Its a long way from here...

Today I traveled. A long way. Relatively anyway; we're pretty good travelers, us Aussies. But still, here I sit, 947km from home (according to google).


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And now I'm here I find myself at a bit of a loose end (here is lovely by the way).



There are no children to feed or bathe. Nothing to clean or maintain. Just me and free broadband internet. So I've downloaded some photos and I'm ready to bombard you with them. A potted history of our June, if you will.

Lily lost her first tooth! She's been walking around bearing her teeth at anyone who will look... Its pretty disturbing.

We got two new family members - Meggs on the left and Sophie on the right. Meggs is named for the Australian cartoon Ginger Meggs; and Sophie for the main character in Mamma Mia. Lily named Sophie. We tried to dissuade her from that name, but its stuck. Paddy calls them 'Meh' and 'Sousie'. They're still pretty timid - especially Meggs - but they're warming up slowly.

I made this hat for Nath. I love it. Its Marram by Eskimimmi (rav link). Its a really clever pattern that looks far more complex than it is. Only problem is that its too short. Based on comments on rav I added another repeat, but its still too short. Oh well. I'm still really proud of it.


I also knitted this cowl for a colleague at work. He loved it, however my cast off may have been a little tight... like, he got it on then couldn't get it off for quite some time... A little unpicking and looser cast off fixed it though and he's pretty chuffed. The middle pattern is a row of double yarn overs which means that when its on the yarn folds towards the neck, making it extra warm.

Lily and I found the most enormous strawberry in a punnet the other day... it must have been a couple that just grew together... but it was pretty stunning! Guess who had the best lunchbox that day...


And a picture of Paddy as you'll most likely find him nowadays. If you ask him to do something he closes his eyes. If you ask him to stop doing something he closes his eyes. Its his way of pretending to not hear you. He does it alot at dinner time...

So there you go. Amazing what kind of posts you can do with a bit of time... I've still got tomorrow night away - but its the final of Project Runway so I see myself holed up in my 'spa bure' with some chocolate and the remote... See ya!

First Female Australian Prime Minister

OMG – Australia has its first female Prime Minister – so very exciting! Congratulation Julia Gillard!

Trippin'

During my work life I've been pretty lucky with work and work trips; working with a mining industry body saw me in an underground mine; I saw heaps of regional Victoria and east-coast Australia working with a Senator; got to live on the Brisbane/Sunshine Coast for six months with CHOGM and meet the Queen.

But the most diverse and wonderful ones have been with my current employer (10 years this year!). They've sent me to Johannesburg for a month, on a tour of far north Queensland's recycled oil reclamation facilities (mostly rubbish dumps and a sewerage facility!), lots of Zoos and recently lots of parts of Australia I wouldn't have seen otherwise.

Now that I have a family I don't like to travel too much - it puts too much pressure on Nath and its draining. Work travel isn't really very glamorous and usually cuts into personal time more than you expect. So next week I'll be heading to northern NSW and losing most of my Sunday in order to get to a pretty regional location for a meeting. As a result I'm going to stay somewhere nice. Nicer than I'd normally stay at but still within my travel allowance.

I think it will help ease the pain a little... and I'm kinda looking forward to it.

Gifties

I don't have the energy to really blog about these bits - I'm proud of them and they were both gifts for colleagues. The details are on rav.


Kimono for Monica it was pretty but really dense resulting fabric.



And this foxy cowl for a lovely lady who helped me at work.


I've still got a few more gifts for lovely folks. I'm really enjoying knitting at the moment.

Lost and running

I was looking over at One Crafty Mother and she's just posted about a song her son made up and was singing in the car

"Sometimes, you open your eyes but you can't see da world." Finn sings from the backseat. "You open your eyeeeess but you can't seeeeeee da world."

I ask him what he is singing, but he doesn't answer, just keeps on singing: "and dat's just da way it is, sometimes, wif da world."

It made me think that sometimes kids make you stop and think about where you're going and how you're getting there. It also made me think about the time I was singing "Lost and Running" by Powderfinger in the car when Lil asked me about the lyrics

Oh I'm still lost and running
I can't get enough
No I'm still lost and running
I can't get enough
No I'm still lost and running
Somewhere I lay down my arms
Oh I'm still lost and running
I can't get enough

She asked me what 'lost and running' meant and I said sometimes we don't know where we're going and it might not be the right way but we're going there fast. She asked me if i felt like that sometimes. I said "yeah, sometimes" while thinking "yeah, all the fricken' time". She said "don't worry, you're going the right way." Could've been that we were nearly home, or that she thought I was doing ok. I choose the later. And felt a little bit better.

Little Dutch girl

My father was born in the Netherlands. He arrived in Australia at four and my grandparents fully integrated into the Australian lifestyle. A bit too much I think. We never really heard much about Holland from my grandparents, which makes me sad. My Beppe was obviously crafty and I think she could have shared lots with me about her life in Friesland. Of course we often realise these things too late. Since she died I've developed more of an interest in Dutch things and have been finding lots of lovely, lovely Dutch bloggers. Here are some:

Grietjekarwietje
This lovely lady likes a bit of upcycling, a bit of drawing, a bit of crafting, and a bit of waldorf doll making...


guusjes-appeltaart
This lass does lovely screenprint art, and a bit of cooking, and posts photos of the most gorgeous children!


Under Dutch Skies
An American (I think?) in Holland, a knitter, online yarn shop owner and an observer of things...


Little Z handmade
Oh my she has some lovely stuff... A thrifter and a crafter.

These two little fellas are transfers - how cute would they be on kids shirts?


Even though I don't understand much of the text on these sites (despite Google Translator!) I love clicking through and checking out where they link to.

Check

Empty house? Check
Tissues? Check
Humidifier? Check
Vicks - applied liberally to all available flesh? Check
Comfort food - ham, cheese, tomato toastie, pikelets with butter, jam and cream, macaroni cheese awaiting?* Check
Tea? Check
Bed? Check
Laptop with Bleak House ready to go? Check
Heavily congested head and sinus pain? Check

All ready for the day then.

Image from http://s259.photobucket.com/albums/hh297/kbroglio/?action=view&current=sick-girl_032909.jpg&newest=1

*I never lose my appetite when sick...

Another year marches by

Another ANZAC day in Sydney for me. This year was more sad than previously. Four members left in Pa's Association, Z Special Unit (mentioned here ). My Pa is the handsome man holding the wreath.

My husband was again proudly with him in the march.


After the march we headed to The National Maritime Museum for lunch and a trip around the harbour in The Krait - a small fishing boat (not the submarine in the picture). Pa spent two and a half years on a boat very much like this - the The Tiger Snake.


He and his 9 (8?) mates served in Borneo, in their little junk behind Japanese lines. To be in Z you couldn't have any tattoos. They carried no dog tags. They did have suicide pills. He was not able to talk about this experiences for 40 years after the end of the war. I cannot even begin to imagine what he went through. Pa was the stoker on the Tiger Snake and spent most of his time in the engine room. I got a glimpse of the depth of emotion when he got on the Krait and looked in at the engine room (about 10 seconds after this photo).
He was overcome and got off the boat as fast as he could. He couldn't speak. He just turned to me and said - choked - 'all our mates' and then ran his thumb across his throat. I just squeezed his hand - what could I say? He recovered (with the assistance of two very healthy 'fingers' of rum). And then thanked us for being with him. He didn't go out on the boat around the harbour - my Mum and cousins did and were touched by the experience. My sister, my husband and I stayed with Pa, mostly just to be with him (but also because my sister and I suffer horrifically from seasickness - a story for another day).

I'm so honoured to have shared the ANZAC Day experience with my Pa - and my Nana - for the last 10 years. I'm proud of him and his service. I love you Pa. Thank you.

What a difference a day (or two) makes...

So after an awful Monday, I had a wonderful Tuesday at a training course! It was enough to renew my spirits (surprising, no?) and on Wednesday and Thursday had a much better attitude. Lots of breathing and trying not to think to much really helped!!

And yesterday I was home with the kidlets.

Since Lil started school I've not had both of them for a full day - it was nice! Primarily because I looked at it in terms of what I could do to make it fun for them - rather than trying to get my stuff done. We went down to the school carpark and Lil showed me how she learned to ride her bike (on Tuesday with my Dad). She was pretty good! Then we went for coffee and a play in the big mushroom at the Belconnen Markets with my sister. Lil ran into a kid from her school who is known as the 'naughty boy'. I didn't know it was the NB. They played nicely and laughed and had a great time. Until it was time to go and he yelled 'bye bye f**king head' - which is his hallmark farewell. Then I knew it was the NB... Otherwise he seemed lovely. I'm loathe to label him a naughty boy, because, well, people in glass houses and all that.

And now its the weekend again. I was just cruising through my blogs and my head nearly exploded when I saw that one of my embroidery pieces was featured on Craft! So hello if you've come by from there. Ironically, I made the picture when I was cleaning out my embroidery floss, which Nana had gifted to me because she no longer used it. Then Nana asked for it all back and I couldn't say no because it was all hers... so I'm not doing much embroidery at the mo! I did do the embroidery button swap over at feeling stitchy and did these for Quinne


And she sent me this lovely package:




Anyhoo, I'm off to visit a friend that just had a bub (great reason to start a baby cardy) and then to Mum's for dinner. Enjoy yours!

P.S The roses are from my inlaws garden. They not only look stunning but they smell divine!

Grrr

I'm starting in a new area today - for 3-6 months - and I'm scared shitless. I know the people, i pretty much know the work, I know all the parameters, and yet all those stupid fears i have about my ability to do anything competently are banging around in my head and making me crazy.

Its been building up over the weekend and so I've done what I always do - play dead. Not really play dead, but become so paralysed by fear of failure at everything that I don't do anything. Except mope and make a nuisance of myself. Unfortunately my husband is so excellent that he stands in for me and is the only functioning adult in the house. I say unfortunately because if he wasn't so capable I'd have to get my shit together and keep going. But I don't. I sit on the couch while he does everything. And then when he's finished doing everything he brings me cheese and biscuits. And then I drink and don't feel any better (duh) and all of this is just more for me to get down on myself about.

What's worse is that I know how to fix it. I know I have to "fake it till I make it" but with all the energy I possess being diverted to unhelpful thoughts I don't think I can fake it.

You are my sunshine.

So I find it difficult to come up with post headings most of the time. I always think of the same ones and have to check if I've used them before. And I'm always jealous of those who have a theme like 'song titles' or cities or whatever. So I was thinking about a post (its been a while) and I thought I'd go with a song. But then it reminded me about my history with this song. The story begins now...

When my husband and I were going out we lived briefly with his parents. It was primarily because I had to move to Brisbane for work temporarily and had moved out of my granny flat and had nowhere to go in the interim. Anyway, the day came when I had to go, and I gave him a little gift to remember me by. It was a sponge duck, which when emersed in water would play an electronic beeping version of 'you are my sunshine'. Remove it from the water and it would stop. After this touching gift I'm sure we embraced and then I drove away.

That night as I sat in a hotel room somewhere near the Queensland border I called Nath. He had just got out of the bath and had put the duck in the water. It beeped as expected. Then he took it out. It kept beeping. We agreed that it must have a little residual water in it and took bets on how many hours it would take to stop beeping. The box had said it would go for around 3 hours!

The next morning Nathan rang. It had not stopped beeping. At some stage during the night he had angrily stomped into the bathroom and shoved it in the laundry basket under some towels. When checked in the morning it was still going strong with its incessant 'you are my sunshine'...

That night (24 hours after the fateful bath) it was still beeping. His father banished it from the house.

The next day I was in serious trouble. The sponge duck of doom was still beeping. And although it had been removed from the house it caused the dog to howl all night(the dog had evidently tired of the bloody song too).

I told Nath that maybe he should just rip the damn thing open and step on its infernal sound mechanism. But this was personal. It was him versus the duck. And in the end only one would still beep.

That night (48 hours post bath) it went into the garage in a suitably soundproofed receptacle where its beeping could not enrage or induce insanity in the residents.

For four days post bath - 96 hours give or take - Satan's duck poured forth its demon's song. Nathan vowed that if he ever had to hear it again then the singer would be eviscerated immediately.

Flash forward three years to the birth of our daughter. Night time. Colic-y baby that won't settle. I'm swaying and singing everything short of 'i like big butts' to try and sooth the child. In what can only have been a moment of insanity I launched into 'you are my sunshine'. The child stops. And it becomes the only song that will soothe her.

I estimate that given she is 5.5 years now and that I would have sung it at least 10 times a day for the first two years, and at least once a night every day since that I have sung it 4,927 times. That's all three verses. And that's not counting the times I've sung it to Paddy.

I think I've been punished enough.

Longing

Last weekend saw me and four spectacular women head down to Longbeach for a girls weekend.

It was pretty hard work.

We had dinner in the Bay on Friday night

then headed back to our humble accomodation...

On Saturday brunched in the Bay and gathered supplies so we had no further need to leave our house.

The other four went for a run and a swim. I did not (see post on aversion to sand).

Our mobile masseuse came to the house and massaged us in turn (for 7 hours!!).

Then we sat and read and talked and knitted and slept and listened to the beach and music and had facials and did our nails and ate and drank and generally relaxed.

It was wonderful. We didn't have to do any parenting, or nagging, or warning or disciplining. We didn't use the TV or the internet (although the phones were a must so we could hear how the boys faired without us).

It was a perfect weekend. And I'm already longing for the next one...

Only a mother could love...

As a parent, there are no more attractive children than your own.

From the moment their mushed up faces emerge from within you, you are smitten.

Every smile lights up your heart like a little bushfire.

Their eyes dance with laughter and your soul soars.

You peer into the prams of other parents and say 'aren't they gorgeous!' while thinking 'but not a patch on my little sproglett'

And then - one random Saturday - your son; your pride; your joy says 'Mummy...'

But when you turn around it seems all that pride in your child's seems ill-placed...



Then of course the older child wants to join in.


And yes, the backwards facing goggles have been removed and the faces have returned to normal. And yet, the image remains burned into my retinas.

The big O

Not a huge Oscar's fan but...



Tina Fey looks great!


SJP does not.

Coasting and such

We went away for a couple of days this weekend, being the Canberra Day long weekend. Nath and I are generally homebodies and don't really like going away. Nathan and I also don't like sand. Or sun. Or sweating. So the coast is pretty much the worst place we could be... but the kids love the beach so it was coastward bound we found ourselves.


Between gritted and gritty teeth we wandered and splashed and played.



I guess it wasn't so bad.




That is until the Ben Hur of the spider world found its way into the house. (Nathan and I also don't like spiders.)


We had an epic battle disposing of this bread-and-butter-plate-size arachnid. Amid much spraying and screaming and jumping and running (ours, not the kids) we emerged victorious. It has confirmed our belief that we must train Paterson to be the great white spider hunter.

And on the way home we had our third experience with 'gum in the hair thanks to Willy Wonka'. From memory, when the Violet Beauregard character (in both versions of the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) is about to try the three course meal gum, she takes out her current piece of gum and sticks it behind her ear.

Three times Lily has attempted this.

Three times she's had large chunks of hair removed from her scalp. Because I'm not that mother that's going to go through several hours of bright-blue chewing gum removal so she still looks normal. I'm the mother that hacks the blue right out and leaves a hole where the hair should be, because she never looks like she brushes it anyway.

Rosie

Lily and Rosie 2006

This morning we had our cat, Rosie, put down.

I've spoken about Rosie before. As I said in that post Nathan and I got her from the RSPCA just before the 2003 Canberra Bushfires. We found a little cat, about 6-12 months old who was likely to be put down because she wasn't a cute little kitten anymore and decided to take her home. She was a big-looking cat, but was actually just really furry. We called her Rosie.

Rosie loved being with us. She used to sit beside us all night. She sat on my belly when I was pregnant with Lil. But she had been absent more since the children arrived - primarily to escape too much loving. 'Rosie' was one of the first words Lily ever said. She crawled so that she could catch Rosie. Lily used to eat her food. She was often found sleeping under Paterson's cot. Paddy used to try to copy me whistling for her, cupping his hands around his mouth and calling 'who hoo'. She taught Paddy a valuable lesson about problem solving; one day he was trying to hit her with a plastic golf club and she hid under the sideboard. He notice the golf club wasn't long enough for him to be able to reach her, so he dropped it and went and found something longer... (clever, and slightly sociopathic...)

When I got home yesterday i knew something wasn't quite right. She seemed to have a problem with her back leg. I made a vet appointment, and then went to get her to bring her in the house so I'd know where to find her in time for the appointment. She sat quietly on the couch between me and Paddy; Paddy still and very gentle with her for a change. Lily and I took her to the vet and he when she got up to walk he noticed she was walking in circles, and only turning to the left. Apparently it was indicative of brain trauma, or infection. He dosed her up on antibiotics and kept her overnight, saying that if it were infection then we should see a big improvement by morning. And if not, then the kindest thing to do would be to put her down.

She didn't improve overnight.

So this morning I went in to see her in her little cage. She was quiet; she never was one to meow much. I patted her and talked to her about all the other noisy animals in the room, tears dropping slowly onto my shirt. She began to purr quietly. She rested her head in my hand and let me rub under her neck. The vet came then, and I picked her up to take her into the consulting room. They shaved her forearm, and I rubbed her neck. She started to purr again. Then meowed as the needle went in. She purred. Then stopped.

And now I'm at home I see her shadow everywhere she should be. I can feel my self prepare to see her, then the disappointment and sadness when I don't.

The worst thing is that this is not a pain that I'll experience alone. We haven't told Lily yet. We plan to pick her and her brother up, and go to the garden centre together to find a Rose to plant to remember her. I hope that helps her, because I don't really know how else to approach it.

So, bye bye Rose. Thanks for the cuddles and purrs and scratches and friendly bites, and putting up with the kids and their attempts to love you. We'll miss you.

Busy bee

Paddy had to have grommets (small tubes, not small surfers) put in his ears on Thursday. He's come through really well, but is very quiet, doesn't want to go outside, and only wants to watch Dora. Poor poppet. But that means that I've been able to get a bit of crafty stuff done that I've wanted to do for ages.

Firstly this.
I think I'd seen something similar on the web somewhere. So on Thursday arvo I painted up this random piece of wood (mdf) blue, then brown. I wanted it to look like a eucalypt forest so just drew some long tree shapes, then yesterday morning started carving them out with my lino cutting tools.

Too easy. MDF is totally the wrong wood - no grain showed through, just that fibrous wood. I was going to clean up the edges, but they look better not being 'sharp'. From a distance it looks great. I can't wait to try it again with some decent wood.


Then this.


I cleaned out my embroidery box the other day and gathered up all the stray floss laying around afterwards. It looked so pretty and so I thought I'd use it for something. I was going for a eye type of image and was going to have all the threads coming out as eyebrows.


But it looked pretty good when they kind of exploded out of that shape. Now I don't really know what it is, but I like it!