muppinstuff

seven random things about me and pineapples

On Wednesday morning as I rushed out to work, there was a wonderful gift in my letterbox from Suse (thank you). Three beautiful old linen tea-towels. Featuring pineapples. On Thursday, late in the afternoon, I hung them on the line and pointed the camera, hoping to preserve their complete glory before they start doing the hard work of tea towels in this house (although the one with the surfer may be a wall hanging for a while).

Then I had the idea of a pineapple meme. How hard could it be? While on summer holidays, now so long ago that my memories are more faded than my tan, I was tagged by Schmutzie to do the seven random things meme. I didn't do it at the time because the internet connection at the sandy point internet cafe was at best flaky. And the computer was on a shelf in a passage between the kitchen and the door to the toilet. Where I  perched on a high stool, watched chips being cooked and thought about the beach or other holiday joy I was missing, sometimes trying to keep the small child out of mischief. Although I was only ever charged for 15 minutes, even when I'd been there for a good 45. Anyway, this meme continually circles blogland, somewhat like the playgroup cold/lurgy. It nonetheless has a certain charm. I like this meme, but it's hard separating out what is and isn't weird and /or random. Hence the pineapple thought. And I get to show you my new tea towels!

1. When I was a child, a dinner we sometimes had was ham steaks, or rather slabs of ham like meat, possibly out of a tin, grilled (as in broiled) and with tinned pinapple on top.  I loved it. Now it doesn't even seem like proper food.
2. Sometimes when I feel a bit liverish, tinned pineapple juice and soda or (diet) dry ginger does it for me.
3. I still make the boiled pineappled fruit cake that was my grandmother's recipe. It's probably from the fifties, uses a tin of crushed pinapple and a standard packet of mixed fruit. It's really very nice.
4. Back when I bought my own point and shoout camera, an olympus mju, I spent days racing around taking heaps of photos. Here's one of three pineapples against the window in the sunroom on a rainy day. Why would I have had three pineapples? Where they really cheap back then? Now they tend to be a bit of a treat. These tea towels made me immediately think of that photo. Gee I loved that camera. Pity it got stolen, not once but twice. The replacement also got stolen so I just gave up.
5. When I was in Paris and twenty-one, I remember being in a shop that sold dried fruit and asking for ananas in French. When I checked the spelling by googling, I got "Je suis un ananas ivre" which means I am a drunk pinapple.
6. I rather like fresh pinapple, but only if it's sweet enough not to hurt my mouth and has been cut up so that all the core and all the skin and all those little sharp bits are gone. Sometimes it improves sitting around for an hour or so cut up, but more often than not pineapple is just a waste of money. I think the only way to got a good one for sure is to have a greengrocer that tastes their own fruit and will tell you for sure. Like Cramer on Seinfeld said, fruit's a gamble.
7. Here's another picture of a pineapple, from about this time last year. I remember the fruity smell of this one on the kitchen bench. Rich and ripe. Attracting for those little flies that hang around fruit shops. I don't remember being dissapointed. Maybe I'll get another one tommorrow when I do the shopping.

So, whew, meme all about pineapples. Didn't think I could do it. Although I do have the sadly neglected blog about washing, which is soon to feature a delightful laundry related gift from another lovely blogger (scanner has started working again). I feel very lucky and smooshed by blogworld sometimes.....Thank you. Now I'm going to tag, because it's in the spirit of it all.

Girl on the Avenue
Alby Mangroves from new blog on the block, Life in General
Saha
Stomper Girl
Susan from Five and Two

Rules, you know, seven weird or random things about yourself. You can even re-cycle a previous seven or pick a theme. Tag another five people. But any or all of it, only if you want to.

a visit to the ephemera dealer

Need something lighter after that last whingerama. So. We went to the Coburg market this morning and it was great. Excellent. Although I did get a little carried away. Books for Grace, including a delightful Noddy at the Beach board book. Another camera for me, an old olympus mju 1 film camera, the same model as my first point and shoot camera, which I truly loved.  I had two of them actually, both stolen in burglaries. I missed both. Just love that design, so beautiful to hold. Saw it, had to have it and haggled down the ridiculous price the lady was asking.  Some cheap and pretty plates. And then Grace begged to go to the playgound and I watched as the market started to wind down and tried to feel big about it. Because I hadn't been to my favourite stall yet. The ephemera dealer. Gerard came back and I made a beeline. And boy, did he have the goods today!

An excercise book full of baby cards. Two babies, a boy and a girl. And, from the same family, an old photo album of snapshots. How anyone would let this fall into the hands of an ephemera dealer is beyond me. That makes me feel sad really. Nonetheless, and I feel it's a bit weird or somehow at odds with my sentimental reaction, but I love looking at these photos of someone else's family, imagining their stories. Seeing how life has changed. Although the back of one photo was extra sad.

Also thrown in, some old jam covers and a picture frame. Should have gone for some buttons as well, because the ephmera dealer will always throw in extra little stuff if you spend more than five dollars and ask nicely. I really like it that he bothers with paper stuff, which is really my favourite and he's good natured and generous with it. Which is proabbly why he has such a good stall. Grace had wanted a new baby dolly, but there weren't any. Until we were leaving and I saw a doll abandoned in the carpark. We stopped the car and I jumped out to get her. Doll came home with us and after having her hard battery bit in the middle removed and a good scrub, is now hanging with the dolly clan (in the middle, they all had a bath together after lunch, being grubby sorts of dolls). We'll have to make her (or him) some clothes later in the week. 

the tale of how we bought horsey and I redicovered the joy of sewing

I went opshopping three times last week! How delightful. First there was after the beach on the Tuesday. An opshop I remember from visiting my grandmother by train and bus maybe twenty years ago. And it's still pretty much the same. I do enjoy an old fashioned opshop. We bought quite a few books, my favourite being a Rudyard Kipling tale of elephants with beautiful illustrations. And a funny top for Grace which she loves because it's pretty and cute, and insists on wearing over her singlet. Which amuses me a little because it's hard to get her to wear anything other than dackies and just singlet. I also found the crochet bedpread there, for eight dollars! It's handmade from beautiful soft cotton and I have visions of it being Grace's summer bedspread in our new house (when and if). And a lovely piece of silk (pretty sure, although have yet to do burn test). I worried that the design might be a bit busy or too nana for me, but it's such gorgeous soft, light fabric. And just wouldn't leave my hands.

It's now in my sewing pile. For after I finish this binge of work clothes sewing. Two skirts and a slightly dodgy refashioned top this weekend. Considering that we also went and looked at houses, did shopping and other weekend hoohah, I'm pretty pleased with that. No photos because I was too busy cutting, faffing and sewing. Unfortunately when I washed the other skirt I made, it lost so much colour and sheen that it now looks very worn in. Not in a totally bad way and I still really like it, but I think it's a weekend and going to the beach kind of skirt.

Anyway, mid week we dropped a load off at the brotherhood. And came home with more yet more stuff, but still less overall. Which is good. Nothing too exciting there, just some old magazines. The real haul was on Friday after I went for my (should be more) regular thyroid function blood test. Grace was very good at the doctors, played with the toys in the waiting room and then sat on the little stool next to me while the nurse slapped my arms around and tried to remember which vein she used last time. Afterwards at Savers, I took Grace into the changerooms with some summer clothes we selected together and she told me they were all too big or too small, give to bubby-lee. Even dresses or tops that fit well. Sigh. I think she's still too young to help select her clothes, which is a pain because if she really doesn't like something, it involves no end of drama to get her to wear it. I try to pick things that are practical, that she will like and offer limited choices and pick my battles but, as far as I can see, there's no reasonably reliable laws as to what she does and doesn't like. Even the aforementioned dackies and singlets can be tricky.

After hanging the rejected items on the return rack we found some books and I did a deal that if she came up the back with me to look at tea towells and fabric, then on the way back she could play with the toys. Which we did. She started playing with a slightly older girl and it was all going well until the older girl got down a plastic dolls pram. That Grace instantly decided she wanted. I said no, because she already has a dolls stroller. There was howling and the other little girl was kind of egging her on. I looked away and noticed a felt horse. I pulled it from the shelf and realised it was a homemade hobby horse. Not great felt, but kind of kooky and charming. I gave it to the girls to play with. Grace liked it, but the other girl raced away with it, riding all around the shop. In the end, I told Grace that we had to go home now, or we'd be late for lunch and that as the other girl was playing with horse we weren't going to buy it today. More howling and some kicking and screaming. After the storm abated, I sat her up on the bench and she looked all woebegone, horsey come home with Grace? The Savers lady looked at me, did you want the horse? She didn't think the other woman would buy it and went to see. Now, tantrums don't as a rule get results around here, but I would have bought the horse anyway, if the other girl hadn't run off with it.

Grace rode horsey all the way back to the car (except for crossing the road) and has been telling me all about girl play horsey, lady in shop get horsey, thank you lady, horsey come home. On Sunday, horsey had lunch (salad) and then had a afternoon sleep on the sunroom floor with blanket over her. While I sewed and Grace played with my buttons. The buttons are no longer sorted according to kind in little plastic dealer bags but a big joyful muddle. Which gives me a precious thrill. Especially since when I came home from work (aargh) tonight, Grace asked, mummy do sewing and play with mummy's buttons? I see so much more sewing in the future.

Thinking about another houses post. There was a fabulous one, which even though it probably won't be ours, was great to visit, but haven't processed either the pictures or my thoughts yet. One thing at a time.

take me to the kittens

Four houses today. Including the stinky house, which Dad went through with me prior to auction. He has an approach to houses which is very detailed and practical. It's the first time it's just been me and him and I learnt alot. All week, I've been flip-flopping about this one. Great location, nice aspect, much potential. Haunting me was the thought it would go really cheap and I'd read the result in the Sunday paper and kick myself. The auction was slow but went well over the reserve and well over the price we could pay for it and realise the vision splendid. It was all a bit shocking really, that people would pay that much for a house probably built during or around the time of the war (an austerity house) with bad plaster work, a crap kitchen and an unbearable odour. So bad that my jacket is still hanging out on the clothesline waiting to be washed tomorrow. It will be interesting to see whether it's pulled down or renovated. And it was a relief to hear my Dad say that it was a good house to consider but I'm also a bit relieved that it really wasn't the one.

There weren't many houses to look at this morning and the first one up was delayed by an hour. So we drove around looking at the other houses on my afternoon's list and visiting garage sales. Getting an idea of the neighborhood, you know. It sounds like an excuse, but you do get to talk to people and hang out. It's also a break and a pleasure in a day that has lots of driving around, the odd tantrum and some quiet bits that aren't really worth going home in. We let Grace choose one or two little toys and some videos, if they're cheap. Today there was one sale that was mostly kid stuff and she scored bigtime, heaps of new books (I chose these), three (!) new videos, a Thomas the Tank engine thing-a-ma-jig and a green dinosaur from the Wiggles. Obviously we're going to have to do a big return to the oppy trip soon. At the next garage sale, G found a very cute tin.

Once Grace settled, I bought a picture which she subsequently decided would be nice in her room. Kittens. And knitting. 

And a book about the history of gardens and plants, full of gorgeous photos and writing that I'll go back to again and again. 20cents!

And, and, and I now have the use of a very flash camera for a while. To see whether I like using a DSLR. It might still be a while before pictures appear here because there's going to be a big learning curve as I've never really used anything other than a point and shoot before, and there's software to set up etcetera. It's very exciting though!

Oh, and one house I saw today is pretty nice. With very special and very brown carpet. In a good area, but maybe not too good. If you know what I mean. And it doesn't smell. Not one little bit.

yesterday was father's day

I asked G what he wanted for father's day and he said, a sleep in. Fair enough. Grace even took him a glass of orange juice and then dutifully dissapeared to watch TV. But he didn't sleep in that much, so we went to Coburg trash and treasure for a spot of shopping. It was quite excellent. Grace wheeled Pooh bear-bear up and down the isles and was generally pretty good company despite having a bit of a cold. And needing to have her face wiped frequently. We scored bigtime as there weren't that many people there, being father's day and windy. Also we haven't been for a while so there's been a big turn over of stuff.

I bought a rather special yellow dish and a tea strainery type thing in a little stand. Both of which delight me in ways that are impossible to express. Also a big bag of trashy mags (I don't care if they're a couple of years out of date), some retro and modern kiddies books and a swag of old photo phamplets. Oh how I love buying papery emphemera!

Grace chose herself a rather revolting pink barbie wallet in which to put her library card (actually a Carlton blues thingo from a chip packet, a very treasured possession although she does also have a real library card) and a doll which she chose from amongst many. A stallholder was selling her large collection of childhood dolls. I've started calling this doll Dolly Parton. We washed new dolly, as Grace calls her, in the bath last night because she probably hasn't had a bath since 1970. And she was pretty stinky. Luckily G was able to get her head back on. But apparently, the best thing of all are her shoes. Which are also in the wash, alongside the rather goovy little outfit which includes bubble underpants. G scored himself a robotron at-2 (a boy's doll?) which apparently blows smoke if you fill it with household oil or somesuch.

I also spent some time photographing the colours at the trash and treasure which I never think about until just before we have to go. But really it's one of my favourite aspects of the day. Up there with fish and chips for lunch and the unpacking of various bags and parcels and the showing each other all the stuff we've scored. It was a pretty good father's day outing, really. A little oasis of pleasure amongst the stress of househunting (which I never thought we'd do but I'm really pleased and grateful that we are) and the trials of cold and flu season. Grace had her first visit to the doctor in well over a year, she's hacking a cough and streaming snot but doesn't understand why she feels so terrible and can only run around for half the usual time before falling in a heap. Gerard did a sterling job of looking after her today, but you know, I kind of take that a bit for granted on a day to day basis. Which is actually pretty nice.  It makes me very happy when I think of that. It's not coming out right, but he is a terrific Dad and I really do love and appreciate that about him. 

career woman's cookbook and other gems

There's a post brewing about my motherhood stuff. It's in draft form and every couple of nights I open it up and type a few words or a sentence here and there, and then suddenly feel really, really tired and have to aimlessly cruise flickr or go to bed. I think this draft is blocking me from writing about all sorts of other stuff. Like opshopping. Sometimes when I read dear meagan or fiveandtwo and about their fabulous opshop scores, alongside the vicarious pleasure ( a bit like the best kind of make believe/virtual/internet opshopping), I get this feeling oh, I don't go opshopping anymore, boohoo. Which is just not true. Not at all. There is always some opshopping (or trash and treasuring) in my life. Without it, I feel bereft, so lately I've taken to having a longer lunch break and once a week, striding down to one of the oppys near work. Last week I got some fantastic new tea towells and small tableclothes useful for draining glasses in the scullery. This week I found an orange folder of neatly ring bound women's weekly cooking supplements. I can't tell you how much pleasure it's given me, the touch of old paper, the history, the recipes. And this one spoke to me, not that I see myself cooking prawns at home on a weeknight.

I remember my mother making us dresses like this and I think there's some photos somewhere which I might drag out for a flashback friday soon. Except mine wasn't white, but lurid purple. A bit like the dress in Miles Franklin's, My Brilliant Career, you know the moment when she gets out the beautiful dress her mother has slaved over and it's all wrong, it's lurid and gaudy. All the other girls have dresses that are tasteful, pale and understated. And then she digs herself into an even worse hole and says it's the dress of some girl who died.

There is also a book on cooking with potatoes, some racey rice packet pictures, copha cooking (but no White Christmas or Chocolate Crackles which are the only foods occasionally justifying the actual ingestion of copha, in my opinion), spring lamb cooking (yum, yum pigs bum), some cakes and slices, kids cakes and a book of wedding cake designs. Which contained this one, for a young wedding. 

It's decorated with jasmine, pink rosebuds and the bride and groom design is flooded onto the cake. I don't know what that means exactly, but all the other designs look stuffy and middle aged by comparison. Not hard, I guess, when this couple look like very young children.

whiskers on kittens

My last opshop finds, photographed in sunshine which seems a distant memory, even though we are getting little bursts here and there. I miss opshopping, I'm yearning for some good opshopping action. Not that I miss the stuff I buy all that much, but I miss being in opshops and the calm space of going through a box of odds and ends at my leisure. Although I have to say, I'm a bit taken by my last purchases. From a quick trip to Savers, with Grace in tow, walking or should I say, running around and finding all sorts of things to pull out. Not really all that restful.

Anyway, it plays Lara's theme. And still had the box, which I found on another shelf. I love it when I find the original packaging for stuff like this. So much more thrilling. Almost like new, and yet old, all at the same time. I have fond memories of having a music box just like this when I was a girl and thought Grace might enjoy it now, and she did. Especially pulling the ballerina off the spike and putting it in her mouth. So it's living on the high shelf above my computer desk, along with a few other fragile oppy finds until she's old enough not to destroy it within the first five minutes. And, of course, until she's old enough not to hurt herself with it either.

 

I'm not sure about the material. It was an impulse buy. Yellow isn't really my colour and I'm not sure whether it's seventies or a more recent knockoff. Not that that should matter. And I'm not sure what I would make out of it but sometimes buying material just for the sake of having it is cheering. Maybe it will become one of those pieces that I pull out of my cupboard every year, touch and look at before putting back in the cupboard. Which in itself is quite satisfying.

Why we are decrapulating* our house

This afternoon G took a car load of stuff back to the op-shop. And this is just the first pass. There will be more, I'm sure of it. Grinchy housework day has moved from Monday to Wednesday on account of my work days shifting around. It actually feels better doing it on a Wednesday, less grinchy. I don't know why, but it does. Maybe because after two days of sitting at a desk having numerous and intense customer contacts, a couple of hours dusting is a relief? Anyway once we were past that point of argument that happens because I do some stuff (not all housework related) then have breakfast, then have a shower and then get stuck into some power cleaning rather than getting started right away, it was quite pleasant. Except that as part of our post holiday decrapulation project, G made me go through Grace's toys before breakfast. Anyway it's done now, all the surplus (as in yucky) soft toys and bits of plastic crap have gone. She hasn't even noticed. I don't imagine we'll get away with that for much longer. Still with a birthday coming up, I think it is provident to make space for some new toys. I often feel I'm holding back a wave of stuff threatening to engulf us.

It doesn't help that we both love opshopping. Or that her Nana is a bigger opshopper and hoarder than the both of us put together, times two. Therefore, I've decided to be unsentimental about the stuff that mum gives us. If it doesn't fit or doesn't work, it goes out. Stuff that arrives home from Nana's after visits, goes back to Nana's, otherwise my mum gets more stuff, to have at Nana's. Et cetera. The only exceptions being the hand made jumpers and toys which I am a bit more inclined to keep. We've had some discussions about this but I'm not sure my point is getting through. Indeed, when I told mum that we were having a big clear out, she asked what we were getting rid off with a certain glint in her eye. As if she had somewhere to put more stuff.

This issue of stuff is one that I have plenty of internal conflict about myself. I love certain sorts of acquistion, opshopping, markets, bookshopping, hardrubbishing. Gifts of useful things like fridges. Oh yes. But I do love opshopping, especially country opshopping. It's not that I think that the goods are better in country opshops, it's the thrill of finding new oppys, stopping your journey. And yes, buying stuff. We managed to get in quite a lot of opshopping on our holiday. On the drive down we stopped in Loch which has an opshop that opens on Sunday! Which the opshop lady said was when people passed through. I bought two childrens books, one a lurid fairy tale book and the other an original 1940s copy of The Wanderings of Mumfie, written and illustrated by Katharine Tozer. I'd never heard of Mumfie before but he was a "rather common little elephant" who "waited every day for the postman to bring him a lovely Adventure all tied up in a nice exciting parcel". This adventure is all about how he ends up being one of the toys chosen by Father Christmas to go across the sea of forgetfulness to the world of children. It's very odd, but I couldn't stop reading it. And I love the illustrations.

At the first visit to the Foster opshop I stocked up on material bits, some old buttons and bought yet more kiddy books. And a knitted toy, now called Foster, which Grace chose and tried to shoplift. Luckily it was one of those opshops that are very friendly to little people and they weren't at all fussed. In the picture above, Foster is on left. The other, almost identical, toy (called Snowman) was also chosen by Grace at a local opshop presided over by a lady who seems to dislike children intensely. There must have been a fashion and pattern for these at some point because I've seen others. I didn't like the Snowman at first because he's acrylic, but Foster is wool and very nicely made. And as a pair, I'm warming to them. Grace finds it hilarious and carts them both around.

The next opshopping trip took in Port Welshpool and Toora and Mum came too. I ended up with another plastic coated sewing basket, more material (like I don't have enough), yet another tin and the plastic cat which I spied on the way out. I have a soft spot for cheap older style plastic squeeze toys. When I asked how much, they laughed as if to say who'd want that and gave it to me. G is trying to convince me to keep it in the packaging but Grace loves it too much. And toys are to play with. But I do love the packaging.

And there was much opshopping on the way home. Most of which was spent restraining Grace, or letting her play with the toys depending on the kid friendliness of the shop. I bought heaps and heaps of kids books at Leongatha. Many little golden books, some bigger golden books and assorted other gems. Part of the decrapulation will have to include re-organising all the books. I'd like to have them all properly in shelves rather than in baskets or strewn around the floor. But that seems to work for about two minutes.

*Decrapulate, to rid ones life and space of accumulated material possessions that have become a hindrance rather than a pleasure, ie crap. So you can get new crap, or lead a crap-free life. Or at least spend less time re-arranging your crap. We've been having a polite discussion about who made this one up. I think it might have been G. It's a good word, I think.   

B B B Bag

Ever since I did that meme, my head has been filled with Bs. And I never mentioned bags, which are a bloody big thing in our house. Grace is seriously into bags which she fills and unfills. She often has one hanging from her neck, while pushing her shopping trolley full of stuff up and down the garden. I quite like a bag myself, especially old bags from the oppy, even if they're not very practical. But my favourite is the scrabble bag, and I thought I might share a couple of pictures.

I've had this bag for a long, long time and don't even remember seeing it in the opshop or the thrill of the purchase. It's one of those posessions that I've come to love over time and if I remember rightly, it was pressed into service as a scrabble bag pretty early on and seems purpose made for that function. It has a loop closure that closes very firmly and the bobbles on the end of the cord are beautifully worked. There are some minor rough edges in the construction, but it was obviously made with skill and care. Having a use makes me enjoy the beauty and design of the bag even more, I think.

Sunny sunday morning

Somehow I convinced Gerard that today would be a good for a Coburg market outing, as we haven't been for a few weeks. There's not enough turnover to go every week, and some are better than others. We got there about nine thirty but I reckon all the really good stuff had already gone, like the tin of old buttons for $2 that I heard the dealers talking about at the ephemera stall. When I got to the stall that had had the buttons, I could see that they might have had lots and lots of really great stuff but that being market novices they had sold it all too cheap. I felt sorry for them really, I know what it is like to be setting up your stall in the wee small hours, not sure what's hot and what's not, having dealers and pushy bargain hunters haggle and get in your way as you try to get everything organised. Last couple of stalls we had at Daylesford, I told people to go away until we were ready and became quite direct when they got pushy.

I did buy a few things though. Like a bunch of old patterns that I thought were for children's clothes but are actually for dolls clothes. I suppose there might come a time of sewing dolls clothes but I'm not sure if I'd use a pattern. Anyway, I guess they're quite cute if a little disturbing, especially the patterns for the high heeled doll. Shudder.

I couldn't resist a small, old and pretty scruffy paper box from Mr Ephemera, it says Glitter Wax on the outside which sounds fun and modern, despite the old packaging. I would really have liked to have seen what Glitter Wax was like but I suppose even if it hadn't been modelled a long time ago, it would have deteriorated by now. I do like the picture of the mother with two crafting little children at her feet.They look so neat and orderly, just like at our house (what no clutter and piles of unfinished winter sewing?). Anyway inside the box is a set of six very charming animal stamps.  Only $2, can't go wrong, hours of fun.

I also bought some cardboard baby books and quite a few golden books. One was Very Busy Barbie (Mattel 1993), a stunningly stilted tale of how Barbie runs late for a modelling job interview because she is taking her elderly neighbour to hospital and yet still gets the job because not only is she beautiful, but her employer learns of her good deeds. Oh dear, so bad it's good, almost. Another is called We Help Daddy (MIni Stein & Eloise Wilkins 1979). Illustrations follow.

Check out the pipe. The daddy is smoking a pipe pretty much the whole way through. Despite the pipe smoking and the very stereotypical gender roles, I find this one quite charming and it has the soft feel of a much read book.  I also bought Tootle and The Saggy Baggy Elephant, which I remember from my childhood, and a few others. Gerard bought a few also, he tends to buy wacky cartoon adventures, while I go for the domestic, girly or prettily illustrated ones. Never mind, I suppose it won't be long before Grace is telling us what she likes and doesn't. Even now, I am often quite surprised at which books become favourites.