Another long weekend

I dropped number two at the airport on Friday lunchtime - I thought the week went very quickly, he thought quite slowly - then headed off to the beach after work. I'd been doing my bosses job for the past two weeks while he was on holiday, so felt entitled to a bottle of bubbly and ice-cream for dinner, which is always a good way to start a weekend. It was sad to wave him off, but he was looking forward to getting back, which is good ... and already had things lined up for that evening! A social whirl. 

I'm still swimming in the sea even though it's starting to get a bit cooler... water temperature is lovely so as long as you stay mostly underwater and avoid the chilly wind it is very pleasant. And then in the evening cold enough for slippers. And the other half of the bottle of bubbly and perhaps melted cheese. And ice cream. 

Number one had a dozen or so people over for a birthday party on Saturday night which I was quite happy to miss (to be honest I don't think I was invited) and we had already gone out for family dinner. It went very well apparently, board games and lots of food. And perhaps a jam session - one of the birthday presents was a proper electric guitar case for our little rock star to take to rehearsals.

I sewed a bit down the coast but made two absolute disasters on day one so gave up and just read books. It was material that had been sitting in the stash for years (and I think was a remnant from someone else's stash even then) so no great loss but still very unmotivating. And then back up the hill to a week of a zoom conference which I am struggling to concentrate on. It's hard not to get distracted.  

Yes Dad, you put the masking fluid on with a brush - it's quite gloopy so you use a cheap brush but if you rub the brush on a scrap of soap beforehand it comes off really easily. And it is quite difficult to see, especially when you put the correct thin layer on, and not my usual dolloping blob. You have to kind of tilt it to catch the light, and even then you can't really tell (as evidenced by my missing bits). My husband has some purple stuff that he uses for painting his models which would be better but we did an experiment and it leaves purple residue on the watercolour paper. Hmmmmm.

Adventures in masking fluid

In the last set of classes we have been learning how to Properly Use masking fluid. Apparently beginners can be overly reliant on masking fluid, which is one of the (many) things that make their paintings look like amateurish shams instead of the glorious masterpieces to which we all aspire. We did some exercises in masking fluid that were quite fun and then a painting of spring flowers.

The flowers and stems are masked off, then the background painted, then remove the masking and do the shadow on the flowers and the detail of the leaves and stems. There is salt on this as well, for the little star burst flowers.

For homework I did another one in different colours and slightly different shapes. There are a lot of blotches, missed bits, scrappy bits and general errors in both of them, but the possibilities are intriguing. 

The Folk Festival is back!

After cancellation in 2020 and 2021 the National Folk Festival is back at Easter where it belongs, and I had a season ticket, and it was wonderful. The weather was perfect - hot during the day and cold when the sun went down - and I listened to music, ate from food vans and sang along with the sea shanties. 

To be honest it was only really two-thirds of a festival; there were fewer performers, no international acts and  the venues were more spaced out from each other, which meant there wasn't as much of a buzz. I'm not sure what ticket sales were like but I suspect there were a few people staying away because of the lack of headliners, or possibly because they didn't want to get covid. It did seem a bit like a superspreader event, if we have those any more. Lots of singing and playing wind instruments and cosying up on close plastic chairs. 

I was a bit worried that my lack of crowd-fitness would be a problem, and I ended up only going for three days and staying home on Monday to have some quiet time. But my husband came with me for the day on Sunday and we did 11 hours of festival concerts, which is not bad for us. Our tastes don't 100% overlap but that is fine, we can do our own thing. Funnily enough neither of the children were interested.

Number two is home for the week from uni, which is lovely. We have heard all about it, and seen the photos, and taken him shopping ... he has admired our pantry, and appreciated our cooking, and thanked our cleaner for keeping his plants alive (she banned us from touching them, they were dying from overwater). His little surprise was a new beard .... it is very very ginger. He says he is aiming for scottish jesus but it is a bit bumfluff at the moment. Frankly after a term at drama school a ginger beard is the least of our worries, I am glad it's not a tattoo or some hideous piercing. It is very nice to have him home, even just for a little while.

Another Parliament done

Monday was the end of the 46th parliament - which is good because it means a more predictable workload for a while, but bad because it means the election campaigning has started. And is there a voter in the universe that enjoys an election campaign? Endless haranguing on every side. 

The dissolution ceremony is one of the least spectacular in the parliamentary calendar. Basically the governor-general's official secretary stands on a podium and reads out a couple of paragraphs. No flags, no fancy cars, no speeches and no snacks. Nonetheless, it was a glorious late summer morning so I wandered out to the forecourt with other public servants and enjoyed the sunshine.

We had to stand well back because after the proclamation there was a 19 gun salute. Several of the guns kept misfiring, which meant they had to go round a few more times than they expected, but they got to 19 in the end. Good thing it was just ceremonial and not firing at Russian tanks rolling up Anzac Parade. But we enjoyed it, it was loud and smoky, and then got back to the office and on with our day....

Two beach weekends in a row!

And why the hell not, if I want to drive to the coast every single weekend then I can! How great is that. My husband was already planning to go down and was very happy to have me along (or he said he was, and I choose to believe him) - number one had a friend from Sydney staying for the weekend so it suited everyone :) We had a lovely time doing not much and the teenagers were very happy with a house and a car to themselves. They even lit the first fire of the season ... what could possibly go wrong.

It rained all day Saturday, to add to the incredible sogginess of the east coast of Australia. Sydney has already had a year's average rainfall so far this year and more to come! There are potholes on the road which is incredibly unusual but the road repair people just can't keep up. 

Sunday though was a beautiful day and I went for a swim. Big waves, and the water was brown with the river run off, but still a great swim. The water temperature is still fine and with the sun out it was lovely ... although probably not for much longer, the leaves have turned....

I did a little bit of weaving but mostly read, ate, and watched the start of the new series on Binge about Julia Child, which is fabulous! Very peaceful, and the house was still in one piece when we came home again (teenagers went out for a burger).

Skirt like the other skirt

When I made the stripey circle skirt I was so pleased with myself I made another one in this cool embroidered cotton. It's a border print, and I wanted to show that off, but couldn't really find anything that would be both suitable for quite a firm cotton poplin and have a border. Maybe a sheath dress? Not the kind of thing I would wear, so I ignored the border and just tried to place the pattern pieces so it made some sense with the embroidery.

More shit photography. I moved to number two's empty room in case it made it better, but it didn't. Neither did toe-pointing or holding the skirt out.

But you get the idea. Here is a closeup of the fabric, it's rather lovely. Very red embroidery on a kind of orangey-pink.  Another $16 remnant from Pitt Trading, you never quite know what you're going to get but this was a winner. 

Wild weather at the coast

We had wind, and waves and rain! I folded the clothes I left over the drying rack from a mere three weeks ago, and they were shorts and swimmers and tshirts ... this weekend I wore slippers and socks and trackpants.

The bend in the creek washed away in the high tides on Saturday night, and the sea came halfway up the carpark. This is unprecedented in my experience but a nice older man with a very cute spaniel said it happens every now and again. And the sandbar just builds back up again ... although it might take a while for the vegetation to regrow. 

There were plenty of people inspecting the damage on Sunday morning. The weather was actually quite nice on Sunday but the waves were still ferocious and the sea was FULL of grass and logs and plants and other things I don't want to be splashing about in. So no swimming. I did a bit of sewing, and talked to no-one, and it was all good. The bottom photo shows the erosion of the main beach, lost a few metres of dunes there. 

We were hoping for an election to be called on the weekend so we could happily dissolve parliament today, but no. It can't be too much longer (as in, the constitution requires it not to be too much longer, that's not just my hopeful comment) but until it's called we have to go on preparing for another sitting week next week. Quite ready for this parliament to be over, electioneering avoids Canberra (safe Labor seats), it's a quiet time for us. Bring it on.