I wen t through my stash of UFOs and found the blue and green tumbler quilt that I started in January 2010.  Last time I went to Tricia's I looked for a nice batik for the border, and could find nothing that suited.   I wanted it finished, so I decided I would use  a combination of batik pieces, none of them ideal, but I just wanted the thing over and done with.  Imagine my surprise to find that it had been packed away with a piece of lovely batik fabric, the perfect border.  I dimly remember buying it; in fact I blogged about buying it at Tricia's and then leaving the bag at John's place so I couldn't finish the quilt.  Somewhere along the line I went back to Adelaide, picked up the fabric and packed it away with the quilt.  I just have no memory of that.  It's a bit of a worry.

I love how this turned out, I think I could seriously fall in love with batiks.

 Most of these fabrics aren't batiks, some are dressmaking scraps, some are printed to look like batiks but aren't.

 I just love the strong colours, nothing wishy washy about this one.  Now I need to think about a backing.

I'm being pretty good about attacking the UFO list; two down for 2014 already, and I'm working on a third.  When I consulted the list I saw that a lot of the projects were stuck at the border stage, but even more were just a collection of pieces, barely started at all.  Really, does one block make a project?  I think not.  I have 37 things on the list, and nine of them are just sample blocks; I'm going to do some revising soon, and some of those UFOs are going to end up in the orphan pile.  Time to be ruthless.
 The bushfire which has been burning for over three weeks was thought to be contained.  It flared up again yesterday, and has burnt out an incredible amount of new bushland, in one of our most beautiful valleys.  There are dozens of homes and families at risk, and countless animals; what remained of the forestry area is threatened, as are three towns.  It's just appalling.  Standing at my back door at 11pm the sky to the north was pulsing and glowing red, and Mereth and I went for a drive to the top of the hill to see what was happening.

It was strangely beautiful, except for the insane destruction it is causing.

The column of smoke was climbing hundreds of metres into the moonlit sky, which was pale purple with grey and white clouds.  The moon sailed behind the smoke and glared out like a baleful red eye, but my camera is not capable of recording that, unfortunately.
We drove along the main highway for a bit, and watched the flames pouring down the slopes like lava.  It was utterly horrible.

 We're praying for the safety of those trying to control this thing, and for rain; it's forecast for Wednesday, but we need it now.

My camera has a good zoom lens, we were nowhere near the actual fire; don't want to be either.  I have such respect for our volunteer fire-fighters, to go out and face that.