buying new swimmers is the WORST

With the change of season here it is time to get new swimmers.  Over winter children have grown taller and having a wedgie with  your swimmers is not acceptable at school swimming.  For some reason the elastic in rashies is designed to last about three months, so they collapse halfway through the summer season and the girls emerge from the surf wearing a sort of elastic dress.

So off we went to the shops for hopefully an easy purchase of new togs for school.  HA!

Maybe I am the only mother in Brisbane who doesn't want her 10 and 12 year old wearing push up bra bikinis.  I am pretty sure my ten year old does not need padding on top.  It was very difficult to find just a one piece normal shaped swimmer.  And with a rashie to match - because their white white pale skin BURNS so easily.  We finally settled on Speedos (thank you speedos for not changing your design.  Ever.), even though they were pushing the budget they were not pushing top padding.

I also needed new swimmers.  When the elastic disintegrates around your arms and you are swimming freestyle laps...it gets a little bit TOO freestyle.  I grabbed a pair of speedos without even trying them on in the shop (because really, I would rather eat a ball of hair than happily try on several pairs of swimmers in the shops) - fortunately they mostly fit except for the back fat.  This I plan to get rid of with my lap swimming.

I broke in my new swimmers by doing a quick km in the pool.  All good.

And hopefully the agony of buying new swimmers is over for another year.

This is exactly how I look in my new swimmers.  Focused.  Fit. In my head.

running away to join the circus

After a concerted pleading effort by my oldest daughter in the first half of the year - I relented and let her do circus classes.  With flying trapeze.

It is a bit of an unusual extra-curricular thing to do - but she loves it.  I think it is awesome for her fitness and trust and self-confidence and meeting different kids.  She loves the flying trapeze and the tissu.

You can check her out getting a catch on the trapeze here:
/http://www.streaka.com/profile/circus-arts/v/nY2laan5rfM/vel/17210/

The trainers at Flipside Circus are great, and treat the kids really well.  Annika has her first show coming up and she has been chosen to go on the tissu.  Heights don't really worry her (complete opposite to me - I start shaking and my blood runs cold when I am further than my own height off the ground).  She also loves balancing on the globe ball.  Pretty much anything high where she can climb.  Monkey child.

Circus is not that cheap, so she wasn't going to be able to do it next term.  But her teacher sent emailed a grant opportunity from the federal government called Creative Young Stars.  I figured - I can fill out a form.  So I did.  And we were the fortunate recipients of a grant - yay!!  So Annika has one more term of hanging around upside down.

So every Saturday morning I spend watching my oldest child swing and climb high.  With a big smile on her face.  I just hope she doesn't run away to join the circus.  I would miss her too much!
 

This is a picture of someone doing tissu - not my daughter, just an image search person

party news

It's like a little knocking on the back of my brain - 'update the blog', 'write about what is happening' - but most of the time it is fairly easy to ignore.  But here is a quick update:

Fortieth birthday op shop party went very well.  It was a bit overwhelming having nearly all my friends and family at my house at the same time - but it was lovely to see everyone.  I had a bit of hostess anxiety about making sure everyone had someone to talk with, and a drink, and something to eat, and the running schedule of the night - but that's part of the fun....isn't it?

I was really happy with how everything ended up looking.  Op shop theme is a great theme - nothing needs to match!

So much food - thanks everyone for cooking!

My wonderful cake made by the beautiful Kerrie.  It is caramel mudcake topped with chocolate mudcake, topped with a tea cup cake -  I think it is symbolising all the many cups of tea I have had with friends and family over the years, and many more to come!

My dress was $7 from the op shop - hand made by somebody and fitted me like a glove.

Lanterns on the deck ready for the party.  I love these lanterns.  I had the same champagne type ones in my house when I was small.

Chris made a wonderful speech.  Love him.  Mostly gorgeous and only a little bit embarassing.  Mum also made a great speech, revealing parts of my personality from when I was small that still ring true. Annika wrote me a song. A real proper song that she sang and played the piano accompaniment. I felt so proud and I cried and laughed and then cried some more. Some of the lyrics are
'you think you're so hilarious, but I don't always agree, 
you know deep down inside, I laugh until I see, how amazing you are'
and
'I've never had a day when I didn't love you, 
I've never seen a day when you weren't strong, 
I've never been away without missing you,
 I've never seen a time when you didn't sing a song'. 

 Such a wonderful gift from a beautiful daughter. It had a chord progression and everything (did I mention I was proud?).

All of us in our op shop clothes.  Such fun!

I had live musicians playing - it was really nice and added excellent ambience.  There was some very interesting oufits.....I think everyone had fun finding that special something at the op shop.

My girls had a wonderful time going through all my photos to make a photo timeline for me. It is astonishing how pictures of me as a girl look just like Annika.  The genes are strong there.  We picked way too many photos, so we had to do a cull to see what made it onto the wall.  We used little paper doilies to mark out the timeline.

In all the preparation for the party I kind of forgot the fact that I was turning 40.  Maybe I am supposed to have a midlife crisis or something.

But I'm not.  I feel blessed with family and friends.  I know I am redeemed with God.  I am cool with the fact that I have never backed a trailer, been to Paris or folded a fitted sheet.  I have learnt so much and I have so much more to learn.

Bring on 40 more.

Recycling op shop crockery

I have a significant birthday tomorrow. It starts with four and ends with 'o'. I have decided to have a party. Cause I'm extroverted like that.

For my party all my guests have to come in something they have found at an op shop for under ten dollars. It has been pretty fun searching for an outfit - I have visited many of Brisbane's finest op shops and now know which ones are cheap and what the opening hours are for my local ones.

On my travels around the op shops I have been collecting crockery as well. It means that I have been searching through dusty piles of plates with patterns I remember from my childhood. I am going to serve my party food on crockery cake stands. My friend and I made them the other day - we stuck them together with royal icing so I can dissemble them after the party and return them to the op shop.




I am really happy with how they turned out. I'm pretty excited for my party!! Bring on tonight! I will try and remember to post some photos of the cake stands with food on them. And my spectacular op shop outfit.

our bookshelf in the wall

I thought I would write about a favourite part of our house.  My bookshelf.  I love books, and read QUITE a lot.  To support this habit I need fodder - books. To support the books we need shelving.  Since I was small I have dreamed of a floor to ceiling bookshelf.  Now I am grown up I can make it happen in my house.

About six years ago we decided to make a bookshelf along our corridor.  I measured (well, Chris did) and decided it would be too squashy to walk down the hall with a bookshelf running along it.  So Chris decided to take off the wall sheeting to see what our studs (up bits) and noggins (across bits) looked like.  Wonderfully, the person who had built our house made an excellent hardwood frame straight and true.  All we (Chris) had to do was sand back the wood and add some shelves, custom height made to my books.

The shelves are re-used timber from the stage at Festival Hall.  There's Beatle spit on that wood.   Chris also put white backing on the shelves so we weren't looking at the back of a plasterboard wall.  We put in some little lights to jazz it up.

Even these shelves don't hold all of our books, we have another five bookshelves lurking around the house.

I like how anything I chuck on these shelves becomes arty and like it is supposed to be there - can you spot the wool balloon craft from a child, an empty beer bottle, a gyroscope, Nan's crystal, and a tiny lego piano on this shelf?  Proof I took the photo just how the shelf is today - without tidying it up.

I like that my house is a collection of found things that have meaning.  Not stylish, but comfortable and interesting.

Like our bookshelf in the wall.

ladder in the kitchen

I found an old wooden ladder on council pickup on our street.  I dragged it home and said to Chris with eyes full of designer dreams - let's put it in the kitchen.  Lovely man that he is, he just sanded it, measured where to drill the holes for the screws, and mounted it.  He has also replaced the ancient wooden window with a new wooden window.  Yay. 

Now my (before unrealised) dream of having a ladder in the kitchen has come true.

Before ladder (old kitchen decorating - I had a theme of utensils everywhere)

After ladder mounting.  Fun times on a Thursday night.

I had to move my clock from one wall to the other.  My eyes keep going to where the clock used to be, only to be met with blank wall NOT telling the time.

Shiny saucepans all hanging in a row!

Not bad for a cheap way to spruce up the kitchen.
Ladder = free
Chains and hooks = $60
Saucepans = from my cupboard
Husband labour.....priceless....

from chaos comes...

In choir at the moment, in fact for the last six months, we are tackling Britten's War Requiem.  I am part of the Queensland Festival Chorus and we are singing this requiem in about three weeks.  I am still discovering bits in it we haven't sung yet.

When we first looked at it around Easter time it was a discordant mess.  Britten likes his clashy chords and funny rhythms.  I had my doubts it would ever sound any good.  I figured, well, it is all about war and the futility of it all, it is supposed to sound depressing and atonal.

Then over the last few weeks moments of beauty have emerged.  I will be sitting there listening to the tenors and basses rehearse, and glimpse what Britten had in his mind.  I hear the sopranos soar over us altos, meeting our notes then leaving them again.  The urgency of the Dies Irae making you feel unsettled and like guns are rumbling in the distance in a 7/8 rhythm.  The sadness of the Lacrimosa, weeping for the soldiers.  I feel like the choir plays the part of the ghosts of soldiers haunting the battlefield.  I use my spooky singing voice...

From the chaos is emerging tiny parts of beauty and order.

The poetry written by Wilfred Owen contrasts with the Latin Mass.  Some parts of the poetry are so sad:

Anthem for a Doomed Youth
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, -
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

and

The Next War
Out there, we walked, quite friendly up to Death,---
 Sat down and ate beside him, cool and bland,---
Pardoned his spilling mess-tins in our hand.
We've sniffed the green thick odour of his breath,---
 Our eyes wept, but our courage didn't writhe.
He's spat at us with bullets, and he's coughed
 Shrapnel. We chorused if he sang aloft,
We whistled while he shaved us with his scythe


So my mind is resting on the requiem for many hours a week at the moment.  It makes me feel thankful for hope and eternal peace.