Melbourne (1)

I went to Melbourne. Over at Be-mused there's a nice little story about how a friend said she wanted to watch Be-mused buy fabric. That's just how I was feeling. I wanted to watch the food nazi buy food. She's written such interesting posts about her weekly sojourn to Vic Market that I wanted to go too. So she picked me up at the airport, and with a fortifying stop for caffine and mushrooms on toast, off to the market we went.

Custard apple, pretty chillies, and deli delights - Vic Market

"What's that?" I said, pointing at the huge ugly green thing. "A custard apple." "What's a custard apple?" "Buy one" she said, "it's cheaper than chocolate!" So I did. It was huge. It needed to ripen, so we left it for the next day. It was delicious, it tasted like a tropical holiday.

Fresh fish, fresh veges, and hand knitted tea cosys

No-one had responded to either of our pleas for ideas for crafty places to visit, so my tour guide thought of her own. She took me to Zetta Florence, in Fitzroy, a beautiful shop to take the breath away of anyone remotely interested in design and paper....ohh, such beautiful paper, journal style books begging to be written in, stamps, cards, posters and stickers that made me go ohhhhh. I bought a beautiful solid eraser, with 'oops' written on it, which Santa will leave in someones Christmas stocking.

Off we went again to the Artisan Books. Oh my! Of course I bought a book. Don't be silly. I bought "Color by Accident" by Ann Johnston, mostly on the strength of the too few colour pictures. I want to make fabric like that! I declined to purchase "unexpected knitting" which intrigues my non-knitting , non-sewing friend. There were nearby exciting shops too, Industria with recycled industrial bits and pieces for home, Cooks Books which was full of cullinary treasures, Spacecraft for beautiful screen printed linen I will have to learn to live without and funky clothes. Gertrude St, Fitzroy is a wonderful place. I was a very happy Pixie!
More adventures to come.

 

done

3 quilts, finished, photographed, entry forms completed. I hope at least one of them gets accepted. Now I can go to Melbourne. 

I'm going to Melbourne

On Thursday. For a long weekend with AOF.
What should I do there? (Besides the food that is. Doesn't everyone go to Melbourne for food?). Is there some crafty goodness I should not miss?

Oh, yes, the essay is done, the quilts for competition entry are close, very close.....there's hours yet til the plane goes on Thursday, of course I can do it.

Free Hugs Campaign. Inspiring Story! (music by sick puppies)

Here's something to make you smile.

Quilting

I'm quilting. Furiously. Must finish quilts for National Symposium. Entries close 1 November.

Oh, yes. Must write essay too.

Where have I been?

People have been asking. It's nice to be missed. I've spent lots of time at swimming pools. I swam hard at the North Island Short Course Masters meet in Masterton. I swam fast. Faster than I thought I could. My team had a real mixed meet, with people sick and slower than they should have been, but I swam personal best times in every event. It was very exciting, and worth all the hard work. My favourite swimmer at the event was an 85 year old woman who broke a national record in every event she swam. She dove in off the blocks, and she did tumble turns with finess. She is a real character with a big grin, and she had a great time. Now that's the way to grow old!There was food of course. Roast lamb, for 11, at the Greytown Hotel on the way home. Swimmers get hungry, and it was just what we needed.

Goldenrod

For a year of colour. My beautiful 9 patch quilt. 3" nine patch blocks, made by 12 different people. This quilt is a treasure, and I could use it for every week during a year of colour.

Well the last day of September has been dealt to in great style. There was swimming of course...at Karori Pool, bright and early. While we prefer to swim at the Aquatic Centre in Kilbirnie, the Karori* pool is lovely and the change of suburb is a fine excuse to upgrade our breakfast venue. We ate at the Boutique Dining Cafe, a cafe much more stylish than the name suggests. The coffee is great, they happily push tables together for our large party, they remember who ordered what, the food is delicious and usually plentiful enough to satisfy ravenous swimmers. They have live jazz on Thursday nights, I'm sure it would be worth a visit. Many extra coffees were ordered this time, while the relay teams for the national short course championship (next weekend....eek!) were negotiated with military precision. Takes about 100 times longer to sort out the teams than it will to swim the races. Ha!

*(Dear reader who is not from around here, these are suburbs of my beloved Wellington, about 20 minutes apart, if the lights are right, at 7 am on a Saturday morning. Swimming at Kilbirnie is preferable because the pool is bigger, and not so busy, we don't usually swim til 8 am, and it's also closer to home for me. Every now and then some event at Kilbirnie means we must swim elsewhere).

Breakfast at the Boutique Dining Cafe

Later that day there were cocktails with 5 fabulous women at Logan Brown, one of Wellington's best restaurants, followed by their superb 'pre-theatre' dinner. Logan Brown is the kind of hi-brow place that wins major awards. It is perfect in every way, from the beautifully decorated 1920s former bank building it is housed in, the three tiny courses of the pre-theatre menu, the wine list, the doris plum daiquiris...if you have someone to impress, it's the place to go.

Chocolate mousse with raspberry sorbet, plum daiquiri and manhattan at Logan Brown

Now, although the night could have ended in fine style right there, it got even better. We went to see the 2006 World of Wearable Arts Show. You can see some of the entries in a slideshow here at Stuff. It was a truly amazing show with spectacular staging. It was music, dance and theatre. It was a little Moulin Rouge, alien ballet, greek theatre, a kids cartoon, pyrotechnics, acrobatics. It was sexy, laugh-out-loud funny, and made me want to dance. The pacific section was breathtaking. Suzie Moncrief, you're a bloody genius.

The winner, "The Love of Icarus", by Rodney Leong, made of 20,000 plastic collar stays