Southern Highlands jaunt

Yesterday, after going to the earlier service at our church we drove down to the Southern Highlands. Arriving about lunch time, we decided that Bowral might be the best place to have some lunch.

You may know that some in our family have food issues, primarily dairy allergy and gluten intolerance. There are other foods that make life really uncomfortable as well, but they’re the main things. One of them by themselves can be hard, but put the two together, and eating out can become quite difficult, especially at lunch time when many cafes serve stuff on various guises of bread.

We wandered up and down the main street, trying to find somewhere where we could eat something. One cafe said plainly on their menu that dishes could not be changed as it would slow down lunch service. Well, that sounded wonderfully inflexible. We moved on.

Eventually, I hit on the idea that there was a wholefoods store with a cafe, that might have suitable food. Often people move to a diet based around whole foods and organic foods because they have food issues, the idea being that when you’re (for example) gluten-free, it is easier to prepare your own food from good quality “real” foods, because you know you can trust it.

Imagine our delight when the staff member immediately went out to the kitchen to find out what would suit our diet. She came back and suggested no less than 4 dishes on the menu. We found a table! We enjoyed an absolutely delicious lunch at Raw and Wild on Bong Bong Street (yes, that seriously is the street’s name!) in Bowral. Each member of the family enjoyed a completely suitable and extremely yummy meal.

The menu stated that you should inform the waiter if you had special dietary requirements and that they would do what they could to accommodate. We sincerely thanked the staff for their flexibility and willingness to serve people with special dietary requirements. We were so impressed, and so grateful!

Then we went on to Berrima, so that I could go to Berrima Patchwork to choose my fabrics for next year’s projects for “Quilting in the Highlands”. I like to use their fabrics because then they can put aside enough for the classes, and they won’t have to go searching for something to match a fabric that I might have bought locally to me.

While we looked at fabrics, The Husband and The Reader went off to Berkelouw Books just out of Berrima, to the large store they have in a barn there. I’m sure they enjoyed their time there.

The Gymnast and I enjoyed spending some time with Tamsin and Sue, and choosing fabrics. If you’ve been reading White Threads for a while, you’ll remember that The Gymnast’s moniker used to be Rainbow Girl. She loves colour, so it was great to have her input!

As for this year, I’ll be teaching two classes again at Quilting in the Highlands next year. That meant choosing two lots of fabrics for two different classes. Again I will be focusing on embroidery for applique, but this time the two classes will have slightly different foci. I’ll leave it at that for now, and explain the two classes in time, after Tamsin has publically released the details of the retreat.

As I was standing at the counter, while Tamsin cut my desired portions of fabric, two people came in through the door. I first recognised the young girl, and then realised that it was Sylvia Kennedy, a past editor of Embroidery and Cross Stitch Magazine, and her granddaughter. Sylvia had introduced her granddaughter to me at the Sydney craft show back in June. It was lovely to see them both again. As with us, they were a long way from home too! It’s funny who you meet in unexpected places!

(That does tell you how good the selection of fabric at Berrima Patchwork is, though. I feel they have a much better selection of fabrics and quality patchwork and quilting products than anywhere local to me, and we had to drive about 1.5 hours to get there.)

When we got back home, late in the afternoon, I washed all the fabrics, ironed them, and hung them out to dry. Today I’ll get stuck into working with them.

On Saturday I did a little bit of work on my website and on this blog. I fixed up the header on both, so that they now match (they didn’t previously!) and show the current Vetty Creations logo. I also changed my spam protector on the blog. I’m hoping that you all are still able to comment. It would be lovely if some of you could try, so that I know whether it is working or not! Perhaps you could comment to tell me what enjoyable needleworky things you did on your weekend?