Two thousand and ten!

You know what - doesn't seem all that long ago that we celebrated the year two thousand? And now it's ten years later - hmmm.... I don't know about you, but one heck of a lot has happened in the last ten years - wonder what the next decade will hold? I don't ''do'' resolutions, but I did spend a little quiet time, just thinking about the past year and making a few plans for the coming one. There's a few things I would like to achieve. Did you celebrate the New Year in style? Very belatedly Jake and I wandered down to the Octagon, enjoyed the bands, and then were treated to an amazing fireworks display. And today, we went walking. Jake wanted to show me one of his biking tracks - said it was a goodie to walk up as you got great views. He was right - it was ''UP" (for a long long way!) but you did get great views so it was worth it. What I thought would be a quiet stroll turned into nearly a 5 hour epic, mind you I did dawdle a little to take some pics. This is a view along the way....

... and this is from the top but you don't see so much from there as it's flat. It was pretty amazing being up there though, with not a soul around for miles. We sat among the tussocks to shelter a little from the roaring norwester, ate cake (what's life without cake!) and drank lots of water.


I absolutely love the way new fern fronds look and can't stop myself from taking far too many pictures of them.

Christmas was a very happy family affair this year - all of us managed to get together for Christmas dinner - what a racket!!! This is what I gave friends for Christmas this year - I used Marg Low's gorgeous covered coathanger pattern, and made them up in Tanya Whelan fabrics. Cute ay!

And this is Christmas night - glorious sunset over Geraldine.

Boxing Day saw us walking again - a big long walk up Orari Gorge in the morning...

...and another long one along the Waihi River in the afternoon.

I know this is a ''bitsy'' blog - it's what I've been up to over the past week - but there has been some stitching in amongst the walking and Christmas and New Years things as well - a Brenda Ryan sweetie, some more of the Gingham Girls and block 3 of Vero's Mystery Quilt (that's been a challenge to put it mildly). I'll do a show and tell in a few days when a couple of them are hopefully finished. Now I'm off to have cake for supper - fresh Banana cake - my favourite!

Happy New Year

and lots of stitching

Jenny