Inside the dishevelled mind

back again, again

2011-09-04T18:03:00.000+03:00

So, yes I've been gone again for ages but a lot has happened since my last post:

1. he who shall not be named had a job change
2. we've been 'enjoying' the trials of fertility treatment
3. working full time always gets in the way
oh and...
4. we moved countries!

So as you can see all my time has been all taken up living outside the interwebs which is always sad as the real world has so many less distractions which means I have to be productive :(

So far no luck on the baby front but now I'm a lady of leisure I'll have more time to craft and blog so expect more :)

For now here is a picture of a subversive cross stitch that I did for a good friend of mine before I left her in the pits to continue her slavery to my former masters

PS - I now live in Doha in the Middle East which is very conservative and was surprised to hear 'I touch myself' by the Divinyls playing on the radio - it was like a little bit of rebellion in song :)

voodudes

2010-11-20T20:19:00.007+03:00

Long time no write but the world outside the internets seems to take up all my time!

I've been working on some little minions, I call then Voodudes, and thought it was time to show some of them off to the worlds.

this was my first attempt but he was hard

to turn the right way out

second attempt and some cross breeding experimentation

I have more in the works and will post as and when :)

The nappy bag of swirliness

2010-03-26T19:50:00.006+03:00

Both my friend and the sister of He Who Shall Not Be Named are expecting the patter of tiny ~~claws~~ ~~hooves~~ feet and I have decided to sew stuff for them.

I found a pattern and instructions for this hip mama diaper bag on the blog A Mingled Yarn. Of course we don't call them diapers in the UK so I have christened it the nappy bag of swirliness

It's almost really straight forward except for sewing the corners which I only perfected with my second last one so there was a lot of unpicking and swearing going on. At least for the next one the amounts of F's and C's I utter should be fairly limited.

So here is the finished product of the one I made for my friend who is due in July.

I also created a tag by using a iron on transfer however it's not very flexible and I doubt it will stand the test of time so I might fork out some dosh and get some made so I can add them to everything I make.

I love skulls :)

I have a bit more time until the sister of He Who Shall Not Be Named pop's out her bundle of nappiness so that's taken a back seat as I get ready for the Star Wars party I am organising, however I will post pictures when I am done.

My current projects

2010-02-28T15:57:00.015+03:00

I love Star Wars, well the original three anyway, and have taken inspiration from some cross stitch projects in the Flickr group Subversive Cross Stitch which have a Star Wars related theme. So here are some teaser pictures of my new needlework in progress:

That's no moon....

.....It's a space station

the weapon systems on this Death Star are not yet operational

but wait.............IT'S A TRAP

I'm making this for a surprise party which has a Star Wars theme so will be posting other items I will be creating in the future.

I've also made this fleece hat based on a pattern by Heather at dollar store crafts. It is modelled by the Hamster from Creature Comforts. Unfortunately I didn't have the pattern when I sewed it so my ears are a little high and small. If you haven't guessed it's meant to be Yoda not just some random green monster :)

judge me by my size do you?

May the force be with you

Felting - Raving Rabbid

2010-02-24T21:32:00.001+03:00

Even though I have some UFP's I have finished another felting project which is just as cool.

We had a dress a sprout competition at work. Really, it's the best thing to do with a sprout - other than bake it wrapped in bacon so that the lovely bacon fat disguises all the horribleness of the taste of sprout......hmmm bacon......sorry where was I? Oh yes, I dressed my sprout as a Raving Rabbid with a plunger gun. Unfortunately everyone thought my gun was Santa's boot and while I can see what they are getting at it was displayed in front of a background that showed the plunger gun peoples.

Anywho here he is in all his glory:

I'll be back

He is languishing in a box at the moment as the sprout has since rotten and been buried with full honours. So I now need to make him a felt head so I can have him guard my room at night when all the things that come alive while I sleep roam the land.

sad and lifeless not to mention a bit googly eyed :(

Felting - my new craft interest

2010-02-22T20:46:00.001+03:00

So, one of the crafts which has been distracting me from my little old blog is felting. It's pretty amazing actually as it's sculpting with wool and it''s not as hard as it looks.

I bought a woolpets kit of a bumble bee and was quite impressed with the fact that it didn't take that long to create and well it actually looks like a bumble bee and not some type of mutated beastie.

Here are some photos:

hmmm......nectar

here's a close up

I'm in the process of felting an eyeball & a brain but at the moments that have become UFP's (UnFinished Projects) which is a little sad because they will be awesome when they are finished.

Neglected yet again

2010-02-21T14:13:00.011+03:00

Once again I have neglected by blog and it is the love of shiny things that makes it so.

I start out with the best of intentions, committed that I will stick with it this time.........but then, oh look a shiny thing and then I'm off, searching the internet for something, learning a new craft, obsessing about finding out as much as I can about jellyfish - you know that sort of thing.

So since my last entry we have finally finished the house. We are still talking to each other, the artex effect is gone and my arms are the same size.

I've been back to oz to visit the family, have holidayed in Ireland and Spain and done more dreaded walking here in the UK than I like to think about.

I re-purposed this blog along time ago to show of my photographs so here are some random ones from the last couple of years:

a gecko in the light at our hotel in San Pedro Spain

The tip of the rock of Gibraltar

Dundee Beach, Northern Territory, Australia

The highest point in Shropshire*

I promise I will be back soon

*just a note to add here - once again I was 'conned' by He Who Shall Not Be Named and told this was a gentle walk on flat terrain - THIS WAS TO THE HIGHEST POINT IN SHROPSHIRE! Flat my arse

DIY & Sunflowers

2007-09-06T11:39:00.000+03:00

We eventually started one of the many DIY projects we envisioned when we purchased the house back in March. I have spent the best part of the last week loathing and detesting someone I've never met. A previous owner of our house had some sort of mental breakdown/loss of reason/watched too many changing room episodes for their own good attack. They decided to plaster our walls in an Artex style while adding decorative beams TO THE INSIDE of the lounge, dining room and kitchen in some sort of misguided attempt to make out circa 1990's house into an inside out old cottage.

I must admit that it was one of the things that drew me to the property along with the very spacious lounge, dining room, kitchen, master bedroom & en suite that soooo many houses here in England lack (I'm from down under, I need my space) It is also located in a very quite, almost kid free cuddlisack (cul-de-sac to the uninitiated) backing on to a mass of playing fields that will never be built on. But I digress, now I HATE the country cottage look and long for clean crisp walls. Of course we had the plasters in for their opinion but alas the Artex effect is too thick just to plaster over. We could plaster board over it all but that would mean losing precious centimetres of length and breadth to my room and we can't have that. Also we would need to rip out the ceiling and start again. WTF! No way!

So the solution, me and He Who Shall Not Be Named started scraping it all off to reveal the lovely flat walls beneath the lounge and the ugly swirly artex under the ceiling (which is better than the current cottage look, believe me!) And, as I am not working, I have continued the torture while he is out earning all the dosh we need for future holidays, food, cat biscuits, other DIY projects, booze and our broadband connection.
Are we mad? Definitely
Will I be taken away and committed by the neighbours for all the cursing and mumblings that filter out through the open window? Maybe
Will we still be talking to each other at the end? Possibly
Will I have one arm massively more muscular than the other? God I hope not

Oh, then there is the clean up afterwards..........don't get me started on that - let's just say hooray for my Dyson

So to cheer us all up here are some pictures of some sunflowers I managed to secure from the local shop for only £2.99. They were taken on a rare sunny day a few of weeks ago

I'm not a big fan of yellow, but on a sunflower it is joy
A close up of the centre of one of the flowers
To finish off even thought I know he is not a sunflower - A picture of Oberon about to pounce on an unsuspecting wheelie bin :)

Munich, Germany

2007-08-23T13:05:00.000+03:00

We were in Munich around the time Pope Benedict XVI visited last year. Alas it was a few weeks too early for us to partake in Oktoberfest. We made our exit just before the Pope was due to arrive, otherwise we would have been stuck in the city centre surrounded my soldiers and worshippers - what a nightmare that would have been!

This picture shows the new Town Hall tower. It was a wonderful sunny day with an intense blue sky. The tops of the colourful flags are just above the dias that was in place for His Holiness, which of course spoilt my photo op for the entire Town Hall
Even though we were unable to enjoy the delights of the biggest beer festival in the world we still enjoyed a little of the atmosphere by visiting the Hofbräuhaus for some beer and excellent food. Here is the oompapa band that was playing.
We had a picnic in the Englischer Garten or English Garden. Which was lovely, except for all the ravens that had no fear of us big pink things on two legs, so we were forced to feed them or become a real life version of The Birds. We were also intrigued by the nude sunbathers on the other side of the stream. Much to He Who Shall Not Be Named's disappointment most of them were middle aged men!

Here's a picture taken in the opposite direction to the nude pink/brown things from our picnic spot

The Grand Mosque, Muscat, Oman

2007-08-02T14:29:00.000+03:00

This is one of the most beautiful Mosques I have ever seen, so here are some pictures

I find the picture of this arch soothing - a bit crazy, no?
The opulent chandelier inside the central dome

Unknown Cat in Petra, Jordan

2007-07-26T17:23:00.000+03:00

I'm using this cute guy as my avatar at the moment (better than a shot of my scary mug:). So, I thought I would do him some justice by giving him a bigger picture here on my blog. He was on our hotel balcony wall when we came back from seeing the sites of Petra.

He was lovely and so photogenic that I couldn't resist some camera action.

Kinver Edge, UK

2007-07-23T11:51:00.000+03:00

I'm not a fan of walking ......or any exercise for that matter. I think of myself as subscribing to the anti-exercise movement. I don't like sports either, which in turn makes me feel a little un-australian. As a society we are suppose to love exercise and sports. We excel at growing tall in the sunshine and beating other countries at 'their' sports. I can't understand either of the rugby's, cricket bores me, swimming and athletics -excuse me while I supress a yawn. Tennis is all right in small doses, say once a year - except for all that unnecessary grunting, the mute button is my friend when Wimbledon is on. But I feel more than a little un-australian and I'll tell you why:

Hatred of almost all sports and exercise (see above paragraph for pre-ramble)

I'm not that tall

I hate the beach...and the sun. Going to the beach is torture. You get sand places it shouldn't be, you are suppose to lie there cooking your skin in the HEAT risking cancer and the sea is like hot salty water. Why I ask you, Why?

I hate beer

I have to admit that when I first go home to visit the accent grates on me a bit. I know, I'm ashamed of me too

Going back to number one and I'll say this quietly I like watching soccer. Though Australia did make it to the last World Cup, something I was very proud of. By the way, we were robbed by the cheats that are the Italian team.....that's all I'm going to say on the subject because I have been known to 'get nasty' when riled up about this

So what has this got to do with Kinver Edge I hear you ask - well we went for a walk there yesterday and it wasn't that bad. Thinking about posting about it made me think of the above and well whatever happens to be at the front of the cue in the mess that is my brain needs to be expressed first.

The edge allowed great views of the Staffordshire countryside. Great rolling hills and lots of green. The UK might have 60 million people in it and be seen to be bursting at the seams, but I for one thank whoever there is to thank that most of the inhabitants of these isles are concentrated in congested cities. It's great to go out and see space.

Even though I enjoyed some of my outing it was still exercise so I was concentrating so hard on putting one foot in front of another without becoming angry* that the camera rarely made an appearance. However I did get a couple of shots and here they are:

On the site are the Holy Austin rock houses where people lived until the 1950'sA thistle.......and it's purple :)

* I get angry when I have to do anything remotely exercise like - it's stupid I know but I feel like a little kid who's being punished for something. He Who Shall Not Be Named loves climbing mountains and hills and spends hours badgering me into it. By the time I get to the top I'm ready to explode - I just don't see the point. Sure occasionally the view will be nice, but this is England so most of the time the weather is shitty and you can't see a thing. I'm meant to feel a sense of 'achievement' or something, but I always feel somehow cheated.

Things in my Backyard, UK

2007-07-20T12:01:00.001+03:00

Out of the English drizzling rain of the last few weeks came a day of glorious sunshine

so out came the camera

(then the lawnmower)

I love mushrooms, their shape is so pleasing to the eye

I saved it when I mowed by leaving a little patch of uncut grass around, like a little mushroom shrine

then my cat Oberon hunted it down and killed it

I love daisies and feel like such a murderer when I have to mow the lawn :(

I don't know what this flower is but I love the way the light works in this picture and it's purple - who doesn't love purple!

Pisa, Italy

2007-07-19T10:30:00.001+03:00

one of my 'arty' shots of the Cathedral

Darwin, Australia

2007-07-13T12:35:00.001+03:00

I took this while visiting the clan in 2004 at the recently open but looooong awaited train station in Palmerston.

I did have to photoshop out a whistling street lamp that just happened to be passing, I think it was trying for photo action

Jebal Aktar, Oman

2007-07-10T13:28:00.001+03:00

Along with trees I love to take pictures of textures

these are some wire cables we found while picnicking on the mountain side

Petra, Jordan - to celebrate being named one of the New 7 Wonders

2007-07-09T11:31:00.001+03:00

Our 'Indian Jones Moment' (albeit after our day at Petra as I was too overawed to take a good shot when we came through so took this one as we were leaving!)

My first ever attempt at Photoshop - there were lots of annoying tourists on the sand in the bottom right hand corner - how dare they ;)

View the other New 7 Wonders of the world here

Omani Fort, Bousher, Muscat

2007-07-06T12:08:00.002+03:00

If you like shopping Dubai or Abu Dhabi are the places to go, but if you want friendly locals, amazing landscapes and a vibrant culture - go to Oman.

Purple Flower, Bodelwyddan Castle

2007-07-04T16:41:00.001+03:00

Monument Valley, USA

2007-07-04T16:27:00.001+03:00

Yallingup Point, Western Australia

2007-06-29T14:25:00.001+03:00

I love taking photos of trees and wood, I think it's because they can look so creepy and skeletal yet be so beautiful

Tia

2007-06-29T14:21:00.002+03:00

Oberon's nose and mouth

2007-06-29T14:18:00.001+03:00

Pictures

2007-06-29T13:54:00.000+03:00

I like to take pictures

I have a blog that is neglected

Merge the two

wallah

Where have I been?

2007-02-09T13:57:00.000+03:00

A bloggers holiday?

I read this in many posts, though most are only a holiday of a month or so. Really I've been on a blog abandonment stint. You get all fired up, you create the blog, swear faithfully that you will post every day....then every other day...once a week....once a month.

Then the whistling in your mind starts. The kind of whistle where you know there is something you should be doing but instead you are trying to ignore it. Then something distracts you, a new interest - perhaps downloading movie scripts, searching for exotic recipes, creating words by closing your eyes and hitting a few keys and coming up with 'jfkeo' then googling it to see if there is any other reference to it anywhere on the web. Which there are! How about another shot 'ueiroh', nope nothing that time. See how easy it is to be distracted? But it keeps the fledgling blog out of your mind.

And once you have forgotten there are the virtual tumbleweeds that roll through your blog on winds of loneliness

..........tumbleweed.....................................................a circling vulture.......................another tumbleweed...................................

Very sad, like an abandoned puppy with big eyes and a sad expression, just hoping someone will came and pick you up and give you a cuddle.

So that's what this is: a blog cuddle

Hopefully to be followed by a couple more cuddles and then perhaps I'll let the blog move in and give it daily affection

perhaps........

Englishness - Pub Rules

2005-05-24T09:23:00.000+03:00

I’m now up to page 267 (‘Watching the English’ by Kate Fox). In the last 17 pages there has been a lot that I’ve identified with e.g. shopping and some stuff I haven’t identified with e.g. pet rules or ‘petiqiette’…..

The most interesting part of all has been the part on Pub Rules. I always had the sneaking suspicion that as a women (who is also part of a couple) my turn at buying a round in England was always hastily and embarrassedly fobbed off. To begin with I thought maybe it was because I was not drinking as much as them, but then realised I was drinking as much, maybe even more. After a while I just gave my money to the other half and told him to get the round in. Never any squabbles there, but of course now he feels he’s been cheated – every round in three instead of four…..even though I pointed out it was my money which really was his round in four - he’s an accountant so there’s no telling him really.

I was never a drinker in Australia (always the designated driver) so can’t tell you if there is any aversion to us girlies buying a round. Though I do always remember that the guys bought rounds just like England, but the added wild card was who ever had to go for a pee first bought jugs of beer for everyone. It used to get pretty funny with them all holding it and waiting for the weakest one to try and sneak off – they’d lie in wait and as soon as who ever the poor hapless one was they would pour into the loo and all have their FFP (first fatal piss).

How did I go from talking about round buying to guys’ lavatory antics??

Englishness

2005-05-22T19:55:00.000+03:00

I’m currently reading a fascinating book called ‘Watching the English’ by Kate Fox. It alludes to the subtle English rules of interaction, humour and irony as well as, I’m sure, many other interesting things………….I’m only up to page 250 and there’s a lot more to go.

What prompted me to make this entry was how English my social interactions are, how I observe these unspoken laws with regards to conversation, behaviour and humour…………….and how I am not actually ‘English’.

I’ve always been a bit….out of place so to speak when I interact with other nationalities outside Australia, my home. Living as an expatriate, first in the UK and now in the Middle East, I just don’t fit the Aussie ‘type’.

I am useless in social situations and will sit in an unobtrusive corner for an entire evening rather than try and interact with another human being who I don’t know. Even the awkward looking person in the other corner is too scary a proposition to approach. Australians are known for being friendly, sociable, boisterous and always socially adapt at getting to know everyone – who we will, inevitably, end up calling mate. The surprise when people find out my nationality is usually audible – and that’s before they even find out that I don’t drink beer, hate the sun and am not into sports! Those revelations usually lead to a “are you sure you’re Australian” in a joking but really I’m serious sort of tone.

Once people get to know me I’m the typical Aussie………minus the beer, sun and sports - hey sun and sports as some sort of torture device devised by our English forbearers to punish us in the long run for being criminals but getting to live in a vast, sunny country. Beer smells and tastes like puke…come on, you know it’s true why not admit it.

Let’s just say it’s got me thinking………and when I do go to Oz this year I’ll be people watching like you won’t believe. However I’m not sure now if I want to find out the Aussie myth is real or not – I kind of like being unexpected …….or as an extremely good friend once said “you’re just on a different radio station to the rest of us”