countdown

Well, it's only a matter of days and we'll be on the road, heading south. In the time we have been here, we have seen Remi grow at the rate of knots, fuelled by an amazing appetite. I measured him a few days ago, and since May he has grown one centimetre a month. He is now over a metre tall and close to 20kg. The photo above may give you some idea of his size, and he's not quite three and a half.
He is not keen on us going, and told me a few days ago, in most earnest tones, "I don't want you and Grandpa to go to the farm, Tuppy, I want you to stay here."
Today is Charles last day of building round at Skinner St and he is looking forward to it enormously. He has got increasingly tired as the tools have become increasingly blunter. A couple of days at Yamba on the way to Sydney will be wonderful.

shifting

Here we are at Manly West, not far from the coast and 30 mins drive (45 in peak hour) from West End. A very different Brisbane. We are staying at Claudia's until we leave to head south at the end of the month. We arrived on Sunday morning having gone to see The Audrey's the night before with Lisa and Simon, Claudia and Sam, and Zoe (my niece) and her boyfriend Gray. It was one of the last shows of the Brisbane Festival, and was a great night in the Speigeltent. (not sure of the spelling)
The weather is beautiful. Hope it warms up in Victoria as we are quite acclimatised to Brisbane warmth now. Looking forward to seeing everyone when we get back.

night life in Brisbane

Last night we had dinner with Ian Mclean who is over from Perth to give some lectures in Brisbane. It was so lovely catching up with him, and his life in W.A. Ian & I went to Monash together and it was through him that we met Shaun.
Tonight I had a very little stall at a monthly market that is held out the back of the local wonderful book shop. As you can see, the table size is small, but I manage to do well. This is the third or fourth market I've been to and I'm making some new items, such as fabric brooches. It's great fun. We each take a plate of food and our fee ($10) goes in part towards a few bottles of wine. It's a venue for local craftspeople to get together and sell their wares. Lovely idea.
And tonight, whilst I was out, Charles was baking for a fundraiser for Green Left Weekly (paper) where there will be Iranian, Turkish and Guatemalan music. Here are his caramelised onion tarts. Look good don't they! The other pastry cases are for apple tarts.

the smell, taste and crunch of dust

As you will have seen on the news, today we experienced nothing less than an apocalyptic vision, as the sky, our house, our eyes, nose and throat filled with dust. I can still smell it tho it is now evening and the sky is starting to clear. Two of these are 2 pics I took from the front door during the storm, and the third I took the next day. No need to tell which is which. Normally you can see buildings of the city very clearly, but today nothing but dust, then nothing. Everything inside is covered with a film of dirt.

in the swim

Today it was 31 degrees and by 2 o'clock I could hear the pool calling me, so I bravely donned my rapidly deteriorating togs and had my first swim post winter. It was beautiful. I was joined by Garry who spent last night here on his way to Fraser Island, and who has since left to pick up Annette, Phoebe and Charlotte at the airport. It was great catching up with him. We went to the organic market this morning and met Helen and Remi there for breakfast. Bec was theoretically having a sleep in, but the plants she bought last week awaited her and she could not resist. The garden is slowly emerging out of the rubble and they are doing a wonderful job in their busy lives.
Here are a few pics from last weekend, Mat, Jeff and Remi.

my blogs have disappeared

Not sure what went wrong, but my last 2 blogs are not here. So here's a third try. These show the deck at Bec & Helen's, almost complete and being put to good use. Matt & Jeff were here last weekend so will put a few pics on when I download them. Only a few weeks to go in this place ... then to Claudia's for the last few weeks before heading south again. Mum is back here in less than 2 weeks so will be good to see her again, tho it seems no time since she was here.

some new pics

I have been busy making more dressups for Remi, the latest a horse, at his request, which, lika all his toy horse, is called Ben.






These next three were taken at the celebratory dinner after the opening of Sam's latest show...he has sold 7 paintings so far. If you want to see them, they are currently on the website of Andrew Baker Gallery. Claudia, Simon and Lisa, and Charles and Zoe, along with a whole lot of us, had a great feed at the local Indonesian - our favourite eating place.