Myrtle & Eunice

The Four-Month-Late Catch-up Post...

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 00:52:00 +0000

Alas, alack, I have sighingly come to admit, that my juggling talents can no longer extend to holding down a blog like a real blogger should – unless someone invents an eight day week. Simultaneously, I have come to admit that I am extremely bad at knowing when to quit. I thought it’d sit more comfortably to be a fair-weather blogger, who pops by on an Every Now and Then, (rather than being dignified and throwing in the towel). Eye roll.

Following is some recent happenings stuff. I can’t remember the other stuff because I have turned into a fair-weather blogger, who only pops by on an Every Now and Then, (rather than being dignified and throwing in the towel). Double eye roll.

The bit about the camping...
Same place as last year, excellent company, all-day swims, explores and adventures. A stunning display of kids-in-car behaviour, with only ONE jelly snake flying out the window over the nine-ish hour journey. So impressed (relieved) that the evil parenting technique STILL works.

Wildlife spotted:
2 x Red-bellied Black Snakes
10,000,000 x Kangaroos
22 x Lace Monitors
5 (or 7,000) x Brush-tailed Possum (never could work out if it was the same characters sitting in the Weet Bix box)
20 bazillion x birds/fish/skinks/interesting insects
1 x Less Interesting Paralysis Tick.

More on That Less Interesting Paralysis Tick...
The little blighter may or may not account for a very sick, big kid for an uncharacteristically-long time. She missed the first day of school and the next and the next and after the weekend, the next and the next and she’s still not back to ‘her’. I have a self-imposed ban against medical Googling but was well into it, after the third frustrating doctor visit. After breaking my medical Google ban I became promptly aware, that while ticks are parasitically impolite when they burrow their head into your shoulder and feed on your blood, they ain’t got nothin’ on the Bot Fly. I can only assume that coming to know about the Bot Fly in the first instance and viewing one fifth of the Most Revolting Bot Fly Removal Video Ever, is the penance one pays for breaking a self-imposed medical Google ban.

The Day the Small Started School...
I had toyed with scheduling my dental appointment on the First Ever Day of School. I trusted this would distract me from the inevitable My-Baby-Has-All-Growed-Up sooky mama-ness. As it turns out, it is actually hard to weep, when your kid is that ready.

The Finishing (Including End-Weaving-In) of the Blanket of Squeak...
Unfairly named, the Blanket of Squeak is actually only soft and snugly. It’s just that I always expected acrylic yarn to have that squeak-factor. A worthy experiment, nonetheless I reckon I’d opt for a breathable cotton next time – the kid is so attached to her blanket I am even prising the thing off her in forty degree heat = Blanket of Sweat.

The Usual Compulsive Knitting For Winter in The Festering Heat of Summer...
In reaction to the completion of the above blanket and its veritable explosion of (sometimes wincing) colour, I started to prepare for a Melbourne winter and gave my eyeballs a rest with grey grey grey. All finished, except for weaving in those blooming ends and the blocking bizzo. More to come, possibly even with snazzier pics, after the sorting of the blooming ends and blocking bizzo.

The Wear Your Heart on Your Sleeve Red Cardi Number...
Because I can try ’til the cows come home to be one of those dignified designer-types dressed in understatement and confidence-inspiring muted tones, I know I’ll never be able to pull it off. My personality is too prone to outbursts of blunt, or undignified displays of excitement, or just whole doses of daggy. So I started on a cardigan in an apt blast of red. Come to think of it, I was also married in red, (though I reckon that had more to do with colour co-ordinating with a London bus).

The Something Entirely Unexpected...
It started with the Middle Kid’s Most Excellent Cello Teacher. Actually, it starts and ends with him – because I lay every blame squarely at his feet. Towards the end of last year, parent classes were run, with the aim of better enabling kid-music help at home. What I could never have imagined, is that playing the cello, (read: beginner squeaking and squawking), could come to feel as essential as breathing. I understand that this comes over as rather DRAMATIC but there is something incredibly meditative about beginner cello squeaking and squawking (unless you’re having to listen to someone else’s squeaking and squawking). Meanwhile stuff like this and this and this prompt anything from goosebumps, to forgetting to inhale, to an adrenaline-surge keeping me awake into the wee small hours. There has been much eyebrow-raising (my own included) and some discussion debating the mid-life crisis-ness of this new development.

But at least it isn’t a red Ferrari.

Squeak Squeak...

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 09:10:00 +0000

SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqu...

Etcetera.

I’ve lost my voice. For days. Getting the big kids out the door for school has been an exercise in wild gesticulation.

Ironically, my voice always seems to reappear to summon great coughs of hacking-ness...

HackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHa...

Etcetera.

The Small has been worse. (But today she isn’t grey. YAY!)

Ruptured ear drum, then Friday night in Emergency, with lots of cuddles but not many soothing words from Mum except for the best intentioned...

HackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHackHa...

Etcetera.

For a few weeks I’ve been stitchety-stitchin’ a blanket for her Big Girl Bed. Never ceases to amaze me how a crocheted row or two squeezed between bits of a day can grow so speedy-like.

StitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitchStitch...

Etcetera.

255 stitches per row, all of ’em trebles (I’m talking UK language here), two rows of each colour and entirely prompted by Lucy’s blanket of happy. I reckon I’m halfway-ish at 1.5 metres wide and just over one metre long. The Small and I have been snuggled under it as I go.

Perfectly fabulous until I reach the end of a row, flip the whole shebang over and all the ‘warm’ disappears. Bad, bad mother. Sorry sweetie.

Remember the Epic Blanket, crafted from Yarn of All Manner of Gloriousness? It is coveted and stolen from my bed on a regular basis. That Epic Blanket almost required a second mortgage. I will never ever tell you how much the Epic Blanket cost to craft. I will most certainly NEVER EVER tell the Mr – even though he reckons he’s worked out the yarny yardage. Hmm.

The Small’s blanket is a toe tip into the World of Acrylic. I am a great big acrylic yarn snob but I can see the benefits of this particular one greatly extend beyond the cheap as chips. No need for a second mortgage and no itch factor! Best of all, so far, no sign of what I had been dreading – you know that acrylic-y sound I mean? The sound of...

SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSque...

Etcetera.

Randomly Mused

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 09:13:00 +0000

ONE

For obvious reasons, I always look before I empty the Middle Kid’s pockets. I always do a quick reconnaissance, before I touch anything inside his school bag. I thought we’d hit an all-time EW! high, when I spotted the DEAD BIRD LYING AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SCHOOL BAG.

He said he collected the interesting piece of wood because it looked like a vulture. He has his eye out for two of the same in complementary sizings, so that we can arrange all three on the wall, in duck-like fashion.

TWO

I have an addiction to frozen blueberries. I cannot stop. I do an excellent impression of a Blue Tongued Lizard. The kids are mortified and keep warning me about the legend of the great aunt who turned bright orange from eating too many carrots. (She really, really did).

THREE

The Small drew a cockatoo on the wall. The Small scrubbed at the cockatoo and said it wouldn’t come off. Secretly I like the cockatoo.

Secretly I am collecting roadside-find picture frames. I plan to paint the empty frames white and mount them on a wall. Then there will be an open invitation to draw artful, direct-to-wall things. I also quite like the notion of a champagne-fuelled gallery launch.

FOUR

Jodie and Sarah’s Mum wanted an update on the state of the Dinosaur Egg. I am very sorry, Jodie and Sarah’s Mum, for the disappointing and hard-to-grasp imagery. A jungly garden seems to have grown around the Dinosaur Egg and there is no longer a clear line of sight. For three weeks during a wet, wet winter it looked doilied and verdant. Until a fungal affliction struck and the verdant was replaced with white spots. The white spots have eaten away at the doily bits. As far as a doilied, Jurassic-type Dinosaur Egg goes, it looks extra convincing.

PS. Jodie and Sarah’s Mum, if you are considering a stab at mossy creations, might I forewarn that success seems to depend on a truckload of commitment. It’s like keeping an ever-thirsty pet (don’t even think about a holiday).

PPS. Worthy of note is a distinct lack of green in either of my thumbs.

FIVE

The eldest has adopted a parsnip as a pet. This is Phillippa. I note Phillippa seems to be wearying of the experience and would probably prefer to be baked.

SIX

A Well Known Magazine published one of my patterns and forgot to ask permission. The Well Known Television Version of the Magazine filmed their own version of my tutorial and forgot to ask permission. I sent them an invoice. I emailed an invoice chase-up. Invoice was paid. Sometimes it’s all about the principle.

SEVEN

I am overusing the word ‘snazzy’. ‘Spiffy’ seems to creep in occasionally too. The other day, a youngish client asked me to make a poster design look ‘sexy’. But I am 41 and obviously nearly ancient. And I have a constantly weird-coloured tongue from too many blueberries. I can do snazzy posters, but ‘sexy’ is patently well beyond reach.

Hope you’ve had a SNAZZY start to your week!

My Big Kid

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 03:12:00 +0000

Every now and then, I receive an email from some nice person and in amongst the chat, there’s a HOW’S YOUR BIG KID GOING THESE DAYS? query.

That has been a bit of a tricky one to answer. Throw in the pre-teen moodiness of Nearly Eleven and consider the light and dark that fills any day and it sort of depends on the timing of the question. On balance I’d say things were much better. I would have said that my big girl, on balance, was travelling ok.

Then there was the recent episode which I should never have allowed to happen. How I kicked myself. On a playdate with a friend, I belatedly realised that my girl would be exposed to the main protagonist of last year’s awful bullying saga.

I realised this halfway through the basketball game that my kid was attending for the first bit of the playdate. I paced the floor. I rationalised there would be a dozen kids or more. Pacing and reckoning that with all those parents and friends around, my kid could hold her own.

What I did not reckon on, was the mother.

What I did not reckon on, was that my kid would be left in the care of that awful mother of that awful bully kid. Not for long. Just long enough for my kid to endure the long, steely glare – ‘right through my head, Mum!’ when my girl dared to utter her nervous hello.

My girl held it together. She did. Well done kid.

Then she went back to her friend’s house and was treated to entries in her friend’s diary written by the bully kid a month earlier. Eight months since bully girl had last attended my girl’s school and still the insults and slander continue in a written format, recorded for posterity.

My girl held it together. She did. Well done kid.

Long enough to arrive home. At home she screamed out her indignation and anger and hurt. I joined in. Somewhere there, in amongst all that mutual fury, things got funny. We had a long chat about choosing our friends. Understanding a healthy friendship. Finding good hearts and kindred spirits. About how much stronger my kid is this year than last. How she has changed, how she gets to decide how to deal with things.

I realised that these days my kid is much more than travelling ok. She’s travelling brilliantly, thank you very much. And she’s wearing her made to order (longer in the body, shorter in the sleeves, please) Rubble jumper LOTS.

.........................

PS. It did not end there. There was communication with the Mum of the playdate and an entirely productive frank and open discussion. YAY!

Meanwhile, I know from previous entirely patronising and ghastly experience, that approaching the bully girl’s mother is an exercise in gobsmacking FUTILITY. This may or may not be the reason why I am still fighting the still adrenaline-charged temptation to aim one heck of a hearty slap. No apology from me on that one, I’m afraid.

PPS. I realise I haven’t had it in me to blog the details of the bullying. The big kid still sees a fabulously down-to-earth, with a wicked-sense-of-humour counsellor type person. The appointments are increasingly infrequent. Much to my dismay! That counsellor has been as much therapy for me as for my kid. Except she says I probably shouldn’t slap the mother.

Dizzy Around the Edges

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 02:05:00 +0000

Throw an emergency my way – particularly a medically-themed one – and without missing a heart beat You Can Count On Me. Calm, capable, clear-thinking, efficient, methodical: that’s ME!

Except...not any longer. Last Thursday, it became evident I have acquired too much traumatic, bloodied history under the belt.

I am no fainting type. Last Thursday I turned a whiter shade of pale and felt a tiny bit dizzy around the edges. I gladly accepted the role of ‘support act’ to the Mr’s competent ‘lead’.

List of Traumatic Bloodied History (All Weirdly Occurring on Holidays) With Two Faint-Inducing Links

1. A couple of weeks before the birth of our second kid, my Mr made an impressive attempt at severing his thumb with a circular saw. I was on maternity leave. (So I guess it wasn’t a real, official-type ‘holiday’).

2. My nearly-two-year-old Small attempted to permanently sever her finger in the cog of a bicycle wheel. (I feel a bit dizzy even typing that). It was the Easter holidays.

3. Then there was the unmentionable incident involving the poor, unfortunate groin and the slamming rabbit hutch lid. That was the Christmas holidays.

4. These school holidays I bring you the next trip to the Emergency ward...

...Involving a wrong-way-up Swiss Army Knife, an impaled hand, some frantic arm-waving-about, eventual removal of a blade and an impressive, back-garden-covering, splattering of blood.

No tendons involved – HOW LUCKY IS THAT? Wound healing pretty well now, thank you for asking.

Mother of child booked in for twice weekly appointments with therapist to address issues of sustained and repeated trauma and the fact that she has unexpectedly morphed into One Great Big Wimp. She also currently feels a little overwhelmed at the sighting of red food colouring.

.........................

PS. Yes. Of course I would really, really like it if the Middle Kid sat quietly inside and read a book for the remainder of the school holidays, avoiding all objects with impaling potential.

PPS. Instead he’s back to the now meticulous, painfully careful use of his Swiss Army Knife, (while his mother helicopters irritatingly overhead).

PPPS. School’s back on Monday. Thank ye Gods.

The Ugly Blanket

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 00:30:00 +0000

These last months, while I’ve been working my cotton socks off, bits of coloured yarn have proven something of a lifeline. Every day for half an hour, I’ve tied one end securely to a skerrick of sanity and stitch by stitch, woven a bit of headspace back into my world.

What has become increasingly apparent, at times such as these, is that I care NOT A JOT about the ‘look’ of things. Well, hang on – I do care a very lot at the very start – and the Ugly Blanket was a planned yarny purchase. But once I’ve made that first slip knot, I couldn’t care less. It’s ONLY about the ‘make’.

Stitch stitch stitch. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

Even though I don’t think the Ugly Blanket is as ugly as all that – SHEESH! – the name has stuck. It was coined as soon as I reached for that apricoty, pasty, naked-coloured yarn in the middle. There was a raised eyebrow from the Mr and some immediate banter concerning the exact shade of old man undies. I blue-in-the-face argued that old man undie colour is a lighter shade of beige, possibly with yellowy undertones. Right?

Regardless, the family has decreed that ‘apricoty-pasty-naked’ is a bad colour for a blanket.

Stitch stitch stitch. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

Ironically, after all the family insults, when I went looking for the blanket with my camera, I found it in the kids’ cubby house. HUMPFH.

Not too ugly to be STOLEN.

I twisted arms and forced admissions. Now it’s the ‘Ugly Snuggly Blanket’. Apparently the Ugly Snuggly isn’t entirely awful.

I left it to hang out in the cubby for a very teensy while.

Ugly Blanket details over on Ravelry...

Not Drowning. Waving! (Though P’raps a Little Waterlogged Around the Edges)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 07:10:00 +0000

I hadn’t planned to fall down some watery vortex thingy, unannounced and all, but, well...you know. The ante was upped and there were kid issues to deal with and some really lovely work stuff to juggle and now months have whizzed by and I’m sitting primly on the edge of the posh chair, knees pressed together, back straight, trying not to slurp my tea and feeling like a guest in my own blog.

While I was doing the vortex thing, I amassed eleventy bazillion blog posts in my head. I’ve forgotten almost all of them...

I’ve been a lioness Mama and done a victory lap. From the sidelines I’m learning to read – like you learn to read when it doesn’t happen by osmosis – and my dyslexic kid has a smile on his dial.

There are countless other, supremely dodgy Mama moments. Mostly swept inconspicuously under the rug.

I made two quilt tops in February and gifted them in their total unfinished-ness to my July birthday children. The flimsy bits of scrappy cotton are still draped decoratively over their doona covers. Both children know NOT TO PICK AT LOOSE THREADS.

I thought up a brilliant name for a business. Unnervingly, inexplicably, the name and the website are available. This indicates the rest of the world thinks this is a stonkingly bad name for a business.

I’ve knit a whole lot of therapy.

I crocheted an Ugly Blanket. It’s ugly snuggly.

I changed my blog header and purposely stuck a blurry fly on it. I still like flies. Flies still have chutzpah.

I took one day out and I went to The Nursery. Breathe.

I took an hour out before dinner and went to the beach with the kidlets. Double breathe. I remembered the camera...

Took a goofy shot...

A kid nicked the camera...

(Evidence I haven’t been swallowed by the vortex – albeit with scary, vortex hair).

I was thinking I’d like to come back for another visit. Find the comfy armchair in this blog, slurp tea and not care if I leave biscuit crumbs.

I’ve got some catching up to do. HOW ARE YOU?

The Anti-Quilt

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 04:02:00 +0000

’Tis a ridiculous notion – the one that involves two graphic designers (and three children) meeting at a fabric store. Even when the graphic designer with a small amount of quilting experience, has forewarned the graphic designer with no quilting experience, of the danger of Overwhelmed by Sheer Choice. Both graphic designers will enter the fabric store with a degree of confidence, nonchalance and a solid understanding of colour theory.*

One graphic designer – the one foolish enough to haul along her three offspring, will waftily declare a time limit: “Twenty minutes! Tops!” Yet, it will become apparent to both graphic designers, within thirty-seven seconds; they have bitten off more than they can chew.

All around them, real quilter-types will bustle about the store, throwing thirty fabric combinations together, with confidence and ease. Meanwhile, the graphic designers will freeze with indecision and the three children will punctuate their inevitable, long-haul wait, with huffing and eye-rolls.

Only after the desperate notion of an ‘anti-quilt’ is vetted, will the two designers function sufficiently to select two plain fabrics within fifty minutes. One fabric for the quilt top. One for the quilt back. There is no requirement for the piecing together of any fabrics. None of that daunting co-ordination of floral with stripe, spot with paisley.

There is a palpable sense of relief.

On a roll, the two designers will take but thirty minutes to shortlist from the Liberty fabrics on offer and select one for the binding. One of the children will nap fleetingly under the cutting table.

After eighty minutes, two dazed graphic designers will be evicted from the fabric store by the three desperate (to varying degrees) children. One graphic designer will drive home, in a stunned sort of silence. She will ponder the reasons why the other graphic designer a) claims to enjoy this quilting lark and b) is dumb enough to haul three children to a fabric store. This graphic designer will wonder if the anti-quilt she has commissioned will ever arrive in time for an important birthday.

The other graphic designer will drive home in a stunned sort of silence, as two children threaten calls to Child Services for the Gross Act of Boredom inflicted upon them. The third child will seem quite perky, (after the fleeting nap) and the graphic designer knows this child will punish the Gross Act of Boredom with wakeful vengeance into the wee hours.

Some time later, after the wee hours, the graphic designer with the small amount of quilting experience, will baste the quilt. Some time after that, she will machine-quilt the living daylights out of the thing.

In the true spirit of her notion of an anti-quilt, she will do her best to make things haphazard and rule-bending – even if she doesn’t know any of the Official Rules in the first instance.

She will make many, on-purpose, anti-quilt-type, stitchy mistakes and use kilometres of multi-coloured thread.

The graphic designer will remember, at the very last moment, to stitch the personalised message requested by the other, commissioning, graphic designer.

The Anti-Quilt is finished an uncharacteristic three weeks prior to gifting deadline. Characteristically, both graphic designers leave things to the very pointy end and engage in a panicked, sixteen-mobile-calls-later, top-secret, Spooks-style handover, with a mere handful of gifting hours remaining.

.........................

* It took the graphic designer with the small amount of quilting experience, thirty eight years to work out the correct colours of the rainbow, (it turns out THAT song led her well astray) and she has never grasped ANY theories on colour. The other graphic designer, with no quilting experience, could draw you a definitive colour wheel in a snap (but a paisley pattern scares her senseless).

Click Clack Click Clack (etc)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 03:01:00 +0000

You’d be forgiven for reckoning, that along with the lapse in regular bloggy activity around these parts, that everything crafty had also taken a flying leap out the nearest window. But you’d be wrong. Admittedly it isn’t the creative sort of activity launched by a nutty notion or a DAMMIT! I AM SO GIVING THAT CRAZY IDEA A WHIRL! Ah – I miss the time for that kind of thinking and mischief and making.

Rather, it’s the therapeutic click clack of the knitting needles, that punctuate the day in tiny blocks of time. As the kettle boils for the hot water bottle (my studio ain’t no Bahamas), the wool weaves its way, the sanity holds and I can kid myself I’ve had some quality ‘me’ time. Excellently, it’s just enough to keep my world on track for weeks at a time.

So, I thought I’d better tackle this knitty malarkey in style! I’ve considered cladding my nearest and dearest (and everyone I know with a birthday) in winter woollies and angsted over online colour selection and stalked the postie waiting for the parcels of yarny goodness to arrive.

I decided way in advance that this yarn and this pattern, (modelled by the eldest), was all sorts of right for this lady. A while ago, I spent a forever knitting a 2ply cardi in the same colour – ahem, worn lots in warmer weather, er, not yet properly blogged – so I knew it well. I stitched that origami-like pattern and thought about who was going to receive it and wondered how they were travelling and hoped they would like it, all the while crafting in loads of care and some heartfelt warm.

A gift to her and to me.

Ravelled here.

In Predictable Myrtleandeunice Style, Another Deadline is Pushed to its Very Limit and as the Last Ticks of May Are Tocked, There’s a Sprint Finish...

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Wed, 30 May 2012 21:11:00 +0000

...and a Make it in May Skirt Sew-Along contribution is completed – JUST IN THE NICK OF TIME.

I can’t express the ridiculousness of posing an entirely motionless sprint finish while balancing on a wooden beam while Mr Myrtleandeunice takes a few forevers to take a pic.

On reflection I can see that I really should have ironed with care and possibly even attention, rather than in a sprint-finish, haphazard blur. On reflection, I can see that I really should consider a visit to a chiropractor (it’s not the skirt that’s crooked).

The skirt is a ClothKits purchase and I’ve been trying to grow taller since it arrived.

Usually I’m a slightly shorter a-line skirt wearer, (longer skirts make me feel 153cm and stumpy-looking) but I couldn’t bring myself to hem through those parked cars and ruin all that nice perspective.

Located not far from my London workplace, I’ve walked past the Trellick Tower, alongside those parked cars, a few times. I never imagined I’d be back in Australia, no taller and three children later, walking around looking 153cm and stumpy and WEARING the Trellick Tower.

You can sign up for Cam’s Make it in May Skirt Sew-Along over here. Best make it like Speedy Gonzales.

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PS. There’s a really lovely Rob Ryan skirt over at ClothKits. Like the Trellick version, it comes with the pattern printed on to the fabric, lining, facings, excellent instructions, zip and thread. Best suited to tall persons, those with patience to rejig a pattern, or those who can work a lengthy a-line without coming over stumpy.

PPS. I know it seems as though I’ve disappeared from this space – but in my own head I haven’t! (I enjoy this bloggy-lark too much). Apart from skin-of-the-teeth skirt making, I’ve been bizzy ‘stepping up’ to that real-world parenting gig. Geez, there’s some cathartic writing brewing, on that particular business.

PPPS. So hope all is going along swimmingly in your world.

The Fairy Godmother

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Fri, 18 May 2012 01:53:00 +0000

Meet my Fairy Godmother – he’s the one on the right. The one on the left, is a latex doppelganger, conceived back in the era of Spitting Image puppetry and the satirical UK television series. The larger than life version, was born with a glint of evil in his eye, a shocker of a temper (bellowing roar to match) and a talent for the foulest vocabulary. To this day, I have only Fairy Godmother Roger’s influence, to credit for our full-to-the-brim-and-overflowing swear jar.

Roger Law was also born with a heart of gold, though he’d deny it to the death. He disguises his acts of fairy godmotherliness in a veil of self-interest. As the creative director of Spitting Image for 13 years, capitalist (it used to say so on the business cards) and artist, he markets the employment of the latest young upstart for the advantages of enthusiasm and cheap labour. From the young upstart’s point of view, Roger presents only exciting possibility.

I met Roger at the AGIdeas design conference in Melbourne. I was his ‘minder’. Collecting a jetlagged, two-metres-taller-than-me, long-haul-from-the-UK, non-driving, backseat-driver in the wee small hours, inspires a certain level of fear. Deirdre Amsden, Roger’s wife, who was born talented, gorgeous and Thank God A Diplomat, (as well as considerably shorter and more conducive to good-humoured, sardine-like air travel), typically smoothed things over.

Later that year, with one week of a design degree remaining, I received a bolt-from-the-blue call from Rog. Did I fancy coming over to London to work on the final series of Spitting Image and could I start in ten days? Born with a gene prone to fabulous bolt-from-the-blue opportunity, I’d committed an unhesitant YES before I’d put down the phone.

I never did work as a line producer on the show, but I did play at Assistant Puppet Co-ordinator on set, hanging out on reception inbetween. As it turns out, I wasn’t born with the single-minded, eat-’em-alive drive of a TV producer – but geez, I had a heck of a lot of fun finding out. After four months, the show and an era ended, then Roger bumped into his mate, (my other Fairy Godmother) and pushed me onto the right career path.

As it happens, Roger is also my Mr’s fairy godmother. Straight out of the Royal College, the Mr landed a job as a sculptor for Spitting Image. It is therefore a lot Roger’s fault, that the Mr and I are the Mr and I. For our wedding gift we were presented with not one – but two – of Roger’s framed paintings, (the explanation in the inscriptions is: “in case of divorce”).

My Mr and I watched Artscape on Tuesday night. Both of us wore great, ridiculous grins for half an hour. This is because we were reminded that there is something else that Roger was born with. It’s a bit intangible this ‘something’. It’s a bit bloody-minded determination. It’s a lot to do with that eye glint, that palpable obsession with his craft(s) and a booming enthusiasm. Mostly it’s his infectious living life LARGE. There is no regret. There is a truckload of mistakes, tailgated by three lorry loads of swearing, and a crashing write-off of lessons learned. To top it all, the Fairy Godmother has a heartstopping talent. His ceramics are breathtaking. He draws in infinite beauty.

I don’t think I ever said a proper thank you.

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The ABC’s ‘Artscape’ programme, ‘A Law Unto Himself’ is one heck of a worthwhile, half hour watch, currently easily accessible on iView.

Watch out Sydney, Roger is back in town! His latest exhibition, ‘Travelling Light’ is on at the Mary Place Gallery, May 15 to May 20.

Finally! The Child Succumbs to (Momentary) Warmth

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Mon, 07 May 2012 00:01:00 +0000

Over the Easter weekend, I started and completed a Rubble jumper for my smallest.

It was a get-your-teeth-into-it, satisfyingly speedy knit.

Even though there have been many days of freeze-your-socks off, since Easter, it has taken veritable weeks for the child to feel the cold.

Admittedly with all that usual running around

and leaf-throwing

mischief,

the kid never really looks cold.

She was heard to declare: Mum I am soooooo snuggly! no more than three seconds before she took her Rubble jumper off.

I’ve had the Rubble pattern earmarked for ages, because it looks as sweet as all get-out as a layering garment and also because the sleeves are on the cropped side – oh, how the kid DETESTS warm wrists! (cue: Mama eye-roll).

Knitty details ravelled HERE.

The Great Mudbrick Weekend

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 01 May 2012 22:05:00 +0000

The weekend was two sleeps ago but it’s taken me this long to defrost. Wallowing in Daylesford mud, in the middle of autumn, is guaranteed to turn every extremity blue. Nonetheless, stupendous fun was had – and all in the name of Education.

The Middle Kid’s class is studying ‘dwellings’ as their main lesson. Their current homework project is to construct a hut/teepee/yurt/cave/ger/whatever-the-imagination-dictates. With great foresight, the teacher has emphasised this a Kid Homework Project. Parents wishing to get involved in the fun, should Jolly Well Make Their Own. But we ALL got to join in with the mudbrick making...

Here we are, getting straight down to the nitty, gritty, business of things – the preparatory mud wallowing:

These are the mudbrick moulds:

And releasing the mudbrick from the mould:

Here is some good, old-fashioned teamwork:

And some sheer, unadulterated MUSCLE:

Once the mudbricks are dry they will be transported to school and we’ll all get together to build some sort of...um...structure.

(Can you tell we haven’t thought that far yet?)

After the mudbricking, it was straight down to the nittier, grittier, business of things...

The mudslide.

This is one of the impressive, flying mud splats:

And that is a Washing(?) Basin in the foreground:

Amazingly, throwing fifteen or so kids and one crazy adult into an outdoor, wood-heated bath, in frosty temperatures, was a streamlined process.

(can you imagine how glorious, to soak under the stars?)

After the mudsliding, it was straight down to the nittiest, grittiest, business of things:

The huddling around the campfire, the heady waft of simmering gluhwein in the air, the sharing of food – and the sort of conversation that is never spoken, in the bustle of the normal school pick-up routine. While we adults were distracted with all that, most of the kids rushed into the bush, morphing into country-kid, Wild Things. Look what they made...

There were four huts in all. Painstakingly decorated with moss-carpeted interiors and a path swept between them. To my shame, I don’t have better pics. I’m blaming the gluhwein and the warm of that campfire.

I’m really proud of that weekend, (now I’ve defrosted). This was not an ‘official’ weekend away, organised by the school. This was a ‘thing’ that happened, because one family owned a stunning block of land in Daylesford and were unfailingly generous hosts, who stoked fires and handed out blankets and dug mud pits. It also happened, because one teacher was mightily enthusiastic about a curriculum (and mud wallowing in general). It also happened, because the class families, (I think there were fifty or so bodies, in all), pulled on their gumboots and hauled their camping gear for an overnight stay, or daytripped their way into the country. All of us, together, made a whole lot of fun stuff happen.

BLOOMIN’ MARVELLOUS.

.........................

PS. Coming soon: actual, completed, CRAFT!
PPS: I know. Hold on to your hat.

A Cobbled-Together Autumn Cowl (and Postscripts)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 07:39:00 +0000

On Sunday it was chilly in those hills. Real Autumn chilly – with a sweet, earthy smell of decaying, damp, mulching leaves underfoot. I wore my newly knitted Cobbled-Together Autumn Cowl. I stood in the middle of the forest while my kids ran around like wild things and the Mr went off on chestnut reconnaissance. I assumed that weird, taking-one-handed-photos-of-self, contortionist pose, tried to look like a happy cowl-wearing person and felt like a dork.

Three

dorks.

Ever since Monday it has been getting steadily warmer, with a weekend forecast bordering on perfection and there is very little chance that I will be wearing this cowl and taking better photos, without feeling like a bigger dork.

.........................

Postscripts
1. I know the Mr could take the photographs. But he always has an OPINION and then there’s disagreement and someone occasionally accuses someone else of behaving like a ‘dork’.

2. The Cobbled Together Autumn Cowl was supposed to be a Honey Cowl, but I failed to read the pattern, assuming I remembered everything from last year’s Honey Cowl. Twenty five centimetres into the knitting, I realised I was using a two row pattern repeat, not the required four rows. Ah, well.

3. The Cobbled-Together Autumn Cowl was supposed to be a pair of socks. I have only ever knit two socks in my life. Both are odd socks, as they are in a different yarn and knit to a different pattern. As it happens, odd socks fit in well around here. Even so, given my current inability to make the same thing twice, choosing a cowl over a third odd sock seemed a sound executive decision.

4. Cobbled-Together Autumn Cowl details here. Again, my heartiest thanks to Alexis for her beautiful yarny gift.

Random Postscripts
1. On Wednesday the Mr and I went out on a DATE! and saw Daniel Kitson in Where Once Was Wonder. Fabulous. Sadly no tickets left for the remainder of this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival but the Mr and I have made a mutual decision to be groupies and join his mailing list and thank him exuberantly for any updates he emails. I know Daniel Kitson will love this.

2. I have decided to relaunch my career. Sort of. First I need to grow up and decide what to be. Not a sock knitter.

“If You’re Going to Eat Chocolate for Breakfast You May as Well Eat Pineapple Upside-Down Cake for Dinner”

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 23:21:00 +0000

Early on Sunday morning, I squished my eyes closed tight, clamped my hands over my ears and tra-la-la-ed while my three kids relished in the delight of an entirely self-choreographed, chocolated, Easter breakfast. At one point I overheard the eldest advise the youngest to ‘listen to her body’. The youngest stopped munching and held silent and still, her head cocked to the side, for whole, long moments: LUCKY I CAN’T HEAR MY BODY TELLING ME ANYTHING!

Not long after, we piled in the car with packed lunches and headed for the hills. We found a walking track, noted the cool and the damp and the

exquisite

detail.

After a while, the voices calmed and those three kids fell back into themselves:

Dreamers...

Adventurers...

Inventors...

Bite-Off-More-Than-You-Can-Chew-ers...

The vague plan was to hang out in the hills for the day – at least ’til the Mr stumbled across a chestnut tree.

The day became foraging for chestnuts,

hoping like heck a spiked meteorite wouldn’t plummet to earth, via a human head.

We rushed home – quicksticks! – for fire-building, roasting and toasting. Spent the afternoon and early evening in the backyard, by the fire, babysitting those chestnuts,

drinking tea, listening to just one more Harry Potter chapter, waiting for spur-of-the-moment, Pineapple Upside-Down Cakes to emerge from the oven. More chocolate was consumed. More Mama eyes were averted.

The Chief Chestnut Roaster (aka Mr Myrtleandeunice) noted the knit-knit-(not-stopping)-knitting of the Rubble jumper,

and suggested rustic hunks of Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, a perfectly viable dinner. He reckoned that was the kind of wisdom he’d be happy to be quoted on.

A Sunday packed to the brim and overflowing and runneth over-ing with GOOD.

Monday night dinner: virtuous, brownest rice; holier-than-thou broccolini. Tonight: less smug, (buttery) brussel sprouts and chestnuts.

Just all ’round YUM.

E is for Easter(ish)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 01:42:00 +0000

Usually, at this time of year I hunt out the carefully wrapped handmade-every-year-by-us Easter decorations. Usually, there is as much ceremony involved with decorating the Easter Tree, as there is with the end of year festive version.

Somewhat guiltily, I note a new Easter ‘usually’ developing. A ‘usually’ that involves a second year of Mum not having the FOGGIEST which Very Safe Place the treasured Easter decorations are hidden. A ‘usually’ involving a last minute attempt to engage disgruntled offspring in a whole, new approach to festooning the Easter tree. A ‘usually’ prompting mess and fabric scraps and PVA glue (with the bonus fun of peeling dried PVA glue ‘skin’ off fingers and face and hair and clothes and Mum’s fingers and face and hair and clothes).

Once we finished our Easter Tree, we all stepped back and there was a little sigh and a small voice wondered where, oh where, are the Easter decorations?

This year buttons saved Easter.

A few strands

of speedy button threading

and there was consensus that now our house is definitively Easter-

ISH.

Someone has posed an Easter Chick at the base of the Easter tree.

He’s doing his level best to be convinced.

.........................

PS. MAY YOUR EASTER BE SLATHERED IN DRIPPING-WITH-BUTTER HOT CROSS BUNS AND GET-TOGETHERS AND HUNTINGS OF THE CHOCOLATIEST KIND!

With My Head in My Hands...

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 20:55:00 +0000

HEAD IN HANDS REASON #1
Smallest Child Declares to Kinder Teacher:
“AT MY HOUSE WE’RE SICK OF SEX!”

Later translated at kinder pick-up by mother of Smallest Child (me):
“AT MY HOUSE WE HAVE STICK INSECTS!”

.........................

HEAD IN HANDS REASON #2
At morning tea, Kinder Teacher regales children with stories of her dog. Smallest Child declares that she too, has a worthy dog story:
“SOMETIMES MY DAD PUTS ON A RUBBER GLOVE AND SQUEEZES OUR DOG’S ANAL GLAND!”

Kinder Teacher pushes away her plate of hummus and rice cake and is forced to define ‘anal gland’ to 23 kinder children.

.........................

HEAD IN HANDS REASON #3
Smallest Child campaigns to teacher for an Adventure outside the kinder. Smallest Child is emphatic that Adventure involves scouring streets in search of roadside finds “LIKE WHAT MUM AND DAD DOES EVERY DAY!”

In the defence of the Smallest Child’s parents (who do not ‘scour’ but merely keep an ‘eye out’), the Smallest Child has been enjoying the use of a roadside violin find. Currently played as a three-stringed cello.

Recently valued at a surprising, (for a roadside find), $1200.

Dodgy Parenting and Craft Floozy-ing

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Sun, 18 Mar 2012 07:52:00 +0000

Last week, the Mr and I were lying in our ripple-blanketed bed, chatting, (except he was already asleep). We decided the best way to parent the third kid would be to largely ignore her. Of course we’d read her an occasional story and feed her but she’s dressed herself since forever and has taught herself how to leap tall buildings in a single bound, without any interference from Mum or Dad. The Mr and I also decided, (except he was already snoring), that one day we would apologise to the eight and ten year old, for not largely ignoring them.

To make up for all that past hovering, helicopter parenting, the next day we let all three kids drive the car:

1. Under Age Driver

2. Even More Under Age Driver

3. Ridiculously (Can-Only-Just-See-Over-The-Dashboard-When-Sitting-On-Dad’s-Knee) Under Age Driver

If you would like four more suggestions of dangerous activities you should let your children do, then click over to this fun TED talk. I am proud to say we have all five basically covered. I am also proud to confirm that no kid breached any driving speed limits.

In more sedate news, I’ve come over all craft floozy again. I can’t stick to any one thing and I haven’t even the foggiest what this pink knittery is even meant to become. The Small keeps asking when her ‘thingy’ will be finished. But the poor Small keeps being ignored.

I have managed to make a good start on this blue knittery which looks like a large, thick, ribbed sock. There are two holes for legs and it will remain open-ended, so sometime soon, before things get frosty, Jasper the Dog will have a possibly humiliating, thick, ribbed, sock-thing to keep him warm.

Between rows of dog ‘sock’, I’ve been surveying the ripple blanket scraps and opening a whole new can of blanket worms, which I am inevitably destined to regret.

I’ve been feeling very sorry for my eight year old boy-kid. When I last performed cooking duty with his class, apparently I danced. DANCED! Possibly at the same time as the muffin mixture was doing its Mixmaster mixing thing. I can only begin to imagine how embarrassing this was and have promised to limit all dancing to gardening and reading duty only.

To make up for such indignity, I have made a start on a quilt for him. He’s been asking for a while, since before he started growing up a bit more and needing to act a bit cooler. Before he started losing some of that breathtakingly-precious, carefree, kid-innocence.

I thought I’d better get cracking and stitch in a whole quilt load of love before he decides he doesn’t need it anymore.

The Blanket of Epic! FINISHED! (With a Small Disclaimer)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 03:45:00 +0000

73,528 treble-based crochet stitches later and the way I figure things, my snuggly queen-sized ripple blanket is FINISHED.

It looks convincingly finished on top of our bed,

even if I haven’t yet got around to spray painting the bedroom and the Mr’s birthday suit a nice, crisp, contrasting white.

The big kid has thrice attempted to claim it as her own

and once succeeded for an entire night, when I was wrongfooted by her sudden, complimentary enthusiasm for crocheted craft.

The Mr deemed me well within my rights to indulge in another WOOHOO! blanketing moment

and dutifully lobbed kilos of crocheted yarn into the air.

Perhaps the eagle-eyed, the Those Who Know Me Too Well, the Doubting Thomas types, just spotted the ‘disclaimer’ in my ‘finished’?

OK, nearly finished.

Dangly disclaimer bits aside, finished enough.

PS. It wouldn't be dubbed the Epic Blanket if I didn’t whinge about end-weaving-in for the next three years.

PPS. Crafted using Lucy’s pattern here. Ravelled here.

’Scuse Me While I Veer Off On A Random Tangent...

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 00:44:00 +0000

As I was saying, I have a new-to-me sewing machine. This came about, not because I was proactive in any way, shape, or form but because Nikki needed some designy-type stuff done. May I suggest, that being presented with a sewing machine that entirely ROCKS, along with a bazillion sewing machine feet and associated gizmos and a swisho case on WHEELS, may be the most excellent swap for services rendered?

As emphatically requested, my new machine is low on superfluous bells and whistles and big on the everything-I-need. Big on ‘workhorse’. It’s weighty. Reliable.

Because the last machine was basically pathetic and couldn’t do any free-wheelin’, sketchy stuff, (you need to be able to lower those feed dogs for that), please do bear with me, while I veer off on my random craft tangent...

.........................

Sing
at the top of your lungs

at a red traffic light
with your window open
and your teenager
in the passenger seat

(Don’t mind me, I’ve been musing over future revenge upon my children).
.........................

At a wedding
the two 90 plus grannies
are congratulated
for attending...

Is that weird?

(The fact that the grannies made it to the wedding was remarked upon in three separate speeches. Both grannies looked lovely – and more importantly, lively).

.........................

Actually, this one is less of a tangent and more a reflection on everyday life.

(as well as an acknowledgement of the trouble I’m in, after the granny speech commentary).

.........................

Hope your weekend is fabulously high on nice tangents, definitively low on controversy.

In a Startling Turn of Events, the Marinating Quilt is Completed and Posed on The Front Gate

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 06:58:00 +0000

Fellow craft campers, steel yourselves. In a burst of Dammit! I AM a finisher! the quilt top destined to marinate in its juices for veritable epochs (i.e. ages longer than five months), is basted, quilted and completed with a smug, handstitched binding.

Here it is, not posed on the front gate...

...

There are 560 little and littler squares of the very scrappiest scraps. I love scraps. Scraps have history.

There are bits of screenprinting history:

Inklings of ‘T is for Towel’ history:

There’s the big girl’s favourite dress history:

There’s long-time-fabric-fave history:

After I’d finished the quilt top at Camp, I gathered up most of the scrappy quilt top scraps and made a scrappy cushion cover. There are scrappy cushion cover scraps, waiting in the wings and, a bit weirdly, I sense a scrappy potholder in my destiny. (Just thinking about scrappy potholder scraps is scary).

I keep throwing the scrappy quilt in an artful, spontaneously considered fashion, over the arm of the sofa. Tragically, no one else seems to appreciate the spontaneously artfully considered. Every time I turn around, the scrappy quilt has been unceremoniously pegged to the Other Thing Which Did Take Six Epochs to Finish and morphed into another kid cubby house.

Go figure.

The Magpie

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:23:00 +0000

At some point in every day, there’s a wash load to tackle and dirty clothes to sort. There will be a pair of jaw-droppingly filthy trousers or shorts belonging to the collector kid, the boy kid, the Magpie. There’ll be no getting around the need to fully investigate this kid’s every pocket. I know there is no getting around blindly poking my fingers into the deepest pocket crevices, because once or twice I squeezed my eyes shut and la-la-la-la-ed with my hands over my ears and slammed the washing machine door shut and pressed ON.

Nothing like freshly laundered bug carcass, spread over an entire wash load.

Last week I thought I’d do a study. See what shiny and not so shiny objects caught my Magpie Kid’s eye...

Monday
Irrefutable proof lunchboxes are a shared affair at school. No bug carcass.

Tuesday
Irrefutable proof the child drinks beer at school. No bug carcass.

Wednesday
Irrefutable proof the child is solely responsible for introducing gall wasp to our lemon tree. No bug carcass (probably a thousand, living, unhatched, waspy ones inside that nice piece of holey wood).

Thursday
Irrefutable proof of school gardening day. Kid plotting own stealth kitchen garden. No bug carcass.

Friday
Irrefutable proof of Excursion With Mum into City to See Jess’ Grand Exhibition and all her red SOLD! dots. No bug carcass.

Saturday
Irrefutable proof my kid is the thief stealing all the copper wire and shutting down entire railways and phone lines. Makes up for this by finding a button for the jar. No bug carcass.

Sunday
Irrefutable proof that nonchalent rummaging through the Magpie’s pockets is a Very Bad Idea. One arachnid carcass.

(I checked. He intends to keep EVERYTHING).

Dipping a Toe in the Water

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:33:00 +0000

One day when I sew something tricksy and pushing my comfort zone and involving more than a half available half hour (and no doubt, multiple zips, purse frames and Vliesofix tape), I’m going to tell you about my newly-acquired, fantabulous sewing machine. In the meanwhile, I found a half available half hour and dipped a toe in the sewing water and knocked up an easy peasy sundress. Now the Small is clad in something newly Mama-made, which was absolutely and entirely the main point of things.

Even though it could do with a good, soften the fabric-type wash, it has survived a day of gymnast-style manoeuvres

and backyard pottering

and general giggle-silly.

In other Sunday news, the Mr gave bagel-making a whirl.

Thoroughly tested (demolished) within fifteen minutes of oven removal. SERIOUS YUM.

In further news, the leafy stick insects are growing in size and in number. Thirty? Maybe forty with some recent hatchings?

Even though we’re all besotted with every single one of them, a house extension, purely to accommodate a possible 347 stick insects is, sadly, not an option. We’ve been busy interviewing (grilling) potential adoption candidates and performing police checks and stuff.

Hope your weekend has been all about good smells coming out of ovens with a bit of giggle-silly...

Ripple Smitten

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:08:00 +0000

Just when I thought the Epic Blanket honeymoon period was about to end, a whole extra pile of work landed on my desktop and it seemed I worked every waking hour (and quite a few unwaking ones). Every now and then, I’d smuggle time to crochet a ripple blanket row. The Epic Blanket is therapeutic, rocking-in-the-corner, crafty sanity at its best.

So far the Epic Blanket has taught me three things.

1. No use regretting colour choices. Just keep plugging on and all the rows will merge into one colour explosion. Everything will come out all right in the wash.

Although there’d be an epic tanty if the colour did come out in the wash.

2. I have short legs.

The above image was trying to give you an idea of scale. This doesn’t help a heck of a lot unless you’re standing next to me, in which case you’d be thinking: Wow. Five foot, one and a half inches really isn’t very tall. That blanket is smaller than I thought.

While you were reflecting on my shortness, I went off and counted stitches:

364 stitches per row
72 rows
= a cool 26,208 treble-based stitches to date.
Well that sounds big. Non?

3. In order to live with such a blast of all-round, queen-sized colour, I think it best we spray-paint our entire bedroom white.

I have informed the Mr that he should also wear white pyjamas for full co-ordinating effect. Or, more likely, a spray-painted birthday suit. Here is what our white, spray-painted bedroom will look like, with the Mr sleeping in his white, spray-painted birthday suit (just imagine the blanket):

PS. For more blasts of crafty colour, pop on over to the land of Our Creative Spaces.
PPS. Easiest, peasiest, ripple blanket pattern by Lucy.

The Potted Version (As Opposed to the Extended, Post-Holiday, Slide Night Kind)

noreply@blogger.com (Tania) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 04:24:00 +0000

Yesterday evening we arrived home, stinky and grimy after ten days of camping and I’m estimating the hosing down and cleaning and packing away a No-Less-Than-Three-Stage Operation.

Worth every single wash load.

An absolute privilege, the hanging about in a stunningly beautiful environment,

serenaded from dawn to dusk by an orchestral movement of bellbirds.

There were some kid dynamics to navigate but there was oh, so much more, to mark a fabulous holiday with some blooming excellent people.

Holiday Happenings In No Particular Order...

1. The Middle’s glee at getting close enough to one of the many camp Lace Monitors to have it whip him painfully in the neck with its tail.

2. The pickling of this kid (and, well, every other kid, because they rarely stood on dry land) in a seawater/freshwater brine.

3. The not entirely covert camp kitchen ransacking by Nigel and Doug and Nigel and Doug and Nigel and Doug the Brush-tailed Possums. The realisation that Nigel, (or possibly Doug), is partial to a jar of peanut butter.

4. The discovery of some local residents:

nb. The current, post-holiday BCC (Bug Carcass Count), after emptying two of the Middle Kid’s pockets, stands at six. Please know the Middle Kid only ever collects bits of dead bug and this magnificent (breathing) specimen is, no doubt, still pootling about on some branch-let.

5. The breakfast consumption of some freshly-fished residents:

6. The search for the resident Red-bellied Black Snake at the shower block proved fruitless. Who knows where he was – lurking behind a loo, no doubt. But we found his stunningly elegant brother:

7. Despite photographic evidence to the contrary, there was jumping into water from height as opposed to jumping into tree from height.

8. Expeditions were mounted:

9. HMAS Sinkable was launched:

(unless one weighs no more than a sprite, things tend to get wet. Entertainingly so, for those onshore).

10. Fires were crafted:

11. Things were cooked on sticks:

12. The very beginnings of a late-night, 500 card game addiction initiated.

13. Australia Day was acknowledged:

14. There is actual evidence that I was there too, waving at you from inside a bubble:

15. A start was made on the Epic Blanket,

(mostly over the nine hour, each-way car journey),

and that the ends, yet to be woven in and bemoaned, are currently coming along quite photogenically.

Weird to think that it’s back to the school routine in not too many ticks of the clock.