Sunday, September 30, 2012

WOW!

Yesterday TLM and I went to the World of Wearable Art show for the first time.

A fantastic show - such imagination. Such joy. Such beauty. And I haven't even gotten to the part about the entries!

There was so much to see, and the background activities every bit as interesting to watch as the up-front stuff.

And I wish we had more that one set of binoculars because if you're sharing with three other people (my sister in law and niece came with us) you're going to miss out on a bit of detail(though we had great uninterrupted views).

One of my highlights was the dancing performed as a backdrop to the Avant Guarde section. It looked a bit hazardous for them to be floating up and down chairs in those long dresses but they made it look ethereally easy. Another was the kitschy space rocket that signalled the start of the Bizarre Bra section.

The only bit that seemed slightly "off" for me was when the male dancers were got up in tuxedo jacket and teeny tiny shorts. It just smacked of "male stripper" to me and not quite in keeping with the general wholesomeness of the show.

TLM got a bit tired and overwhelmed around the second half of the 2-hour show, but she was very good and made it through to the end without complaint. If she'd been sitting next to me instead of two seats down (next to her cousin) I would have gathered her up onto my lap and given her a mixture of cuddles and commentary.

And afterwards we had massive ice creams.

Friday, September 28, 2012

Online shopping while you're home sick

I spent an awful lot of time online while I was home sick. I pretty much alternated between 'Net surfing and knitting.

By the time I was back at work, I had nearly finished my denim sweater with spiral eyelets. Unfortunately I discovered a mistake about 40 rows back which has set me back another week.

I also went onto TradeMe and bought some lovely aubergine cashmere yarn. Unfortunately apparently aubergine means "brown". I can probably make it work if I combine it with lots and lots of purple or blue yarn though.

I also bought some brown jeans from Wallis in the UK. They were meant to be burgundy, and probably in a certain light they are - but mostly they just look brown.

Buying trousers and jeans online was such a dumb idea. I thought I was safe by buying from a store where I'd successfully found a pair that fit me really nicely. But apparently it's impossible to make everything of the same size, the same size.

And then I do have a history of being too lazy to return stuff that didn't work out.

Maybe I can knit me some trou...


Tuesday, September 18, 2012

In recuperation

The good thing about my current bout of bronchitis is that at least it hasn't been as bad as the almost-pneumonia of 2-3 years ago. This time around my throat doesn't hurt so much it feels like I'm swallowing razor blades.

The first round of antibiotics didn't work - after 5 days I was coughing up blood, which is a first for me.  but now I'm on a broader spectrum drug which is working really well. In fact, after taking them for a couple of days I keep waking up thinking "today I could go back to work" (and then I take TLM to school and getting huffy and puffy on the way home so I know I'm not quite there yet).

It's a beautiful day today, a wonderful day for sitting in the sun and getting better. I really think that I might be ready to go back to work tomorrow (otherwise my library books will become overdue).

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

In which TLM reaches a new milestone

We hoped it was an unlucky fluke when TLM got horribly airsick on the way home from the UK last April.

But, no. TLM is now a motion sickness-prone kid.

The morning they took off for a weekend in Nelson the weather was, in the words of the airport folks, adverse. In plain English that means that your trampoline was likely to end up in another part of town. So it was a rocky take-off and poor TLM held it all together until she got off the plane in Nelson. Then she threw up on the tarmac, which fortunately was being washed already by the rain.

She also got car sick on that windy road between the airport and the place they were staying. ("You won't need to pack any extra clothes for just two days - just pack spare undies and socks" - eek!)

So that's what TLM meant when she told me her throat hurts whenever she gets in the car. It hasn't put her off being a car passenger though, because if we give her the choice of a 15 minute uphill walk home after school or a 5 minute drive, she will still choose the latter.

I am famously vulnerable to motion-sickness so I guess in that respect she's her mother's daughter.

Tuesday, September 04, 2012

Three strikes

Right after TLM got over her chicken pox, a cold virus was already waiting to pounce.

It did, and it got me too.

And in between, the boy managed to get conjunctivitus in both eyes.

Maybe it's just Spring, or  maybe it's having a kid who doesn't live in a bubble - or maybe we live in a sick house.

On the bright side, I have discovered Knitting Daily on YouTube, TLM is still well enough to enjoy making imaginative space craft with lego, and the boy is still terribly handsome.