Weekend Musings

It is Friday night Sydney time and it is pouring outside!

We have a busy weekend ahead but I like it that way. It is a privilege to be busy with activities and with people that we love. At some stage though I will sit down with the weekend papers and read them in my 'order'. My dad has always been a SMH newspaper with breakfast and lunch person and the newspaper was and is always read in a certain order. Now, this is something I always thought was a little bit obsessive, but like so many other things, I am no different. The order has changed a little over the last couple of years, but there is still an order! I start with employment, not for any other reason anymore than to look at the education section as it keeps me up to date with the movements in the private schools in Sydney. Then it is the front and back pages of the news section, followed by spectrum. Then I read the Good Weekend. Now this has an order of its own as well! (writing this makes me realise how funny this may sound!) I read Megan Morton's article, followed by Maggie Alderson's, then the real estate 'you wish' page, then the two of us (some of these people are inspiring) The whole magazine is then read from the start to the end.

I love chatting with my mum & sister about Megan and Maggie's articles. It has been scary how many times I feel as though they are writing about my life. For example Maggie's recent article about jeans and how she started a week with no jeans wearing. Just that week I swore myself off jeans to see how long would last (my 'uniform' is jeans and a white shirt'). I almost repainted my whole house for the 4th time in 6 years after Megan made a derogatory comment about Magnolia paint colour the same week Kirk put the Magnolia paint brush down. There have been the articles about how to hang the washing on the line (where do you put the pegs on tshirts etc etc) that have me reflecting on quite random things. I love the articles. Random. Random is good. Like the cornwall blue picture used for this post.

Pruning the Roses

Gardening used to be my obsession. I once was an early bird, almost feeling ill if I slept in. I would head outside at 6am with my walkman turned on the weekend gardening show with Graham and Sandra Ross on 2GB and potter away. It seems like a very long time ago!! Water restrictions and 3 babies later, my garden isn't as manicured as it once was, but it has grown! It is exciting seeing fences disappear and being replaced with lush green plants.

This time of the year I attempt to time the roses to bloom at just the right time. It used to be for Christmas, but now it is for Milly's birthday in January and Thomas' in April. I was stoked to come home from the hospital with Henry to a garden full of flower - so now each child will have their flush! So 6 weeks before the event, the roses get chopped and fertilised. My aim is to prune at least two bushes a day and that way the job should be complete by the end of the week.

Nature is amazing. I love the Jacarandas against the blue sky on days like today. I think we underestimate leaves in a garden - greenery is so soothing. Today I found some gorgeous hydrangeas outside Coles - I don't know where I will plant them - but they look great sitting on the porch!

Although nature isn't always forgiving. I moved a rose away from a path this winter and I lost it. It survived kitchen trademen reversing into it chopping it in half a couple of years ago, so I overestimated its toughness. I am now on the hunt for a Mrs Cant rose. Unfortunately not a common one & I may have to wait until next Winter to replace it.

My favourite roses? Mrs Cant, Julia's Rose, Just Joey, Souvenir de la Maison, Iceberg, Grace, Tara.

I am loving wallpaper!

My grandparents had wallpaper on the walls in their home in Eastwood. I loved it - that along with the grandfather clock that chimed every hour, it forms part of my childhood memories.

In my parents current home they have wallpaper in their bedroom that dates back who knows how long and it is gorgeous - green background with pink flowers. Kirk reminded me a few days ago that we once talked about stripping it back and painting the room for them as a surprise when they were o/s. So glad we didn't!!!

Catherine Martin's range of wallpapers with Porters Paints for little ones and grown ups is fabulous. If only there were more hours in the day to decorate ... at the moment thankfully there are great wall stickers to transform a room quickly!!

P.S Looking for the Alimrose Monkey often photographed in the photo shoots? We have him :)

Ten Little Finger Ten Little Toes

I LOVE kids books. Before Mummy's Favourite became a boutique gift store, I contemplated opening an online book store. I think I see myself as the Meg Ryan character in You've Got Mail. Reading stories to a class of children is one one of the aspects of primary school teaching that I miss. Yay for my 3 kids because I get to read to them! I read to my kids from newborn. Thomas' first book was a soft cover book called Snail. He is now teaching himself to read & I am loving it. The first book he read was Where is the Green Sheep by Mem Fox.

I went shopping for some bedlinen the Thursday night before Henry was born and browsed David Jones' book department. I came across the new Mem Fox Book, Ten Little Finger and Ten Little Toes. Whilst reading it I started to get very teary (embarrasingly emotional when pregnant!). It is the sweetest book about babies who are all born at the same time around the world. I didn't purchase it as the cover was already torn and regretted it worrying that the hardcover might have been hard to track down - but yay - The Children's Bookshop rang me today to say that they have got it in for me.

It would be hard re-creating a bookstore like the one in You've Got Mail online!

My Gorgeous Little Boy

I am a bit behind with blogging, but I have a good excuse! Little Henry William Barker was born on the 14th of October. I can't believe that is now over a month ago! In some ways it feels as though he has always been with us, in other ways it all seems so new :)

Henry is my third child. He has a VERY helpful big brother Thomas (5) and sister Milly (2).

I went into labour naturally on the day before his due date (I think being on the pre school roster that morning as the aid probably helped push things along!). I have been blessed with smooth labours and healthy babies. Contractions started intermittedly at about 3pm and by 7:30 we left the kids with my parents to go to hospital. 4 hrs later Henry was born. It was a drug free labour mainly because I would rather go with the pain than have an injection or go through a caesarean section. I can highly recommend exercise balls to bounce on to help distract during contractions! My husband Kirk was a gem -

Henry was 53cm long and 4.06kg :)

Perfume Samples

I love the cover of this months Vogue magazine - the blue background is striking against the red jumpsuit ... but what I loved finding inside is one of those little cardboard samples of Chanel no5.

It isn't the perfume that I got excited about - it was the way that it was packaged in a little envelope. Cute! It has been ages since I have looked at perfume counters - I have a shelf full of them - all representing a different stage in my life - and none of them finished. The only one I don't have is the Red Door Kirk gave me for a birthday that smashed on the bathroom floor in the little unit we were living in at the time. The place smelt beautiful forever after that - made up for the very ugly tiles!

When I used to go shopping in my teens with friends I loved feeling grown up trying all the samples. Now, life seems even too busy to take a sample from someone handing them out. I am going to pop todays one into my hot pink Pratten purse and my notes will smell lovely - just like I used to - 20 years ago!

Summer Dresses

I love colour and I love Summer dresses. Came across this one by Lisa Ho today ...

Emerald Green is one of my favourite colours.

(courtesy Shop Til Drop Sept 08)

Soft Stone Sculpting

I struggle with being patient with artwork / craft and I really struggle in not doing something 'constructive' so spending a whole Saturday away from my family and the computer was a big ask but my husband thought it was just what I needed & he was right!

We started off with basically sand and water and some other bits and pieces and ended up with a sculpture. It took ages for me to come up with something I wanted to sculpt. Some people were very creative - frogs, faces etc etc. I had no idea where to start and somehow ended up with a C looking shape that I think looks like a mother and child - but I will forgive anyone who can't see it! I didn't actually realise I was pregnant at the time so it has even more meaning :)

Beatrix Potter

I was surrounded by great books as a child and thankfully that love for reading that I developed has never left me. Lost is an understatement when I finished The Forgotten Garden last week. I even re-read the first couple of chapters to remind myself of where the story started. It was a fabulous read! Although you could be mistaken for thinking it was boring given how few pages I managed to read each night before falling asleep!

I had to search high and low for this book on Beatrix Potter and lo behold, it was at The Childrens Bookstore in Beecroft, where I frequently visit with my kids. Miss Potter the movie really surprised me. On my TV cabinet there is a pile of 30 year old Beatrix Potter hardbacks that once were in our family lounge room when I was young. The pictures more than the story always captivated me, but I hadn't really given the author a second thought.

Now, reading the story of her life that goes into a lot more detail than the movie, I am moving the Lake District in the UK closer to the top of my seachange list!

Nesting in Pregnancy

Some people say it is the tiredness, mood swings or cravings that signal to them that they are pregnant. For me it is the obsessiveness about the house that kicks in which makes me wonder ...

It is strange that something that one can be blissfully unaware of can suddenly become number one priority regardless of what else needs to be done. My pantry is one of the areas that with this pregnancy has become number one on the hitlist. That and the fridge. Neither were bad - but they are now spotless and VERY organised with labels everywhere. It was the timber floorboards that were frequently attacked at 2am with my first pregnancy and with number two it was the garden (not 2am but gardening with torch in hand was attempted!). I am a house proud person, not a Stepford wife by any means, but I like things to be in their place. Nesting attacks me like an obsessive compulsion.

I love being pregnant and with the weeks disappearing with the blink of an eye I am enjoying the oneness I feel with the baby and the determination to get some jobs done that have been hanging over my head for years. It is my patient husband that I feel sorry for!