into the hills and around a corner

We visited the Alfred Nicholas Gardens this morning (can't believe that it's only 5mins drive away!)

A must see if your ever up in this area. My photos really don't convey the strange beauty of the place - I find it a rather beautiful but silently spooky place, the gardens are so vast and whenever we've been there rather empty of people and for some reason I find the giant vacant art-deco mansion that shares the land really quite disturbing... but really, probably just because it's so huge and so very empty at the moment.

 

lovely, lovely gates

the famous, much photographed boat house

down at the lake area

 

a section of spooky, empty Burnham Beeches- designed for the very wealthy Alfred Nicholas (1881 - 1937)

 

The front of the house in 1947, pic from here

tiny ponds near the house - love that red

we went for a little 'off-track' walk - how spooky is this water pump house! such a gremlin habitat!

ok, this was actually how she was sitting for a few minutes, looks so comfy...??

Fun had by all, love the fact that it's dog friendly place :)

To the Mountains we go

Goodbye little house in the glen, we're hill folk now...

"Up high all the birds have flown away, 

A single cloud drifts off across the sky.

We settle down together, never tiring of each other,

Only the two of us, the mountain and I"

                                      - T'ang Dynasty poet Li Po

                       

bye, bye yellow house

Hello house with the little blue door

                                                                             ***

Well, it actually happened quite a while ago...October in fact, but well, I must have sloth blood running in my veins...
We now live up in the Dandenong Ranges outside of Melbourne, and it's a beautiful place to be. I've finally found a place where I feel like I'm part of a community, and it's one that's also artistic, musical and creative :)

We're in Belgrave, home of the magical puffing billy steam train (I love hearing the train's hooting echoing across the hills) in a little cottage on the side of a hill, with a rambling garden that really needs a bit of love right about now, with fat possums in the trees (and galloping across our roof just when your on the verge of sleep..!) ancient sounding white and black cockatoos, echidnas in the gully's and platypus's in the creeks (well, I hope so..) and if recent reports can be believed, a black puma or two roaming the hills, eep!
But really rather delightful!

Earthy Pleasures Cafe - yummy - I think this is the oldest building left in the centre of Belgrave. Can be quite spooky on a dark and rainy night

new front yard for Jools

ok, so this one's from back in glen iris, but isn't she a sweetie?

Love, love! :)

little creature

Just got hold of this photo - this is the little mite I mentioned in the last post. This was taken just before we let her go so she was bright and perky :) Such an incredible feeling to hold such a tiny creature in my hands!

The view from here

For quite a few months now I've been meaning to share some photos of the area in which I live. I love seeing the working spaces and surroundings where creative people live, I find it very inspiring. Maybe it's something to do with seeing these artists and creatives in such normal surroundings, it helps me to remember that these amazing people are just people! While of course they have, no doubt, incredible natural skills, they have also gotten where they are through hard work and perseverance and so this makes me think that maybe I can get there too :)
Anyhoo, while I haven't really taken any photos of inside my house and studio yet (it's a very dark little house and I'm not the best photographer....) these are ones of the surrounding area of Glen Iris. I really am loving it here at the moment - we are still so close to the centre of Melbourne but with all the parks and bushland walks around here you can almost fool yourself that your out in the country (well, apart from the distant hum of the freeway!)
And I love the fact that there is wildlife around here! I love that I wake up to birdsong these days instead of traffic....
And so many birds - there's the common cheeky magpies and pigeons but also wrens, cockatoos, galahs, ducks, parrots and lorrikeets... and spooky, silent bats that float by at dusk.....and soooo many possums! Most of our neighbours really dislike them - they can make an awful amount of noise at night and can make a mess of trees and gardens, but I love them :)
Although admittedly we don't have any trying to nest in our roof or pooping on our driveway so maybe I'd change my mind if that was the case, hehe!
But I love sneaking out the back door at night time and catching them staring back at me from the fence, most of the time not scared at all, just watchful.
And the size of some of them! There was a brushtail possum as big as a cat out there the other
night!

Unfortunately our dog Jools has also discovered them...and she can be quite obsessed. A couple of weeks ago she actually managed to catch one! I couldn't believe it! Here I was thinking she was trying to catch mice in the undergrowth as she often does with no success and there was the fact that it wasn't even close to dusk, until i heard the squeeks and realized what was going on...!! Then I became this screaming, yelling, hitting banshee and thank goodness she dropped the creature and I was able to pull her away and managed to tie her to a tree. The poor wee little mite was just a baby and I found it shivering in the undergrowth with clumps of fur missing and covered in wetness which at the time I thought was blood but afterward realized was just saliva.
So I picked it up and wrapped it in my jumper and we took it off to the vet thinking that at least they could put it to sleep and save it from a lingering, painful death.
But yay! I rang back the next day and the little guy was fine! So happy to know that our Jools isn't a possum killer, phew! She obviously didn't know what to do with it once she had caught it and didn't clamp her jaws down. I hope she never learns! (it was such a disturbing sight seeing her standing there with tiny little possum feet sticking out from either side of her mouth, waving slowly in their struggles - urgg!)
So we picked up the little fellow from the vet and popped him back in his tree, and were overjoyed to see his mother and him staring down at us a few moments later! So beautiful!
Every time I pass that tree I look out for them but I haven't seen them since. I hope they are both still ok... but i guess I'll never know.

So here we go - I'm a bit slow -these were taken a few months ago in winter.
Now the trees are swimming in green and there's a completely different feel to the air. But it gives an idea of the lay of the land at least. And of course my silly little fur moppet :P

Dreaming in the past

Quilcene Boy


Bethlehem Child

Girl with bear cubs
Market Street, Goslar, Hartz, Germany
A Bedouin woman, Tunis, Tunisia
Native children, Marken Island, Holland


Oh, how I adore old photos....this is such an inspiring site: http://www.old-picture.com/

From my collection

So these beauties are from my collection of old photographs and postcards.
This last one is of Marysville, which a lot of you, especially those in Australia, would have heard of after the terrible bushfires in February. It's a rather fascinating look at what it once was so long ago.

Beautiful, beautiful

How I love images like these! Love, love, love!
They just invite you to dream about other worlds, other places, where life is exotic, compelling and strange.
Found at this fascinating blog right here