Moving along...

 Doesn't this look like a sweet little seaside town you might see in Scandinavia? Or Europe?  This is the  River between East Devonport and Devonport- and is where my parents grew up. Its also the port from which a ferry called the Spirit of Tasmania leaves to connect cars to the mainland.

I've been quiet for a while with good reason!  Incase you're tuning in, we are moving states to the Australian Capital Territory.  Canberra is our nation's Capital as well as the Capital of the ACT.  It is the seat of politics and government of Australia.  A massive public service workforce and support services offer employment to  many and probably is the main reason people move to the ACT. Although it is certainly a beautiful city lined with mountains of the Great Dividing Range and some man made lakes
Our family is now in Canberra settling into hotel after hotel as we are moved around every few days. The most we have had in one place is just under a week due to an impossibility of booking consecutive weeks in one place- US President's visit and other events has placed a major squeeze on availability.
We have not been idle.
We drove after last minute evening cleaning of our house after packing to Westbury, stayed overnight, then drove the next afternoon  to Devonport.  Cars line up waiting to get onto ferry- we were treated to a rap-mobile DJ who was mixing it up as we waited.  Loudly!
He let Hamish and Thomas up into his mobile  to scratch some vinyl, it was very funny!
Ferry ride was nice until we hit the ocean and then it became rough.  Big waves, white cap rough.  It was a beautiful moonlit night and since I couldn't sleep the waves were lovely to watch and the wake was impressive with swirling patterns of foam.  Neither hubby nor I slept all night until we hit Port Philip Bay in Melbourne when it became calmer and we dozed for half an hour. 

Kids of course had a great sleep on mattresses we pulled off the bunk onto the floor thanks to my sister's suggestion, so that they did not roll out of bed.  Not much of a safety rail.  Great adventure!
Early breakfast in the car in Port Phillip,



Then we drove for about 4 1/2 hours to Albury, NSW. 
Nice botanical gardens and great kid's parks for playing and BBQs or picnics.  It was roasting hot so we had dinner at a kids park nearby.

   
More hours of  driving the next day through country NSW to Canberra early in the morning in time to catch
a few open homes, none of which yielded a result. 
We drove from Hobart to Canberra totalling  1014 km of road travel excluding distance by ferry across Bass Strait.  There was beautiful scenery in places along the way but we did not stop for photos.  We stopped for rest breaks and food along the way in country towns, some with antique stores that I wished we had been able to stop and explore. I imagined what treasured lay within...
We arrived on Saturday, and on Monday Hubby has started a new job.   Its with a good employer and his work colleagues are friendly and helpful.   Our arrival to Canberra was marred only by the process of finding a rental place.  We have been looking at properties constantly and applying for rental properties when we found one that was actually clean and spacious enough to fit our lives into- but tiny compared to our previous home.  Some areas prove undesirable for a range of reasons and we discovered that you never can tell about a property photographed online or by descriptions. Nor by price.  Expensive rent can if you are unlucky enough to come across it, yield horrible accommodation fit barely for animals.  Other houses are lovely but refuse pets or dislike families.  We had forgotten how much we hate the process of securing rental properties after owning our own homes for 12 years.  The terms "spacious and airy" are vastly over exploited. Very occasionally you find a nice house that is almost affordable in a good area, but there are often 50 applicants for the property.  Understandably we have had a frustrating time finding something to suit our family that would also take well behaved cats.  We have been looking for a home for several weeks before we arrived.

  Finally today we got VERY lucky for a house in Woden Valley.  We are over the moon happy as the suburb within that general area  feeds into an excellent primary school.  It has nearby awesome services and shopping within 5 minutes of driving or less.  There is a direct bus route for DH to get to work leaving me with the car to drive the kids to and from school unless we find we are close enough to walk.  We can move in on the 14 December so look forward to having Christmas in our new home and growing some new roots. 

Happily our new home is not far to a wonderful quilt shop called Addicted to Fabric that has gorgeous patchwork fabrics as well as delicious dressmaking fabrics in loads of natural fibres.  And stunning knits as well.  Oh my!!!  MOST lust worthy.  If you come to Canberra, be sure to go there.  They are in Dundas Court in Philip.
I have also had fun at Hobbysew in Belconnen and discovered just how much Lincraft has changed from the days when it used to be in Tasmania supplying quality dressmaking fabrics and equipment, with a change of management and store content.  I think my kids like the store for its general craft content, and it is useful for basic items like interfacings or patterns etc...I found a nice roll of black and white precut strips in good quality that exceeded the handle by far of what I felt on bolts in their patchwork section.  There are more quilt shops to explore further afield.
I've also discovered some dealerships for sewing supplies and service along the way as my 2nd hand Bernina 1000+has proven by design limitations of the hook system, to problems consistently on different fabrics  on some stitches ruling out applique and freemotion quilting.  It didn't show up on test sewing or on the servicing test sewing.  I believe it was an experimental model of rotary hook system that was improved not long after it was launched when they switched to the CB oscillating  hook system, which I adore.  It is going to a new home and has been replaced with a stop-gap measure store demo machine on a healthy Christmas sale discount.  I have a bunch of  work to remake and finish soon as a result of packers (there are words to describe them, few are polite)  refusing to follow instructions and packing things into the container that they should not have.  You have to love that when it rains, it pours.




We are happy to be in our new city though.  Especially when it turns out one serviced apartment looks like this!  Our hotels vary from modern and tiny to this latest serviced apartment with traditional country style furniture and more space lending a more home like appearance.  Its nice sitting outside when no-one is around to fill the air with smoke in what is supposed to be a non smoking complex, to enjoy the view and peacefulness of the garden.
I loved the iron work wall decorations and the rockery garden is lovely.  There is a pool we will investigate and our master room has a spa bath.  I have plans for that soon!!

I am home schooling right now, until we secured a rental place and could enrol the kids into school here.  Which means we can do that very shortly.  My creative juices have been somewhat cramped.  I found a solution of sorts though, set up the machine near the kids, or cut out a garment, or fuse a wall hanging class sample when they do not need my active guidance, as they work on their tasks.  I don't get much done usually but its good to try, at least it is good for my soul to touch fabric and snatch moments of sewing. 
Cut out on an apartment kitchen counter, I  casually whipped up a quick test sew of a top from Simplicity 2660 that worked well enough to make worth finishing- in the fabric I sourced in Devonport a few months ago. It has pretty pleats in the upper and lower front bodice and cut on sleeves with a zipper in the back.  I did fit the tissue pattern first before I cut!   I plant to make this up again in a cotton lined with voile for a summer dress as this fabric being cotton blend is more suited to low 20's than the 30 plus degrees we had last week.  And the new machine can at least produce a perfect zig zag without skipping a series of stitches every few inches.  I have areas to get back into on this top and repair areas that have little stitching which is frustrating to have to do.

I have met a bunch of lovely ladies with the Guild in Canberra, which now has permanent home in Cook.  Phoned and picked up a day after we landed by the Guild's President, it was great to meet people here.  The Guild's  facilities are amazing- a fantastic library, huge design board, multiple work benches, overhead electricity supply, kitchen, storage areas for stuff...in an old school that was sold to the community when closed.  I have been able to get to a couple of sewing sessions and one Christmas morning tea meeting as well.  They have a very full calendar.

Our initial impressions of living in Canberra is that its very leafy and with some lovely established suburbs there are some really attractive streets and gardens, public spaces are beautified with baskets of flowers, the shopping is really excellent, and things are convenient when you know where to find them.  Sat Nav is totally invaluable.   I am sure we are going to love living here with a balance of the beauty of nature mixed with some well designed buildings, both modern and older, loads of exhibitions and festivals, displays and markets of all sorts.  Good schools.  Great fabric shops.  The people seem friendly and helpful- what more could you want?

And the house we are selling?  There is a contract being exchanged and signed with settlement to follow within short order.  We are thrilled after the amount of work that has gone into the preparation for sale of the house and the work in the garden also. It actually has had offers for some weeks thrown at us but they were far too low.  Now someone is in the ballpark worth accepting, given it is a depressed real estate market in Tasmania, we are pleased there is a result within 4 weeks to market.

Stephanie.

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