Archive for the ‘Latest news’ Category
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Me Made May
Over May, sewists all over the world, (often) post their makes on Insta, vlogs, blogs and other social media platforms and (usually) pledge something about their making practice, even if that is simply to wear one handmade or refashioned item a day. It was a challenge started by a sewist in 2010 – you can ...
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Raining outside and in
Oh my goodness, we’ve had a blast of winter weather here in Melbourne. We have woken up to mist so dense we’ve not been able to see our back hedge and we’re back to wiping Winter’s paws before we let her inside. That’s Winter the dog, not the season. It is an odd name for ...
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Serendipity
is one of my favourite words. And my life was enriched by a serendipitous event last week. I’d been trawling through the Writers Victoria website looking for useful online courses to do – something that could be beneficial to me as a writer but, full admission, that I could also use for my vocational currency. ...
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And that’s a wrap
Finally read Margaret Atwood’s Testaments which has been sitting on my shelf for the past two years. I know that the joint Booker Prize win was controversial, but I find it hard to begrudge Atwood anything. Her poetry has been such a constant presence in my life. I bought her first Selected poems at the ...
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Too sad
I was going to write a tribute to the late poet, Jordie Albiston, who died earlier this week, but in truth it just makes me too sad. I met her when we were both at the beginning of our writing careers and she – and her work – remained dear to me, even though I ...
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Random thoughts from an anxious week
Rosalie Gasciogne’s assemblages are like flash fictions or poems – the window frames with corrugated iron ‘curtains’ hint of the yellowing paddocks they might look out on and the people looking – a young woman drying dishes at the sink or hushing a baby, a farmer stroking his stubbled chin, thinking of rain....
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The Pursuit of Happiness
I found myself wishing plaintively the other day for an engrossing and lengthy series of novels to get stuck in to – a series that would enchant and engross. Like The Borrowers, The Farseer Trilogy or the Anne books. It’s no accident that two of that small list are children’s books. What I wanted was ...
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Post-Lockdown Ants in Doc Martens
I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve emerged from the past eighteen months of on-again-off-again Lockdowns feeling bruised and flattened. It doesn’t help that The Optimist reads me all the bad news first thing in the morning. Often before he brings me a cup of tea. It’s cruel over-sharing. But the Optimist thinks it’s ...
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Saturday at Through the Looking Glass
I was affronted, turning up this morning to help out at Through the Looking Glass, our local secondhand bookshop, that someone had put Karen Joy Fowler’s novel, We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves out on the bargain book table. I repressed an urge to reinstate it on the fiction shelves and mark it at the ...
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From the book stacks
I had a completely valid reason to spend too much money on books this week. So my daughter and I organised a trip in from the outskirts and it was one of those post-lockdown shocks to find ourselves browsing in shops after so much months waiting for parcels to arrive. I bought a pair of ...