Awe-summmm

Lou at Lahlahh kindly nominated me as an awe-summm blogger. (Albeit a slack blogger of late, as the pace speeds up at school and home with approaching exams and talk of yearlong trips)
I am also not awesome enough to figure out how to post the picture- so any people I nominate if you want one you will have to look at Lahlahh's post to get it.

Now I have to think of 7 thinks that make me awe-summ. This is quite flattering to receive but also a bit tricky because there is always a little grain of doubt in the back of my mind thinking I must have deceived people and I'm not really very awesome at all!- My demons that I am constantly battling with, the self doubt that has difficulty giving myself compliments. But here goes 7 things I like about myself.

1: Although I am questioning it at the moment as I struggle with the shift of my children from childhood to adulthood I am a pretty good mum- most of the time.

2. I think I'm pretty resourceful, and creative.

3. My brain works in a way that can be both logical and creative- Making it frustrating to work with some people who have less agile brains!

4. I am forever thankful for my hands. My hands that can sew, crochet, knit, paint, carve, mosaic, print, garden and talk (I know I must use them often in discussions as I see the kids at school mimicking my hand movements as I talk, then I know my conversation is becoming passionate and excited)

5. I am kind, compassionate and sensitive. Maybe overly so. I tend to cry at the drop of a hat. Much to the amusement of my children. There was a boy in my grade 5 class who was what we would term today as special needs although he did not require an aide or one was not allocated to him. He had a tendency to dribble and had difficulty picking up the concepts. I voluntarily sat next to him to help him with his work and explain again and again what was needed. I even invited him to my birthday party- much to the horror of my peers. Years later he arrived in my mum's driveway- he had come to say thank you for how I had been nice to him at school, and how important that had been to him.

6. I can cook and sew but I can also drive a drill, a jigsaw and a welder and have in the past- before my back gave out on me I have laid slabs just to prove I didn't need anyone. Need being the important word there. Want was a entirely different matter.

7. I am loyal. If you earn my respect and friendship I am very loyal and I will defend your actions and offer support where I can.

Pheww!! 7! did it.

Now I get to tag 7 other Awe-summm bloggers (My favourite part of this award!!!)

1: Fifi-Strange fruit (I believe she has already been tagged but I'm going to tag her again as she really has an awesome blog) Her paintings, photos and writing are all so beautiful. I wish I could express myself half as well as she does.

2: Kirti-Skeleton woman. A beautiful friend who is not blogging as frequently as she adjusts to her newly found "single motherness" but her blog is lovely to read.

3: Sarah- With a cherry on top. A young girl who loves cooking and crafting and tells of the antics of her grumpy teen aged brother and wonder dog Jasper.

4: Melanie- Kimono Reincarnate A lady who has just recently returned from Japan and makes yummy things with Japanese fabric.

5: Rachel- The Rachel Papers- Rachel has written a book "the divided heart" containing interviews with artist/ mothers and how they find the pull between the need to create and the need to nurture. Interesting reading! Her blog relates to these type of topics and is often thought provoking.

6 Geninne- Gennine's art blog. This lady lives in Mexico and makes the most delightful little paintings of birds. (one day I am going to treat myself to one!)

7. Attic24- this lady has beautiful crochet and the photos of her part of the world are lovely. She also has some good tutorials.


Below are the rules and guidelines to the Awe-summm award:
* List 7 things that make you Awe-Summm and then pass the award on to 7 bloggers you love.
* Make sure to tag your recipients and let them know they have won!
* And finally link back to the blogger that tagged you.

And the fledgling edges his way out onto the branch, beyond the nest...

Bantam Boy is adamant that he is going to take a gap year and spend it travelling around Australia!
Chicky babe has "baggsed" his room- it is bigger than hers.
I want to know who will eat curry with me and wondering how I will cope!

Ummm, confession....

I did not clean my room yesterday or today....

I did this instead.

I had to put this on the table to get it squared off. I meant that I had to unpick sections to make it sit better but in doing so I was rather surprised to see that I was closer to being completed than I had thought. Looking at it from above (yes I'm standing on the table!) I am enjoying the colours and the arrangement. It really does remind me of the work of Gustav Klimt, one of my favourite artists. In fact I took my Klimt book into the wool shop to help me select the colours. The center section which is the multi sized squares is almost complete and then I will frame them with a boarder of green, purple and pink maybe. Rachel asked if I sell my rugs. The thing about these kind of rugs, well any kind of handmade rug or object for that matter, they often take more time to do than you can reasonably charge for. Particularly things like crochet and knitting, that's what nanas and women do and hence they are often highly under valued. It's a homely craft passed from mother to daughter-unless your daughter has no interest at all in the weird knitted stuff! (That's why it's nice to connect with a community of people who really appreciate hand made objects!) This particular rug has taken me forever! Although as it was my first crochet project after a thirty odd year break it may have taken longer and the tension varies from the first squares to the more recent ones. I'm already planning another one.

Chicky Babe wanted to go into perth to meet up with some friends on saturday so I took her. I am not keen for her to take public transport into the city on her own- she thinks I over react. Maybe I do but I needed to go into the gallery anyway. I've booked into a one day jewellery making workshop with David Walker and had to pay in order to confirm my booking. Plus I have been keen to see the Year 12 Perspectives exhibition. High school kids nowadays are very clever and the schools do a great job. I came away thinking I'm going to have to support Bantam Boy in his art course partly bey being a nag to keep him off MSN. 5 minutes on that can turn int two hours before he knows it!

Don't ask me what I did today, wasted a lot of time, went to visit my mum, drove the kids around and got flashed by a speed camera- third one in 27 years! Bother!!!! I was going to go into school to do some work but just couldn't bring myself to do so. Apparently an ex student with emotional problems, has made threats towards me. I'm sure there is nothing to it, just a lot of hot air but it has affected me a bit...I'm not sure what I will do about it. I might talk to the union and see what they think. As a result I was a bit nervous to go into school.

Speaking of which I should do the work I was going to do then now and resist the urge to continue with my rug!

PS: How do I delete unwanted comments on posts?????

Going backwards

I've been trying to rush to finish this off. I seem to be so far away from finishing and I'm getting impatient with it. I've just spent the evening unpicking squares that were not in the right spot. I started this project as my first one after a thirty year break from crochet and the tension varies from the first lot of squares to the most recent ones and I've learnt how to join them better too. I've also realised that I can add rows of crochet on the edge of a square to make them fit a space better, but I learnt this after I'd sewn quite a bit together already.

(This is a phone photo)
When I first started I would block the squares as I went. Now, because I am notoriously impatient when it comes to finishing things off I'm just sewing them together and blocking it after! I had a look at Babettes on purl bee and realised that they are all following a pattern and carefully crocheting the correct number of squares of the right size and then carefully arranging them according to that....hmmmm, I am not like that. I'm crocheting colours as I feel like it not calculating the patterns and colour combinations and sewing as I go along. I'm adopting a far more intuitive approach.

The other day two of my kids came into the staff room to show me the jewellery they had been making in their lunch break. The other one was a ring of similar construction. They were so excited and I was thrilled that the culture of the school (which was predominately or even dominantly a 'sport' orientated school with little interest in the arts) is beginning to change. I actually got goose bumps because of their excitement and keenness to share their creations with me.

These are the ingredients I used to make dinner one evening recently. The green stuff is Kale from my garden. Luckily I got to use it because yesterday when I went out into my garden I noticed I have provided a banquet for some type of Caterpillar. It looks more like "lace kale"

Well at least Bantam Boy and I enjoyed our chicken and Kale coconut curry with almond slivers sprinkled on top.

Tomorrow we are going to a play at the kids high school. One of Bantam Boy's friend's is playing the lead role so we are really looking forward to it.

Tomorrow I really must clean my room. It has been embarrassing for months...it looks more like a teenager's room than a mummy's room. No more excuses! Hopefully having posted this here I will be more inclined to do it. (fingers crossed)

Happy Mother's Day!

Last night I stayed up untill 2am cleaning and starting the cooking for today. (and looking for tim's combi keys!!!!)

I made a quince and coconut cake for brunch (click the link to find the recipe on my cooking blog)
I have never used quince before and was surprised at how long they needed to be cooked for, I poached them in sugar syrup for one and a half houres and they turn from a pale creamy yellow to a lovely rich pink colour. They have a high level of pectin in them which made the syrup go all jammy. Then the baking time in the oven made them caremelise a bit too.



I also made a quiche or asparagus and greek fetta tart. So simple but surprisingly delicious. Luckilly I did my usual over catering trick, Tart, bacon, organic sausages, fried onion and tomato, "mock snapper" as my granny used to call them or you may know them as hash browns or Potato Latkes ,a herb salad, champagne and juice, tea coffe and cake and cream. So there will be leftovers for tea tonight. which is good because I was up again at 9 and was cooking until 11 when Mum and Ron arrived for brunch. so now we can graze on left overs for the rest of the day and I won't be doing any more cooking!

Bantam boy and Chicky babe gave me some lovely pink wine glasses and tumblers and some tulips as seen featured the photo of the table. I got to use my crochet edged tablecloth and new place mats.

I also got a new CD- Lamb Chop ,very listenable...

Now I intend to listen to my CD and play a bit on my computer for a little longer then have a bit of a nap. I feel increadibly tired today and don't even have the energy to crochet a single square for my rug! Maybe I will after a nap.

Today I did not...

buy two magazines!

the red shoes

The other day I went to buy walking shoes ie. joggers. I hate them. They never quite fit properly- well I never seem to find them comfortable and I hate the way they look. So I went into a rather large well known chain store to spend as little as I could for a pair of walking shoes. I found one pair of size ten shoes that fit me, my ugly step sister foot refused to squeeze itself into any other pair and I was rather alarmed and worried that I'd have to try men's shoes!
The store had a sale on if you bought one pair of shoes you got 60% off the second pair....so I spent $49 on joggers and an extra $22 dollars on these lovely red shoes! They are SO cute on. I could not resist (That's only 3 magazines!) and I have a thing for red shoes. I think I've mentioned before that I loved the story about the red shoes -though why I don't know as she danced herself to death! Although what a way to go hey? Dancing through life.

Before I left the shop I had pants for me and a t-shirt for Chicky babe and a pair of PJ's each all these bargains cost me $150!!! I'm a sucker for a bargain, I love saving money. (???)

Today I spent my lunch hour well my lunch 25minutes teaching two of my colleagues how to crochet. I really enjoyed it.

This afternoon I came home to a clean kitchen. Bantam Boy cleaned it up last night , after a pretty heated exchange in the morning. The pattern has been to spend time procrastinating until very late then doing homework until some outrageously late hour and then not get up in the morning, this cycle is accompanied with a large monotonous amount of red hen nagging. I was fed up. I think I may have used some inappropriate language!
anyway...

I came home tonight to a clean kitchen so I made his favourite spinach and ricotta cannelloni. And had a bit of time to invent a recipe with the left over filling these little fritters.

They have a bit of flour added and milk added to the ricotta and spinach filling. Now I've finished this I'm going to go on with my "Babette" rug, a project that has been shelved for a little while. I draped it over my knee it is long enough to cover my feet! but it's less than half way done. It is very much a long term project.

Best get on to it!

Just my luck

I was watching telly when an add for eharmony, online dating service came on. Chicky babe said her friend tried it out for a laugh and I thought why not. You do a personality test and then they match you up with people who are compatible personality wise. This sounded better than the shopping list approach of other dating sites.

So I did the test, it took a while. I selected the box that said consider matches from anywhere around the world...pressed the button and waited for my matches.

They are displayed 20 to a page as standard. I had 7. Not pages....7 matches! 7 in THE WHOLE WORLD!!!!!! 1in Perth 2more in WA and 2 more somewhere else in Australia and 2 overseas.

Just my luck!

Tim tried it out then too- We didn't match. :(

My addiction...

Yes I have an addiction....
to magazines. (And cook books, stationary, art materials, fabric and yarn...and reading blogs...and collecting things like teacups...but I'm getting carried away here!)

Magazines are what I am particularly referring to tonight. After looking at the recipe site below I followed the link to the notebook magazine site. I buy this usually for the yummy covers and floral photos. As with most of them I flick through and read a paragraph here and there. Then I wondered if there were any on line versions of the magazines I often waste my money on and clutter up my house with.

After a bit of net surfing I found this one for InsideOut. I am going to try to give up buying magazines- well maybe reduce the number that I buy well at least control my addiction and curb the mess that results in collecting them. Then I can save the money I would have spent there on my Europe trip (This is my big "when the little chicks fly the nest plan / dream")