Stop that Commotion

Inevitability Strikes Again

2011-12-08T16:11:00.001+08:00

Some things are inevitable, unavoidable, irresistible (tautology is my middle name, by the way).

First of all, at this time of year, there is the buying and giving of "stuff". Unavoidable.

And inevitably I become frustrated with the volume of plastic-y "stuff" that have a built in obsolescence set to expire and become landfill before the year is out so that they can be replaced with a shiny plastic-y thing-a-ma-bob du jour next Christmas.

And here (unavoidably) I become another in a long history of people worldwide to exclaim, "Why aren't things built like they used to be?"

This was literally brought home to me recently. Astrid had seen a waffle iron in a Christmas brochure that was (inevitably) placed in our letterbox. Shiny. Plastic. Junk. I remembered that mum had a Husqvarna waffle iron and so we've borrowed it for a while to sate Astrid (and, after being reminded of waffles after many years waffle-less, my) waffle cravings.

This beauty must be close to 50 years old! And yet, here it is going strong and turning out beautiful waffles.

Hard to imagine a single appliance that will be given to anyone anywhere this Christmas that can become a family heirloom.

The inevitable angst about presents starts. We try to make good choices. For the children: Lego (this is sanctioned plastic as far as we are concerned...and also heirloom material as the kids actually have Lego passed on from my brother and I in their box), art supplies and books, that sort of thing.

And this year, for the adults, we have decided as an extended family to give donations to charity.

Take that JUNK.

In other inevitable, unavoidable and irresistible news: I have once again missed the first of Advent and have to sneekily, secretly, covertly light the second candle during the week to make it look like I didn't!

I think perhaps that if I did actually remember to light the first candle on the actual first of Advent, we may all disappear in a POOF of unpredictability.

So it's probably better that things remain inevitable, unavoidable and irresistible .

TAH-DAH!

2011-11-15T13:26:00.001+08:00

Before and After shots of our rejuvenated "free" deck sofa...

...of course what you can't see is that I pulled out a bazillion rusty staples and replaced the seat webbing and that I sanded and refinished the wood. Also, while the shape is really, really cute, it was a bit of a bugger to sew removable slip covers for. I cut up an old foam mattress for the base and the cushions are also recycled, so it's cleared up random junk as well as made a useful piece of furniture. Now on to the chair...and finishing the deck so I can do a really impressive before and after of that!

BEFORE

AFTER

So far the cats haven't claimed it as their own but they're lurking.

Productions

2011-11-13T19:59:00.001+08:00

Finished Astrid's cardigan this weekend (pattern linky). It's still a little coolish in the evenings so she may get some wear out of it before it's put away all the long, long months of summer. There is not a hint of "itch factor" with this one as it's made from lovely Patonyle (sock wool). It's also blocked in shampoo, so it's passed Miss Fussy's stringent criteria for acceptable knit wearability.

I've also almost finished restoring the found sofa. I'll get some pictures of it soon.

We went on a walking tour of some heritage sites around our neighbourhood yesterday. It was a bit like being tourists in your own backyard. It was fun and something we'll be doing more of now that I've made myself an early New Year's Resolution to do more family/community/free and low cost stuff next year.

Yep, all in all, it was quite a productive weekend.

Congratulations Australia

2011-11-09T13:50:00.001+08:00

WHOOOOOO-HOOOOOOO

Beautiful South

2011-10-18T11:48:00.000+08:00

The south coast of our part of Australia is truly beautiful.

It's for salty eyelashes and never brushing your sea-tangled hair.

It's for exploring secret paths sliced through granite boulders.

And discovering an ancient herd of elephants frozen together forever.

For building sand civilisations and climbing willow trees.

It's for making new friends.

It's for waking every morning to have your breath taken away by an ever changing view that is somehow disconnected from time and ordinary things.

It's for dreaming of another life...(this vineyard is for sale)...sigh.

When the internet is really helpful

2011-10-01T20:22:00.000+08:00

I hate folding washing.

It's probably my most hated household task.

It's probably because there's ALWAYS mountains of it.

It's probably because it NEVER ends.

I stumbled on this video today. I'm sure it will wear off but at the moment it's actually fun to fold (T-shirts anyway).

Thank you the Japanese, thank you the internet.

I'm off to Google Origami Undies now!

Crusty

2011-09-25T09:20:00.000+08:00

I've made a cardigan for the Historian!

He has problems with the concept of the "cardigan". He has problems with the concept of hand-knit too. Born, I suspect, out of years of hand-knits from loving relatives that were too short, or wide, or acrylic, or otherwise weird.

I've been able to knit something he'll actually wear in the past but have until now had no success on the cardigan front. He thinks they're fuddy duddy.

Here's the thing.

The Historian didn't think that History was a crusty enough profession for him and so he is now in the thick of a post doctorate degree in Archeology.

Now an Archeological Historian or a Historical Archeologist simply must wear cardigans, don't you agree? . . . preferably with suede elbow patches and corduroy trousers.

I'm pleased to say that he has finally embraced the idea of hand-knits and cardigans but I can see with his new profession that I'll have to be careful not to steer him down a wrong path...

Mick Aston from the Time Team

Nothing is sexier than a good brain

2011-09-21T21:24:00.002+08:00

Thinking a lot about evolutionary biologists lately (more on that later). In the meantime, for your viewing pleasure, a mind altering talk from one of our world's sharpest minds; and an evolutionary biologist, Richard Dawkins. Who is married to Princess Astra/Romana from Dr Who by the way (remember her?).

Neighbourly Lessons in Gratitude

2011-09-06T12:34:00.002+08:00

I love where I live.

I met an inspiring woman the other day. She's in her eighties and lives a few streets away. We got talking about the neighbourhood and old houses and she invited me into see hers. As soon as I stepped past the threshold I knew I was in the home of a remarkable person.

Every neat-as-a-pin, yet comfortable, room was sparingly furnished with elegant teak pieces that looked as though they had been newly purchased last week . . . in 1955 and on every wall hung enormous, beautiful painted canvases, mostly portraits with pleasant personalities that seemed to reach out of the surface asking you to get to know them better. I lingered at a handsome smiling young man that absolutely shone with yellow tones from mustard to marigold.

"My long ago paramour, he stayed in France," she sighed.

"Are you the artist?" I asked, impressed.

"Yes, most are mine. Oh, I wanted to see how it was done," she said as she noticed me studying a really convincing copy of the Mona Lisa that hung in her sitting room.

She told me that she has traveled and lived in many places around the world but that this is where she has put down her roots. She has lived in the house for 55 years, her children grew there, her grandchildren love to visit and she has two studios out the back where she takes small groups for painting lessons. She said that when her friends come to stay from overseas that they are blown away at how close she lives to the city and yet what a relaxed and idyllic life she has.

"It's paradise here," she said smiling at me.

I came away changed from that meeting.

I had been feeling rather antsy, flighty, foot-itchy lately. Some friends have recently relocated to London (making me really envious, it sounds so exciting) and Dette is about to set off on her incredible European escapade.

Blah, I thought. Boring, I thought. We should pick up and go somewhere. Relocate. Have an adventure. I even made a mental (googled) list of places that I thought would suit me: Victoria, Canada; Aarhus, Demark; Gotland, Sweden; Somewhere nice that I haven't narrowed down yet in New Zealand?...hmmm.

But I do actually love where we live.

I love our lifestyle. I love that we have roots and family here. I love the community. The people, who will share life lessons and readily invite strangers into their homes! The skinny musicians loping along with guitars slung across their backs - just like generations of hip kids before them. Elderly Italian and Greek families with bursting vegetable patches, illegally planted but ignored by the authorities, on their front council verge. The pink and grey galahs nesting in street trees and the magpies hopping about in their brilliant white and black below them.

I love the mild winters and the spectacular spring and autumn days (we don't have to talk about summer). I adore our house that we are making so comfortable and beautiful and the memories that my children are creating here daily.

I love the open blue sky that we enjoy (3200 hours a year).

I love that we're walking distance to friends, the best park in town, foreign restaurants, art galleries and cool little wine bars playing original music. I love that we can holiday nearby in really pristine wilderness, deserted beaches with the softest, whitest sand and world-class wine regions

Perhaps I'll just content myself with fantasy international holiday plans. That way I can come back to "paradise".

A Love Letter to my Dearest Friend on the Occasion of her Birthday

2011-08-17T08:17:00.000+08:00

Dear Dette,

Thirty years ago we found each other at high school and I am forever grateful that we did.

We were together through the ~~teenage angst~~ incredibly important dramas of our late adolescence. We created our own styles together, sewing and knitting clothes (urg, remember the black polkadot jodpur things I made? And our anti-fashion stance of mixing colours that we thought shouldn't go together...only to find pink and yellow were the "new black" of 1982 and the competitions to see who could be clothed for the least money - curse those undies, they always bumped up the total cost).

We felt passionately about so many, many things and causes and talked endlessly about our hearts and who was trampling all over them or who we wished would trample on them a little bit...staying up all night giggling insanely, eating "magic" french onion dip in my bedroom window.

Since then we've both had relationships and break ups, joy and sorrow but your friendship has remained a strong constant in my life, like a pair of warm and loving arms always there to catch and comfort. I am continually inspired by your courage, strength, kindness and creativity . You really do make me a better person.

When we were 17, we imagined the sort of old ladies we would one day become. We vowed to be as naughty as we could possibly be and exasperate everyone with our tricksy ways while we wreak havoc in our super-fast shiny red sports-cars. I'm looking forward to that in another 30 years.

Happy Birthday.

Love Anki

Some Music for You

2011-08-13T09:09:00.000+08:00

One of Australia's most brilliant bands, The Drones, performing Kev Carmody's "River of Tears".

Here he comes again

2011-08-04T12:35:00.010+08:00

I'm prejudiced.

Against.

Mauve.

Mauve has never done anything to me and yet I can't even stand the sound of his name. Mauve. Yuck.

It's a truly visceral affect he has on me. I hide my prejudice. When the Wisterias are in bloom, I naturally ooh and aah with everyone else but inside I'm shuddering...Mauve. Too much Mauve. Yuck.

As with any prejudice, I see him everywhere, I distrust him and am uneasy when he's around. He seems to sneak into so many colours and try to ingratiate himself. The silvery, mother-of-pearly colour that I yearned for in the dining room has him lurking in the darkened corners. And now he's threatening to show up again in the pale grey colour that we have chosen for woodwork at the front of our house.

Dulux Lunette

. . . not to mention the colour we've chosen for the walls.

Dulux Bilby

The Historian keeps saying, "Look, if you're going to stare at the colour long enough, you're going to see it. Relax, and get that look of disgust off your face, it's grey . . . . . . . . . .with a hint of purple".

But I know that wily character Mauve, he lulls you into a false sense of security with his purple-ness or his pink-ness but he's still Mauve under it all.

Maybe I need to accept him. Embrace him. Plant a Wisteria and name the house "Mauve Manor".

Pssst...I've changed the main colour...that should foil Mr Mauve...

Dulux Raku

Cute and Cuddly Boys, Cute and Cuddly

2011-07-27T14:31:00.006+08:00

So. Hello again. I've been neglecting you, poor little blog. I have excuses, I guess.

We've been busy. We've had nasty colds, birthdays and school holidays. We've had outings (Zoo, Museum, Art Gallery) and In-ings (cocooned in our new library because it's quite cold and we are unprepared for that) and creating an awful mess again as we scrape, sand, fill and paint the front of the house (with associated paint choice dramas again).

And we have a new member added to our family.

Meet NASA (as in National Aeronautics and Space Administration, named (naturally) by science-mad Linus).

We lost the youngest of our geriatric cats (Scat) a few months ago. As much as you are prepared for the loss of elderly pets, it still hurts an awful lot when they go. We didn't want to "replace" him as we still have two ancient cats and the idea of upsetting their sunset years with an interloper seemed a bit cruel.

But, then Linus has been positively aching for a cat that would be friendly to him (yeah, old cats won't put up with the attentions of 8 year olds very well). So we made the decision to adopt a rescue kitten. He was found in the middle of a busy road at only a couple of weeks old by a kind soul who took him to the local vet. He has settled in amazingly well. Really, amazingly well. The old folks 'round here could care less that he's on the scene and he's taken to sleeping on Linus's bed which makes him and us all kinds of happy!

Watching a new baby come to terms with the world is so much fun...smelling things for the first time, feeling and chewing and generally attacking everything that moves (including knitting wool, sigh).

But man, you got to be careful of those Koi in the pond. They look really scary! Actually, be really careful of the pond in general so that you don't fall head first into it with your jeans and shoes on as it's not a nice experience, ask me how I know.

I've also managed to finish a couple of knitting projects (while fending off NASA). One is Linus's cardigan.

Which he absolutely insists on wearing with the hood up. I tried to tell him that it's "cooler" to wear it down, but what do I know.

Erratum: Astrid informs me she is a rabbit in this photo. Well, of couse she is. None of those at the zoo either.

Oh, these are pictures of Astrid being a deer at the zoo.Because, there ain't no deer at the Perth Zoo (plenty of kangaroos, koalas, zebras, giraffes and an inordinate number of gibbons) but much to Astrid's chagrin, no deer. Luckily she can act so that other visitors to the zoo didn't have to miss out entirely.

Better watch out for that hooded creature though...

Children being childish

2011-07-09T08:41:00.001+08:00

Early July means lots of important birthdays. First there's mine, then there's Linus's and then mum's all in a 9 day period. My amazing, sensitive and funny youngest son turned 8 (the ages of mum and I aren't relevant here, or maybe they are...it's all about me getting crotchety...again).

It's incredible how quickly the years go, isn't it?

Linus fools us a little with his way. His brain gears are always ticking over and sometimes we have to stop and remind ourselves that he's just a little kid.

But, you know, we do remember he is a little kid and it's important to us that he and Astrid are "allowed" to be little kids. 'Cause, wow, the world really seems to want them to grow up really quickly and become dutiful little consumers (I guess). Why are we in such a hurry to rush them through the wonderful years of childhood? Drinking their baby chinos in cafes, wearing their little high heels and bras, watching Southpark (I mean, have these parents ever watched Southpark, or do they think it's animated, so it must be for kids?)...

We're constantly telling our children, "Oh, we don't do that in our family". Perhaps we're really weird for wanting to preserve their childhood for what seems to us a reasonable amount of time. Fortunately for us the majority of parenting that they come into contact with is in line with our own. But the wider community is a different thing. Things might be easier if we wore aluminium foil hats and mapped star charts from the freckles on our forearms. Then it would be obvious that we're, you know, different.

Just before his birthday Linus was invited to a school-friend's birthday that was held at one of those in the dark laser shooting thingos. Well, I was conflicted. I mean, I think he's too young at 8 to get into faux bloodsport games. I'm not sure if there is an appropriate age for it but I didn't want him to miss out and become a social pariah at school. I told myself that it was just "chasey" in the semi-dark.

We got there and the music and lights and things designed to get your adrenlin pumping made me want to scoop him up and run away...he was shaking, actually shaking...we had already gone in and since I'd left my aluminium foil hat at home and so looked like a "normal" mum, I hugged him and left him.

I spent 2 hours (well 1.25 hours, I got back early) in a knot worrying about him because my mothering alarm bells were ting-a-linging.

He was fine, albeit a little testosterone charged for the rest of the day. But my position still stands, too young.

Then I got into a bit of a "to-do" with my brother at my birthday dinner about, "Kids today". It's the argument that goes like this:

Him: "Kids today aren't like they were when we were young, they are far more grown up."

Me: "Bullshit."

Him: "Oh you don't know, you can't contribute. You don't have a 14 year old daughter...yet. When you do, you'll know."

Me: "Bullshit."

Kids aren't different, they're exactly as they have always been. Society is different. It's like that frog in the slow boiling saucepan story. He doesn't jump out and save himself because the water is just getting warmer and warmer, till it's too late.

You see, we do protect our children, we do set boundaries and milestones for them to wait for when they're older. We don't let them watch commercial TV and get assailed with screaming ads telling they must buy, eat, watch. We don't over-schedule them with all sorts of activities, we let them play and make up their own games. We will surround them with an environment that lets them be silly and crazy and free and innocent for as long as childhood should be. Anyone who wants to join us, I can send you a pattern for a really spiffy alfoil hat.

Indoctrinating the offspring

2011-06-08T10:35:00.006+08:00

Three generations of the family went to a community rally to say YES to a price on carbon and action on climate change. It was part of simultaneous events held in all capital cities in the country.

Mum and Dad came up from south of Perth by public transport and we walked through our beautiful Hyde park on the way to the Perth Cultural Centre. Thanks to some rain last week the lakes are looking a little less sad at the moment but the week before the ducks were waddling through the water instead of swimming. We need well above average rainfall this winter or our dams (and duck lakes) will be empty by the end of next summer. We will not get even close to average on current trends and so water restrictions are going to be more severe than ever before and we'll be drinking recycled water.

This is why we protested.

Linus with his head full of deep thoughts and concerns for the environment was contemplative and pleased that we were all there.

Astrid was pleased to get her face painted.

But then, last year she was incredibly enthusiastic when we went to this rally.

As it turned out she had misheard the chant of:

"What do we want? Justice. When do we want it? Now"

She thought it was:

"What do we want?Christmas! When do we want it? Now!"

A social conscience takes time to evolve.

Things I don't understand

2011-06-01T14:06:00.005+08:00

There are many, many things that I don't understand in the world.

Last Monday our premier investigative news program Four Corners exposed the unspeakable horrors inflicted on live Australian cattle sent to Indonesian abattoirs.

I didn't watch it. Just reading about it before the show was plenty disturbing enough for me.

I have for a long time been opposed to the live export of cattle, sheep and camels. Stories of incredibly tortuous journeys for terrified animals, only to be dispatched in an incredibly inhumane manner make me very angry.

OK, so I'm a vegetarian that's a personal choice but I doubt there would be many meat eaters who would want their food to be terrified and tortured and die an agonising death before they eat it. And I know that cattle farmers are by and large furious that their livestock has been treated this way.

So the finger pointing has commenced. How did this happen? There are guidelines and inspections, methodologies and payments. Which department is responsible? Who knew what and did nothing?

Australia has temporarily halted shipments to the abattoirs that were the subject of the investigation. Indonesia has responded by saying that while there are laws protecting animals, there is no penalty for transgression and so no reason to adhere to them.

The reason that live animals are sent to Indonesia is so that they can be assured a Halal slaughter. As I understand, Halal killing is much like Kosher killing. The animal must be alive (that is, you cannot eat carrion), the executioner must recite a prayer before slitting the throat and the body must not be touched until after exsanguination. Treating an animal the way that has been exposed here before death would result in the meat being Haraam or forbidden.

Clearly all the checks and balances, forms and departments of doing this and that have failed. If these barbaric atrocities are going on in the11 abattoirs that were filmed by Four Corners, then what comfort can we have that the same thing isn't going on all over the world at the final destinations for our livestock?

Since animal rights guidelines in the countries are not going to change practices, I think more Muslims worldwide need to come out and publicly condemn this horror as being Haraam (some in Australia have already said this). If the meat is deemed unclean by clerics, just watch how quickly humane practices are introduced.

Unless that happens, we should not send any live animals overseas.

Please sign the petition at Get Up! HERE

ps. sorry for the still of the poor wretched creature in the video at the link. Watch the video if you aren't convinced and have a stronger constitution than I do. Or, if you're like me put your hand over the left-hand side of your screen!

Frenemies

2011-05-31T14:13:00.002+08:00

Small girl friendships can be "complicated".

Astrid's BEST friend (I'm going to call her Lucy) is, according to Astrid, a "frenemy". Last year, which was forever ago, they were not friends. Astrid said she was bossy and mean and sang rude songs about snot and farts. Don't get me wrong, Astrid is quite partial to songs about snot and farts, but these particular songs were not to her liking.

This year they are "in LOVE". Last week Astrid received a note, "I love you because you're pretty and have shiny hair"...five year old girls are very superficial.

But it appears there is a decidedly uncomfortable dimension to this friendship, a Single White Female component.

Lucy insists that Astrid play only with her at all times. She must even eat her lunch bite for bite with her, wear her hair the same and woe betide any child who talks to Astrid. Astrid is not a shrinking violet and so when Lucy tries to enforce these rules, a loud disagreement ensues.

Astrid and Lucy are not the only fraught relationship in her class (it's just the girls though, boys are far less complex) and so their teacher is trying to shake things up by forcibly separating the pairs. Time will tell whether this direct action works or backfires...

If I'm to be completely honest, all of this suits me perfectly as it absolves me of any suspicion of social engineering. I was feeling a little squeamish about my meddling in the friendship. "Why don't we have Alice or Amy or Wendy over to play instead of Lucy", I'd say . You see, while Lucy is fine (despite the Jennifer Jason Leigh-ness) her dad kind of gives me the creeps. You know, when the hairs stand up at the back of your neck but you're not really sure why? He is disheveled, sadly not in a Tim Roth/Robert Downey Jr sort of way, but in a park-bench-trench-coat-what's underneath kind of way and he told me my shoes were "pretty" last time I saw him.....creepy.

2011-05-24T10:40:00.000+08:00

So, I went jeans shopping...yes, thanks for your sympathy, I've almost gotten over the experience.

The sheer volume of choices that you have to make completely does your head in: skinny bogan legs, wide flower-child legs, low/mid/armpit rise waist, curve, length, colour, weird little faux crease marks etc etc. AND that's even before you go through the soul destroying fitting room experience, where the lights are 2000 Watt and artfully designed to make your pudgy bits look like enormous globs of congealed pure white porridge. Just how that's supposed to sell jeans is beyond me.

I'm not really a big fan of jeans (not solely because of the buying and trying). I appreciate their usefulness but they are so conformist and I have an annoyingly ingrained tendency to try to be "different". It's been with me for as long as I remember.

I hate being part of a crowd.

When everyone around me was getting tatts, wearing and dying their hair black, I wore turquoise and bleached my hair white...and, thankfully, I was dithering on the design of my prospective tattoo for so long, that they became mainstream and I decided it was more alternative to not have one.

It's probably why I don't Facebook, dislike the latest, big label Avett Brothers' album and I have never seen E.T.!

I know how stupid it is, but it's ingrained, like I said. It's me.

Tara recently mentioned "mum (mom) jeans" and while I now understand, thanks to some helpful advice, what they are (highpants), the mums that I come into daily contact with at Linus and Astrid's school do not wear them. These mums are size 10 and below and get about in a uniform of designer jeans and pony tails.

Due to lack of time and the issues with hairdressers I've discussed before, I currently sport a bloody ponytail and...now, a new pair of jeans......I feel like I'm becoming a new millennium version of a Stepford wife.

Chocolate - a Really Guilty Pleasure

2011-04-20T20:00:00.011+08:00

It's so hard to do the right thing all the time isn't it? Sometimes it's ignorance and sometimes it's selective remembering but when confronted with the truth of something that is really wrong, we try to do the right thing.

We're Atheists. I don't know why that word seems so aggressive but it does. I sometimes say we're Humanists as it sounds less confrontational. The point is, we don't believe in God (or any god). We also don't think you need a religious ideology in order to be ethical. It's perfectly fine with us if you do, we're not going to light flaming torches, go crusading and bop you over the head till you join the fold! See, completely non-threatening fluffy Atheists here.

It's Easter and, as with Christmas, there are issues to contend with when you have small enquiring minds who ask probing questions. We're not about to let them miss out on the fun parts of both occasions. We're Atheists not Sadists. Fortunately for us the Christians co-opted other earlier celebrations to do with Spring and the Winter Solstice so we can tell them, "Some people believe...and others believe..." and still find a reason to have the Easter Bunny visit and eat chocolate that doesn't feel too hypocritical. Although our stance is made more tricky by being in the Southern Hemisphere and so the whole new life, spring celebration thing is a hard sell.

We focus on the being with family, enjoying life and each other, and eating chocolate angle.

Well, that was till the child slave labour thing! So, I'm off to Oxfam to buy fair trade chocolate and I'll be filling these adorable old school cardboard eggs with something that hopefully hasn't abused the rights and body of a child somewhere in the world.

Zen and the LOL

2011-04-18T15:52:00.002+08:00

I was going to post about my outrage that the OED has accepted LOL and OMG into its latest revision. But then I realised I actually don't really care enough to be outraged. Although I prefer LOL as an acronym for Little Old Lady and I doubt that when people write ROFLMAO, that they actually are, or we'd have funny shaped jeans everywhere.

I will remain a conscientious objector and, apart from the above occurrences, I will continue not to use either. People can transmogrify nouns into verbs (gift, access) or stick superfluous prefixes on words (irregardless) and I still don't care. I will not be ruffled. I have newly honed reserves of patience toward people who aren't me.

Oh, but please don't use commas as apostrophes..............my new Zen outlook doesn't allow for that trangression.

PEACE

OUT.

2011-04-02T08:39:00.000+08:00

So much despair and tragedy. Some good news is always nice.

Bring Out Your Dead

2011-04-01T12:02:00.006+08:00

Many years ago we did a road trip through western parts of the US. As we were approaching Las Vegas I was reading to the Historian the entry in the Lonely Planet book. It said that even the most jaded person can't help but feel lucky as they crest the final hill and see the twinkling lights of Vegas laid out before them. It was true. We felt "lucky" but we're not insane gamblers or wealthy by any means and not about to blow money.

Vegas was hilarious to us, everything was funny. So glittery and gaudy and "ping-ping whoop" over the top. The lights! the carpets!! We laughed a lot and after two days of playing the 5c slots and living on free popcorn, $1 frozen margaritas and all you can eat seafood buffets at 5pm with the flocks of old age pensioners (the Historian went back for 5ths of dessert and we had to sit in the car like boa constrictors digesting a very large animal afterwards), we came out completely even but with a fantastic adventure to show for it. We may not have won the jackpot but we were very "lucky" indeed.

We've recently had a council bulk rubbish collection here, A.K.A "Bring out your Dead". Bring our your Dead gives me that same feeling. An irrational "lucky" feeling that I'm going to hit the jackpot and find the perfect antique oak hall table that I'm looking for discarded on the neighbour's front verge. Sadly, it doesn't usually live up to it's promise. Hordes of "professional" rubbish fossickers patrol the streets and anything remotely "good" is snapped up very quickly. It's a true demonstration of the idiom, "one man's trash is another man's treasure" as even the hideous burnt orange glass and gold 70's style chandelier we removed from our dining room was grabbed by the neighbour across the road while still in my hand as I was putting it out on our pile of rubble - yoik! The council no doubt banks on this helpful recycling as by the time they come to collect the stuff there is a mere fraction of it left.

Because I find it slightly (well, very) unseemly to be blatantly cruising up and down the roads of our neighbourhood with a trailer and picking through mounds of detritus in broad daylight. I have to wait till the cover of night and grab whatever I have just happened upon in my normal movements. Still, I feel that lucky feeling against such high odds that the perfect thing will be right there for me and this year I did manage to find a fantastic sofa and chair at different locations. They obviously weren't considered "good" by the professionals and were still there when we hurriedly crammed them in the back of our car while no-one was watching.

They need work but they have so much potential and they're destined to be our new "lounging area" on our deck. We can see ourselves snuggled up on them reading books this winter...now to finish a few billion other jobs before I can get stuck in to restoring them.

Gustav doesn't think we should bother, they're perfect as is!

Oh, Narcissus

2011-03-26T09:25:00.005+08:00

I'm quite partial to a house magazine now and then. As I also have a soft spot for the overuse of the term "bespoke" and pictures of lovely leafy, rosy, willowy gardens, I like to occasionally get the British Homes and Gardens.

I feel that I should draw your attention to this fellow:

His name is Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen. Well of course it is! You don't cultivate a look like this and call yourself Bruce Bloggs. He is an interior designer and appears to be somewhat of a minor celebrity in the UK. I'm sure that he's a perfectly decent person in real life but they have really made him look an absolute twit here.

Photographed to endorse various companies making "bespoke" furniture; the advertisements are memorable but not in the way they intended, I'm sure. . . I actually look for the ads each time I get a copy of this mag but couldn't actually tell you what the rooms look like as I can't take my eyes of Laurence.

In his awkward, overdressed glory.

Here he is looking relaxed in a kitchen. Just about to whip up a batch of scones...obviously.

Hey, hey in a bathroom. Oops someone maybe should have cropped out the chinless profile reflection.

And my personal favourite, "Chika chika boom, ladies here's a bedroom...with me in it". I'll just make it look like I'm buttoning up my jacket - next to this purposely tousled bed (nudge, nudge, wink, wink).

Snort!

LOVE

2011-03-21T14:34:00.030+08:00

18 years ago today I sat on the Historian's doorstep waiting for him to come home.

It was a really beautiful, clear blue day but my stomach was a knot of fear. He rode up on his motorbike, took off his helmet and looked at me and I thought I would die from the electricity between us.

We both knew the gravity of this meeting. It was time to face up to how we felt and either choose to be together for the rest of our lives or walk away and vow to never see each other again.

While being together was going to be enormously difficult; to be apart was actually impossible for us.

When you find your soul mate, you have to hang on as tightly as you can.

I love you.

Quite the Artist

2011-03-08T09:56:00.002+08:00

Astrid LOVES to create "art". She is always busy drawing, painting, gluing and cutting and her volume of output at both school and home is astounding.

I have to admit that her "art" has up till now had a vaguely alarming skeletal horror type look to it that makes you a little uneasy and requires some tact in appraising.

"Look mamma, it's a bunny"

"Arrrrrrg...I mean, that's really lovely sweetpea. I didn't know that rabbits had such long claws, fangs and...so many...um...teats?"
"That's fur mamma"
"Oh. Well she certainly has a lovely smile" (I hope I never meet her in a dark alley though).

"The princess is riding on a unicorn"

"Well now, isn't she beautiful? I don't think I've ever seen a princess quite like her. Such lovely hair" (Doesn't look in the least bit creepy or like an Apocalyptic Horseman).

Remiss

2011-03-03T12:32:00.003+08:00

I've been a bit quiet lately and it was terribly remiss of me as I should have posted about the lovely gift I received from the incredibly sweet Lauren at Grubby and Green.

Thank you so much Lauren, receiving this "warm fuzzy" from you was a bright shiny moment in a pretty blah month.

This wonderful little Liberty print purse is finished so beautifully with lining and a hand embroidered label, the letter set is ingeniously made from recycled milk cartons and there's a hand-made card with a lovely message. The patience and attention to detail put into these things is inspiring and brings into pretty stark contrast the sloppy, lazy mess that makes up EVERYTHING else around me at the moment.

All spark has been sapped, SAPPED out of me by: the horrid weather, the never ending saga that is our dining room, the Historian having to travel away from home too much and that I seem to have become allergic to our poor old geriatric cats. I say "poor old" as I'm constantly escaping from their attentions at the moment and Nori has been ejected from the bedroom at night...but seriously, cats, it's far too hot to be canoodling up to me at the moment anyway (stuffy, drippy sinuses or no).

So, my aversion to the heat has already been documented here but that won't stop me having another whinge about it as we start Autumn (which is really just more Summer, seasons?...HA!). We have just had our hottest summer on record - YAY - (average temp 32C) and there's not much relief in sight. We have had 26 consecutive days with an average of 34C, although, what the statistics don't tell you is the heat starts really early (our night-time average is over 20C) and then stays all day. There's no building slowly to the peak in the middle of the day and then cooling off as the sea breeze comes in. It's far too uncomfortable to be outside between 7am and 7pm, except of course you have to go out so there are a lot of grumpy, exhausted and slippery with sweat people out there.

It's deflating and that's just how I feel: like a wrinkly, sad balloon with only a few puffs of air left in it.

After months (not an exaggeration) of scraping and plastering and painting we have finally got some colour on the walls of the dining room and while the "end" is in sight, it seems at times like one of those never ending hallway scenarios...you know, where you run and run and the end keeps telescoping away from you.

In other never-ending hallway type news, I have 360 more squares to do on the blanket for our bed.

Yeah, probably not an issue as it won't be required for some long, long, very long time yet!

Picky

2011-02-14T09:51:00.009+08:00

Do you know the adorable Charlie and Lola story where Lola refuses too eat a tomato? In fact she doesn't like lots of things, she is a "very picky eater". In the story Charlie convinces Lola to try new things by making it into a game, peas become "green drops from Greenland".

Very sweet and bares absolutely no resemblance to anything that could happen in real life.

I often think that Linus and Astrid could be the inspiration for Charlie and Lola. Linus is conciliatory and patient and Astrid is stubborn and prone to extreme flights of fancy; she would happily live in "uʍop ǝpısdn" and Linus would be right there with her encouraging her and building a complicated machine to stop the blood rushing to their heads.

Astrid is a "very picky eater" and it drives me BONKERS at times. The idea that you could trick her into eating something by saying it is, "cloud fluff from the top of Mount Fuji" is beyond ludicrous.

Things are either "too crunchy" or "too squashy", "too greeny" or "too how can I possibly be expected to eat THAT-y!".

And how you mount a persuasive argument against someone who contends that something is "too medium-y" is beyond me!

Comedy Food

2011-02-09T11:12:00.002+08:00

Oh look, Spaghetti Bolognaise, a staple weekly dish for many. Wait, but you're vegetarians, how can this be?.

After my experiment at Christmas making vege Swedish "meat"balls, I made this recently with Quorn mince. We laughed and laughed with every bite, it was so preposterous. Looks and tastes so much like meat it's quite unnerving (or maybe it doesn't, it has been 18 years since I've eaten it).

As funny as it was though, I don't think I'll be doing it again. For me, vegetarian food isn't something inferior that secretly aspires to be animal meat and it felt weirdly wrong to be eating it.

Warm Fuzzies Rule

2011-02-05T17:57:00.005+08:00

We have a friend who gets hate mail. I find this all kinds of cool, though of course it's not so pleasant for her. She's a token left-wing journalist writing an opinion column for a right-wing newspaper (you know, just to show the Murdoch press isn't biased). Unfortunately for her the readership of said newspaper has also fairly right-wing leanings, so just about anything that she writes spurns a tirade. Write a balanced article about our first female prime minister...KAPOW tirade, her personal struggles with breast feeding...BLAM tirade, the alarming sexualisation of small children by the media...KABLOOIE tirade.

She recently wrote a thoughtful article about forms of communication and their effects after getting a nasty note from a neighbour in her letter box. She merely suggested that had the neighbour first spoken with them personally about her grievances that the whole matter could have been dealt with rationally and civilly. Once pen was put to paper emotions were allowed to stew on both sides, notes were fired off in retaliation, the situation was blown out of all proportion and made all concerned feel really awful. This article unleashed the bile of many readers who saw fit to send venomous missives about how "stupid" she was. Of course you would write a mean note rather than have a friendly chat with your neighbour (yeah, I didn't say it was "quality" hate mail). Ironic really.

This got me thinking about "Warm Fuzzies" and "Cold Pricklies". We did these at a school camp to boost self esteem and encourage people to make new friends. A Warm Fuzzy is a nice little note about how you like someone's hair or some such, while a Cold Prickly is. . .you can work it out. Getting or sending a Warm Fuzzy makes you feel really, really good, while getting or sending a Cold Prickly makes you feel rather wretched.

We recently received a lovely Warm Fuzzy from our own neighbour who was moving out and wrote a little goodbye note thanking us for being good neighbours and praising our parenting! Yes, we were shocked too. Our children are the world's loudest children (a hypothesis that we have tested by going over seas and making scientific comparisons). We spend a lot of time shushing them. Obviously a glass-is-half-full-silver-lining type of woman, she said that she loved the sounds of our children "laughing and screaming" in the backyard and congratulated us for being exemplary parents and teaching our children to play.

This Warm Fuzzy made us feel wonderful, full of goodwill and pride in our children and ourselves. I crocheted a housewarming potholder for her new home and wrote an equally Fuzzy note back (so that she too could feel all warm and fluffy). Spreading the LOVE.

Then Astrid came home from her second day back at school with this Warm Fuzzy from her teacher.

"Resting nicely" (if you know Astrid you will find this as hilarious as we do). I'm so proud and Warm and Fuzzy. I'll be sending a potholder post-haste.

And I think I'll send our friend a Warm Fuzzy and tell her I like her hair.

Cleansing

2011-01-31T13:09:00.000+08:00

It rained!

We ran around in it like demented things.

You'd think it was a rare occurrence or something.

Happy Invasion Day

2011-01-26T09:42:00.003+08:00

It's Australia Day today.

Let me tell you about it.

Australia Day is when people have barbecues, eat baby sheep (because apparently it's "un-Australian" not to), flock to the beach and temporary tattoos are given out in the local papers to be pasted on children's cheeks.

Australia Day is a manufactured day that marks the day that white people came here and dispossessed, oppressed and murdered in large numbers the Indigenous peoples that had lived here for 40,000 years.

Seems a twisted day to "celebrate" does it not? This is why we choose not to celebrate.

Any time we have an occasion that encourages national pride a really rather ugly side of Australia comes out. It happens on ANZAC Day, during any international sporting event and Australia Day. Xenophobic Australians drape themselves and their cars in flags and drink lots of beer and generally act like meat-heads. (Aussie, Aussie, Aussie Oi Oi Oi). This is apparently patriotism.

Why is this?

I think that one of the problems is that nationalism has been usurped by people who wear T-Shirts with slogans like, "Speak English or Piss Off" and the rest of us shrink from patriotism.

We feel the cultural cringe when a cartoonish version of ourselves is flaunted to the world. The brainless "G'Day Mate" blokes who sound like Crocodile Dundee or Steve Irwin. We are confused that sporting heroes are given more cultural recognition and status than pioneering Australian scientists, thinkers and humanitarians. We are perplexed as to why we still have a flag with the flag of another country in it's corner and why we don't have a constitution that recognises Aboriginal people and protects all of our civil rights. We feel the inappropriateness of fostering a singular national pride in a country of immigrants and in a world where national distinctions are broken down by multi-cultural cyberspace communities based on commonality not division.

And most of all we feel enormous sorrow and shame of our past and continued treatment of Indigenous Australians, immigrants and asylum seekers.

There are times I have felt swelled with pride at being an Australian, it's when we've been brave. When we finally had the cathartic "Sorry Day" to apologise to Aboriginal people for past wrongs. When we brought in tough legislation to control gun ownership. When we elected a woman who chooses to be single, atheist and childless as our prime minister.

If we one day: became a Republic, changed our flag and paid scientists more than footballers, I would happily celebrate that positive day.

The Boy's Deep

2011-01-21T11:26:00.004+08:00

Everyone knows that seven year old boys are philosophical geniuses.

I've spent a frustrating few days cleaning out our spare (junk) room that is going to become our Incredibly Organised and Tidy Library/Study. I've been pulling things out of the cupboards that are going to be demolished, sorting paper, throwing out things (ancient power bills and bank statements, random bits and bobs that belonged to some-thing-or-other that has long ago been lost or broken etc) and generally feeling like I'm getting nowhere fast and making more horrible mess!

This morning I decided that we should have a big clean up of the whole house as school holidays, renovating and the "sorting" was making every room a tip and the whole thing was bringing me down.

"Where are we going to start?" I asked rhetorically looking around in dismay at the imposing MESS.

"Well, mamma, when I play a game on the computer I always start with the easiest levels and work up to the hard levels as I get better. I think we should start with the least messy room first" said Linus.

Hmm, I really would have done it the other way around but he's right. We now have three really beautifully tidy rooms and plenty of time to make inroads into the fourth and maybe fifth rooms . . .and if we don't finish them all, who cares! We have places to feel good and relaxed in.

There's a deep life lesson for you;

Start with the easy stuff and work up to the hard stuff when your skills are better honed.

Then you can beat the mega tough big boss at the end of the level!

Just a couple of bags of flour, that's all!

2011-01-20T11:47:00.002+08:00

Five kilograms of flour weighs quite a lot (well, it weighs 5 kilos but you know what I mean). Especially as you carry it home walking from the shops on a hot summer day.

I want to lose two of these bags in weight! This is weight that I've put on since having Astrid (five years ago!)...It's fat that obviously likes being on me but the feeling is not reciprocated. I lose some it and then it sneaks back on.

But now I'm serious! And I'm posting it to the world so that you will keep me strong and honest. I don't want to see myself in photos any more and think, "who is that fat woman with my family that sort of looks like me but fatter?".

If I imagine how light and springy my steps will be when I don't have to lug around two of these enormous bags of flour with me every day it may give me the strength to stop eating this:

But there's no reason that you shouldn't enjoy it;

Rye and Caraway Bread

4 1/2 tsp. active dry yeast (2 packages)
300mls warm water
125ml plus 1 Tbsp. brown sugar
250ml milk
40g melted butter (cooled to lukewarm)
125ml molasses
1 tsp. salt
500ml rye flour
1 litre plain flour
2 tbls caraway seeds

Stir together yeast, warm water, and 1 Tbsp. of brown sugar in mixing bowl. Let sit until mixture is frothy, about 10 minutes.
Using a wooden spoon stir milk and melted butter into yeast mixture. Gradually add molasses, the remaining brown sugar, and 1 tsp. salt. Stir in caraway seeds, rye flour; add enough of the plain flour to make a soft but firm dough that pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
Knead dough lightly until surface is smooth; place in a lightly oiled bowl and allow to rise until doubled (about 1 hour).
Punch down the risen dough; allow to rest for 15 minutes. Then form dough into loaves and put in two loaf tins. Sprinkle tops loaves with some more caraway seeds and allow to rise until doubled, about 40 minutes.
Preheat oven to 375º. Bake about 30 minutes.

Then let your family eat it! Resist the temptation to put butter and cheese on the freshly baked, delicious smelling bread...think of the bags of flour, think of the bags of flour, think...of...the ...

The "Accident"

2011-01-19T11:15:00.011+08:00

Perception is a funny thing isn't it?

Last night we had what could be described as an "incident" or as Astrid would later call it an "accident".

Just as Linus and Astrid were going to bed we discovered that Linus's favourite toy (a snow leopard, called LinKitty) had been left outside after their earlier adventures. So I went out to fetch him and then tossed him to Linus's welcoming arms in his bed. I then went to settle Astrid down.

Suddenly Linus sprang 2 metres in the air and out of his bed. He stood in the middle of the room pointing a shaking finger at his bed, "S...S...Slug!" he whimpered.

Astrid sat bolt upright.

"What did he say?"

I knew where this was heading and time was of the essence, "Oh, nothing, never mind" said I promptly ushering the trembling Linus out of the room before he could divulge any more details. "Go talk to your dad in the lounge".

"He said, S...S...Slug, didn't he?"

Then the screaming started.

We're talking blood curdling, incessant, horror flick style screaming here. There were pauses just long enough for her to draw breath and then it would continue with renewed gusto. I bundled her up and whisked her away from the bedroom of "horror" to the Historian who was sitting with Linus trying to get him to explain through his stuttering what was happening.

Her hysterics started Linus screaming too, he had after all been the "injured" party. It had been on his ARM, he needed his ARM washed and disinfected immediately, it might have "laid spores!" ?

Louder and louder the screaming got as both children tried to climb on top of the Historian's head as though it was the only slug-free island in a slug-infested sea. Surely the neighbours would be calling the police by now but while we were trying to make calming noises it was hard to do so while laughing as hard as we were.

The offending creature was about 2cm long and trying to extremely slowly escape the scene, it seemed to look grateful as I released it back into the "wild".

Astrid had never even actually seen it.

That's thing thing about perception, it's all how you look at it. Astrid loves little critters. She adores pill bugs and slaters for example, making little homes for them and taking them on picnics. To her they look like this:

But somehow she can't bring herself to see slugs like this:

Weeping a Flood of Tears

2011-01-14T14:49:00.000+08:00

You've no doubt read about the floods.

In Queensland 15 people are currently confirmed dead with 50 missing and presumed dead; suddenly and without warning, swept away in their cars and houses. Brazil's death toll is 500 and climbing rapidly. Numbers of dead in South Africa, Philippines and Sri Lanka are taking longer to estimate but there is little doubt that there will be scores of tragic losses.

Thousands and thousands of animals have perished; wild, livestock and pets. Thousands and thousands of people in all these countries have lost homes, belongings and livelihoods. More deaths will result from the aftermath as water-borne illness, food and clean water shortages, looting, economic devastation and incredible psychological trauma all take their toll.

With this indescribably horrific tragedy occurring simultaneously over such a huge and varied swathe of the globe and touching people of so many different cultures, religions and economic circumstances can we please now stop the F***ING around and get serious about banding together as a WORLD to do something about Climate Change?

Disasters that were once coined, "once in a hundred years" have now the potential to occur any old day of the week. 2010 was the hottest and wettest year on record. Flooding rain in Sri Lanka means no rain in Western Australia and the conditions ripening for out-of-control bush-fires here.

Is this what we have to get used to? Is this what we want for our children's children to have to contend with every day of their lives, an alien apocalyptic version of Earth?

It will be hard for some to change the way of life they are accustomed to but is the idea of your loved ones burning alive in bush-fires or drowning in flash floods not enough to make you get off your arse and do something?

Obsession

2011-01-09T09:03:00.004+08:00

There are people who love cars. You know, the ones who go to car shows and museums (Hi dad) and talk on and on about transmissions and donks?! I'm not usually one of them. Although I have had small love affairs with a few.

My first car was a white Morris 1000 called Horace.

My friend (Dette) had a dark green one called Doris and another friend (Sez) had a Morris 1100 called Boris. So it was Horace, Doris and Boris Morris and their madcap adventures.

Horace was a really uncomplicated old bloke. He had a button you pressed to turn him on and when his fuel line blocked (which was really rather too often) it was really easy to take it apart and blow though it by the side of the freeway and then be on your merry way again nightclubbing. He rattled and squeaked and threatened to shake apart if you went over 80km/hr and I was a little obsessed with him.We had to sell him when it seemed his floor was going to rust away and I was in danger of having to stop him Fred Flintstone style. I was sad.

As endearing as Horace was I don't think I want to be performing emergency maintenance by the side of the road or carrying a brick to chock behind his tire when stopped on a slight incline any longer and so the idea of an old car again is sort of out for me.

But then Dette sent me this link a little while ago and now I'm obsessed again! These beauties aren't old, they're built in 2006 or more recently. Who knew that Brazil never stopped making Kombis (apart from you dad, of course). AND this lovely hire place sells them too (including left hand drive and water cooled ones)...I want one so badly. The Historian is fanning the flames too with all sorts of schemes and plans to get one of our own. Yes, I know they're in London....so there are some obstacles, love is never easy.

I think these curvy characters with sweet old names (Elsie, Flo and Cilla) are in my genes (thanks dad)...In the meantime I'll have to be content with crocheting a granny blanket for her...I may call her Tallulah.

Think I'm joking don't you?

Nemesis Neighbour

2011-01-06T12:40:00.003+08:00

Shortly after we moved in here a fellow, lets call him Alfonse, introduced himself to us pausing briefly on one of his, what we were to discover regular, evening power-walks past our house. He lives three doors up the road and used to own our house as a rental property for many, many, many years.

As our renovating involves piling lots of stuff for removal on our front verge, he gets a daily snapshot of what we are doing inside and out.

He stopped to comment with thinly veiled horror when we removed the horrible dirty cream carpet to have the beautiful wide jarrah floorboards polished;

"That carpet is only a couple of years old!" he exclaimed.

When we removed the falling down wonky picket fence out the front to replace it with a low limestone wall and lavender hedge;

"I built that fence myself" he sobbed.

When we pulled out the hideous kitchen to replace it with one that wasn't inhabited by crawling things.

He walked straight by just slightly shaking his head.

So, safe to say, that Alfonse is responsible for most of the things we are now undoing in our renovations.

He buried the 50 or so enormous concrete slabs all over the back yard that the Historian had to remove in back-breaking toil.

He put in the "death trap" (quote by our plumber) gas heater in the lounge room and various dodgy electrical s**t-f**kery all over the place.

And he slapped cheap yellowy cream (we call it "Tenant Yellow") paint over everything without any form of preparation (including over dust and dirt!) so that it now has to be completely scraped off by hand and the walls primed before repainting! The lounge room took us an incredibly long time to prepare and now we are struggling with the dining room.

It's not many people that have the daily opportunity to kick their nemesis in the shins as he walks past.

Fortunately for Alfonse the Historian is restraining me.

2011-01-01T10:46:00.002+08:00

There was a time that doesn't seem too long ago when the idea of being at home on a Friday night was completely unthinkable. The idea of being at home on New Year's Eve was akin to The End of the WORLD.

Now I can't imagine a better way to celebrate the end of the old year and the welcoming of the new.

We've got all the predictable resolutions for 2011, including; "must lose weight". So to go out with an enormous BANG, we gorged ourselves on the BEST Rocky Road ever!

For those Australians looking for a replacement for Dumlekola, I can tell you that Pascall's Choc Caramels are a great substitute. I would absolutely make this again for the easiest of dinner party desserts . . . after we lose the aforementioned kilos, of course.

Happy New Year and fabulous 2011 to everyone from us!

2010-12-27T13:13:00.011+08:00

Well hello. Hope your Christmas day and aftermath was lovely.

I la la LOVE Christmas!

I love the once-a-year only traditions and starting new ones.

Every year about 10 days before Christmas day, mum and I make Pepparkakor. It takes a whole day of rolling and cutting and chatting. We make many tins worth and then I guard mine like a mother wolf from the ravenous hordes to make sure we still have a few left by Christmas day. We have had helpers over the years with varying degrees of enthusiasm for the task (as opposed to enthusiasm for the eating of the dough or finished product). Astrid is certainly looking like the heir apparent, as at five years old she is already demonstrating good staying power, rolling pin and gossiping skills.

We always have a real tree as the smell is so important to the sense of the season for me. Every year there are more funny little child-made adornments to add. It's like a nice smelling, twinkly, shiny time capsule of creativity.

And this year Linus, Astrid and I painted on our dining room window. That's a new tradition for this new house that we'll definitely continue.

I love the food and drinks. The Jansson, the Glögg, the Sill and Snaps and songs that go with them. My job has been to make the rye bread for Julafton but I have also recently added into the mix a ginger and nectarine tart . The ginger flavour teamed with the in-season nectarines make this a brilliant fusion of Swedish and Australian Christmases. Not that we really have room for dessert! And we may have finally hit on a winner for vegetarian köttbullar
using Quorn.

I also made Saffransbullar or Lussekatter for the first time this year for home (mum makes them every year and they are our traditional breakfast on Christmas morning with black coffee and orange juice - with or without a hangover from the snaps of the night before - while we wait for Father Christmas to make an appearance).

Speaking of whom. I also love my dad immensely for dressing up as probably the dodgiest looking Father Christmas in the world under extreme conditions (Australian summer). I love my children for suspending disbelief and wholeheartedly believing that he makes a special appearance just for them. We suspect that there might be small cracks appearing in the illusion for Linus (he said quietly to us later that, "I didn't want to say anything at the time but he looked a bit like he had a pillow shoved up his top".)

Here are some photos to show you just how much disbelief has to be suspended here. I'm crying with laughter at these....

Pillow? What Pillow?

Look at his wonderful little face. Complete belief. If we can sort out the wardrobe problems we may be able to keep this going a bit longer!

Christmas day was a lovely relaxing time with nowhere to be but at home...building an Eiffel Tower and trying to solve the Rubik's Cube...bliss. We had a lovely, simple meal on our deck and a visit from the friendliest of Singing Honeyeaters ...

That's me feeding her a raisin. She actually got on my arm and let me stroke her with my finger while she closed her eyes contentedly.We also whizzed up some grapes that she drank from a medicine cup. We can only assume she was hand-reared by humans? She's either the bravest/smartest or dumbest wild bird in the garden! We're calling her Fizz and are prepared to give her whatever she wants to eat (lovingly regurgitated...by our kitchen appliances) so, I'd say she's probably the smartest bird.

"Santa" doesn't come to our house. Father Christmas is very welcome though!

2010-12-23T10:24:00.007+08:00

Here's a little rant. Apologies in advance.

With every passing year as I get older and more crotchety, my blood boils a little as our traditions are eroded and transplanted by those of the US.

You must be told that I'm not in any way anti-US, far from it. It is just that our culture is constantly bombarded by the pop culture of the US, through film, TV, internet and we lose a bit of our own in the process.

Astrid goes around saying, "that's how I roll", which, I must admit is so cute coming out of her 5 year old mouth that I let it be. There are however, no "Cookies" or "Trashcans" here (Sesame Street is highly censored for appropriate language) and we like our "U"s in our words too (colour, flavour, RANCOUR! Go away little red squiggly line!). We already have opportunistic teenagers "trick or treating" for Halloween (they get no "candy" here, just a lecture) and if marketers could figure out a way to do it, we'd be celebrating Thanksgiving and the 4th of July!

One of my pet hates at this time of year is the exponentially increasing use of "SANTA"...I'm sorry, but the jolly fat man has always previously been FATHER CHRISTMAS. We are (apologies to Traditional Owners) an English colony with "Australian" Christmas traditions following those of Mother England, even when these traditions are patently inappropriate like full roast Christmas lunches on 40C days.

We are also a multicultural society where all important traditions are welcomed and encouraged. We happily celebrate an amalgam of Swedish and Australian Christmas traditions ourselves. If you want to call him Jultomten, Babbo Natale, St Nicholas or Fatso that's just fine but our dominant culture traditionally calls him Father Christmas. The country's media and retail outlets should do the same!

The expat US population is absolutely free to call him Santa Claus, all 0.3% of them according to the 2006 census.

End of rant.

P.S. I do love you all, even if you do call him Santa, really..

EEEEEEEK a SNAKE!!!

2010-12-20T10:08:00.003+08:00

Phew, really busy time of year, huh?

Well, the Historian's family all came for early Christmas lunch on the weekend and things have been mega-hectic leading up to that! The good news is that our outdoor deck has been well and truly stress tested with 24 adults sitting on it and not a creak!

While the lunch was in full swing I got the news that my brother had been bitten by a Dugite!

He's just fine, thank goodness, and we're all extremely glad. He spent the night in hospital under constant observation but it appears that he was extraordinarily lucky and didn't get enough venom in him to have any ill effects. In fact, I suspect the 30 minute observations and lying on a skinny, hard emergency bed all night had a worse affect on him, poor thing.

There is however a sort of amusing side to this (now that it's all OK of course).

Australia has a bit of a reputation internationally as a dangerous place where deadly creatures abound. It's true that there are deadly spiders, highly venomous snakes and jellyfish, crocodiles and sharks but in reality the risk of encountering these things is extremely rare, unless you're a drunk trying to ride a crocodile (idiot!).

We have recently had my cousin and his friend living with my parents (Hej Jonas and Tomas) and they were very concerned about this reputation. We allayed their fears with the fact that we know no-one that has been bitten by any of these creatures. In fact, even the people we know and the people they know and the people they know (and so on), know no-one that has had a run in with dangerous Australian wildlife.

Now this happens to someone so close to us . . . while they have now returned to Sweden, they can now say with conviction that they were living in the constant real threat of DEATH from creepy crawly while here!

I'll post our Christmas decorations and such in a little while. In the meantime check out this Moomin gingerbread house! I am DEFINITELY making this for next Christmas.

Must Have Home Improvements?

2010-11-30T20:55:00.002+08:00

Astrid's wonderful cross-stitched Advent Calendar made by Mum

As I settle in for an evening of individually wrapping 48 little bits of chocolate to string on Linus and Astrid's (Incredibly Awesome Mormor Made) Advent Calendars ready for tomorrow, I am reminded of wrapping stations.

What's a wrapping station I hear you ask? Well, I certainly didn't know there was such a thing until a few months ago and my mind I must admit BOGGLED a little.

Researching colours for the dining room I stumbled upon Riviera View where I was introduced to a pair who's home (apparently); "friends and neighbors all agree ... is hands down one of the most stylish in the Hollywood Riviera" (I assume this information was volunteered by the power couple themselves, um, hubris anyone?). Anyway, the home includes as we are exuberantly told, "a gift wrapping zone - on everyone's fantasy design to-do list - which Melissa actually accomplished! "

This got me pondering.

You know, I've never fantasized about this and I'm fairly certain that I NEVER will. So who are these "everyone" who do fantasize about a place to wrap stuff?

Apparently quite a few people do including Martha Stewart.

I know very little about Martha (save her white collar prison escapades). But Martha doesn't just have a wrapping station! No, her must have design items include; a pet grooming salon, a dining room and kitchen in her state-of-the-art climate controlled stables (and not for the horsies either. I certainly hope the ventilation is state-of-the-art), a barn (I think just to hang quilts in and make culturally uncomfortable puns "Barn-Mitzva"?!), 100 year old Canadian fencing to, I presume, make her Canadian horses feels at home and 45,000 Daffodil bulbs!

Hmmmm, would I fantasize about any of that? Erm, no.

Although I will admit to having a little daydream about a few of the daffodils.

Keep it between you and your doctor!

2010-11-17T14:05:00.016+08:00

We are of course all for reducing our packaging and recycling.

Reusing things for whatever creative whim might strike is encouraged and the volume of "art" produced by our children is staggering. Cereal boxes, yoghurt containers and bottle tops are whisked away to make spaceships, "dog jails", famous landmarks, and modern sculptures that defy labelling. That's just fine with me as I can do regular sweeps of the house to help these things make it the rest of the way into the BULGING recycling bin before bin day.

Fortunately for us we have a huge Wheelie Bin for recyclables that is collected fortnightly. Unfortunately though despite our best efforts to reduce the amount of packaging we buy this bin is nearly always filled to capacity. OK, so there might be a couple of wine bottles in there but even so where does it all come from?

Well, the school insists on sending home mountains of their own and donated (from other people's bulging bins no doubt) recycling made into treasures like life-size models of box children (thanks for that, it took about 2 months of crammed bins to get rid of) and robot dogs like this one. The troubling thing about Fido here is that his head is made out of a tablet box for a medicine that Google tells me is for Gout (well, you know I had to Google it, it could have been for Syphilis or an Anti-psychotic or for Flesh Eating Disease. All things I'd rather my children's teachers didn't have).

Who donates their prescription medicine boxes to a school? Couldn't you have slipped this into your own bin and given them a toothpaste box instead? This is now too much information and a bit of a burden for me (and not just because I have to try and squeeze it into my recycling bin). Now I'll be secretly watching the staff and parents for signs of limping or grimacing to work out who's recycling this is.

And what if a "bin diving" tabloid reporter goes through my recycling, sees the box and the couple of wine bottles and writes an article about me having Gout?

I guess it could have been worse. I could have Syphilitic Psychosis and a nose hanging by a thread.

The Frogs of Anarchy

2010-11-11T11:14:00.001+08:00

We have a Motorbike Frog living in our pond we call him Opie. He’s been there for a couple of months now calling every evening, “Bwrrrrrrrrrrrrr-rudtp rudup” (which means, “Ladies . . . got a really nice pond here . . . ladies! There’s lots of lovely plants to hide in and bugs to eat . . . LADIES!!!”).

After months of his effort, who should show up? Not one but two more male frogs! Seems that they are starting a motorcycle chapter (the Frogs of Anarchy). So now we have an incredibly loud chorus of motorcycle revving going on each evening. Surely the lady frogs can hear them now from kilometres away.

Of course what they’re not saying is, “Bwedipt” (there’s also 6 Koi fish that will gobble up any of the eggs that the three of us don’t eat first).

Melbourne is for Cool Kids

2010-11-02T11:29:00.003+08:00

Ducked off to Melbourne for the weekend (sans children!).
Walked our little feet off.
Hung out in Fitzroy mostly and tried not to look too old and boring (this is hard to do around Brunswick Street).
Went to some great restaurants, bars, art galleries, parks and visited with friends.
I bought some silk and stainless steel yarn just because I could, really no idea what I'm going to use it for though.
I was "pan-handled" by a well dressed dwarf in Carlton. He had apparently, "lost his wallet". The situation was so absurd that I gave him $2.
We had Brazilian coffee in a Cuban cafe served by a dark smouldering-eyed young man who had the Che Guevara look down pat. Funny thing is that the Historian looks somewhat like Castro at the moment with his greying beard and black cap. Another absurd situation...Comrade.
Then it rained.
Lots.
We still walked our little feet off but in very wet sloppy shoes. Rain wicked up our jeans and our legs got heavier and heavier, and colder. Lucky for tiny warm dry bars...everywhere.
Thanks Melbourne it was really fun!

HEAT

2010-10-27T10:06:00.008+08:00

Things are starting to heat up here and the mild sense of panic that comes over me each summer is creeping in. I know, all of you staring at long dark winters ahead of you will be rolling your eyes,"What's she complaining about?"

I really struggle with summer and the older I get the more wussy I get. I don't want to make light of depression (because that's serious) but I think I have a slight touch of S.A.D (Seasonal Affective Disorder). More rolling of eyes. Yes, I know that's usually associated with those long dark winters (not to set off your S.A.D by reminding you again). . . mine comes from too much light . . . and HEAT.

So to stave off the dread of the approaching furnace that is the Australian summer, I thought I'd list the pros and cons as I see them (hopefully the Pros will come out in front?!?):

NEGATIVES

It's HOT, sticky, sweaty, uncomfortable...you don't want children, Historians or even clothing touching you. This is particularly horrid when small children insist on climbing all over you wailing, "it's HOT mama".
I have to wax my legs . . . more frequently. OK, I'll admit that during winter my legs can get a little Hobbity and I like it. No mess, no pain, no hassles.
Sleep is HARD. I remember years of summers when the only way to get through the night was to wet your top sheet in a cold shower and drape it over you Coolgardie Safe style. I've gotten soft. Aircon. is a priority for our new house. Last summer without it brought me to a very dark place!
Flies! Little skinny ones that like to get up into your nostrils and big fat slow ones that square dance contemptuously around your room. Oh, and Mozzies (Mosquitoes)! Lying in bed willing sleep to come and hearing that high pitched whine as the horrible sucker that avoided the Mortein Napalm cloud you sprayed before bed circles it's prey and secretly hoping it chooses the Historian's exposed flesh over yours.
Your candles, ice-creams, make-up(if you wear it) melts. Disgusting puddles of once solid stuff are everywhere.

POSITIVES

I get to wear a Kaftan at home without any hint of embarrassment. It's the only thing that touches me nowhere but the tips of my shoulders.
Washing is dry by the time you finish hanging it out. Very efficient.
Goths. Watching Goths in Summer is hilarious! I admire them for their steadfast commitment to their style but 40+C days are really tough on them. There's pools of white pancake makeup and black eyeliner everywhere. There's one particular local lad with licorice thin legs who gets around in his sprayed on black denim, long sleeved black shirt, black boufant hair and a frilly black parasol. I saw him "run"(mincingly) across the street last summer. That vision still gives me the giggles.
Everyone gets more sociable. There are tons of barbecues to be hosted and attended. So that's nice.

Hmmm, the "Nays" seem to have it. I'll have to dig deeper for the positives before it heats up, or escape to cooler climes (more on that soon).

Fennel

2010-10-18T09:56:00.006+08:00

Apparently I'm attracted to Fennel. Every time I'm perusing the spice aisle at the supermarket, I have to stop myself from getting more Fennel. This is how my internal dialogue goes, "No, you don't need Fennel, I'm sure you've got some already. What do you even use it for anyway? You probably need Turmeric. Turmeric is something you always use. Get the Turmeric . . . but what if I don't have Fennel? Fennel is exotic, I'll probably need some Fennel. Imagine how annoyed I'll be when I discover I have 5 jars of Turmeric and no Fennel."

I think it's the sound of it. Fennel. It's such a pretty word, like fairies flitting through a shady glen (far prettier than Turmeric which sounds like something you need to have removed from your big toe).

So I end up with lots of Fennel (and yes, no Turmeric in sight).

My latest impulse buy was Fennel Tea. How can you make Fennel sound more attractive to me? Put the word Tea after it and have it made by someone called Heath & Heather. It's undoubtedly what the fairies drink. I believe they use it to flavour Absinthe too and fairies are definitely associated with Absinthe.

Fennel Tea is however . . . horrible! Actually, Absinthe is fairly horrible too. That should have tipped me off. The packet tells me amongst other things that it's great for appetite suppression. Well they're not kidding. After a few sips of this you're turned off food for some time. Must be why fairies are so small and thin, huh?

In other news, we have some nesting Kookaburras in the trees behind us. Here they are canoodling on the neighbour's broken basketball hoop.

And coming down for a closer look at me. The vege-patch Chitty Chitty was NOT at all pleased.

The Poo Man Cometh

2010-10-15T13:49:00.000+08:00

50 litres of sheep poo delivered to our door! LOVELY!

We live on sand in this part of Australia. A whole city built on sand dunes. Whenever we get rain it goes straight down, schlurrrrp. And being basically dirty beach sand there's nothing at all good in it for your plants and vegetables. So the Poo Man is a bit of a super hero here: "Send up the Poo signal, we need POO MAN" . . .

Dealing with sheep and cow manure for a living gives you an odd sense of humor I suspect (one that a five year old would appreciate). It seemed that every discussion I had with the Poo Man was fraught with double entendre and toilet jokes;

"Hello, I'd like to order some sheep manure please."
"Great, I can't deliver till next Thursday though as we're...ahem, fresh out of it at the moment (snicker)."
"Out of it? You have to wait for some more to be forthcoming then (snicker)?"
"That's right. We need to increase production, we've had a bit of a run on it (snicker)."

"Hello. Just letting you know that we are running a little behind (snortle). We usually have a regular drop off in your area on Thursday. Is Friday too late for you?"
"That's fine we had no urgent plans for it"

Anyway, thanks Poo Man. Thanks sheep's bottoms. Our garden loves you!

Feline Decrepitude

2010-10-10T18:50:00.004+08:00

We seem to have evolved into a home for geriatric cats as our three slide into dotage around us. Cats are eccentrics, that's their thing. Ours are no exception and as they age their oddness is only becoming more pronounced and amusing.

When we first moved into our house the local birds went into a frenzy of panic. They needn't have bothered. These three are no threat whatsoever! The doves now eat directly out of the cat crunchy bowl while all three are within pouncing distance. I'm not sure if that's an indictment of the doves or the cats, but there you have it.

NORI

16 years old and with superb comic timing, turned up to her photo shoot sporting a cobweb fascinator, very Miss Havisham.

She was brought to us by her own teenage mother when she was a tiny dot of a kitten. We had been duped into taking another older (about 6) cat a few months before by a tearful girl at the local video shop who, wasn't "allowed to keep him in (her) rental house" (in hindsight, they may have actually been crocodile tears). The cat, Mr Flibble, was a truly horrible piece of work and had some deep seated psychological issues that meant he was not always toilet trained and lived mostly under Matt's bed (on one of his rare sojourns out from under the bed he got hit by a car . . . we cried, not for joy however as we actually loved the stupid, insane cat).

As we had him at the time, we also had cat food and Nori's mum, unable to provide for what was probably her only surviving infant carried her to our house. We got both Nori and her mum (Clawdia) "fixed" and then Clawdia eventually ran away from home. We know nothing terrible happened to her (she was very street smart), she just got fed up with Nori not weaning after about 12 months! and packed her little spotted handkerchief and went to another home.

Nori has personal daemons (I'm sure Cat-Freud would have plenty to say about her weaning issues). Despite living the most comfortable and relaxed existence known to catkind, her neuroses mean that she thinks the world is out to get her. And with an amazing gift for self-fulfilling prophesizing, she places herself in the road of every loud power tool, wheelbarrow or running child around here. We expect her to become the longest lived cat ever and enter Guinness Book of Record fame as she is so extraordinarily careful of herself and although always in the self perceived path of impending DOOM, is always able to dodge disaster!

Actually, she really doesn't know her own bravery. She "tamed" our old dog while she was still a little punctuation mark of a cat. Kato had an insane hatred for cats and had once attacked a stone cat statue. Nori swiped her once across the nose and they were lifelong friends.

GUSTAV

14 years old. Lovely, affable, roly poly Gustav, came to us as a little impoverished waif about two months old who had been living off bugs and dew and stuff. He was scrawny and his little ears were dessicated, he really was a pitiful sight. We lured him in with tasty morsels and he has vowed never to go back to a life on the mean streets. He is ENORMOUS and spends most of his day hanging out in our kitchen expectantly waiting for more of those morsels (which, obviously he gets).

He has an $800 pin in his leg (from 12 years ago when $800 was like . . . 10 thousand dollars) from an altercation with a car. He never, ever crosses the road since the incident (too far from the kitchen). He likes to sit with his pin leg straight out which makes him look like a big fat Greek fisherman mending his nets.

SCAT

12 years old. Scat was the only cat we actually got from a pet shop. While he's been "fixed" we suspect that they didn't "get it all" as he's still a bit (well a lot) of a Tom Cat. He's a bruiser with bits missing from his ears and nose from fisticuffs with neighbourhood cats. Fortunately he mostly leaves his own clan alone (although Nori is constantly on guard)

He's a beautiful looking cat but also one that you don't feel 100% safe turning your back on.

He has to be shut out of the kids room at night as he's been known to actually push a sleeping child right out of bed!

Strange, wonderful, entertaining members of our family they are. We love them so much, and so does the local bird population.

2010-10-06T20:09:00.008+08:00

Dear Astrid,

I promise that next year I will try harder to make you a nice cake. Linus suggested that this was possibly the ugliest cake in the whole world but that he was sure it would "taste great". Just for your amusement, this is what is was supposed to look like (scroll down a little to the incredible cake).

Of course there's a story behind its ugliness; involving long car travel, family reunions in a wheat-belt town, Historian's mum staying at our house, a family dinner amongst the renovating rubble and worries about having enough food, chairs, cutlery and lighting, falling in a slow motion and spectacular manner and spilling a whole hot bowl of Tofu Massaman Curry (thanks mum I'm sure it would have tasted wonderful) all over various guests (guess there wasn't enough lighting), half-made decks having to be made "safe" and finally pouring melted chocolate into a mould and swirling for hours (well maybe 10 minutes but swirling till chocolate sets makes watching paint dry exciting) and cursing as the stuff wouldn't leave the same mould when asked (and repeating the last 3 steps 3 times)....in the end it didn't matter and I had a bit on an epiphany.

You go to all the trouble to make a knock out cake but for whom? The parents all do "drop and run" for a couple of hours of kid-free bliss (or one-kid-less-bliss), the 5 year olds don't give a toss as long as there's the required lollies, chocolate and icing...in fact you could forget the actual cake and just have those piled on a plate and they'd be as pleased as punch (pretty much what we have here).

Still, just for you my sweet little 5 year old, I'll make a really complicated Blog-brag-worthy triumph next year.

Wait, that's right the epiphany, I'll pile the lollies, chocolate and icing in a more attractive manner!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MY SWEET LITTLE SASSA!

Seven Signs of Ageing

2010-09-29T07:00:00.001+08:00

1. After having your muscles stretched to accommodate enormous babies three times, the hospital Physiotherapist shoves her hands wrist deep into your flabby belly immediately post the third one vacating and says,"Yeah, that's never going to go back to normal, without surgery".
2. There's an audible (apparently benign and "nothing to worry about" but really quite loud) click sometimes as you walk, meaning that anyone passing you will look about themselves thinking, "what on earth was that audible, and really quite loud, clicking noise?"
3. If some bloke gives you a second look as you're out and about and you haven't been "clicking", you don't think, "yep I'm looking good today", you check to see that:
a. your skirt isn't stuck in your undies
b. you don't have toothpaste (courtesy of being in a hurry after getting two small humans ready and not having enough time for yourself in the morning), texta or stickers (courtesy of your artistic 4 year old) or grease/paint/dirt (courtesy of your renovating nonsense) on your face
c. you've buttoned up your buttons in the right button holes.
d. you don't have a herd of cats following you because you are exhibiting all three of the above and look like a crazy old cat lady.

4. You'll see an 80 year old woman at the local shops wearing exactly the same shirt as you and go home and throw that same shirt into the old rag and painting clothes pile.
4.1 You now think of your clothes in terms of, "this is too young (tight T-Shirts with pithy slogans), this is too old (shirts worn by 80 year old women)".
5. You buy moisturising creams containing exotic ingredients that can't have anything really to do with getting rid of wrinkles and the cost of said creams increase exponentially in relation to each passing year ( I have to put this in context. I don't buy $200 tubs of the stuff from the "beauty" departments of up-market department stores, just Nivea and Olay, ahem . . . supermarket. But I find myself getting sucked into the tiny jars with ridiculous names like DNAge instead of the plain ordinary Nivea. Even though logically I know there's no difference).
6. Your artistic daughter draws pictures of you with two horizontal lines across the forehead (the only consolation being that pictures of her dad have three lines).
7. You inadvertently divulge your year of birth in conversation with another mother at your children's school and she says," Oh, you're doing well for your age" . . . ! ! ! ? !!!

Destruction and Pool Heebie Jeebies

2010-09-28T15:49:00.007+08:00

Old ramp is demolished in readiness for our new back deck. Boys like a bit of destruction!

It's going to be so wonderful. We're going salvage yard fossicking this week to get some lead-light windows for one end of it (I love salvage yard fossicking!).

Linus also started swimming lessons this morning.

Public swimming pools, oh joy!

I don't exactly have a phobia, more like a deep case of the willies concerning public swimming pools. I'm not a germaphobe or a clean freak but the "Human Soup" in these things....Brrrrrrr yuck. Hundreds of people spitting and snotting and dipping their hairy dangly bits in the water. And I'm not in the least convinced of the water-tightness of those "swimming nappies" on the babies!

Lucky I don't have to get in the water with him. I've told him he has to keep his mouth closed at all times and I'm working on covering up the look of abject horror on my face with a look of "excitement" or "pride" in his progress (I probably look completely demented).

It's no good reminding me about the chemicals; the germs may be dead but it doesn't change any of the soup's basic ingredients.

Iris

2010-09-26T09:04:00.002+08:00

We have a long standing joke with my parents about our inability to grow a Strelitzia flower. Well, when I say "joke" it's usually them pointing out our continued barrenness and their fecundity and giggling. These things are as hardy as all get up and grow in the most neglected of gardens (like the abandoned house down the road amongst the dead wild oats !) but we never seem to get a flower...

Well, bugger the Bird of Paradise . . . we've got Irises!

Nyah-nyah-nynah-nynah-nynah!

Quilty or Not Quilty?

2010-09-17T10:23:00.011+08:00

Well, I finished Astrid's quilt with time to spare. That's the good news.

Here's the bad.

1. It's not very straight. Well the outside edges are straight but don't take a ruler to the squares.

2. There's a decapitated deer. Oops!

3. I picked gingham for the back. No wonder the woman in the shop looked down her nose at me like she was thinking "novice!" when I poo-pooed the ugly stiff tie-dyed purpose-built "quilt backing" fabric. There's a reason you don't choose a soft floppy fabric with lines on it to make your wobbly shame more apparent. I gave myself a headache with Fabulon fumes trying to stiffen the material so that I could line it up straight. All to no avail. Also, by the way, why are shop women in wool and fabric shops so snooty?

4. And the biggest confession I have to make is . . .

it's not actually "quilted".

Well, it is a sandwich of backing, wadding and top but there's no stitching through the layers. It was a combination of the inadequacies of my 20 year old machine (rocking foot, what's that?) and my extreme lack of patience. I tried, I grumbled, I used a bazillion safety pins, I grumbled some more, I hand tacked it (yes, HAND TACKED), I SCREAMED (the hand tacking had brought me to the brink) and then I sewed around the edges, applied a binding (with lovely mitred corners I might add some things I can do) and called it DONE.

Oh well, it's cute (actually it's really cute) and I made a pillow case to match (with all deer keeping their heads).

I think my first will be my last though.

Big Up Respect! To the Quilters Massiv out there (because I know you're all into Ali G style West Indian Street Slang).

Sad Songs

2010-09-16T10:51:00.006+08:00

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a complete cry baby. I will cry at anything, ANYTHING. Especially bad for me are commercials for telephone companies (you know the sort with the grown child calling home to mama in Italy), children's stories (The Happy Prince and don't get me started on The Little Matchstick Girl) and sad songs.

There are some songs that it doesn't matter how many times I hear them I lose it . . . Bwaaaaahhhh!

Okkervil River's John Allyn Smith Sails
Iron and Wine's Naked as we Came
Iron and Wine / Calexico Dead Man's Will

(Actually a LOT of Iron and Wine has me teary . . . I love him so! He could read the phone book and I'd listen completely enraptured and soggy with tears).

So anyway, the other day my little guy came out of school with a very serious look on his face.

I asked, "What's wrong?"

He said, "Can't tell you till we get far enough away from school". . . I was worried (remember the haircut? Kids can be cruel about such things).

We walked halfway home and he decided that it was enough distance and told me that the teacher had been playing some songs for the class while they worked. There was one song that was partly in Spanish and partly in English about a cat. He was enjoying it immensely (I've mentioned before he LOVES cats). That was until the part where the, "cat falls off the roof, breaks his solar plexus and dies". . . he cried his little eyes out telling me about it. And you can bet I cried too. The two of us sniffling away outside the fruit and vege shop and Astrid looking at us in a perplexed way (she only cries when she's really ANGRY).

He described the song so well that I found it; Señor Don Gato . He doesn't believe the last line about him returning to life.

He had sat quietly in his seat during class and cried without anyone seeing him and then had cried on and off discretely at school whenever he thought about it. He was inconsolable.

Poor little guy has inherited my BooHoo gene . . . Astrid appears safe however.

Hairdressers

2010-09-09T17:56:00.005+08:00

I have a bit of a vexed relationship with hairdressers. I try to explain what I want and they look at me like I'm speaking Venusian. This is bad enough when it concerns my own head but I also have "control" over my poor offspring's noggins.

See this photo of Linus? That is a ROCKSTAR haircut. I have no idea how I managed to be understood (perhaps she was wearing a Babel Fish?). Sadly for us that particular hairdresser disappeared from the salon (she may have returned to Venus).

Today I couldn't put off the poor little guy's haircut any longer. The woman who lives behind us keeps referring to him as "the girl" (although I suspect she may have issues involving her brain and a life led too long on the wild side).

As pure chance would have it there was a young lad in the waiting area who sported exactly this haircut (it must be mentioned that he was pre-haircut and his mum had plans to shear his all off. I think he looked cool, but then I'm from Venus). So I pointed at the boy and said, "like that please"... Pudding Bowl was NEVER mentioned, I promise . . . and yet, here we are . . . lucky he has to wear a hat for school, that's all I'll say.

Yaaaaarrrggg!

2010-09-08T09:43:00.005+08:00

Astrid's Kindy class has "Dress up like a Pirate Day" today...I'm not sure why, seems that "International Talk Like a Pirate Day" is next week (although I guess that's a pretty arbitrary day in itself, so it could potentially be any day you feel like calling someone a Dirty Bilge Rat with indemnity)?!

She was very excited. She wouldn't have us telling her she was a pretty pirate though!

In other news: HOORAY!!!!!! After an absolutely nail-biting day yesterday, I think I'm in love with Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott (the Historian won't mind a bit). It took guts to go against the bullying tactics of the Coalition and back the Labor Party. Fingers crossed that the Coalition don't turn into Scurvy Dogs and keel-haul the new government, the Dirty Bilge Rats!!!

and...by the way, the major national Australian newspaper (Rupert Murdoch's propaganda machine) needs to have a long hard look at itself. It has behaved abominably, hopefully they have lost all credibility and will be seen for what they are.

Green, Green Soup

2010-09-04T20:34:00.002+08:00

Do you have one of those recipes that you make about weekly and is really quick, really easy and really cheap and also surprisingly delicious?

Here you go:

Pea and Rocket Soup

1kg Frozen Peas
1litre good vege stock like Massel
1 bunch (a colander full from our vege patch...that's as exact as I can get) of Rocket (that's Arugula, Lindsey)
1 onion
1/2 tbls Dijon mustard (but that's because I put Dijon in most things . . . except . . . cake)

Cook onion in a little olive oil till softish. Bung everything else in and simmer for about 15-20 mins. Then "Mouli" (mush) it a bit to make it not too smooth but not too lumpy....top with some grated parmesan cheese if you want and definitely with some freshly ground black pepper . . . delicious (seriously, and low fat and good for you and incredibly almost Kryptonite or Algae green...but don't be put off, try it,you won't regret it)

Bohemian Chic

2010-08-28T08:18:00.006+08:00

I'm hardly a slavish follower of fashion (oh, so much far from it) but I really wish I had a definite STYLE. I wish I was elegant and/or chic. I'm old enough now to have defined the sort of looks I like; quirky, hand-crafted touches, comfortable and a little bit retro...

Check out Kim Hargreaves new book of knitting patterns. She describes as;

"...an eclectic blend of chic sophistication and bohemian charm."

Hmmm, this is exactly what I'd like to be; chic, sophisticated, bohemian and charming...sadly I mostly come out like a mad woman's custard that got dragged through the wardrobe, eaten for a dog's breakfast and spat out.
ps. There is also Anthropologie's new catalogue ... I think I need to go through my wardrobe and get the lumps of custard and dog spit out!

Things to do with $6.00

2010-08-27T20:14:00.002+08:00

My recent posts have been a tad depressing...sorry.

Today we went on a shopping expedition and this could very well have turned out to be another depressing post. Ive been putting off going as we had to go to a large shopping centre. I hate going there; the peculiar people, the constant noise, the junk screaming at your eyes to buy buy BUY! It all gives me the willys...But we had to get something for school (which we didn't end up being able to find...typical!).

Fortunately the trip wasn't a total waste as we found two plain T-Shirts for Astrid for $2.80 each! I couldn't make them for that price. But I did gussy them a bit, those deer are everywhere. Now I'm feeling a bit more cheerful!

We're all moving to Antarctica

2010-08-26T16:35:00.005+08:00

When I was young I remember lying awake in bed worrying about the world ending in a nuclear war. The Cold War permeated my psyche and the constant threat of global annihilation seemed so real and close.

Now my beautiful, deep thinking little boy is petrified that the world will end due to climate change (it is a slower end than the burning flesh and disintegrated buildings that gave me nightmares but he cries and trembles at the thought of global warming nonetheless).

This makes me so sad...

He's constantly bombarded with messages on how he has to save water and energy, reduce waste and recycle. He's repeatedly told of the dire consequences of inaction. He hears his Dad and I complaining about the lack of rain and cursing the news telling us that our politicians are dragging their feet on a carbon tax and targets on greenhouse gas emissions.

He internalises all of this, he's only seven years old, he must feel so utterly helpless.

We have made a pact to stay upbeat for him (no more shaking our fists at the news or the weather reports). He's very enthusiastic about the positive steps that we are taking as a family and is happy to be involved in the planning and implementation. We're getting things set up for grey-water recycling (Linus is drafting the architecture for this), putting in rainwater (if it ever rains again) tanks and are planning to get off grid for our power (solar and wind power). We walk and cycle just about everywhere as we choose to live in a place that is close to work, school and all other amenities. We also buy local as much as possible, and we have already put in a whumping great vegetable patch and 7 new fruit trees.

And, being an optimistic seven year old he has decided that he will plan for our future. He is currently obsessed with his plans to settle Antarctica. The map below is just the tip of the iceberg ('scuse the pun)!

Linus's map of Antarctica - note the bridge from Perth at the lower right.

Take me to your leader?

2010-08-23T13:11:00.009+08:00

OK, I've calmed down a bit. So I'm ready to make some comments on the election (or lack of election) for anyone interested at all (be prepared, this will be long and boring).

Here's what happened in a nutshell. We had 12 years of the most hateful, mean, conservative government (Liberal/Coalition) that was finally tossed out in 2007. Just as the new government (Labor) took office the GFC went down and the world threw a collywobble. The government spent up big on urgently put together stimulus packages aimed at keeping the economy bobbing along and it worked, Australia did better than any other Western economy. But the problem is that since no-one lost their job or had to go without a new plasma TV, the public didn't believe that we had narrowly missed a recession. So the Liberal party (a definite misnomer) managed to convince people that the government had squandered heaps of money and bungled the administration of these hastily put together schemes. The other thing that happened is that since Labour had a majority it attempted to put through some very bold and noble reforms; tax reform to try to stop big, multi-national mining companies taking all their multi billion dollar profits offshore and a tax on carbon emissions (ETS). There were other issues concerning factional infighting in the Labor party and the Liberal party showing their puppet masters (big business and Rupert Murdoch) and appealing to a very ugly side of Australian psyche (the racist nationalist thug).

So we went to the polls...and...
We still do not have a leader and the two major parties look like having 72-73 seats each in the House of Representatives.

Stalemate! Otherwise known as a Hung Parliament. And there's me blowing raspberries at the other 50%...

So now it's all down to 3 ex-National Party (think, farmers) independents that hold the balance of power and are being wooed by the major parties to form a minority government. The 4th non-major representative is from the Greens (hooray) and has already pledged allegiance to the Labor Party. Fortunately two of the three seem like reasonable men (both believe in action on climate change, one is an Amnesty International member and a White Ribbon Ambassador for the prevention of violence against women!). They both want what's best for Australia as a whole with a focus on country region issues and that's fair enough.
One is, however, an out and out fruitcake! Bob Katter is a climate sceptic who has espoused some horrible misogynist, racist and anti-gay views in the past. He (Katter) seems to think that they will be acting as a bloc and will all go together on whoever they decide will form government, but on paper, I must say they sound like chalk and cheese.

I am bemused by all the comments that suggest the "electorate" are voting for a change in the way parliament is conducted (even if as a result of this 50-50 split a change to processes will happen). As though the "electorate" is a sentient and rational being that has voted accordingly! A lot of the anti-Labor vote in Queensland seems to be out of a "state or origin" mentality that was miffed at the treatment of one of their own, Kevin Rudd. I think we are far too invested in sport and the resulting cross-state rivalries in this country and it flows into our political thinking, grow up people!

Some really good things have happened though; the huge Green vote means that a lot of people want action on climate change and presumably more compassionate treatment of asylum seekers and; Wilson ("Ironbar" need I say more) Tuckey and Stephen Fielding (both even bigger and more frightening fruitcakes than the one mentioned above) have lost their seats! And some icing on the cake is that Tony Cook who won the seat off Tuckey will not join the Liberal/Coalition (as they assumed) making him another independent and taking another seat off the Liberal party.

A most atrocious thing for me is that the informal ("donkey") vote is up to around 6%. Shame on you.
OK enough now, I'm off my soapbox (I've probably put you to sleep). As long as the conservatives and Tony Abbott don't get in, I'll be happy enough and we'll no doubt be heading back to the polls in the next 12-24 months when a double dissolution is caused by the failure to get a Carbon Emissions Trading Scheme through. Hopefully next time around we can have a more positive outlook for the country's future.

I'm not sure why our cats like blowing raspberries so much! Must be picking it up from me!

Pblurrpth!

2010-08-22T08:46:00.006+08:00

Sometimes I HATE democracy!

I particularly hate that idiot people will vote against their own better interests out of racist fear, selfish greed, ignorance and laziness.

On ya Australia, so proud today....pblurrrpppppppth to you all!!!!!!!Well 50% of you anyway.

...more when I'm less angry.

Quilt again, again

2010-08-19T17:18:00.000+08:00

OK, so this is the last update until I finish I promise (it's getting boring).

I can see why people like doing these. It's fun. But it's getting harder to be random with the patches and now I have to be more strategic with the placement. I also have to square off my squares a bit more . . . but ask me if I care about the imperfection (Wabi Sabi as always, that's me!).

Astrid LOVES it and keeps hugging it.

More Quilt

2010-08-18T10:15:00.000+08:00

Much happier with the second deer. Cut it closer to the drawn line, finer nose and thinner neck, definitely more deer-y to me.

Also found some really sweet deer fabric to add into the mix.She knows all about it now as it was impossible to keep from her but that was OK as she helped choose the fabric (hard to steer her away from the bright pink and yellow polka dots though!)

Quilt

2010-08-17T17:07:00.002+08:00

So here we are . . . doing things completely wrong I'm sure but onward we stumble. Thankfully she prefers deer without antlers!

I was going to machine stitch around the deer but I wonder if it will make it too stiff and will tiny, tiny hand done blanket stitch keep it from fraying enough?

Let's call this one the guinea-pig-deer.

Audrey with Holes

2010-08-16T13:34:00.001+08:00

Finally finished my cashmere Audrey cardigan (this is my second Audrey, I love the pattern)!

I changed her a bit with an all over pattern and a much smaller gauge which was at times tough going but the light, soft and warm result was worth it.

I also finally committed to a colour for the dining room! I actually woke up yesterday morning (D Day) with a knot in my stomach because I knew I had to make a final choice! It's beyond ridiculous the emotional contortions that this has had me in (very unlike me).

The Historian has been building a "wine robe" (basically a wine cellar in a custom-built corner cupboard in the dining room) . . . we're calling it NARNIA. Anyway, because of the way it is built we had to paint the wall above it before going any further, hence my D(ecision) Day. I chose a pale grey blue (it's called Grey Cloud). I think I made the right choice . . .

It's none of these, ha ha!

Deer for my Dear

2010-08-13T11:40:00.002+08:00

This little person is OBSESSED with Deer. I guess if she lived in Europe or North America she might be keen on Kangaroos, but deer (be they Reindeer, Red deer or even Elk) are her passion. She is also about to turn five in early October.

When I get a creative idea in my little head it pushes and pushes and pushes at me (I go to sleep thinking about it, I wake up thinking about it, you get the idea) until I make it and exorcise it out of my system.

I have never made a quilt and yet that's what I've decided to make her for her birthday (I mean how hard can it be??? ho ho . . . nervous laughter). I'm not going to go crazy here, just squares and then I'm going to appliqué some deer silhouettes around the place . . . and, I'm going to genetically engineer the cat pattern to make a matching deer toy.

I have 7 weeks and I have "real" paid work to do too (not to even mention all the other stuff) . . . maybe I'm biting off more then I can chew? Oh well, never stopped me before, watch this space.

Meadow Kitty

2010-08-10T17:39:00.002+08:00

After yesterday's skirt whip up, Astrid is more than enthusiastic about the magic powers of the sewing machine. So this morning she suggested, "let's make a cat for Linus as a surprise" (Linus, it must be said, is Cat-mad...he loves his toy cats more than you can imagine. Yes, we have 3 real cats too and he thinks they're OK, but that's more their cantankerous fault than his . . . more on that later).

Well, what's a person to do? It's so sweet that she wanted to make a present for her brother but this had to be while he was at school and there were some other (house is a tip) work to do too. I thought to myself that I would get shifty and try out a pattern that I want to adapt to make a reindeer for Astrid (more on that later too) but of course it wasn't a quick "whip up" and I took some major shortcuts, so she is also wonky.

So here is Meadow Kitty (Astrid wanted it to be a girl as there's somewhat of a gender imbalance to his toy cats). I used all sorts of scraps that I was given by a lovely woman de-stashing a while ago.

Now to go un-tipify the house!

and she is LOVED

Pink Twirling Skirt

2010-08-09T11:59:00.006+08:00

Why do girls go so mad for pink? I've actually made a conscious effort to limit the amount of pink in Astrid's life. It's such a conformist colour and "girly girl" (ooh I HATE that term... ugh especially when grown women use it to describe themselves) is not a box I want my wonderful, assertive, creative daughter being stuck in. Yet it's a force sometimes too big for me to fight ...15 minutes this morning on the sewing machine making a dodgy pink skirt out of the satin she chose and she's delighted! I know she'll wear it getting muddy while planting "forests" for her toy deer and climbing trees while helping her imaginary "silly fruit-eating duck", so I guess she's not totally boxed yet.

WAKE UP AUSTRALIA!

2010-08-04T11:48:00.004+08:00

I am fearful Australia (and I know you're all reading this)! Latest opinion polls indicate that the semi-clad idiot I mentioned below may actually become our Prime Minister! Have a listen to his own quotes and help me make sure he doesn't lead us back to the 50s!

The Aarvark Cottage Beautification Project # 2

2010-08-03T13:17:00.010+08:00

KITCHEN

I think I've mentioned that before we bought our house it had suffered a long, long time as a rental property. This area is inner city and has a bit of a seedy past before getting all gentrified (in fact we used to rent around here in our earlier and seedier years).

The kitchen was DISGUSTING and had to be the first thing to tackle (I wouldn't use the oven for fear of hairy beasts may have been living and toileting there).

I've just discovered that most of my "before" shots are really pretty crappy as I took them on the day we were moving in. Perhaps it was a subconscious act on my part to make the "befores" look even more awful. Of course the view onto the neighbour's brick-clad monstrosity is still there (sigh...) So . . .

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

and AFTER

Family get-togethers

2010-08-02T09:35:00.008+08:00

Our neighbour's almond tree is in full swing and a mass of humming bees. That has nothing to do with anything, but the picture's pretty.

We had a family barbecue yesterday, my cousin Jonas is visiting from Sweden and staying with my parents while he does an exchange at a local university for a semester, so it was a sort of a welcome to Australia.

Barbecues can be tricky for us vegetarians (alright we're Pesco-vegetarians, or "Fishocrits" as my eldest, totally vegetarian, son lovingly calls us) and we don't usually do them as a family but they are quintessentially Australian and so the carnivores went to town.

So to cater for our own "peculiarities" I made a Sweet Potato Galatte, a couscous salad and one of my Dad's favourites, Mazarins.

From my absolute favourite cake and biscuit book,

Sju sorters kakor...

MAZARINS

Preheat oven 175C (350F)
Pastry
300ml Plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
3tbs sugar
100g butter
1 small egg
Combine dry ingredients, rub butter into(till resembles breadcrumbs) Add egg, wrap in plastic refrigerate 1 hour.

Filling

75g butter
3 eggs
2/3 cup sugar
150g ground almonds
Melt butter and cool. Beat eggs and sugar till VERY light and VERY thick. Stir in almonds and butter.
Roll out pastry. Line oval forms (I used a Friand tray) with pastry. Fill with filling and bake in bottom half of oven 15 minutes till tops are golden. Cool and apply icing and glacé cherry halves.

TRIFFIDS

2010-08-01T18:45:00.002+08:00

Do you remember the Triffids (no, not the Perth band of the 80s, the killer plants of the movie).

Well, I think we have some growing around the corner from us . . .

Should we be worried?

Seriously, what ARE these plants?

And . . . The house that they are growing in front of is . . . deserted . . .dum dum dum dum!

Lazy Day, Scones and Flat Bread

2010-07-26T10:34:00.013+08:00

A really, really, really lazy Sunday after the excitement of Saturday.

I sat in the winter sunshine for huge lengths of time and knitted (bliss). Linus and Astrid played quietly with not a hint of a "hangover" from the day before and the Historian pottered around in his shed. Oh, the gender stereotypes! Anyway, we had a lovely relaxing day.

We had scones with blueberry jam and cream for morning tea (A Country Women's Association (CWA) speciality of course. They are perfect looking but can be somewhat rubbery scones (psst. I don't use the recipe in the link, I merely included it for the photo of what a CWA scone looks like for comparison). Mine are rather ugly looking, irregular, crumbly, crusty on the outside and soft and delicious on the inside...I'm sure they wouldn't pass the muster with the CWA but am I a terrible person for preferring mine?

Then I made my absolute staple; Crispy Caraway Flatbread to nibble with a nice glass of Sauvignon Blanc in the late afternoon. I love this recipe and make it pretty much weekly, I found it on Smitten Kitchen but I find caraway far nicer than rosemary. (of course that's because I adore caraway ). The only other thing I do differently is that I roll it out very thin between 2 sheets of baking paper to make things easier. Then I break it into shards when it cools . . .

CHEERS!

PARTY

2010-07-25T18:10:00.005+08:00

We had our belated birthday party for Linus yesterday. 12 small ones running around hyped up on sugar and excitement! I was too busy to take any decent photos, although I did get my blank canvas cupcakes with meringue icing...kids decorated them with EVEN more sugar (yay!)

Fortunately we had 5 girls included into the mix which was brilliant when things started to look like they were going "Lord of the Flies"-ish (they keep the testosterone down to a dull roar). Yes, that's the tree-house gang throwing plastic balls at the trampoline crew and vise-versa! I had all manner of clever party games lined up but as always happens - 12 children will make their own faux blood-lust fun.

I'm not perfect

2010-07-19T15:15:00.008+08:00

I'm far, far from perfect! I try to be non-judgmental but there are whole people and even trees that I can't stand. I can be snobby and impatient and vain. I'm frequently hypocritical and downright bitchy.

And I often feel exactly like this picture. Astrid has brilliantly captured "angry", the caption reads:

"I feel angry sometimes when my brother says I can't play with his Uberstix until I make a satellite for him but I don't know what they look like" (teehee)

As we're heading towards a Federal election on the 21st of August. I expect to be making this face quite often. We have the real risk of this pair taking power!

Yes, they are every bit as loathsome as they look.

Let's see: He thinks he's pretty sexy in his speedos and gets his gear off at every opportunity (Tony, just so you know, this isn't working on me, if fact it's pretty much the epitome of "unsexy") and he has some really dodgy ideas on women (all we apparently really want is to have more children), homosexuals (they "threaten" the "natural" order), refugees (lock up children behind razor-wire) and education (bible studies in all schools).

She is a creepy plastic "Stepford" deputy (on her 3rd Leader of the Opposition) with a death-stare for anyone who dares to disagree with her and a disgusting habit of getting all kittenish around any men.

No, I'm not perfect and I have faults but the world these two represent sends shivers up my spine. Brrrrr....

Chitty Chitty

2010-07-14T08:16:00.003+08:00

There's a lot of birds living with us. Well, they were here before us, so they kindly share the space with us.

I love watching birds (not in a Gould League sort of way, I think they are nature's entertainers). We have crows and magpies residing out the front and honey eaters and doves out the back.

We also have a fabulous Chitty Chitty (the Noongar name for a Willie Wagtail) living in our backyard.

They are such tiny balls of fury with their wagging tails, flicking wings and the angry chitty chitty sound. This one is, however, extremely happy (and fat) and sings a lovely song most of the time, despite his frown. And why wouldn't he be happy? He has hit the mother-load of bugs in our compost bin!

Going to plant more vegetables in our new vege patch today...digging the ground should make him ecstatic!

Hilarious

2010-07-13T07:45:00.008+08:00

Our children are comic geniuses. We're always doubled over in belly laughs at their antics, ideas and conversations. We write down things we remember but I thought this would be a good place to chronicle some of their pearls of wisdom and hilarity.

Ghosts (July 2010)

Astrid - You know, I'm not scared of ghosts. They can't pick anything up because it would go straight through them. So they can't get a sword or anything and those sheets with the eyes cut out aren't scary at all.
Linus - Ghosts aren't real Astrid.
Astrid - (pause)... and that too.

ps. Astrid looks so serious in the photo as she has painted herself to be a tyrannosaurus and they are not funny!

Colours!

2010-07-12T14:12:00.000+08:00

I've been feeling a little glum. I think it's the stress of the past week, the huge amount of kilometres travelled and that many birthdays (including mine) have been disrupted...of course I can't completely rule out a hormonal element.

So to lift me out of the funk, I've been looking at colours to paint our dining room and hallway. This is becoming quite a saga for me. I'm usually a lot more decisive in these things but one of my many problems comes from having got a hold of a paint manufacturer's fan deck - oh, too much choice is turning me into a ditherer.

I love the colour of this room in the magazine (by the way, the chandelier... wow) but "is it this colour? Or more this colour?" etc. Our lounge room and kitchen are both finished (green/blue and blue/green respectively) and since the dining room is in between them, the colour has to tie the other two together (blue/grey would be good). I "think" it's one of these........Rats!!! This isn't working. I think I'll go scrape the door and swear a bit, maybe that will un-glump me!

Winter is still swimming weather...somewhere

2010-07-12T09:06:00.001+08:00

Winter holiday in Kalbarri. It's a seaside holiday town with more than a touch of dagginess about 7 hours drive to the north. It is also where the Pale Historian's mum lives.

We had an important 7th Birthday while there. What better way to celebrate than home applied face paint, Tiki-style Mini golf, ice cream and beach cricket at sunset.

Things to Remember

2010-07-04T22:52:00.000+08:00

I had to make an emergency road-trip to the Western Desert over the past two days. It was a 1300kms (808miles) round trip. These are the things I already knew but was reminded of on that trip:

The complete incredible wonderfulness of my parents and my sister Dette (well, she isn't actually my "sister" but she is closer and more important to me than just a best friend).
Black coffee and licorice allsorts do not make a good breakfast.
Overtaking 37m (121') road trains is made easier by long straight roads (see above) and sweet truck drivers.
You can find incredible beauty anywhere...although it was easier to appreciate on the return trip while my precious love was back with me.

And one thing I didn't know till now:

When you're alone and frightened the "Free Coffee for Driver" signs can make you feel like you are loved and supported by the whole of humanity (although I didn't avail myself of the offer....yuck!)

Elbow Grease

2010-07-01T13:20:00.001+08:00

See this door? It's the new bathroom door, or it will be when I've managed to strip off the dirty old varnish and got it back to the lovely Tasmanian Oak. This renovating nonsense is all about elbow grease. Things are constantly rubbed and scraped and rubbed some more with a lot of huffing and puffing and barely audible swearing.

We're all about words (and not always the profane ones) and labour at Aardvark Cottage, so I while I was cursing and scrubbing I got thinking about the etymology of the expression "elbow grease". Sounds like it might have a colourful story, doesn't it? I imagined the phrase being some "Olde English" reference to putting some poultice made of pig fat on your poor aching elbows after a long day vigorously rubbing the family silver (you'll note I didn't say "jewels").

Before moving house our 2 volume Oxford English Dictionary went to live at the Pale Historian's office (wouldn't want anything untoward happening to the OED, would we?) and it hasn't come home yet. The Pale Historian dreams of one day owning the whole 20 volume OED. Mind you, to keep him happy we will need to build a hermetically sealed library to house it and it could only be viewed wearing cotton gloves!

Without the OED to refer to I took to the internets and to my disappointment I couldn't find anything interesting about "elbow grease", save a reference to it being mentioned in 1670 meaning "hard rubbing". But as often happens when you're wandering throughout the internets you can find (well, fall into and I'll be here a while) wonderful things like this site...look up "rule of thumb"...times have changed!

The Aardvark Cottage Beautification Project # 1

2010-06-25T13:36:00.001+08:00

We're renovating our 1920 built house. It has over the course of its life spent time in the hands of concrete-loving elderly Italians and a long string of renters. So there's lots to do! I'm going to post before and after shots...I love before and after photos!

The first one is our shed. It was asbestos (walls AND roof) with a broken old louvre window...a horrid eye-sore but it's huge and useful. We had a team of (actually, quite frightening...ex criminals?) burly blokes come and get rid of the nasty stuff and then we re-clad it in timber and painted it. It makes me so happy now!

BEFORE

AFTER

Of course the garden has also changed quite a bit...but that's for another post!

Ugly old bananas

2010-06-25T10:18:00.000+08:00

It doesn't seem to matter how many bananas I buy, I always have a couple that end up going a more then a little sad and old in the fruit bowl. So I fling them in the freezer (my freezer is full of ugly black bananas). Every now and then they reach embarrassing plague-like proportions and I feel bad about them languishing in there, so I make muffins or a cake or smoothies...when they come out and are defrosted they are truly the most obscene sight in the world. Then they are transformed into far more palatable stuff.

Not necessarily related to this, we have rather unexpectedly got our first ever female Prime Minister, Julia Gillard (not to say that our old PM Mr Rudd was an ugly old banana or that Ms Gillard is a warm and sweet muffin).

I am a little conflicted. I am happy because she is a wonderful, strong, acid-sharp politician and a WOMAN! But I really hope the Labour party hasn't done themselves too much damage in the unprecedented process of ousting a sitting Prime Minister in his first term......we simply can't have the opposition and (shudder) Tony Abbot as our PM, now that's some hideous old bananas there!

Here's the recipe:

Banana Cake (or Muffins)

100g butter
300ml sugar (1 1/4 cups)
2 eggs
500ml plain flour (2 cups)
1tsp baking powder
2tsp cinnamon
1tsp ground ginger
2 large squashy icky old bananas
3tbls milk

Preheat oven 175C (350F)
Beat butter and sugar until light. Add eggs beating after each. Add all the rest and mix till just combined.
Bake in cake pan for 45mins to 1 hour. If making muffins, make that about 30mins.