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!

Mamma mia...

Last weekend Lily and I went to Melbourne* with her friend M and her mum S.

Lily and M have a love-hate relationship. They've been friends since they first started childcare at 15 months and have been pretty much inseparable since. Except when you have to separate them for their own safety. Or your sanity. In the beginning it was just your standard hair pulling/face biting (seriously)/pushing each other type confrontations. Now they fight about who is the best swimmer, dancer or singer. ALL. THE. TIME. I probably would have discouraged such a competitive friendship long ago, but I really like her mum (and her son gets on really well with Paddy so we won't be parting ways anytime soon). That and the fact that I guess they're kind of like sisters - they fight hard but love harder. And having each other has given them a confidence at school that has been incredible. They are the two that the other kids gravitate to - because they are sure of themselves because they have each other. As long as the other one is there they are fine. And its not like they're totally codependent - they've each made other friends in the three weeks they've been at school. Anyhoo.

We went to Melbourne to see Mamma Mia. The girls love it so we thought we'd do a girls weekend. While waiting for the show we walked around the city a bit and I found my favourite fountain. It reminds me of a similar one in Bathurst...


The girls loved it! They kept re-enacting it - at breakfast, in the hotel foyer, on the tram and down at St Kilda beach.


We went to see the markets and had some lunch down by the beach. It was really nice. Except for the dead jelly fish.



Then it was time to take two very tired, very grumpy children back home. It will be a nice memory for them hopefully. For me it will be a reminder to always take a leash when I'm taking the child to large cities.


* It was a flying visit - and the first time I'd been to Melbourne in 18 months. It made me realise how much I want to go back without any 'hangers on' so that I can catch up with the lovely folk I know down there and see the places I want to see.

I'm hot

Gentle reader. Please allow me permission to boast. I'm hot, and new according to craftster!!!

I'm positive this is random - but how cool to be on the front page of craftster???

FO - lace ribbon scarf

I started this in September 2008 and decided that I had to finish it before beginning anything new*.


So here it is. Lace Ribbon scarf, in merino bambino, knitted on nana's old tortoiseshells. I didn't do as many pattern repeats across the scarf as required and in retrospect I think it may have been a mistake. It's as long as I am tall. It could have been longer but I was bored to tears by the end. Great TV knitting though.


It was knitted for my sister. But as she's sitting on a beach in Mexico at the moment she's not received it. I'm frankly a little offended that she didn't hang around to receive it. Screwy priorities I reckon.

*I did start a little jacket for my step niece in bendy 4 ply... but that doesn't count!

More embroidery

I made this for my sister last year. Another thing that wasn't blogged!


She loves this haiku

Here is the dark tree
Denuded now
Of leafage...
But a million stars

Shiki




I love it too.


I love this embroidery too.

Homage

I first drafted this post before Paterson was born, in mid 2007. I never posted it and I don't know why. The link doesn't have the image i used anymore - but it does have her other work on it.

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Wandering the net one day I found the wonderful Muffin's site... all her illustrations are just delightful, but there was one that truely resonated.

I was so taken with it that I decided to embroider her. I'm nearly all finished - barring the legs. I'm not so happy with my take on her mouth and head incline - Muffin's version captures perfectly the exhaustion? exasperation? resignation? Whatever it is, she's got it right.

In mine she looks almost pleased. And her face is sharper than i'd like. Either way, I'm delighted to have embarked on this endevour, and to know that I once felt that way. Because once this bub is born then I'll never turn my mind to pregnancy again. I also learnt alot about drawing with floss - its hard to get it to look exactly how you envisage it.

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I did email muffin to and had her permission to post her image. I loved working on this. But three years on, its still sitting in my embroidery bag. I must do it some justice sometime. Check back in 2013!

Embroidery from the past

My paternal grandfather celebrated (I use the term loosely) his 90th birthday in Bathurst on the weekend.

(we lit the candles and he walked away... overcome? pissed that we took him out for dinner when he didn't want a fuss? just sick of having family around? who knows...)

I've never really spent much time with my paternal grandparents but I remember the bits and pieces that they have around the house. The last time I was there was for my grandmother's funeral. A combination of having my husband and his insatiable curiosity about family and history, and the children's brazen invasion of the whole house made me look at some of these things anew. Like this incredible cross stitch map of the Netherlands (where my family is from).



My dad was born here in Leeuwarden.



The work in it is amazing.


Its filled with lovely little details - an ice skater, a horse, a boat (and three things that look like nuclear submarines - but I suspect not)

It makes me so sad when I think that she could have shared so much with me about her love of craft and her country. But we never really felt comfortable with each other. But she certainly had skill and talent and she must have shared some genetically with me...

Cruel embroidery

I had this idea about doing a cruel embroidery (play on crewel embroidery) last week. And here it is!Its not 'nice' but I've found that a side effect of this new medication is an unreasonable amount of anger and aggression. There is a theory that says that depression is anger turned inwards. Ergo as you get better the anger is projected outwards. If that's true I'm much, much better. I'd rather channel it into this kind of creative output than yelling abuse. Which is what I've found myself doing to the fuckwits that walk their dogs around my suburb and who don't pick up their dog shit. Seriously. Stopping the car, winding down the window and yelling out 'toser!' or 'Oi, are you going to pick that up?' and then spending quite some time planning how I could pick up the poo, following the offenders home and then flinging it at their front doors... not entirely a positive use of energy.