hangin'

Image by Tigs.

Spring afternoon.

i am absolutely captivated by this story.   a brilliant, unravelling mystery.  the one about a completely untouched apartment, left as it was, just before the outbreak of the second world war and not returned to for 70 years.  can you imagine? what an exquisite find.

you can read all about it here, but in a nutshell:

mme de florian, a ‘demimondaine’, headed for the south of france before the war and remained there for the rest of life, until she died this year at 91 years old.  she continued to pay the rent on her her beautiful apartment for the next 70 years. her home abandoned, it became a time capsule, a tangible snapshot of life as it was paris in the 1930's.

some people have a box of heirloom pieces, an antique clock that sits in pride of place on the mantelpiece, a special vintage quilt they love and saved up for.  but here is a life, an entire household with nothing added to, or removed, in decades.  not a vignette, a mock-up, or an ode to the 30's but a real home, a luxurious dwelling with the normal paraphernalia and unique accouterments of a life lived.

how i would love the chance to wander through, to handle the old pieces and oh, what a tale.

olden days

momo brought us an 'old fashioned' typewriter.
very groovy, very 80's!
very fun! according to both tigs and woo.

i love the sound of it tapping away as i sew.

very madmen.

back soon with a report on last night...

bu-kurk!

our neighbour flew past to say hello!



she was a very welcome visitor and caused egg-streme egg-citement around here. jun was seriously shocked to see her appear outside his window, tigs super excited and full of a thousand questions, woo shouting and laughing with delight. even greg thought it was an interesting event. me, i was thrilled by her beauty and the chance to photograph her, liberated and off on her adventure to 'the other side'.
i felt very 'beatrix' as her story played out in my head.

her family retrieved her and her beautiful wings have now been clipped so she'll probably not be here for a while, but i'm glad she won't get 'lost' on the roads around here. i rather like her and her sister's gentle clucking as they go about their day over the fence.

my day ...

... blue skies, lavender and busy buzzy bees!

Hope your day is lovely too.

E x

what are you?

I took this test via this blog and this is what it said:

I'm a CREATOR. - Correct!

Nonconforming, Impulsive, Expressive, Romantic, Intuitive, Sensitive, and Emotional - Correct!

These original types place a high value on aesthetic qualities and have a great need for self-expression. They enjoy working independently, being creative, using their imagination, and constantly learning something new. Fields of interest are art, drama, music, and writing or places where they can express, assemble, or implement creative ideas.  - Correct!

What are you?  I'll be fascinated to hear if you think it's spot on  too!

dear God

We've had unseasonably wet and cold weather today. Last week we reached 43C and today we got to 19C. There's snow on the hills! It's summer down here!!!

I sat eating my breakfast thrilled to see the pouring rain beating our windows, leaves swirling and trees buffetted. Hoping it was reaching our reservoirs. As Tiggy sat in front of the window I overheard him softly praying to God for the sun would come out. At that very moment one little boy's prayer was answered and the house became filled with the glow of sunshine funnelled down between the heavy grey blanket that surrounded our little house. He looked up at me beaming and said gently in complete belief, "God heard me Mummy". Breakfast unfinished, I dashed outside in the then, thankfully, easing rain, clambered inelegantly onto the table, dressing gown flapping in the gale, the hems of my pj's soaked and shot this pic whilst balancing precariously - quite a feat for Miss Clumsy! Tigs danced at my feet, excited to be outside in his 'jammies and Uggs, in the rain, to have his answer to prayer documented.

oh what a night

My day wasn't too good today.  Under the weather, tired, mauled by an unwell baby who had four needles yesterday and is naturally feeling under the weather too!  Felt like I was walking thorough syrup all day.  Grazed the side of Greg's nice new car.  Uggh. 

And then it all got better...

Thank you Sweetie for putting Tigs to bed.  Thank you Skype for being well behaved tonight. And an infinitely bigger thank you to my still horribly missed friend Kylie, for filling my heart with happiness and unearthing the laughter that lay hidden under a pile of misery and bad self talk.  Wish you were here...

Here's to a better day tomorrow.

bX-kzyqj6 or in other words b@**#y blogger

I know it's better to not say anything if you can only think of unpleasant things to say. 

But ... Blogger you are a royal pain in the deriere and I'm extremely cross with you. 

Thank you very much (more, much more, than a hint of sarcasm applied, read that through gritted teeth) for letting me stay up until midnight, writing the blog post to end all and then ... nothing, and then, even worse: 

Blogger apologises but we cannot upload your post.  Please quote bX-kzyqj6 if you would like to talk to support or to discuss it on the forum.  Click here to chat with others who have received the bX-kzyqj6 error.

I dread to think what the fellow bX-kzyqj6-ers have to say but something tells me that they are not all sharing cyber cookies and tea now, are they?

So, I will not be defeated.  I will forget about cleaning, ironing, cooking or caring for children (okay I'll still do that) but today I will get the 'post to end all' up.  Really it's just a lot of photos and I think therein lies the problem.  But it will be up today friends and family - particularly Mummy and Tena who read my nonsence regularly and although Tena hasn't asked for an updated post Ma has!

Thank you for listening.  Transmission ended - oh but I can't go with out something nice to say.

  These were growing wild on the Murray River.  Just beautiful.

Calm breaths now, iiiiiin and ooooout!  That's better.

more bows & random thoughts

I've been so pleased with the bows that I made for Woo that I made some more. I found some gorgeous French grosgrain on the weekend and made them up too (no pics yet). One little pair will be winging their way, belatedly to our now 4 year old friend 'Ony Rose.

For some reason, call me odd, I love production line work and although I like the process of designing things, sourcing materials, trialling (and error-ing!!) and creating the things I make, I really enjoy getting a big old pile of things made at once. Zoom-zoom.

Mostly I think it's in my make-up, I love saving time, minimising double-handling - I usually open the mail on the recycling bin to avoid even bringing the unsolicited mail into the house. I'll spare you my showering routine, but let me tell you with our current drought in Victoria I can assure I'm done in the requisite 3 minutes.

Okay I'm really quite odd and you may well be x-ing out of the page about now. But wait. One second. I want to tell you where I learned about my love of production lines and 'time and motion study' and where get my motion saving practices from. Have you heard of my favourite book, "in the whole wide weld" (thanks Tigs), Cheaper by the Dozen?

It is true the story of Frank Bunker Gilbreth and Lillian Gilbreth and life with their 12 children.

Frank and Lillian worked as time and motion experts in the 1920's to reduce the number of motions used to perform a task in order to increase productivity. One of the most well known experiments examined the handmotions of bricklayers and were able to reduce the number from 18 to 5. Cool hey? So the brickies worked more efficiently and were less tired to boot!

Many of their experiments were carried out on their children and are retold hilariously in the book and in the equally funny original movie. Minimising wasted time came in endless forms including having to learn Morse code from signs on the back of the toilet door! They were tested by having meals at which no one was allowed to speak. All conversation was held by Morse code being tapped out on the dining room table! Lessons in how to wash efficiently sounded a little dull and the elder girls were thrilled to be presented with a gramophone, only to be disheartened to find it was to be placed in the bathroom so that cleansing ones body could be combined by learning a foreign language.

Father was a strict disciplinarian and Mother was incredibly strong but gentle with her children. In Father's eyes he had "only 12 children" in Mothers she had "12 only children". I have my Meme's copy. I treasure it, I know she loved the story too.

Anyway, at risk of wasting time, it's why I love production line work and my favorite book synopsis wrapped up in one.

I had NO idea when I started typing where my (evidently weird) brainwaves would take me. Are you still with me? Anyone?

OK goodnight!

sing-er-song-of-sixpence

Look at this little sweetheart who has come to live with me!!! And she was way less than a sixpence. She was FREE to a loving home. Well, actually to any home.

She was this () close to being put out in the hard rubbish!

Don't worry you're safe with me, now.

She belonged to my dear friend who, close your ears dear machine,

I can't believe this for a minute, did not want her.

Gasp indeed!

She's not in working order at the moment, but may, in time, be put to rights. Bless her. I'd love to know a little more about her. Anyone know where I can find some more information?

This is the same sort of machine I learned to sew on when I was at Boarding School. First sewing straight lines on newspaper (don't say anything but Flossy didn't graduate past this stage - shh now, she'd be mortified if she knew I'd told - well she reads here from time to time so I guess she'll find out! Hi Floss).

We then moved onto making our science kit bag, much like all the pencil-rolls out in blogland. I wonder where that bag went. And then onto our DS (Domestic Science) aprons.

How quaint and English it all was. It was SO long ago though and I imagine I'm wearing my rose tinted glasses. No it actually was as lovely as an Enid Blyton novel. I did love my old school.

And this one - just to shame my husband into FINISHING THE WALL!! Pleeease. It's been this way for too too long and it's driving me bonkers! I thought if I posted a photo I'd have some evidence to a) show how long it's been left like this and b) to spur him on.

number 3's

This ad came on my TV the other night.

My jaw dropped and I literally had to check that it wasn't a 'funniest videos' show.

Something about it is SO revolting. Something about it is SO bizarre. Something about it may be very useful to families with new babies.

Something about it eventually makes you laugh (but I still had a weird and slightly distasteful and disbelieving look on my face!).

I think they would go well with Darby's new scented sachets.

yippeee for costco

I preface this urgent bulletin by stating that the author of this post is in fact mad, crazy mad! Mad, but Happy!

Costco is open in Melbourne. The first store in Australia. I felt almost giddy with excitement (yes I know, I already confessed to being mad) as we gathered the troops and headed on into heaven/hell depending on your perspective.

I bought Tide and Downy in huge quantities (for my Mummy and Flossy) and my laundry already smells good, so good in fact that it smells like a hug from my Meme. She died 2 1/2 years ago and we all miss her terribly. Tide and Downy were the laundry products she used and the combined fragrance literally feels like she's right here with us. So I'm happy and mad. And looking forward to the usually boring task of washing.

The rest of the trolley is too boring to mention.

Oh, by the way we were skiing - I'll be back soon with all the thrills from the mountain.

Toodles

old hair, new hair

Old hair. Just not cute anymore. I was starting to feel really "bluk".

New hair done in two stages. The brilliant cutter I went to trained with Vidal Sassoon, but she trained as a cutter, not a colourist.

Already feeling so much better.

New colour done at a local colourist. Although I did have to tone it the day before the party. Too ash for me and now it's just right.

I hadn't had my hair done since February.

My dear husband could never complain that I'm high maintenance, now could he?

What a wacky post! As the label says it's 'random'!

just scoooooting in the rain

raining, pouring ...

... and we're all cheering!

We're in the grip of a drought in Victoria. But today we're thankful for rain. I don't know if it's here for long but it's welcome to stay.

We've had some fierce winds to go with it and they've caused some terrible accidents, which is not good. I'll be thinking of the SES tonight.

They'll probably be very busy helping people out of emergencies.

The rain is welcome, the winds can ease to blowy, not stormy please!

Tiggy has had a ball.

It was not quite 5pm when it really got going here and that boy just ran wild

round and round the garden like a teddy bear.

Eventually I managed to call him in and get a rarely worn raincoat on him. When I was teaching we always braced ourselves on the wild and woolly days as the boys always seemed to go a little loopy.

My whacky boy did just as I knew he would, and probably many, many other little 5 years olds were around Melbourne. C.R.A.Z.Y!

Needless to say he headed to slumber early and easily!

God Bless and sleep tight Tiggy.

first cuppa

my tidy desk - only for a moment but it's a good a moment

I love my new mugs. They're from Country Road. My tea this morning tasted so good. Plus I was able to have a moment to myself before my sweet babies woke. Bliss.