Collecting: Top 10 ducks in my flock

Collecting ducks was an accident, but I have great fun finding fun ducks to join my flock. They range from ¼ inch high buttons to 12 inch high garden ornaments.

Of all my many ducks, I decided to show you my top ten. I hope you like them.

While I'm no longer the duQ editor, I still love ducks.

Real ducks visiting my house from the pond out the front of the house I used to live in.

They don't eat the snails in the garden either

They're made of porcelain, pottery, plastic, rubber, wood, fabric, towelling, paper, metal, in fact almost anything you can imagine.

They are on pictures, on placemats, clocks, vases, pot holders.

They are buttons, earrings, toys, bath toys, kitchen gadgets...

I have dozens and dozens of them.

Blame my late husband, Paul

I used to own the Australian national quilting magazine, Down Under Quilts. (I still write for it today.) People call the magazine duQ (pronounced duck), and so I used to say I was the old duck running it.

During the time I owned it, duQ had its 10th birthday, and I decided to have a conference so that all the regular writers could meet with each other. They lived all over Australia, and while some did know one another, most had never met face to face.

We were a party of twelve, including Paul. He had a national managerial role in a large transport company, so we often went to conferences, and knew about ice-breaker games and team games, so we devised some fun things to do.

I sent Paul out on the morning with a very tiny budget to buy a small gift to place at each plate on the dinner table. As it happened, Angela went home sick, so Paul called her out to the family room to see what he had bought for the gifts.

On the table were twenty, six inch high pottery ducks with checked kerchiefs, and in different poses.

She told him I would kill him for spending so much, but he just laughed and said that they were $2 each.

It was just for fun, after all.

They were an enormous hit with the 'staff' of duQ, and thereafter people began to buy me ducks.

My ducks are special, because Paul started the collection off, and they mostly were presents from special people in my life.

Have you some collected treasures that would brighten up your interiors? Bring them out of storage or cabinets and display them around your home.

Enjoy your collections now, instead of keeping them for future generatins.

She's into miniatures and thought that I would find it irresistible and she was right. If you like ducks, or any other animal, and have limited space for displaying collections, perhaps miniatures are the way to go.

When I bought the three stained glass wall hung ducks at a craft fair as a joke to send up my late husband's hatred of his mother's "ducks on the wall", I had no idea that he would fall in love with them, and even help to hang them on my wall.

The best laid plans of mice and wives?

Everyone is familiar with Kermit the Frog's song about his beloved Rubber Duckie, but these ducks can really liven up a cold, dark bathroom on a dreary winter day.

They can even help get the kids to wash themselves.

I don't want to unwrap him, he's so cute. The top is a rubber duckie, with clear soap attached underneath.

Lois gave me this one.

No! They can hold utensils, help clean the pots, spread pate, adorn your coffee cups...

My favourite kitchen duck is my white porcelain egg cup, which I have had for many years. It is lovely to hold the duck's head while digging out the inside of my boiled egg without burning my fingers.

My utensils are all in one place on my benchtop, being protected by Chef Duck, and awaiting my cooking with them.