Were you the target of any April Fools’ Day pranks this year? I hope you weren’t caught out as a Silly Galah!
The weekend before the Easter break, Paul and I had the rare pleasure of two nights away without the kids….. actually it might be the first time we’ve had two consecutive nights away without the kids……hmmmmm. Anyway, we escaped out of the city and spent two days in the Adelaide Hills, admiring the beginnings of autumn, relishing the warm weather and drinking in the quiet. It felt amazing.
On the second afternoon, Paul decided to have a post-schnitzel snooze and I lurked about the farm where we were staying. Mostly I was trying to get some horse photos for our daughter. But the only animals that seemed to want their pictures taken was this flock of galahs.
They seemed to be having a lovely afternoon too!
Many Australians have a love-hate relationship with galahs….. they are beautiful, and by bird standards, are pretty intelligent. They can make great pets, learning to “talk” and to respond to basic commands. On the other hand, in the wild they travel in large flocks best described as gangs! They are loud and destructive. They are destructive when they eat, but they also seem to like to destroy infrastructure and crops just for fun. They are not aggressive per se but they do have a severe case of attitude.
Silly Galah!
“You silly galah!” is a mild, mostly affectionate, Australian term for someone who has made a gaffe or done something a bit daft. Using this term will probably date you….. but then, the Silly Galah colour scheme carries much the same risk. Every couple of decades, pink and grey colour schemes seem to get really popular for a short while and then disappear again….. I remember the pink and grey phase of the early 90s in particular because my Mum really rocked it at the time. I quite like it, but I would be careful where I used it…… It does always make me think of galahs……..
How to be inspired by our silly galahs today
In my humble opinion, parrots make fantastic quilting studies. They are such comic and expressive birds, and are usually beautiful as well. I have been inspired by parrots before. You can read more:
– my dancing macaw appliqué idea (I really do have to get around to making this one! And perhaps a galah to match now too…..:) )
– my parrot hand-appliqué pillow, made when I was just 15. Do you remember how I said I had done a hand-appliquéd project ? Well, this is it!
– my coconut lorikeet colour scheme from the 31 Days of Everyday Inspiration series.
And off-site…. I have a fellow Island Batik Ambassador who is very keen on parrots. And luckily for us, she has just posted about a mosaic parrot mini-quilt she made with her try-a-new-technique for March. Visit the Quilting Rambler for a look at her great parrot project. I’ve just added another technique to my to-try list!
I hope you have enjoyed my silly galahs and other parrot inspiration today and that you saw through any April Fools’ Day pranks headed your way on Easter Sunday.
Stay tuned for that tutorial I promised on turned-edge, machine stitched appliqué later in the week.
Those are the cutest birds ever! I wish I could call someone a Silly Galah, but I don’t think they would get it.
What a fun post. I’ve never heard of these birds, but they are kind of cute. I can imagine they can be pests though, in large numbers. Thanks for sharing!
I hope you really enjoyed your time away! Those birds are beautiful and a pink/gray combination is always neat to me.
It is so good to get away as a couple – we are past that stage but every one of those trips was treasured and so important to us. Love the silly galah and the color theme is so much fun with this one!
You are so fortunate to have such beautiful nature in your back yard. I cant think of a single native animal that is as colorful as your Galah birds. Well we do have a yellow and a blue finch that are as bright as your Berry Colourful bears. If the Galah are as loud as a macaw I feel your pain.