they own the place and everything in it, including the people.

Ollie(Jack Russell), Alfie(mixture of who really knows)

Alfie has just been clipped here. He really is very rough haired. His father was a rough haired JR, his mother was a JR/Chihuahua/whatever cross. Ollie has his favourite possession - his ball.

Alfie is only interested in the ball if Ollie has it, much to Ollie's disgust

Keep away. This is MY ball

Yeah?  Well I've got it.

Alfie - a much shaggier Alfie -  and his new best friend Felix. Needless to say, Ollie is NOT fond of Felix.

















Liz Needle

Good Fences and Skywatch Friday

A long time since I have posted a fence, but here is one that is not really the subject of the photo. Recent devastating bushfires in the Adelaide Hills.

This fence survived, but with nearly 13000 hectares of scrub and grazing land burnt out, many kilometres of fencing was destroyed. Sadly though the wire paddock fencing proved an obstacle to many animals fleeing the fire, especially kangaroos and koalas.

Latest update is 32 houses lost, numerous outbuildings and many injuries - mostly minor. Fortunately this time no loss of human lives.

For more photos of fences go to Good Fences and Skywatch Friday

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 8 -- Down on the Farm

Still on the family theme, this is my  favourite family photo - taken about 43 years ago.

Don, me and our three kids down on the farm.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 7 - Family

Wow!!  I've lasted a week with no misses and what's more I've written some extra posts as well. I'm on a roll.

I had to include this photo, with apologies to my son-in-law.  I thinks it's one of my favourite family photos.

Father and daughter. Just beautiful.

Liz Needle

Rubbish Tuesday 33

A new meme for me to play with. Now I have my blogging mojo back again, I'm roaring to go.

This shot is of the old house on our property.  The back wall of this old house was the front wall of the original old stone cottage built of the property. This  one was  still in use in the 1960s, but a newer house had been built in the late 1800s - our present house.  The boys of the family moved out to this old place because there was no room in the main house.

This shot was taken on a foggy morning.

This old cottage was built of cement and rubble and over the years has deteriorated badly. One wall has collapsed, the floors have rotted and the ceilings are collapsing from the weight of the pigeon droppings in them.  Still it is a picturesque addition to our back garden and I quite like it there.

For other photos of Rubbish Tuesday, please follow this link.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 6 and Our World Tuesday

Exciting happenings yesterday. A pair of our magnificent wedge tail eagles landed in a pine tree no more than 40 metres away. By the time I had my camera in hand , one had moved on, but I was able to get a shot of the second one as it flew off.








These beautiful birds are Australia's largest raptors with a wing span of 2-3 metres. For many years they were shot by farmers and graziers who believed they decimated their stock. Now however they are a protected species and most people admire them and wish them preserved.

Linking with Our World Tuesday


Liz Needle

Photo a Day 5 - Gingerbread

Something more pleasant than the fires.

 One of the fun thingsthat happened over Christmas was the making of the gingerbread houses. Great family fun.  All Erinn wanted from Uncle Mark was for him  to make a gingerbread house with her. Here they are creating the masterpiece.

 And the finished house

This second house was made by Mark and his girlfriend for her mother.

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 4 Fire!

Still on target. A very dramatic shot - and a very dramatic day or two.

On New Year's Day - with a temperature of 42 degrees Celsius, a total fire ban and a day declared as a Catastrophic Fire Day - some idiot lit up his incinerator and set alight to the Adelaide Hills. The fire started some 20 kms away from us, but only about 5 kms from my daughter's property. I took the first photo on the evening of Jan 1st. By then it had burnt out about 5 000 hectares of mainly scrub and grasslands and destroyed 2 homes (ironically both belonged to fire fighters).

 The fire raged uncontrollably all night on a number of fronts. The fire fighters hampered by northerly winds, steep gullies and unknown terrain. By morning it was covering a huge area with 10 00000 hectares burnt and more homes lost. There were warnings for a number of surrounding communities to either stay and fight if they had adequate fire protection or to get out immediately.

We packed the car and ute with things we could not do without - mainly irreplaceables like photos, papers, change of clothes, my sewing machine, cameras, i-pads etc. My daughter rang to say they were leaving and heading for her partner's mothers house at Nairne. We loaded the dogs and took off as well, though we were reasonably happy that out property was OK. But the way the fire was behaving nobody really knew. Huge winds were expected that afternoon and it was very hot. The fire fighters had no control of the fire and were worried that when the winds worsened, they would have to pull out for their own safety.

I took this shot before we left home. The fire was about 8 kms away at this stage. It doesn't look as bad as the earlier one, but the smoke haze was bad, it was covering a much larger area and we were getting ash and burnt leaves landing on the front lawn.

We spent the afternoon anxiously watching a very poor TV coverage and really finding out nothing about the current situation. We had 8 adults, one toddler and 9 dogs in the house. Great fun trying to keep the dogs apart.  During the afternoon there was a radical wind change, the temperature dropped and there was even a little rain. The fire changed direction and began to race in different ways, thankfully away from us. My son rang to say he had been able to get home and all was well, so we headed home.

This morning our daughter rang to say that Steve, her partner had been able to persuade the road block to let him through. Their house is safe, though the fire got within 100metres on two sides.  The fires are still burning out of control in some areas and some communities are still in danger, though the worst of it is under control. Last we heard 5 houses and a dog and cattery had been destroyed, but that is pretty old news.

All in all a very worrying few days. We and ours are safe but I feel for those people who lost houses, stock and property.

Liz Needle


Update.  Fire still going, houses still under threat. So far 12 houses confirmed destroyed with a possible 20 more as yet not confirmed. No loss of life.

Sepia Saturday

Such a long time since I posted. You'll have to forgive me and put it down to being too busy with other things and maybe needing a break from Blogging.
But I have decided to get off my fat butt and join the blogging world again, so here goes.


I have decided to use the bicycles as my theme. The only photo I have is this one of a group of boys from a German youth group in Adelaide, South Australia, way back in the late 1800s. I believe my great aunt - about whom I have written at length in earlier posts - taught a number of them. They would have attended the same church as she did.


The back of the photo reads "members of the Yunglings Verem". I have no German, so someone may be able to translate it for me.

For more great sepia offerings please go to http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com.au/





Liz Needle

Photo a Day 3 - Gorgeous Girl

Day 3 already.  Well, can't do one GD and not the other. This one - the elder - is just 14 and she is gorgeous and very tall. 

5ft 8 and growing, with the longest legs - funny really because when she was little her father used to blame me because he thought she had inherited my short legs!! She moves about like a gawky giraffe, but when she dances she's as graceful as a gazelle.


Her dad is going to have many anxious moments in a few years time. Fortunately for him she is not into boys yet - but it will happen!!

Liz Needle

Photo a Day 2 - A James Bond Girl

Day 2 and I am on task still!!  Couldn't resist this shot of my gorgeous younger grand daughter.
She's nearly 11, beautiful, smart and sassy. Love her to bits though she drives me mad sometimes.

A future James Bond girl for sure

























Liz Needle

Photo of the Day 1 - Magnolia

Well, here goes. I am attempting to put up at least one photo every day. We'll see how long this craze lasts.

Today's photo was taken when Don was walking around the garden and found to his amazement that one of the deciduous magnolias had decided to flower for a second time this year - this time in full leaf.

This is pretty unusual, so I checked the other 3 magnolias and found that they all have flower buds forming. Not just one or two, but lots. Weird weather this summer!

Liz Needle