Ransacked chic is the new new.

Well strictly speaking, old is the new new, but it's only 2 weeks till my main Xmas market, so my house is less a home than a loosely co-ordinated pile of - OMG.  If someone actually broke in they'd have an attack of deja vu or think it was Groundhog Day. I'm trying to sell myself on the 'ransacked chic' style of homemaking.  This was the last week for actual making (apart from a couple of special commissions I'm working on) so that now I can tidy up, price, display, record, package and pack.

Riiiight.
Note to self:  buy tomorrow - milk, eggs, self-discipline.

I did work on the trunk table I had planned - there was a bit of restorative work before the whole leg thing could happen.  I like the outcome. Not entirely sure I can part with it now.....I shall be strong. Annotate note to self: skip the eggs and double the self-discipline.

I did locate the kitchen bench and I'm pretty sure there is a kitchen table under there somewhere. Small patches of floor are emerging, slowly.

I still have some original drawings to frame and pack, and some Christmas cards to work on. Do I really need ALL those vintage items? 

It's going to be OK, because I made a list. It's a very long list and I only crossed 2 things off but there's a whole 2 weeks to go. I may have to resort to Plan B, which is really just Plan A with an element of panic.

I had my eyes tested and ordered new glasses this week.  I was about 6 months overdue, but still have the eyesight of a woman 3 weeks younger than me.  The nice man cleaned my existing glasses while I was there and wow - a new perspective - detail!  I've ordered nice new round frames, to replace my current round frames  (I'm obsessed with round frames).  They should be ready in a couple of days. I suspect I may be able to see dust I've been ignoring for quite a while...

Where did I leave that note?

 

Einstein said, amongst many other pithy things, that creativity is the residue of time wasted.  If that's so, then I've wasted a lot of time....I spent a long time today photographing things I've been making because it's that market time of year again.  There are a lot of things.

I open a drawer and  discover a little collection of things I've put aside...and completely forgotten about.  Kind of like Christmas, but every day.  Ridiculously, I panic every year that I won't have enough stuff.  I do, I promise you.  I have enough stuff.  Really.  Truckloads.

The house is really full about now, festooned with bright shiny vintage jewellery, stacked with framed drawings and prints, and all the vintage bits and bobs that I can bring myself to let go.  Some things, which I mean to take to a market, are harder to let go of than others.  A while ago, I found some 1930's Australian matchbox labels.  No worries, methinks, this would look nice in a little frame...and so it does.  A bit too nice - I propped it up to photograph it and it looks so good just there...damn.  Luckily, there were others.

Of course the cataloguing of work uncovers unfinished and intended projects - I have a collection of  pics of the girlchild since she was quite small, I mount them on 8"x8" blocks.  Some are more elaborate than others - handcoloured black and white pics, and so on.  They are testament to a child who wholeheartedly embraced the 'selfie' at a very young age. I finished these two today, to add to the wall.

Even worse, is the dreaded new and bright idea...I was working on something new at about one this morning - sleep is for the weak and the uninspired - or those who are not completely obsessed.

There's also the need to display items for sale - I have trunks of that stuff too.   I saw this on Friday and thought it would come in useful.  It was covered with butterfly stickers and needed some TLC but it's come up quite nicely.  I'll just put it with the others.

We also finally unloaded the big workbench I bought a couple of months ago.  It's big.  It's gorgeous.  I totally have no room for it.  The wood on the top is all hand cut and still has the marks of the saw. I love it.

I'll make room, somewhere.

and welcome to 2012.  Around we go again.



I've upgraded to (free) digital TV.  This venture into commercial television has been interesting for an ABC/SBS watcher.  I've learned a lot of things.

I've already watched a lot of the documentaries and (English) sitcoms on the national broadcasters.  In some cases, a long time ago and several times.  Some of the movies are old, but good - the Lethal Weapon series...ah, Mel, all that hair.  Seinfeld. 

Advertising is no less annoying.  I can tell you that it's time to worm your sheep, and apparently it's also a good time to buy a ride-on lawnmower.

I have a confession to make.  A neighbour very kindly helped me out some time ago by mowing my lawns.  He keeps saying that he hopes our other neighbours didn't get the wrong idea - nudge, nudge, wink, wink. I'm sure they won't, I say, in a slightly confused fashion.   Now I realise it's an ad. Oops, not usually that slow on the uptake.  Note to self, must make more experimental forays into the world outside.


There seem to be some no-brainers - the workout thingy which actually says in writing on the screen that the results quoted are NOT typical (surprise!).  There's an ad for an electric fridge.  As opposed to....?  I already have one. Have had for some time.   Ah, electricity, perhaps it's not everywhere in town yet.  That's the same ad which shows the fridge 'growing with you' (as you have kids, blah, blah,blah) but shows a different fridge at each stage - so presumably it doesn't grow with you at all.  Am I overthinking this stuff?

I'm having my annual at-home holidays.  Xmas and New Year - much goofing off, lots of reading books, pottering about, a bit of socialising.  I have lots of projects which are gradually being ticked off:  bit of a tidy up and a sort out; re-cover the cushions on the chairs out the back veranda and sort out the piles of stuff out there;  re-cover the cushions on the sitting room couch;  some mid-week opshop and tip shop trawls; some fairly serious woodwork projects with the help of a friend and her power tools.  And a bit of gardening.

I've started work on this footstool today.  It's a verge treasure and hopefully I'll finish it off in the next few days.

a tale of two brownies

T'was the week before...etc etc, you know how it goes.

I really like this little helper, I think he's rather sweet.

With only 4 working days between me and some serious rec leave, cheeriness levels are on the up.  Ho, Ho, Ho, in fact.


  I'm planning a re-organisation of the home front in the hols, and have started on the back and front verandas.  I found an extremely ugly but practical rack which I've drafted into service for fishing rod storage.  Each millimetre of space is hard won.  I keep thinking I'll have a garage sale but I haven't really identified all that much to get rid of. Yet.

 



 I have decided to part with this vintage Kodak Brownie Starlet camera, there are only so many cameras and so much shelf space.

Strangely, the term 'Brownie' seems to be almost unreasonably popular, and this week  another Brownie which came into my life via a cake stall outside Bankwest.  I bought a plate of brownies on the way to work from the nice ladies at the stall, thinking that given the season I would share them with my workmates.  Bad luck, people.

I shared one with someone - in celebration of one of those tiny smidgens of happiness which occasionally drop into the pit of despair (and can so easily roll unnoticed behind the couch, where they hide with the minuscule remnants of our self-actualisation) - but everyone else was out of luck. Call me Grinch.  Best Brownies ever.  Congratulations, ladies with headscarves.  You are the queens of Brownie.



There are only a very few framed fish drawings remaining, I am pleased and slightly relieved that others liked them as much as I do.  These are the only ones left apart from some of the smaller ones. I can see the floor in the loungeroom.


 
 

       















            
                            
                  









 




















Quote of the week:
'The day they discover that yoga mats are carcinogenic will be the happiest day in my life.'
Tim Minchin


Status of the week from Facebook:
'Mum goes to personal training at 8am this morning and comes home drunk in a taxi.'
(anonymous, for their own protection - and no, not one of my kids!)  Gotta love the Xmas season....

the swan and the jackalope, a tale of Xmas present(s)

It must be close, the girl-child and a friend arrived and, in a whirl of activity, put the Christmas tree up and decorated it.  We also scattered some other decorations about.  She's placed some presents under it already.  There was considerable disappointment that I didn't have to go to work today, I suspect she had planned on a grid search to see if I have gotten her presents yet.  She may have been disappointed, I sure wasn't.

 (We'll call this one Silent Night, shall we?)

My Xmas present to myself this year was a small sound system. (OK, the first of my presents to myself!)  I've spent almost three years in happy silence - you can hear the serenity - after years of living in a house with at least two televisions on at all times (different stations, of course) as well as various other computer games, music, and portable noise making devices.  I've reached the point where I don't mind a little background music.  My avoidance of the I-empire means that I got a small CD player, although I note that instruments of the empire can be plugged into it also. 



We journeyed to Hardly Normal to make the purchase, having spied something in the catalogue which fit the bill.  Amusingly, having been assured by the salesman that they had nothing at all to match my requirements - although he didn't seem to want to show us anything at all - we were on our way to the door when we crashed into a huge pile of the very item I was looking for. (He must have had a man look.)  We made haste to the checkout, where we were asked the name of the salesperson - "what is this term?" we asked.  At least you couldn't say he tried the hard sell.


Say hello to my little friend the Jackalope.  I got him this week and he fits perfectly in the glass case, although he doesn't photograph so well in it.  He makes me smile.









I seem to be acquiring a small swan collection - this one was made in England and is delightfully vintage. Amongst other treasures this weekend, a small suitcase full to the brim with vintage Enid Gilchrist magazines with patterns for children's clothes, part of a 1934 West Australian newspaper, and lots of beautiful 1918 - 1940 crotchet and dressmaking magazines.  The illustrations are beautiful and some of the patterns are glorious.  The ads, of course, have their own special appeal and when I get some time I'll include some for you to look at.


Back to the present plotting.....

How many shopping days to Xmas?

February. So soon.

The reviews for January are in. Pretty good, all things considered. Number of cyclones in Albany - 0. Sunny days - check. Some refreshing rain - check. Holidays - love 'em. Public holidays - need more of them! The start of the working year - overrated as a concept. The people who say they would keep working if they won Lotto? Shouldn't be allowed to buy a ticket. They are getting in my way.

The big questions of the month - Why can't we have a long weekend for Australia Day? And when did Australia Day become the national drinking holiday? St Patrick's Day, now that's a drinking holiday. The Australia Day long weekend used to be the last family long weekend of the Summer - last chance to get to the beach, before school starts. From there to newspapers full of full page ads for booze - yep, that's a step forward in nation-building.

This was the week when the cyclone didn't here but did over there. I got the distinct impression that the commercial media were actually disappointed that it went as well as it did - not quite enough mayhem, all too well organised, no-one to point a finger at. My boycott of the commercial media rolls on - thank you, thank you ABC and SBS. The disappearance of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert is, however, deeply troubling. I miss you, boys.


The op-shop and general scavenging scene has been a bit average so far this year, but things seem to be on the up and up.

Friday, a good haul including a small Gocco printer - a type of screen printer, very hard to come by indeed, quite expensive and hard to get. This one virtually brand spanking new - OK, so some of the instructions are in Japanese, but I am fairly sure the internet will provide the equivalent of Gocco 1.1. A globe of the world, an interesting book on using markers in art, a haul of Raymond E Feist books for the son and heir. Half a bootload, a yummy lunch. A good end to a tiring week.

Saturday, hardly any garage sales, but what there were, were choice. I was sad to leave the slabs of 1930's jarrah, but seriously, even I couldn't manage them. There were a few other classics though-I am formulating a cunning plan.

Judy is on a break right now. We hope you enjoy this episode from the library - nah, just kidding.

I am on a break, though. I hadn't realised that it had been so long since my last post, guess that December goes more quickly than other months.

Festivities, nice new neighbours, perhaps a nice new handbag - so far, so good for 2011.

The Xmas/ NY break officially concluding at midnight tonight, I must observe that one of the few things better than the Sunday evening of a long weekend must be the Monday evening of a long weekend when you are still on leave. Oh, happy, happy day (or night). There will be that deeply satisfying time tomorrow morning when I take my breakfast and a book back to bed, just coz I can.

For the record, any smug self satisfaction will evaporate Monday next week - as I contemplate returning to work on the Tuesday.

I have spent several days sewing - cheesecloth beach pants for the beach baby, and I modified a couple of linen dresses which have been stashed for upcycling/recycling/reconfiguration/deconstruction. The sorting of the clothing stash is a whole 'nother post, let me tell you.

The reconstructed articles work really well over a plain Tee.

While I was sorting stashes, I also deconstructed a slide projector from the verge delectation, they have such fascinating components (and of course they take up less space this way). The lenses give you the best magnifying lenses.



I've had a Dremel tool for ages but it seems that every time I take it out of the box a man appears and wants to try it out ( malespeak for play with it and make random marks on wood and metal). Yesterday I spent some serious quality time modifying a small and very ugly thing - it was supposed to be a bird - with reasonable success and no major injuries. So far.

Before

After:

Next, the metal cutting....bits. (insert sound of evil laughter here)

Most of the op-shops were closed for the Xmas break but a quick look last week yielded a couple of treasures.

We took a trainee with us, as part of our renowned op-shop with the stars tour program. I have to say that she took to it like the proverbial fish. The three of us carried her bags from the boot of the car for transfer to the spousal conveyance.

Useful tip : fold gleanings in a clothes basket and leave them in plain sight. What, these old things? Had them forever.

Caution: low flying reindeer

That Time of year comes speeding towards me. I am largely unprepared but did manage to put up the Xmas tree and scatter a few decorations about the house. I found this cute angel last week in an op shop, it was rather nastily varnished wood but I decided it would look much better with an antiqued white finish.I spent some time in Perth this week, luckily it was not sidewalk meltingly disgustingly hot, the weather was actually just lovely. Caught up with friends, and enjoyed a lovely Xmas lunch at C Restaurant. Once upon a time called Highlight 33, this is a revolving restaurant in the city. The food was good, the service great, the company excellent and a very pleasant time was had. I can highly recommend it and we hope to do it again sometime.

It seemed impolite to include the photos of everyone at lunch, but I did snap some shots of Perth on a glorious day as we spun slowly around.



Kudos to Malcom for his charcoal linen pinstripe suit, he was the epitome of French style and a role model to retirees everywhere. Unfortunately the fashion style did not extend to patrons of Burswood Casino, where apparently shorts, manky t-shirts, and thongs are considered to be the height of playboy chic. How sad. A classy destination? Apparently not. Think cheap and tacky, avoid it and seek out somewhere more stylish - virtually anywhere other than Hungry Jacks would fit the bill.

I have said goodbye to some of my babies this week. Red Balloon, Dragon Flight, Elephant, and Babyface have gone to live with other people. Now I have some space for new projects.



Obie says Merry Xmas to all....

Now, make that list and get shopping!!!!