1000 Fields of Roses

And So, Hello To August!

What to do for the first post of the blogalong?…
There are a few possibilties.. but I thought I’d start with a bit of joy. 😀
I first came across these videos a few years ago, and they’ve always made me smile. They’re done by a bloke called Matt Harding, who was traveling with a friend. One day they decided to get the friend to film him doing his “funny dance”. There have been a few more since. 😀
Read more of his story here

This one’s not the first (They started in 2003, with the most well known one in 2006), but it’s the first with him predominantly dancing with other people, in various countries. I have a bit of a soft spot for this – there’s a section filmed in Brisbane – New Farm Park, by the look of it. I’ve “danced” there!

One of the things we’re trying to teach our beautiful boys is to look at their place in, and responsibilities to, this big world we live in – to see how much more there is outside of the little they’ve so far seen. I love the breadth of travel in these, and seeing people of such different backgrounds enjoying each others’ company. Doesn’t matter if we speak the same language or have the same beliefs or traditions. We can all still dance! 🙂

Just as a little aside.. anyone remember “Sweet Lullaby”, by Deep Forest? It sampled a recording done in 1971, by a French ethnomusicologist traveling in the Solomon Islands. He recorded a young woman called Afunakwa, singing Rorogwela. Matt Harding used the Deep Forest version in his 2006 video, and later set out to find the origin of the sample. This shows what he found…

So – first blogalong day done and dusted! Yayy!

GIFSoup

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on August 1, 2013 at 7:14 pm Comments (2)
Tags: Afunakwa, Dancing Matt, Effy Wild's blogalong, Sweet Lullaby

Flower Heart

😀

Published in:

Inspiration

on July 30, 2013 at 8:09 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: flower heart

Talking Disco

From what I’ve seen, this appears to be for real…
Prepare to giggle! 😀

… because – nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

Published in:

Music

on July 29, 2013 at 10:14 pm Comments (2)
Tags: Disco the parakeet, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisiton

Park2park

Went to Park2park this morning, for Ipswich Hospital Foundation – our church had a group there, so we did the 700m Family Challenge (i.e – walk 🙂 ) Others did the 5 or 10km…. 700m was a nice brisk walk for a Sunday morning…

Littlest bean had a friend with him, so they ran on ahead… biggest boy stuck with his friends. We walked along in the sunshine… I love watching the tiny ones running – it’s like they fling their whole body into it, while occasionally looking back to check Mum/Dad is still there… perhaps we should live life more like that..

Did I mention that we got medals?

That was a surprise.. I thought it was only the kids who got one..

It was a fun morning. We’ll be back next year!

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on July 28, 2013 at 12:09 pm Comments (3)
Tags: Park2park

Blogalong

So this is what I’m doing soon….

Yippee! 😀

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on July 27, 2013 at 12:35 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Blogging, Effy Wild

Retreat

I went away on the weekend, on a Women’s Retreat with the church. We were up at Mt Tamborine, and stayed overnight at Cedar Creek Lodges. Started with a morning tea at the Botanic Gardens..

A bridge to possibility?

Gateway to hope?

Had a quick gallop along Gallery Walk..

This was beautiful… something that “fills me up” is just browsing amongst gorgeous, creative, sparkly bits and bobs – things others have crafted to show beauty in the world..

Fairy mushrooms 🙂

Then we went for lunch at the place where we stayed. Meals were a selection of buffets – more food than I’ve eaten for a while at each meal, and very enjoyable 😀

It was wet and gloomy when we first got there..

It cleared up eventually, though.. a bit muddy on the Saturday, but a clear, crisp, blue-sky day on Sunday.

The cottages were small but lovely – just the place to sit by the fire and chat..

One of the main joys of going away with a group is that you get to know people a bit better than you can otherwise – youcan sit by a fire, with no other obligations for a short space of time, and just talk. It’s good to get to know people a bit more than the “Hi how are you” sort of thing. The afternoon was spent getting to know a bunch of beautiful women a bit better…

There were games later, and more chatting. And chocolate fondue.
There was a creek flowing right outside the cottage..

The view from the verandah.

It was a constant sound, like rain, but not quite. Soothing, gentle, whispering, relaxing. I came back after the evening activities, exhausted, and was lulled to sleep by the creek flowing past. I have not slept so soundly and completely for a long time – there was chatting and other sounds during the night, but I only vaguely remember.

This is where we had the church service in the morning – out in the open, surrounded by nature. It was the perfect end to the weekend’s activities. Talked some more… went off for more shopping… went home..

I did have a restful retreat. The shopping was fun, but also a chance to remember the “me” of twenty years ago, and how I would have seen things then, as compared to the “me” of now, and how far I’ve come in my perceptions and beliefs 🙂 The sleep was wonderful – I hadn’t realised how overtired I was. I have been randomly snoozing all week, so it was obviously a need that I hadn’t taken the time to consider – the break from the everyday meant I had to look at it. This week has been a week of sleep and refocusing. Terribly indulgent, really, but I feel that I at last have a handle on some changes that need to be made. Sometimes stepping out of the everyday makes some things clearer.

And here is a random glass peacock.
Because it’s beautiful.

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on July 25, 2013 at 1:49 pm Comments (1)
Tags: Cedar Creek Lodges, Mt Tamborine, retreat, revive

Cells. In Lego.

Published in:

Health
Music

on July 16, 2013 at 10:04 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: cells, Lego

The Swedish Chef Speaks..

If you like, you can listen to this here..
If it’s not already captioned, click on the YouTube icon at the bottom, which will take you to that site.. then –
On the bottom bar, on the far left of the right hand side, there’s an icon (the white rectangle..)
That’s to enable captions..
Click on it, then click on “Swedish Chef”
Enjoy..

Published in:

Music

on July 10, 2013 at 11:41 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Muppets, swedish chef

Olden Day Colours

This is a film of London, taken, in colour, in 1927

This process for colour film was created by William Friese-Greene in the last part of the Nineteenth Century, but it was his son, Claude, who created a series of moving pictures using his father’s process. The film itself is originally black and white, with each frame exposed through two different coloured filters, then stained either red or green – I think the film above resembles old hand coloured photos.

It’s amazing to think that there were colour films in the Twenties… but this one is supposed to be the earliest example, even though, to some historians, it may not have been entirely successful.
This shows clips from the film –