A Neighbourhood Barbie

Yesterday we hosted the Annual Neighbourhood Chrissie Barbie at our place. We have a truly wonderful bunch of neighbours, everyone helps each other, we look after each other's pets, plants, chooks and houses when we go away on holidays, we commiserate in sad times, celebrate in good times and help out with anything and everything as needed. We even carry our fish Nemo across the road in his bowl for our neighbours to `fishsit' when we go away. We get together several times a year for a Barbie and we make a special effort at Christmas. Here you can see our decorated living Christmas Tree with our pony Annie in the background.

I was able to decorate and use my painted `palm frond tray' and it received many compliments.

It must have been the hottest day so far this year, it was 36C in our kitchen and the humidity was high, so we set everything up outside. I made salads, Alan barbecued chicken kebabs and sausages, everyone bought something along to share and later in the evening the rain came down heavily to cool things down. So thats our Christmas entertaining done and now we can relax, today is another day as hot as yesterday so tomorrow we are planning a trip to Noosa for a swim :)

Venetian Mask

This was a wonderful way to pass the time in the heat today. I did this for an altered art/collage challenge and the mask template was my reward for participating. So much fun now I want to do another :)

The credits can be found here http://www.scrapartist.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=105387

Inspired by Randel Plowman

This week's `Frameworthy Challenge' was Randel Plowman and being a lover of Collage I really enjoyed it. Yesterday I bought a headscarf at one of those Indian style shops that smell of Patchouli, and the paper bag they gave me was so gorgeous I used it for my Collage. I have titled it `Jungle Juice'. If you click on the image it will enlarge so you can view it more easily.

Riding Max

Finally after several days of 35c plus temperatures we have a cool cloudy day so Alan decided to ride Max.

They both went really well!

And I couldn't resist the photo opportunity.

R.D.A. State Championships

We have just spent the Weekend at the Queensland Riding for Disabled State Carriage Driving Championships. Although the competition was held on Saturday a group of us drove up to Hervey Bay on Friday with all the gear, 3 horses and 3 Carriages. We stayed overnight, went out for dinner and woke with the birds on Saturday morning to get everything ready, horses fed, brushed and harnessed etc. We had a great day of competition with Classes for the Whips and the Drivers, we had 4 competing. I was one of the Grooms and once things got going we were running.

Here are the horses Bobby, Zac and Captain, in their stables after we arrived. Little did they know what was in store for them the next day.

This is Jason driving with Alan as Whip in the cones competition. This is judged on accuracy and speed.

This is Alan doing the cones course on his own.

Here are the horses all warming up - a wonderful sight.

This is where Alan and I spent the night - 5 Star with an en suite only a few steps away :)

At the end of the day there were ribbons and trophies for all and I was really proud of Alan who was first in the Whips Dressage Class and the Whips Cones Class. After the competition we took lots of little kids for drives and we also all got soaking wet in a tropical downpour. All told a really special weekend was had by all.

Snow Horses

I'm feeling pretty hot right now so this image of horses in the snow (from Google) was just what I needed to cool down. The Vellum overlay is by Crissy Armstrong. The b/g is an Olde Worlde Paper by Amy Hutchinson and the Cosmic Glow is also Amy's. The white and glittered dandelions are by Catherine Designs. I love pulling all these things together to create a piece of Cool Art on a hot day :)

Yoga Inspired

This one is inspired by my sister Patti who loves Yoga. I have always loved the idea of it and I have done classes from time to time but for some reason I always drop out. Anyway I enjoyed doing this one - the size is 12x6 inches.