良いお年を

良いお年を everyone! (Yoi otoshi o).
This is the expression people say to each other in Japan as the end of the year approaches but you can't use it after 31st December. From 1st January people then say '明けましておめでとう' (Akemashite omedetou) but I'll leave that til tomorrow :)

These berries are from grasses growing in my front garden. They're extremely purple in colour but this photo makes them look blue for some reason. Anyway, they're quite pretty until they start to fall off and people squish purple coloured mush all over the path. Got to love that about nature.

良いお年を!

away

I've been away breathing alpine mountain air and walking in a ski area without skiers because it's summer. I love nothing more than absorbing the bush smells, the trees and green space, the astonishing mountain views, no people, no shops, no cars, no noise apart from the birds and the wind. The only thing that startled me during the whole 5 days away was a wallaby who jumped out of the bush behind me while we were on a 20km walk. He/she was all wet underneath on the belly, probably having just come up from the creek next to us. She/he then bounded off down the track ahead with important wallaby business to conduct.

I'm back in the city now feeling very revived. What will 2009 bring I wonder?

ginger madness

So now I have to eat my words with this post which show the results of a baking frenzy that came out of nowhere and hit me on Monday night. It was like I was channeling Martha Stewart. But this recipe is from Stephanie Alexander so it would more accurate to say that I was channeling her when the madness descended. I made ginger star biscuits for my work colleagues and bagged them up with little name tags from my illustrations. I just wanted to offer something small even though I am mostly bah humbug at this time of year. Damn these biscuits are good! The royal icing Steph recommends to go on top didn't work out so well (too soft as I didn't whip the egg white and icing sugar long enough) but tasted pretty good anyway. They went down well this morning with a cup of milky chai.

If you want to see some knitted heaven check out this.

the way of tea

I was inspired by the beauty of an art shop in Smith St, Collingwood called St Luke's to create this little piece. It's a collage of original woodblock prints mounted on wooden art board with a lovely textured black backing. My photos keep making the black background look blue-ish but it's not, believe me. It's definitely a nice solid black. The woodblock prints have been printed on an olive coloured textured Japanese paper. But then again you can't really tell that from my photos here. Hmmmmm, it seems I'm being a bit challenged with light and photography at the moment......

A big happy birthday to all fellow Sagittarians in the world! I've just discovered a friend's birthday falls on xmas day. Poor N. He says he's used to it as he's had it his whole life (ha ha). No wonder he has a black xmas tree!

I'm not a very cheery Christmassy type of soul I'm afraid. No blog posts here about Christmas baking or homemade decorations (although I applaud all of you who can be bothered). Instead I usually spend this time to be a bit more reflective about the year that's passed and my hopes for the world in the year to come. I'm finding it a bit hard to do this year (the hope bit) as I'm surrounded by seriously ill friends and family and have been feeling a bit bleak lately. A good friend recommended reading Debra Adelaide's The Household Guide to Dying (which, despite the sound of its title is fiction) and so I bought a copy yesterday. And yet the birth/death cycle continues - I know 3 women who are due to have their babies this week. Good luck girls!!!!

red

As weird as this may sound, I'm convinced that I enjoy the cutting of paper stencils as much as printing itself with screen printing. It's labour intensive for sure, but somehow so meditative. This one took me a while to cut but it wasn't overly painful.

And thanks to J & J I have Lena's new book Printing by Hand to keep me inspired. I scored it for my birthday last week :)