Post 565 A Christmas Indulgence

I began this chronologically at the beginning of the week but reorganised it on Sunday after I spent just over an hour  exploring  Chihuly in the Botanic Gardens, a series of glass installations by Dale Chihuly with a Jam Factory retail outlet.  They were so stunning I have lengthened this post to include them. Feel free to skip any or all.

The first photo was taken in the Bicentennial Conservatory (the building in the second photo). 

The next two photos are installations in the open park. During the day visitors can wander around for free. I didn’t cover the whole park, but will return another day. It’s there until late April. At night the installations are illuminated and access is ticketed.

Coming in from the Eastern carpark, the first installation I saw was the floating balls. A small child in a stroller was yelling bubble, bubble and pointing, an excitement I saw repeated several times by various children at various works. 

The gardens are lovely anyway, but these create marvellous reflections and a sense of both the unexpected, and appropriateness. There is a wow factor, but also of yes, of course. 

There is an entry fee ($14) to the  Conservatory where the remainder of my photos were taken. Here you can get close and also view from all angles. I loved it. There are plenty of explanations and video stations, but I preferred to just take in the glass. I’d had to talk myself into making the effort on Sunday morning. So glad I did.

It was a good day for it, only 25C. The conservatory closes early when the temperature is over 36C and doesn’t open at all when it’s forecast to be 40C. Even at 25C it’s pretty warm inside. I took a lot more photos, but these are my  picks. I will  venture back again on another coolish Sunday and cover what I missed, maybe with a friend.

Like the Radical Textiles exhibition, it will be a major drawcard during the Adelaide Festival in Feb/March. Not to be missed if you are here.

Returning to Wednesday, I almost missed my six monthly car service . As I pay for one service I usually book the next, but it seems I forgot last time. Fortunately I checked my diary and managed to get a booking for last Wednesday only a few weeks into the seventh month. As usual, I stayed for the 3 hours it took for 2 mechanics to complete the service and wash the car. I took my Aquile embroidery, my knitting and my Kobo (I wouldn’t want to run out of things to do). Another woman waiting came over to ask what I was doing. She learned dressmaking from her mother, who learned it from her mother in India. We had a discussion about sewing machines, knitting and learning.

I wasn’t at home to receive the delivery of the alpaca yarn I ordered a couple of weeks ago, so collected it from the Post Office on my way home. This is from one animal, Casper. It is a beautiful dark brown.  I’m looking forward to mixing it with the alpaca I have left  from previous projects. I haven't put it away yet: it is so lovely to look at.

I also tried to visit the Haigh's Chocolate outlet on Greenhill Road, but there are road works happening on their side road. Their carpark was full and no road parking, so I couldn't stop.

The Rita Maria Faleri Aquile is quite challenging. I undid two eagle tails while waiting for the car. I had hoped to live with the mistakes, but decided to adjust. The small sections are especially tricky. The thread is thick, and although the loose weave means holes are easy to see, it is worked in hand, and the threads move around. 

Thursday was the last Pilates class for the year. I managed to return Paul's book on Mitochondria. He, Heather and I had a lovely focused class, much cooler in the studio than outside. I had intended to have lunch at Queen St, but it was crowded, no parking and the kitchen had probably closed anyway, so I went home. 

Friday was my Crown installation - an easier process than the preparation a week ago. Clemmie explained why she hadn't used 3d printing for this. As I suspected, the older method can achieve subtleties 3d can't, and we were altering the shape of the tooth to reduce the gap between it and the next one, to help with cleaning.  She adjusted my mouthguard as a stopgap, but I have an appointment to make a new one. 

I had chosen bags for Clemmie (bluebird of happiness) and her assistant (Clementine Ford is a bit of a hero of both). Both seemed to delight, so I am very happy. I will miss Clemmie - but she will do well wherever she is, and so will her child. 

This time there was no waiting time to eat or drink. I came home via Haigh's chocolate outlet again and this time they had staff directing people to spaces in between the cement trucks and workers' vans on the side street. I managed to buy my supply of Christmas chocolate, and then stock up on groceries and alcohol-removed drink at Unley. Most of the washing I hung out around 2.30pm was dry by 6pm.

I spent an hour or so catching up with my brother on the phone. Our mother would have been 99 on Saturday. He visited her grave and took frangipani - from his potted tree grown from her enormous one where we grew up, and which provided my wedding bouquet. 

 I wore the mourning locket with the hair she was so proud of.  It seems a strangely Victorian concept. Collecting it when she died was really important to my father. I rarely wear it but it seemed important this year. 

Each day brought physical Christmas cards or letters, newsy email messages from friends and family, virtual cards and a phone call or two. I really look forward to catching up (such an evocative phrase!) but inevitably there is a sprinkling of sadness. 

The wife of a second cousin (with whom I had done a lot of family history research) died two weeks ago. There is a lot of infirmity. The joy, however, of ‘catching up’ (like today’s newsy email from friend Christine) lifts me up.

On request I took a bag of my remaining gift bags on Saturday night, where there was a lot of bag making activity happening, along with work calls, cooking, planning, eating and crosswords.

On Sunday afternoon, after Chihuly, I made gingerbread, interrupted by a long Christmas phone call. 

I thought I had checked ingredients before shopping on Friday, but I missed butter. I had 4/5 of what I needed, so topped up with margarine. I had intended to try icing them with white chocolate but, as usual, decided they don’t need icing (besides being too irregular in shape to ice easily!). The lighter ones are rolled thinner and more prone to burning, so I took them out sooner. As well as the smell of Christmas, they taste  delicious.  I tried several to make sure.

I did my final food shop yesterday. Every year I avoid Christmas Eve shopping, and every year as I manoeuvre my trolley around the crowd, I remember that everyone else thinks the same. I went with a list of 6 things and came home with two heavy bags and a box of drinks. I collared the last Pandoro in the Frewville supermarket!

Today I had a haircut in the middle of the day, travelling to the hairdresser on the city loop bus. I didn’t venture into the Markets, but it didn’t look crowded. This was the Market’s Santa seen from the bus. 

A Prayer for the Wild at Heart was still serving lunch when I got off the bus, so I indulged.  They are open, except on Public holidays, until New Year’s Eve, then closed for 2 weeks so I enjoyed the pleasant breeze, 27C and slightly changed menu.

My parcel arrived in Canberra, my packages are ready to take to lunch tomorrow (might need a small sleigh) and my candles are lit.

In the words of Tiny Tim, God Bless us, every one.

Post 564 The temperature feels a lot like Christmas

We had an enjoyable WES meeting on Wednesday, 12 of us sitting around a table spread with food and sharing what we are currently working on (or not, in a couple of cases where family illness is requiring full attention). Colleen brought along a folio of samples given to her by a batik master, showing all the stages of batik preparation. A real treasure. Colleen has an exhibition of textiles opening next Friday at the Fabrik Gallery Lobethal.

Glenys brought a mystery object. The base is hollow, a receptacle of some kind. The remaining three sections all come off separately, but are each like a lid with no connection holes for incense or insertion. There was a lot of speculation, but no concrete suggestions.

On Thursday I saw the hand therapist who brought in a surgeon to look at my myxoid cyst. We all agreed it needed operating on. We found a mutually possible day in late January but I needed a referral from my GP., whose practice wouldn’t facilitate it without my seeing him, but managed to fit me in the next day. Fortunately, I had done all the right things to avoid infection, and need to continue being careful.                                                                                                       Friday, therefore, was spent in a GP visit, followed by 95 minutes with my mouth open in the dentist chair, preparing a molar for a crown. A tedious process, but competently and carefully done. I now have a temporary crown, with the permanent one to be fitted next Friday. It seems that an hour after seeing me last week my dentist had a cancellation and I was in the front of her mind. I was very pleased to be able to make myself a coffee at 5pm, by which time the anaesthetic had worn off and the no food/drink period had passed.!  The practice rang on Saturday morning to check that I was OK. Great service.                                                                                                                    

While I’ve been working on the Rita Maria Faleri birds, a spider has been working her magic on my back balcony. I love the pattern and pictures created by these webs. Unlike me, the spider doesn't need a book (for size indication, the book is a little larger than A4).
                                                                  

I woke around 4.30am on Saturday, registered that it was time for the asteroid shower, but could tell from my bed there was too much light around to see it, so went back to sleep. I was, however, up in time to hear laughter coming from the Square.  It emanated  from this group exercising. A great early morning sound.

I spent the rest of the day at home, mostly playing with colouring a cotton bag, incorporating a couple of experiments I’ve been  wanting to try. 

It’s approaching pomegranate season and Katherine's tree is doing nicely. Such attractive fruit to welcome Veronica home from her adventure in Cambodia and Laos.

I was looking forward to the last Adelaide Chamber Singers subscription concert for the year, Resound at the Cathedral on Sunday afternoon. Although it was forecast to be 41C , I still thought I’d go. The cathedral relies on a couple of large fans at the back for cooling and the concert was one hour, with some audience singing. By the time I had watered my balcony plants I was wavering.

At 12.15 it was 38C and I saw sense. I’ve been at concerts before at the cathedral when people have had to leave because of the heat. There is also minimal shade for parking and while I love singing, the thought of the impact of all that breath in the already hot air cathedral decided me. I microwaved a couple of scones I bought on Friday, made a coffee, closed the blinds and turned on the aircon. A pity, but a no-brainer.  I read Eileen Thornton’s A Mystery in Tyneside and finished the experimental bag, 

which I shall probable give to a charity for food distribution. It's interesting and useful, but of limited success.

The heat continued with 38C on Monday and has brought the mandevilla back into bloom. I've also moved the almanda that was attacked by the blackbird back to the eastern balcony. It is struggling, and won't, I think, survive the heat on the western one. I have hidden it behind other plants in the hope the blackbird doesn't find it.

I made a quick trip to Dymocks at Unley to pick up a copy of the 2025 Guide to the Southern Hemisphere Night Sky, then get some supplies and home by 11 to bunker down and read.  I get very tired in the heat. I thought the sky guide would be useful, especially at Carrickalinga in January. Carrickalinga has met the requirements to become Australia's first International Dark Sky Community. 

There was no dark sky here in Adelaide when I went to bed last night at 11pm,  24 hours after the full moon. It would have been a good night for an outdoor performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

 I nearly put myself to sleep in the afternoon trying to read The Serpent and the Goddess which has been on my pile far too long. Very small print and lots of dense, detailed prose has put me off, but the central claim, that ancient serpent creation mythology largely either assigned or incorporated female involvement in creation but was usurped over time by patriarchal structures, is an interesting one. 

Around 6pm yesterday there was a courier delivery, this time the fascinating, populist, well-illustrated history of sail making in the UK town of Coker, the birthplace of William Dampier and T. S. Eliot. Its supremacy in sailmaking, it seems, was down to its unique process of ‘bucking’. This is easy to read, and will be of interest to WES Group.

Today the temperature dropped to 26C.  I got a lovely breeze through the apartment in preparation for cleaning. It won't last, but the 30-33C forecast for the next week is a lot better than 41.  Tomorrow my car is being serviced, and Friday will be taken up with the Crown fitting, both in airconditioned premises. The current forecast for Christmas day is 34C, so definitely no robins, snow or sleigh bells. I'm delighted, however, to have messages from friends via card, email, messenger and sms, and after significant delay from a cancelled plane, Veronica is home from the school trip to Cambodia. So deo gratias.

I think my Christmas shopping is finished.  I might make gingerbread for the Summer solstice. 

Post 563 Hallelujah!

This week’s highlight had to be the performance of the Messiah that Katherine and I attended at the Adelaide Town hall on Sunday afternoon.  There were three performances, over the weekend and I had booked a year ago for the matinee.

It was a stellar performance by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, the Adelaide Chamber Singers, and soloists Samantha Clarke, Fiona Campbell, Andrew Goodwin and Andrew O'Connor, conducted by Ivars Taurins whose body flowed continuously to communicate with the performers and channel the music. The final standing ovation lasted quite a while. 

The seating hasn't improved, but sufficed once the incoming capacity crowd had been through the ritual of shuffling in and out of rows searching for numbers. That's after we had walked through the outside scaffolding and negotiated the stairs. 

Even with the 160 minute uncut version in the less than comfortable seats I at no stage wished to leave. It was a mighty, uplifting, overwhelming experience. 

By contrast, it was very quiet on desk hostess duty at the Guild on Wednesday. Two people called in briefly too drop of items for the trading table, but otherwise quiet enough for me to do a bit of phone research for my brother and read Silk. I needed to make notes as I read and the conditions were perfect for that. There can’t be many people in the world interested in its level of detail, but a couple of them are in WES Group!   When I got home, one of the Christmas cards I had posted the afternoon before was in my letterbox, properly franked, no note, Sydney address clear????

Thursday was hot (38C). After watering everything, I left a little early for Pilates, planning to visit the Post Office to solve the letter mystery. The lift was waiting on my floor,  lights on, doors open and periodically trying unsuccessfully to close. I rang our Strata rep, who was out shopping (and now facing the prospect of hauling shopping up the stairs). She reported the problem and I went down the stairs, dashed to the Post Office and phoned Pilates to say I’d be late (again).

The helpful Post Person worked out that the letter has gone through the letter scanner upside down, and read my return address instead of the recipient’s! I am mildly panicked, since I have stamped my address in the middle of the reverse side of about 50 cards, a practice that is no longer a good idea. Top corners are the best places for return addresses. Since no more have appeared in my letterbox, I’m hoping the rest survive the machines. Another habit I need to break.

By the time I finished Pilates the lift service company had promised to come that afternoon. My cunning plan to delay my return by lunch at the Queen Street Cafe was thwarted because their kitchen was closed, so I postponed lunch and settled for my lime milkshake and a rhubarb friand. Plan B went into action when the lift was still not working on my return. I took myself down to A Prayer for the Wild at Heart and had a very late lunch of Seared duck breast with Parisian peas and orange. That did the trick.  When I returned 40 minutes later, the lift was working! Safely back in the apartment, the watered plants were doing OK in the heat so I settled with a coffee to finish Hannah Richell’s One Dark Night, a lucky pre- release find via NetGalley. 

After a few more rows of the use-up-Rowan-wool shawl, 

I dug out the Maria Rita Faleri kit I bought earlier in the year and stitched in the centre lines using the cream thread provided (should have swapped to red so it is easier to see!),  over-stitching the edges the next day. I’m not sure yet what I will make this into, but it’s unlikely to be a cushion. The pattern, however, is fabulous.

On Friday morning I spent an hour at the dentist, half with the hygienist and half with my dentist, who, after carefully noting the work to be done on the areas we are monitoring, told me she is leaving the practice at Christmas because her childcare needs can’t be accommodated.  She suggested who I might book with in future and we agreed she would not have time to do the work she had suggested for me before Christmas. We were both sad. I have been seeing her now for 6-7 years.  I made an appointment with her successor for my next session in April next year. About 2 hours later, the practice phoned me to say they had found two spots in my current dentist’s schedule before she leaves, and booked the lab to make the required crown in time to fit! I was astonished and moved. It means missing a Christmas lunch with friends but I didn’t feel I could refuse.  

Then, late yesterday, as I was bringing in the washing, the myxoid cyst on my right index finger burst. It has been inflamed and enlarged for some time and I had been advised to tolerate it rather than intervene. I immediately applied iodine and a bandaid before exposing to the air today and calling the hand clinic. I now have an appointment with a hand therapist on Thursday, in lieu of Pilates. I need Pilates, but need to prevent infection  more. 

On Saturday, after some shopping, I resolutely reduced my pile of hardcopy books waiting to be read. One was the RSN stitch book, read but not written up, two were partially-read books about mitochondria and metabolism,  two were crime fiction titles borrowed from a Book Club member and 3 crime fiction I had bought. As Sunday was our last meeting of the club for this year, I had an incentive. Yes, I skimmed, but in about 6 hours I got most of them read. 

Since taking the photo, I have read the top one - an astonishing book for someone who thought she knew a lot about WWI.  This copy was borrowed and I have now ordered another to lend to family and friends.u

list. 

 The pile is now down to books I need to read and note for talks I’ve agreed to give next year, and which I’m really looking forward to reading. There is still a huge number of fiction titles waiting on my Kindle and Kobo, but that’s OK. It’s the physical piles that irritate me. The finished crime fiction is now circulating around the Book Club,  I have borrowed one of our three recommended titles for next month from the library's ebook collection, so that is now at the top of my reading.

I did less well with yarn, succumbing to a new, and obviously limited, line of alpaca yarn from one specific animal from Adagio Mill - Casper, a lovely brown. I’m thinking of putting it with 3 balls of black alpaca I already have and make a jumper. I did, however, resist the fabulous colours of the current Bendigo Woollen Mill Italian Solstice Cotton import. 

My year's supply of toilet paper, paper towel and tissues was waiting for me at Katherine's place on Saturday night. It's easier to have it delivered there than at the apartment. Fionn helped me load it into my car and yesterday I managed to empty and reorganise several cupboards to fit it, for the first time, into the apartment rather than store it in my carpark locker.  Progress. 

Then yesterday a box arrived for plastic recycling.

Since the soft plastic collection service at supermarkets collapsed under the weight of their failure to recycle, there has been no option but landfill. After much research and checking, I’m as confident as I can be that the TerraCycle company based in Victoria do actually recycle soft plastic, but it’s an expensive option for individuals. 

You buy a box which they send to you. You fill it and return it using the prepaid label they provide. Once a year they have a sale. This year, when they reduced charges by 30%,  I worked out where I could place the box and plucked up courage to try it. It holds up to 20kg. If it holds 6 months of my discarded soft plastic I will regard it as a good investment. 4 months I might begrudge but continue. I am, of course, trying to reduce usage.

There was no family dinner at my place this week, as most were busy. I used the time to dig out a few Christmas decorations and sort out all my Christmas presents. I finished off a few details and have a couple of gifts to top up and some cards to write, but basically I'm organised. 

Today Panayoula and I caught up at length over a couple of coffees, sharing news of our families, health, mutual friends, hopes and fears. In this last month of 2024 we are both encouraged by our children and grandchildren's capacity to find their way in the world, contributing and overcoming adversity. It is so good to share this and encourage each other well beyond our paid working life.

Hallelujah!