The week that was ...

We've had quite a week in Queensland, on Wednesday a dust storm that smothered New South Wales made its way to us. We were hit with strong winds and low visibility on the Gold Coast and in Brisbane. On the roads everyone was driving with their head lights on as if there was a big storm or misty.

I was reading in the newspaper that on a normal day we might have around 10 micrograms of particles per cubic metre of air and a bushfire might generate 500 micrograms. The levels on Wednesday soared to 15,400 micrograms per cubic metre of air in some areas ... that’s just incredible. The Bureau of Meteorolgy said the storm in NSW was the worst in 70 years, if not the history of the state. It’s all due to the fact that we just haven’t had much rain in the last 6 months, so the drought ravaged country areas have been really affected by these fierce winds.

I have received some cool photos of the dust storm via email from my sister in Sydney and also some from our local area, so check them out:

A picture of the Sun when I was in Underwood, Brisbane.

The M1 freeway travelling back from Brisbane to Gold Coast.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge.

A view of Kings Cross, Sydney.

I have made a couple of ATCs for two local swaps this week. The first one is for the Addicted to Scrap swap and the theme was Italian Renaissance, so I used up a stamp I had in my stash that I hadn't used before. I love the quote on this stamp by Da Vinci "Human subtlety will never devise an invention more beautiful more simple or more direct than does Nature because in her inventions nothing is lacking and nothing is superfluous."

Leonardo da Vinci

This ATC was made for a face-to-face swap and I've used the images from Itkupilli Etsy Shop - http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=7021557 - I picked up this link from Jade Adams who made an ATC using these creepy doll images ... I think they're divine. I think I might choose a new backgroud from Itkupilli for my blog ... I'm off to check them out now.

"All our dreams can come true - if we have the courage to pursue them." ~Walt Disney, 1901-1966, Cartoon Artist and Producer~