Adele Davies

Adele and David bought land in Everton Upper and after a few years moved there permanently. Adele had spoken to Ethel Stephenson about her coloured sheep. Ethel bred English Leicesters and so that is where Adele began her own flock and this breed remained her favourite. The network of coloured sheep breeders followed with interest as she and David embarked on the construction of the massive pole house on the original Brown Brothers’ Everton Hills Estate site.

At this time Adele was studying viticulture at Charles Sturt University in Wagga – grappling with the chemistry but finally winning through. There followed a number of memorable vintages. The wine making and storage was on the lower level of the two-storey house. We had a nice mix of wine and wool the day we wound off our new wool tops amongst the wine-making equipment with the odd pause for tasting. The vines were across the road from the hill where they had built. Vines formed an avenue up to the original house and this is where she and David later lived. Adele had a great interest in pursuing different techniques of dyeing and there was a great day when we dyed all sorts of colours over our initial grey yarn and the skeins were hung out to dry in front of the house.

There were goats on the rough terraced hills where the original vines had been and also a super duper hen house with a variety of breeds including bantams from Gay Prichard. In fact Adele was always experimenting with new breeds, new techniques, new approaches to farming (through the soil carbon project) and generally used her very active mind whenever the opportunity arose.

On the working front Adele had extensive experience in the fields of psychology and social work and put these skills to great use, influencing the direction of many people who had lost their way. She trained groups in management skills in Australia and also in Singapore and Malaysia. More recently she conducted courses through The Centre in Wangaratta. She was particularly interested in the training of apprentices for the wine industry and at various times each year would travel to vineyards throughout the region to meet with the apprentices and their employers. Adele had a passion for supporting women in all avenues of life. She worked to improve women’s health. She had formed strong networks in many avenues of community life.

Returning to her interest in textiles, Adele loved tackling new projects and learning new skills and so she progressed through spinning, weaving and knitting to wet felting, needle felting and Tunisian crochet which became her forte. Passionate about promoting women’s groups, she took over as chairperson of the Stitched Up Textile Festival when that looked like folding up and she set it on a strong grounding to ensure its continuation. For North East Yarns she was a driving force. She found funding available and together we put forward a successful submission that resulted in us having our very professional logo and our first 3-fold promotional flyers. Then there was a presentation to the funding body at a dinner at Milawa.

More recently Adele was not going to miss the presentation to the Victorian Feltmakers in Hartwell and spoke eloquently and passionately about our group.

Apart from remembering her unending wisdom and good company we all remember the rainbow of colours she dyed her English Leicester fleeces to liven up our market stalls and her often whacky creations which all eventually sold even though we less creative souls wondered at times if anyone would dare wear them.