colour blocking

This time last year I was doing this. And it hasn't really let up much.

To be honest the year has been brutal.

Sometimes one needs to hide ...

... and spend a day faffing the shelves.

I painted these shelves, turns out almost exactly 3 years ago. Must be a spring thing then ... sprucing.

It was so good to not think. To handle things which have a story for me - the books and the figurines and the things - to dust, to sort, to place. To use my eyes not my heart, my hands not my head.

Regaining control over some tiny corners of my life.
Let's go October.
Be gentle.

christmas happened

It did! And looking back through the hasty snaps taken here and there I realise there were moments of real peace and calm, and beauty, despite the days feeling very full and rushed - the irony of these longest days of the year flying by so fast.

Stella has been taking holiday art classes with her Waldorfy pre-school teacher from 2014 and it's wonderful to have lovely Xmas crafts in the house again. The reindeer above is one of my favourite things ever.

I've never had a nativity scene up for Christmas before, and wouldn't have were it not for this remarkable fold-out cardboard one I picked up secondhand for R20. It's from the 1950's with intricate fold-outs for the kings and the shepherds, hosts of angels overhead.
But it was the family scene which really sold me. Set up on the bureau in the dining room it is just at eye-level for a little girl we have, currently deeply enamored with her family, with concepts of nurturing and loyalty and love. I knew she would love it.
I'm not a believer, and the Christmas story doesn't have the significance for me that it must do for practising Christians. But it represents two things which I do hold dear: the power of stories to teach us lessons and give us a sense of belonging through magic and mythology, and the strength of the family bond. These are the things I celebrate at Christmas, and this little scene captures both of those for me.

We did our annual Christmas book advent too. Each year I think the girls may have outgrown it, but each year they start anticipating them in November and I find myself trawling the secondhand book stores for a few new titles to throw in the mix, and looking for bulk deals on wrapping paper. They love them and the reappearance of our family favourites - Father Christmas and The Jolly Christmas Postman, plus other vintage and more modern titles - gets us all in the Christmas spirit.

There was some Christmas baking too ...

... in this case the freshly spray-painted fuel tank from Husband's project bike, curing quietly in the oven one warm night.

But there was some of the more traditional kind too - annual Christmas cupcakes for the security guards who work our neighbourhood.

We visited FC, and handmade a few gifts (much anticipated little boy cousin due in March!), I watched - and cried through - Love Actually, Husband and the girls attended the traditional Christmas Carols on the water one evening, while I stayed at home with a tummy bug, but I managed recover in time to outdo myself with a Christmas pinata!

It was a good Christmas.

But it was a hard year, and 2016 still had a couple of gut punches it was saving until the very end. Fucking hell.

I'm always partly sad and partly relieved to see the back of Christmas. It was lovely but it was busy and now that it's done, now we can relax for a couple of weeks before bracing ourselves for the next year.

We're clearing the debris today, and packing for the beach. Tomorrow we leave on holiday, and that's a different kind of magic - one which we are all very much looking forward to.

Bye bye x

books: 2015

I did it again! Managed to keep a list, and for the large part keep it updated. I completed it this morning, discovering that I read a total of 25 books this year (fewer than last, I blame Instagram), and a lot more 'girlie' books than last year.
It wasn't a wildly inspiring year of reading it must be said, and a high number of these I sailed through - interested enough to keep reading but not entirely absorbed.

Highlights:
Burial Rites by Hannah Kent
Green Lion by Henrietta Rose-Innes
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
We are All Completely Besides Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler

Re-reads:
The Pratchetts, Adrian Mole and The Time Traveller's Wife (still one of my favourite reads of all time).

We're heading out of town for a few days ... see you in 2016 little blog.

25 things about right now (including 3/5).

1. 3/5 didn't kill me, and it sure as hell didn't make me stronger. But it's done.
2. I hired an au pair.
3. I fired an au pair.
4. Life is too short for my kids to be unhappy. Especially not in the summer holidays.
5. Technically I have 2 days left of work, but I'm done.
6. So, so over it.
7. The big push tomorrow, the big 'putting to bed' of two, massive, growing projects until the new year.
8. The goal: out of office messages on the four different email addresses I'm managing - turn off push to phone for emails - no data use, just surfing on the home wi-fi. That's as off the grid as I can go.
9. And as I'm sizzling right in the middle of the effing grid right now, that's pretty far off.
10. I'm not sure I can do it in one day ...
11. I read this, and it reminded me to be wary of this in 2016.
12. I've developed a strategy, which presently puts me in exactly the same place I was this time last year - working hard, playing hard, pushing it. This year I'm working hard, playing hard, pushing it.

13. 3 nights on the jol last week: Thursday, Friday, Saturday - girls, girls, girls, wine, books, gifts, kids, food, clothes-swaps, G'nT's, laughing and food, and so much dancing.
14. And for 3 nights in a row I had some version of this conversation: 40 is fucking great. It really is.
15. But ja, burnout - let's not do that again.

16. Standing on the lawn in the dark with some mates, watching Kid TV.
17. TWO toad encounters in one evening and I didn't freak out! This is monumental.
18. Christmas started today. A family brunch as various people will be travelling over Christmas. (By people I mean my brothers, and by travelling I mean Thailand and Chile respectively. Bastards.)
19. We've gotten into the vibe at home too, in a nice low-key way. Mid-November. I thought this year I might just put those Christmas books out in a basket with the Xmas tree, but almost the next day Stella asked, with a sparkle in her eye, 'Are we going to open the Christmas books again Mum?'.
20. 'Of course my angel.'

21. We had 5 little friends staying over last night for the 'Slumber Party' the girls have been asking to have for weeks now.
22. My daughters' friends are becoming real people in my life - showing distinctive signs of the women they will become - I'm really enjoying it.
23. I was in a friend's teenage daughter's bedroom recently and I suddenly got so excited: teenage girl bedrooms - they are murky and marvelous, and I have two to look forward to! Secretly I still miss mine.
24. The last push - I'm going to whack it in 24 hours. I need to be on holiday. I. Must. Gather. Strength. for next year.

25. Must remain unfuckablewith.

(f)reader

Used to be you couldn't get anything past her. From before she could talk she would fix me with a knowing stare and my gossip with a girlfriend, serious talk with husband, foul language giggle with brother would dry on my lips ... she was listening.

Oh yes, listening and absorbing.

She was a code-breaker, an ear-thrower (different to a voice-thrower in obvious ways), a listener through doorways and round corners.

We learnt to be selective with our words, careful with our tone and I've spent a lot of time stopping other people mid-sentence ... 'er, could we not talk about that now?'

She was listening.

But these days, not so much.

She's off. In that world, you know the one, all the friends and adventures and countries and experiences and feels folded between two pages, between your hands. 

The limitless span of eternity in the distance between your eyes and the page.

She'll read anywhere. She'll practically read anything. And when she's in that zone you can stand right next to her and sing out 'Chocolate ice-cream!' without even ruffling her brow.

When I turned 18 my parents gave me a birthday card which said Happy Birthday from them, and Laura and Jo and Anne and all the other friends who'd stood by me growing up. They got it so right.

I'm so, so excited for my girl embarking on that journey. 

Oh the places she'll go!

books: 2014

Slipping in just ahead of the new year - my reading list for 2014!

I'm so pleased with myself for sticking with this since last year, and for updating and completing it in time for 2015 ... less pleased that it's been in drafts for months but hey ... it's been a busy year!

Fewer books than 2013 but none-the-less, I'm pleased with myself and spent the year in some very fine company indeed.

Ah reading, where would I be without you?

paul auster day

I spent yesterday in bed with some weird lurgy. Possibly explains the grumpiness on Wednesday...

It was a public holiday so Husband was home, lucky him, and I could just rot quietly upstairs ... with Paul.

Sunset Park, not one I'd read before, and not going to be my new favourite (Oracle Night will be a tough one to oust), but god it was a treat to spend a day in his head, in a world of his creation.

Always, always, while reading Paul Auster I want to write while I'm reading. Makes no sense right? I don't want to copy his content at all, but the way he writes is so very inspiring that my fingertips tingle ... and then stop as soon as I put him down.
Second best would be to read him with a notebook on my knee, and jot down the thoughts that flow. But I'm too immersed, loving it too much, to step outside of the book even for a moment.

So it was a blessing really to be able to read this novel in one sitting lying. And I did!

I must get started on my 2014 book list ... more noise!

books: 2013

For the first time in years I kept a list of everything I read this year. Read to myself that is.

Not only did I keep a list but I got it updated in time to start again on Wednesday! Amazing.

Also amazing is that I read 36 books. Me, the person who never thinks I've enough time to read. 36 of my own books plus about 600 kiddie's books - they count right?

According to this article one's brain function is boosted for up to 5 days after reading a novel. If I count mine, and generously amalgamate all the children's books into, say, 100 novels ... then I had 680 days of super-intellect this year!

That sounds about right. Right?

Happy New Year everyone!

9 dec 2010

Book Club. I never really got it. Women in movies/Oprah/magazines getting choked up talking about their book clubs.

But I do now.

The company, the food, the wine and the books, oh the books. Sanity restored, once a month. Book club.

I ...

 ... have been very preoccupied and absent from this here blog ...

 ... had a good laugh at this yesterday, McNulty reading Pride & Prejudice, have you ever? (thanks SuperFi!) ...

 ... say thanks Ext, for the shout-out, she's becoming a real Souf Efriken, what with driving atrociously and complaining about her maid ...

 ... feel sorry for our leaky pup, who is confined to the tiled areas of the house whilst still on heat, and hasn't been getting as many walks as she deserves (due to my reluctance to fight off packs of horny mongrels in the park) ...

 ... am starting to feel overwhelmed by the piles of clutter in my home. Sometimes, late at night, I feel like they're watching me, and rubbing their little cluttery hands together with proprietal glee ...

 ... am too tired at the end of each day to deal with them and have started thinking it may be simpler just to charge them rent ...

 ... would desperately love to own this book, as much for myself as for Frieda (scroll along the link, well worth the read) ...

 ... optimistically put my wheelie bin out on the pavement every morning, and then bring it in, still full, every night. Power to the People and all that but dear god let this municipal strike end soon and the rubbish men get back to work!

 ... have been thoroughly enjoying Postcrossing. Introduced by B (thank you!), I've only sent and received a few cards, but it's been fun (and can I just say I'm kinda glad it's not just Americans I'm meeting ... )

 ... felt like James Bond this week when I went, with a friend, to fetch her car off the train from Joburg. We got to drive along the platform (the actual platform) of Cape Town station, narrowly wedged between a train and the station pillars, pedestrians with wheelie suitcases throwing themselves out of our path. Any minute I could've veered sharp left onto the tracks and raced after some evil villan. Alas, there was no need ...

 ... saw the 'Ghost Squad' in action today when a traffic officer on an unmarked motorbike pulled a taxi [or, 'lethal van packed full of people' - Ext again] over for 'rat-running' down my suburban road. Frieda and I cheered from the gate. Well, cheered quietly that is, those taxi drivers are mean ... (mental note to self: seriously no chatting on the phone while driving. Seriously.)

 ... am so proud of my little brother, who left today to present his PhD paper at an ESA conference in Albuquerque. He has such a very big brain. To hide how intimidated I am I just keep quoting Bugs Bunny and giggling ...

5 (random) favourite things meme

Get this: I made up a meme. Yup, all on my lonesome. Why shouldn't I, I thought? Who are these 'gods of memes' who circulate them around the blogosphere? Why shouldn't a mere mortal such as myself start my own one? Ha!

So here it is. Long may it travel.

I've always had the problem of not being able to pick a favourite. I don't have one favourite movie or one favourite book, or one favourite food. Life's just a bit more complex than that for me. I'm 75% Gemini  - go figure.
So the idea here is that you list 5 items in each category, a favourite 5 - but not necessarily in order of favouriteness - to show the diversity/similarity/hilarity/polarity/ or extreme same-ness of your personal likes.

And then tag 5 peeps to do the same. And feel free to add or subtract categories as you like.
Down with meme imperialism!

Herewith the first 5 (Random) Favourite Things Meme:

5 Favourite Songs:
1. Hey Jude - The Beatles
2. We Are Going - Burning Spear
3. Feel Good - Gorillaz
4. Hasta Siempre Comandante Che Gueva - Buena Vista Social Club
5. Gold Digger - Kanye West

5 Favourite Films:
1. Love Actually
2. Room With a View
3. Toy Story
4. Lost in Translation
5. Out of Africa

5 Favourite Books:
1. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenigger
2. Saturday - Ian McEwan
3. On the Shores of Silver Lake - Laura Ingalls Wilder
4. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
5. Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak

5 Favourite Crushes:
1. George Clooney
2. Buzz Lightyear
3. Snoop Dogg (saw him in concert, was as surprised as anyone by his total shag-worthiness - who knew?!)
4. Cate Blanchett
5. Benecio del Toro

5 Favourite (Random) Things:
1. Sneakers
2. Post-Its
3. Fridays
4. Curry
5. Giggling

So without further ado, I hereby tag 5 random favourite bloggers:
Extranjera - What Will I Ever Do With My Life?
and just to see if their answers are different ...
Vancouver's Enviro Girl - The (mis)Adventures of Veg
Seaside Girl - Seaside Stories
Spudballoo - Chez Spud
and Superfi 

5 Questions from VEG (and one of my favourite memories)

This is doing the rounds and I wanted to play so VEG gave me 5 questions. Here be the answers.

1. What is a meme?
(Apparently this is a 'cheat question', I told VEG I was about to tag her in one and just realised that could sound a little intimidating if you didn't know what I was talking about, and actually it's a really good question.)

A meme is actually pronounced to rhyme with 'theme', but I totally thought it was pronounced 'me me' the first time I saw it written, which would make perfect sense considering what it is. It's a Richard Dawkins concept dumbed down a little to suit the blogosphere, originally a 'unit of cultural transmission', in bloggie speak it's a list of questions we answer and ask each other. A way of getting to know each other via the internets. Which is, come to think of it,exactly what this is, really.

2. If you could only read books by one author for the rest of your life, who would it be?
David Mitchell.
Tough one to answer though ... but of all my favourite authors, and there are many, his books are the most diverse, so I think they'd keep me interested for the longest.

3. What profession would you NOT want to attempt?
Teacher. Specifically High School. I definitely don't have the patience for that. And the pay is crap. And you often have to do sport duty. Shudder.

4. What is your least favourite chore?
Cleaning bathrooms. Hate it.  Hate.

5. What is your favourite place that you have visited?
A bay we found while travelling through Transkei (the Wild Coast of SA) in 2006. It was getting late, we'd lost our way and were just looking for a place to camp for the night. We found heaven.
I've dug out something I wrote then about the experience:
'A grassy hill, covered in giant gnarled milkwood trees, overlooking a pristine beach and bay of astounding beauty.
We had to stay.

Pitched camp and went down to the rocks at sunset, the boys dived for crayfish (lobster) as the nearly full moon rose over the achingly clear water.
A moment's excitement when we thought a shark was diving in the bay but it turned out to be an ecstatic whale, slapping it's tail on the water over and over, seemingly just from the joy of being alive in such a beautiful place - we felt the same.
Later that night three of us went down the steep path through the striped moonshadows of the trees to the beach. Not one footprint marred the sand, spring low-tide sucking the small rhythmic waves far down the beach, stars circling above.
We started walking round the bay, spreading out from each other. I felt electric, zinging with life and happiness.
Then we noticed a solitary figure walking towards us, and I could feel the vibe shift. A tangible wariness, our 'normal' apprehension and nervousness of a stranger in the dark rushed in.
But as we approached the person, I noticed from his body language that he was wary fo us too. And realised that of course, we were 3, he was 1, if anyone had reason to be nervous it was surely him. And instantly I felt awful for having made someone fear us.
Our friend called out a greeting, and to our amazement the lone strandloper turned out to be a girl, no older than twenty, out crayfishing in the low tide, wandering from point to point with her limpet loop.
She had a beautiful smile, her teeth lighting up in the moonlight, all four of us laughing uproariously from relief, and joy in the freedom that nothing was bad on the beach that night. That all of us were there for the beauty and bounty of this exquisite piece of Africa.
We parted ways with more emotion than our different languages could express, and later her laughter rippled across the bay as we streaked into the ocean, our white bums gleaming, for a midnight swim in paradise.'

Thanks VEG, for causing me to revisit this memory. It's one of my favourite favourites.

the week in stats

number of days it has rained in succession: 7

number of fender-benders I've seen: 5

number of wardrobe crises I've had: 8 (dinner out on Tuesday night necessitated a wardrobe change. ack.)

number of pregnancy tests bought: 1 (just got a funny feeling ... )

number of positive results: 0 (turns out it was PMT. duh.)

number of episodes of Postman Pat watched: 8 (4 x 2)

number of times I've read Penguin: 4562

number of times poor Lego has missed out on a walk due to rain: 3

number of chew toys Lego's annihilated: 4

number of tissues Frieda's used: 852

number of times I've shuddered at the thought of Nu-Skin: 53

number of times I've done something, anything, to avoid tidying my desk: 8

number of blog posts I will allow myself to write before I tidy desk: 0

Goodbye dear blog, I may be some time.

the great murakami

Julochka's posted her last interview answer ~ the question being which was her favourite Murakami novel and why. I knew this would be a good one, and it is!

I'm a newish Murakami reader and find his novels so dense and multi-layered and thought-provoking that I have to work through them slowly, and read them widely spaced apart. I also share Julie's fear of the day when I've read them all so have been trying to prolong that for as long as possible.

But I've often struggled to articulate just why I love him, and what reading one of his novels does to me; my thoughts and emotions. And after Julie's wonderful post I'm not even going to try. This girl gets him, and beautifully expresses what I love about his work too. 

Time & memory people, veeery interesting concepts. Especially when related to Murakami. And more especially after you've read this.

Enjoy! Thanks Julie, you clever thing!

lists of 5: 5 updates on stuff

1. This was a disappointment : (

I realised after about 50 pages, but I did still need to find out what happened, so I skip-read it in under an hour. Yada yada yada.

But I did discover this while looking for one of these. Two favourite novels, two very different stories, one iconic landmark.

2. This was fun : )

I've expanded my repertoire! And am playing with this Design*Sponge tutorial.

3. This is becoming overkill : |

No Mummy, not another one! (Pls excuse dork hair. She's only 16 months you know. Exactly. My baby... Sigh.)

4. This I couldn't photograph, her new piece I mean. But her gallery is so well worth a visit.

5. And pssst, I might have a job! Finally. Tho' obviously I'm not counting my chickens or anything. Or dreaming about spending my first pay cheque on this. Nothing like that of course.

this makes me very happy

A pile of new books, patiently awaiting my indulgence.

Possible new friends, new adventures, new perspectives. Possible heart-break, possible nightmares... A new all-time, life-time favourite could be waiting for me in this batch, or I could be disappointed with all of them (though with a Paul Auster there I think this'll be unlikely). There are very few things on earth which fill me with delicious anticipation as much as a stack of new, unopened, as yet unread, books.

I have to credit my Mum twice over for my love of reading. Firstly I do believe it gets carried over in the genes, but secondly, to read to your children is one of the greatest gifts you can give them, and my Mum read to us every day from when we were babies.

She's a clever lady as I've mentioned before, she knew that nurturing our inner book worms had a long-term advantage for her too.

On Saturday mornings we'd go down to village, we'd run some errands, each be given 50 cents (later it got upped to a whole 1 rand!) to spend on sweets and then we'd make our weekly pilgrimage to the library. She'd gotten us so hooked on the printed word that we weren't terribly discerning, which was a good thing in a small, conservative, mainly-Afrikaans village library, and leaving there on a Saturday morning, with a new pile of books in my arms, I would feel exactly the same twitchy, anticipatory excitement which the above pictured pile gives me today.

Oh, and to get to the clever part, my 2 brothers and I would happily spend Saturday afternoons lying on our beds, eating our sweeties and reading quietly, while my Mum no doubt did exactly the same! I still remember those afternoons as some of my fondest childhood memories. 

And finally, contrary to the popular saying; always judge a book by its cover. This cover is so beautiful I'm going to be terribly unhappy if the book is shite. I'll let you know!