Month: April 2006

I dare not post these tonight – for fear of looking shallow, churlish, ungrateful, bitter and vindictive – until Bec fills me in on what the hell is going on in her world.

because when you’re knackered, writing lists is good…

1. “proper” journalist (as in, writing for a major metro daily paper)
2. artisan bread baker
3. pastry chef
4. interior designer
5. fabric/cloth designer (like this chick)
6. clothing consultant (like Trinny and Susannah)
7. wine maker
8. shoe buyer (as in, travel to Italy, Spain, anywhere really and source shoes for sale in Oz)
9. novelist
10. radio broadcaster (the grossly obese tv lecturer at uni who regaled us with nauseating tales of his stomach stapling procedure told me I had a great face for radio…)

From Loretta

mtc
bec

to avoid the whole – “is that really mine or something I thought of because I read it in Bec’s first”, I haven’t read Bec’s post on this. And naturally, because give me 10 and I’ll give you 20, there’s 10 plus a few.

1. Fresh flowers in the house. Favourites: magnolias, tulips, lavendar, lillies. (Although I hate when they start to die, drop leaves and pollen and that manky water smell.)
2. When a song I love, that is deeply attached to a day, or an event, a moment or a season of my life, comes on to the radio. The volume is up, the voice is loud, the dancing spontaneous.
3. Cooking a new recipe, it being delicious and relatively straightforward, so becoming part of the repertoire.
   
4. Waking up when my body is fully rested and says “wake up” rather than the myriad ways I am woken up every other day.
5. Lying on the lounge, resting my head on Chef’s leg and just being.
   
6. The smell of coffee brewing, even if I don’t like drinking it anymore.
   
7. The sounds of my children
   
8. That silence that fills the house after the dinner, bedtime, end-of-the-day rankle ebbs away. Bliss.
9. The sound of Jasper waking in the morning – those when he just wakes and babbles happily away to his animals. In fact, any sound from Jasper. That little high pitched “ah-eegh” when he sees me, kills me every time.
10. “Mummy” when I walk through the door home from work.
    
11. Dinners when we first moved out of home, with L and R, M and R (then A, then S and finally J who we loved the most). Where we ate late because if I can’t run on time, as if dinner parties I’m hosting are going to. Where we had nibbles, then three courses, litres of wine, chocolates and coffee and would basically eat our collective selves into an eating disorder. Or in fact, any meal with them. They are something I treasure to the core of my soul.
12. Lazy days hanging out with friends. That start mid-morning, become lunch, extend through the afternoon tea to an impromptu dinner. The kids happily playing together, us (normally us and the Doodles – our camping buddies) drinking copious amounts of tea and just talking about everything and nothing.
    
13. Baking.
    
14. Having a jar with homemade biscuits on the bench.
15. Reading the Saturday papers, with a mug of tea beside me and the sun warming my back.
16. That sensation when you lie down in bed and your entire body says “thank GOD” or when during the night you pull the doona back up over your cooled body and the warmth is instantaneous.
17. Either a fresh, warm Italian loaf with extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper or a light French loaf with butter and honey.
    
18. Smelling Jasper’s head
19. Oscar as he slips his arm through mine
20. Felix’s cuddles
    

Miss Eagle is a relatively new acquaintance but I suggest you visit one of her excellent blogs because:

• she has very beautiful magnolias at the top of her Trad Pad pages
• she has two boys who grew to be more than two metres high
• she successfully sewed a safari suit for a man she loved. We all have very special memories The Suit, yes? Mine involves my English head teacher in the summer time shorts version … Oh Vernon, where are you now?

Miss Eagle recently tagged the Kimster and me, but with all the travelling, hospitalling and Anzac biscuiting that’s been going on here lately, it’s taken a while to catch up (and don’t worry, you’re still going to get my Why Am I Suddenly In Dorrigo story, I just have to do this first).

The tag is for 10 Simple Pleasures, and I am certain I won’t be as eloquent as Miss Eagle, who brought a tear to the eye in her number 10.

1. Open fires – mesmerising and, if you have to have cold weather (which I secretly doubt) then an open fire is the best consolation around.

2. A goldfish in a pond, equally mesmerising and just as enjoyable in warm weather.

3. New mown grass: smell, look, feel.

4. Perfectly painted toe nails in summer sandals

5. Chanel No 5 for my birthday – always.

6. Cuddles in bed, from anyone except the dog because of her smelly feet and tendency to lick when over-excited.

7. Silly stories from my children. Actually – pretty much anything from my children but it would have been dull for others were I to list kiddy things for all 10.

8. A perfectly browned pastry crust emerging from the oven.

9. The feel of your tongue over newly cleaned teeth.

10. The smell of sheets coming in from the clothes line on a sunny afternoon.

mtc

Bec