Helen’s new wheels

Two weekends ago, I used part of my K-Rudd 900 to buy a bike. A very pretty bike, a greener bike, a bike from a local company, a bike to make me more healthy and fitter.

This is my bike.
My pretty bike My pretty bike My pretty bike My pretty bike

Is it not just one of the prettiest bikes you have seen? I picked it up from Bicycle Revolution in West End and since I bought it on April 18th I have ridden it to and from work 5 of the 8 days. The other three days were tied up with Grandad and other un-excitable events. Yesterday when I was riding home with one of the guys from work who lives a couple of streets over, a couple rode beside us for a little while praising the prettiness of my bike. They made all sort of comments about technical features of my bike that went in ear and out the other. I thought that was quite cool.

Tomorrow I won’t be riding as I do not yet have the facilities to carry a birthday cake with me whilst I ride πŸ™‚

Becoming a Granny at Brown Owls

Today I went to my first Brown Owls meeting and we crocheted granny squares πŸ˜€ I used the instructions out of the Meet me at Mike’s book. I did about 8/10 of the first square at the Brown Owls meeting today, and then did the rest whilst sitting beside Grandad’s hospital bed this evening until I ran out of yarn. I picked up the same yarn in three different colours and will need to go back and get some more. I plan on making a decent size rug out squares in the four colours.

The meeting was such a fantastic experience. Getting to meet a whole bunch of other crafty ladies, some whom I know a little bit through reading their blogs and others for whom I knew nothing and left knowing a little more. In addition to the crafting there was some fantastic baked treats that were on offer for snacks.

some photos πŸ˜€
most of the collective squares
Brown Owls Crochet

taking photos, Alischa from Bespoke Press, Steph from Bondville and Katie from Miss Kitty Boo Boo
Brown Owls Crochet

A little snippet of Melanie with some of the other girls in the background
Brown Owls Crochet

And here are my squares
Brown Owls Crochet

and a closer view
Brown Owls Crochet

Grandad is doing well, they did six skin grafts on his lower legs after removing the skin cancers and they removed another two which were just stitched up. He was moved to a different ward yesterday which is much nicer than his last one. It is soo handy living as close as I do to the Wesley, I can tuck out of home and less than five minutes later I am sitting beside Grandad in his room.

Fruit, Veg and Grandad

I was picked up from work this morning to take Grandad to hospital, a couple of hours later, Grandad was in the surgery waiting room waiting to go under for more skin grafts on his legs and I was back at work. I went back to the hospital a little ago to see him after he came out of surgery and he was safely tucked up in his hospital bed -> it is very handy living sort of semi across the back fence from the hospital he is staying at. It means I will be able to visit him each day after work. Don’t know how long he will be in there for yet but last time it was two weeks. So we shall see.

Last night, I picked up my first Food Connect box, I had ummed and ahhed about various fruit/veg boxes for a couple of months now but kept on coming back to Food Connect in that they seemed to provide not only a good value for money, but I liked the newsletter they supply to let you know what is happening with the farmers they use and the office.. Last week though I decided to give it a whirl and called the office, I spoke to a very friendly lady who answered my questions. I settled on the mini mixed box for 4 pick-ups over 8 weeks. This is what I got.

Food Connect Mini Box, Fortnight 1

I got 3 avocados, 5 bananas, 2 onions, 3 potatoes, 4 apples, 1 broccoli, 1 celery, a few leaves of silverbeet, a bag of snow peas, a punnet of sprouts, 6 tomatoes, 2 carrots, 5 mandarins and half a cabbage. I think that is all. I am pretty impressed with the swag of produce. It will be interesting to see how it suits me. I know just from my first box that it will force me to eat more fruit, eat a bigger variety of veg and mostly get me to use things I wouldn’t normally buy.

Last night for dinner I made a pot of lamb shanks with lentils, peas and tomatoes. I haven’t eaten many lentils over summer and I had forgotten how much I like them πŸ˜€ Dinner was yum.

Monday #5

1) I rode my new bike to and from work today. It felt great πŸ™‚ I will have to take a photo of my bike to share – it is very very very pretty πŸ˜€

2) I saw a line of furry caterpillars crossing the road today. The line stretched for a good 3m! Each caterpillar was about 8cm long. Sadly, the lesson here is that little furry caterpillars shouldn’t cross the road at 0720 if they don’t have a death wish. I don’t think that many survived the trip across the road.

Caterpillar line

3) I was stuck in the lift at work today for 45mins. That is now something I can cross the list of things I didn’t really want to experience but now can say I have experienced it. I was bringing a candidate back up to Medical and the poor kid freaked out a little bit. He was not all impressed about been stuck. I guess I would have been too if it was my enlistment day and I was stuck in the lift with an ever increasing ETA as to when the tech would be there.

4) I took this photo walking home from the bike shop on Saturday arvo. It makes me laugh.

Tree Lock

5) So I don’t forget before ANZAC Day on Saturday, I polished my SES boots tonight after training. I have one question, how on earth do you use black shoe polish and not get it over yourself?

(secret track)
#6 I first heard about /saw Rodrigo y Gabriela a few years ago. I thought yeah some pretty sweet as guitar playing. I got home tonight to find the guys watching the Live in Japan DVD and cripeamole. That is so impressive. I almost started dancing in the living room (in my SES gear…)

Melbourne, Day 1

Well I am well and truly back from Melbourne, though I would move there in a heart beat and a half if offered the chance. I figure I got about 80% of the things I wanted to do in Melbourne done and I managed to get about half the things on my pre-planned shopping list.

Lesson #1, Qantas time and Helen time are not calibrated. I was supposedly 1 minute too late to drop my bag for my flight. I had already checked in online the day before but had to queue for the bag drop. I was in the bag drop line for about 4 minutes. The lady at the counter said they had put an announcement over the loudspeaker for people to come out of the line. I just shook my head and if I hadn’t been so tired I would have argued it because there was no announcement. She also tried to tell me that I had to have my backpack in a bag before it could be dropped. WTF? Never heard that before – you just buckle all the straps up and it is fine. Though I must admit I heard her a little later telling another passenger that the wooden box they were checking in as luggage had to be in a bag. WTF? I didn’t queue in her line the next time. Back to the story. $44 later I was on the next flight to Melbourne – it left Brisbane at 0655 instead of the 0555 I had been booked on. Still I was ahead because the Qantas fare was still cheaper than Virgin or Jetstar and they would have made me pay the entire fare again to get on the next flight.
When I went back to check in and drop my bag for the next flight, I joined a different queue and the man at the counter had no problems with my backpack just as long as I buckled the straps up. Silly lady.

Lesson #2, do not make eye contact with the person with the explosive trace wand, because she will target you and wave the magic wand over you.

Lesson #3, Helen Γ’β„’Β₯s Melbourne.

I picked up the May issue of Real Living at the airport, so that with The Australian and The Courier Mail courtesy of Qantas were my reading material for the flight. I Γ’β„’Β₯ Real Living. I had a really pleasant flight down. The breakfast was good and one of the flight attendants, commented on my ear-rings which was nice, I returned the comment by saying I would love to be able to style my hair in the way she had done it.

Some photos from the flight.
This is the view as we flew over the Murray, I love the patchwork.
The MurrayQantas Wings

I landed in Melbourne to drizzly rain and grey skies. ugg not the Melbourne I wanted. Still this is the city of “four seasons in one day” by the arvo it would be blue skies. I again stayed at Greenhouse Backpackers. I can not recommend them enough. $30/night, free breakfast if you are up early enough and in such a fantastic location. On Flinders Ln between Swanston St and Degraves St and it has a rooftop πŸ™‚ It is great. Once I had unpacked my bags and grabbed a bed. I was off to explore.

I started on the corner of Flinders and Swanston and walked down to Spencer, back up Flinders Lane to Swanston, down Collins etc in a similar manner till I reached the corner of Little Lonsdale and Swanston. Oh the sights I saw and the sights I didn’t see.

Flinders Lane was great and I must say I loved living above it. The Aesop store has the most incredible fit out, the entire shelving system is made from cardboard. Didn’t go in but I loved what I saw. There was another shop just down from the Greenhouse entrance that had the most gorgeous emerald green wool shift dress in the window. If I was a size 10 and lived in Melbourne I would have stolen it from the window. Had a browse in Polyester Records but didn’t find anything that tickled my musical fancy. Had lunch at Le Petit GÒteau but that will be another post. Really enjoyed walking round the court district, lots of nice buildings and nice looking people.

Saw some lovely bicycles, one great thing about Melbourne is that because it is so flat it is very cycle friendly. I was suprised to see many ladies in full office wear, cycling home after work in high heels and all. I guess you don’t really work up a sweat cycling home in the cooler Melbourne weather.

Melbourne BikesMelbourne Bikes

Had a fantastic time on Little Bourke between Elizabeth and Queen. Wilkins and Kent was a fantastic shop, I picked up a cute little wooden tree brooch from States of Nature, a lavender heat pillow from Tonic Australia and placed a Jo Luping tile on hold that I would pick up from the Fitzroy store the next day. If you go to this article at Lost My Way and scroll down to the Jo Luping section, I got the tree tile that is in the middle. I love it! I had a little look in Paddy Pallin and tried on a great pair of shoes but the size 9 was too tight, tried on the size 10 in a similar style as they didn’t have the size 10 in the style I wanted. The good news was that the Fortitude Valley store had a size 10. Called Pabbi and he went in the next day and picked up a pair for me. Score!!! These are the new shoes, that were waiting on my bed when I got home from Melbourne. They are made by Simple (a shoe company that I just adore) and they can be found on Zappos here

Carousel shoes by Simple

Went to Metropolis Books and oh my I l Γ’β„’Β₯ that shop. I love how much space they were – it was great not having a really cramped bookshop. I picked up the Sublime Stitching Pad which I had been looking at for a while and a book called It’s So You, edited by Michelle Tea, writings from thirty-five women about personal expression through fashion and style. It looks like it will be a really great read. The lady behind the counter said she had loved it, so should be good.

I also stopped by Made in Japan where I picked up three very lovely ceramic pieces. I got the 18cm open shape bowl and 25cm large shallow bowl in Embossed Asanoha, they looked lovely nested together. I also got the 25cm large shallow bowl in Blue Blossom.

Mmm what else did I do? I walked and I walked some more and took photos! Took some street art photos for Karl
20090407_2448720090407_2448120090407_24483my name is...

Another thing I Γ’β„’Β₯ about the Melbourne CBD is all the rooftop spaces with gardens on them etc as well as all the balcony/window sill gardens.
*swoon**swoon*20090407_24466

This photo made me laugh
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I loved the grid of the tram lines against the blue sky and the number 39.
Tram lines in the sky

A little lane way off Little Bourke
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This photo reminded me of a show called Loot I once saw on the ABC.
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Something a little arty.
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The Myer windows in the Bourke St Mall, had costumes and props from Australia. I loved this outfit in the movie.
Australia Windows

dead umbrella, no longer needed, the sun is out.
umbrella, dead.

and I leave you with one last photo. You would want to hope that this building never changes street numbers πŸ˜€
Three Ninety

I retired back to the hostel with a bag full of goodies and a very tired Helen.

Rainy Backyards

Backyard Flooding

Today is Tuesday, this is what I woke up to this morning. A flooded backyard. Due to the local geography, our backyard and the next two backyards over flood in the right rain. Yesterday, it rained and rained and rained and rained some more. Apparently it has been grey skies, drizzly and blah, the entire time I was in Melbourne (we had blue skies in Melbourne). Won’t have to water the plants for a while πŸ™‚