Reasons to be cheerful

 1. Mum's home after a month in New Zealand – a trek and a half for her at 83, considering she's terrified of flying and very shaky on her pins. She had tricky stopovers in Melbourne going both ways, that were almost as long as the flying time. But it was lovely for her and my brother to see each other and, we hope, the first of many.
2. The blokes in my household are away down south doing the firebreaks and mowing the bush block in readiness for the fire season. And while I'd rather they were here, I am enjoying the lack of cricket commentary and bass rhythms.
3. A bit of sewing, above. I made this:

from this pile of Liberty offcuts from my best friend, Shelley:

and a bit I had lying around.

Away

Last weekend it was Adelaide, this weekend it was New York. Kinda!

David was invited to a long weekend at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival, to write about it for his paper, and review a couple of the shows that will be heading to Perth.

He had a hotel room for two and two tickets to the shows of his choice, so I scrabbled together a few frequent flyer points, packed the heels and the leopard-skin coat and off we went.

Well! It was fun from the moment we landed. What a great city! What a fantastic festival! We crammed in eight shows from Friday's opening gala concert to a late Sunday night event.

We had Saturday brekkie at the Adelaide central markets and dropped in at the South Australian Art Gallery, and on Sunday we hired a car and with a new journo friend from Sydney,  headed for the beautiful hills, with another brekkie at Hahndorf (above) and lightning stops at a couple of wineries.

The rolling hills are stunningly beautiful, and it's only about 30 minutes from the CBD. So you can work in the city and live in the bush and have the absolute best of both worlds. Sigh. We loved every moment of it.

For more info about the cabaret festival, you can read David's excellent round-up here.

Last Monday, it was off the plane after a very dodgy flight in nasty weather and home in time to do a couple of hours' work, then straight back into the week.

Then, on Friday night, David and I went to a truly wonderful show, How to Succeed in Business, at the Regal Theatre in Subi, the big annual show put on by the music theatre students from the WA Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA).

We are huge fans of WAAPA shows –  as you know, I am loathe to go to live theatre in Perth, or anywhere, but I will always go to a WAAPA musical. This is a very rare chance to see a big-production Broadway musical brought to life on the stage with all the trimmings: stunning performances, faultless singing, song-n-dance routines, an orchestra in the pit, fabulous costumes, scenery changes ... it's superb. You can settle back in your seat with your choc bomb and be thoroughly entertained.

The New York state of mind continued early the next morning at the Art Gallery of WA with my best friend Shelley and her family. We had bagels and coffee at the Art Gallery of WA and a talk by the director of MoMa and our very own AGWA director, Stefano Carboni. It was to launch the gallery's big new exhibition from MoMa, From Picasso to Warhol, which we then explored before the doors opened. 

Here's a pic Shelley took of Wayne and me planning how we could make our own version of one of the wonderful Alexander Calder kinetic sculptures!

Monday

Peonies from my best friend Shelley – thanks so much! They were such a treat.

It seems odd, when I have every Monday off, for the rest of the working world to have it off as well! I feel like I should have tomorrow off as well to compensate.

I'm chipping away at the book I'm working on, and enjoying sitting at my desk with the back door open to the garden. It's a balmy 22 degrees with a little wind and just bloody perfect.

We had a quiet weekend, mainly because I've been warding off a head cold, which has been coming and going since last Tuesday. 

Saw a lovely Michelle Williams movie (Take This Waltz) on Saturday morning with my best friend Karen. While we both enjoyed it, we did sit for a few minutes afterwards and grumble about some of the odd things in it, like the really bizarre conversation Margot (Williams) has over coffee with the bloke she fancies, in which he tells her what he wants to do to her, at which point any self-respecting woman would either slap him or go "eew..." and walk quickly away. There was a sort of wacky collage of weirdly incongruous sex scenes, to boot. And we'd have trimmed it by a good 20 minutes with some judicious editing. But other than those gripes, it was fab!

David and I are off for a long weekend in Adelaide from Friday morning, he as guest of the Adelaide Cabaret Festival and me as tag-along. We love exploring a good city together, and we are really looking forward to it. I think we're going to seven or eight shows, and a gala dinner. Yay! Packing the wicked boots and the leopard-skin coat ...

Lovely stuff

There are three kaffir lime trees in our garden, and I was mystified when one of them started producing oranges. It seems the limes are grafted on to root stock, and one of our trees has two trunks – one with the distinctive kaffir lime leaves and the other, the root stock, laden with oranges.
Curious to know what sort of oranges they are – with their squat shape and roughly-dimpled peel – I summoned help from Mr Google and discovered, to my utter delight, that they are seville oranges. The actual thing. Perfect fruit for marmalade.

So yesterday, the first day of winter (we also made celebration porridge), I went gathering, and boiling and bottling, and now I have nine jars of fabulous – if I do say so myself – bitter orange marmalade.

Midway through the process, after the whole fruit had been boiled alive for two hours, filling the house with the most fantastic sharply-orange scent, the recipe blithely said: " ... then add the juice of two lemons ...". WTF? It was after 6pm by now, so David and I nicked the front lamp off Will's bike as a torch and traipsed off into the park behind our house where I happen to know there is a magnificent lemon tree with branches hanging over someone's back fence. The marmalade was saved.

Next time, I'll get a funnel to help get the scalding hot lovely-stuff into the jars without getting it everywhere. Lots of stickiness in my kitchen this morning! But YUM. Seriously. A whole planet of difference from the factory stuff.

Friday

We've had some deliciously cold nights, so I've been sleeping like a log. And I'm addicted to peppermint tea, which is all that Will drinks. He and I make a big pot every evening, and we drink the lot between us. And that also helps me sleep, I think, rather than caffeine-loaded regular tea.

I'm starting the day slowly here at Schloss Zed. First load is in the machine. Then a little computer catch-up (that's my desk, above, in this morning's mild winter sunlight), another coffee, and a bit of work on the book – editing, not writing. But my best friend Shelley was reminding me this week that I really ought to get Julia out of the kitchen where her guest is still making coffee and where I abandoned her so long ago ... and I'm wondering if she may need to be transplanted from the backwoods of Tuscany to rural Australia. I do have lovely plans for her, that she'll definitely enjoy ...

Tuesday

When I got home from work today, a box from Japan was sitting on the table.

These are birthday presents from Lily – how well does she know her mum?

I can't believe the rabbit linen. 

And the dragonflies. My mind is already whirring with ideas of things to make. How brilliant.

There was also a stunningly-wrapped roll of exquisite handprinted papers, so perfect, and a pair of these ...

Winter Birkies! Already on my feet - and so warm and comfy.

Thanks, Lily! I love everything. And I love you t-h-i-s much (hands out wide, like we used to!).

:: I'm having great trouble getting the pics exactly as I want them with this new Mr Blogger, which is a bit of a pain. Anyone else finding it difficult? And scrolling to the bottom of the post is impossible, as well. Aaaargh.

Monday

 I started the day with a little chat to this fella, sunning on the succulents I'm growing in pots outside the back door.

Then it was off to La France for petits four avec mes amis ... sitting in my best friend's sunny garden, enjoying the sunshine, a big pot of tea and some book talk, blog talk, garden talk, telly talk and general catch-up chat.

Le Jardin - avec cardie (!

It's very comfortable to be back to my regular working week after a month full-time. I simply don't have time in my life for all that work!
:: I walked through a web a few minutes ago when i went to bring in the washing, and now something has bitten me on the shoulder ... uh-oh. It's a little bit spidery round here for days and days, we had an enormous golden orb weaver spider out on the front verandah, but I've just noticed she's gone. This is what they look like (click).