Skylark and Son

Tamarind Tales

2009-09-24T02:49:00.000-07:00

Eighties high-waisted peach shorts - fifty cents op-shop

Vintage Brazilian tan leather pumps - $10 op-shop

Eighties peach peplum blouse - $1 op-shop

I've had a bit of a monochrome monkey on my back since I saw this Garance shot a little while ago:

Arnsdorf designer Jade Sarita Arnott in... Arnsdorf.

...but what with me being me, and the monkey being an apricot ape:

The monochrome monkey.

...it should come as no surprise to anyone that my monochromatic outfit ended up pastel peach instead of baby pink. It's also far less suave, but who needs suave when you can have a tail of your very own!

Unfortunately it's the kind of tail found on an executive assistant circa 1984, rather than the curling, tree swinging, fabulously prehensile tail the monkey and I might have preferred, but the one dollar rack can only do so much.

There's a pleasing geometry to the whole affair.

I suspect this outfit would have benefited from a statement shoe (or preferably two statement shoes for my two statement feet), but I was having a chasing little dude kind of day so opted for the pumps.

The apricot ape gibbered his approval of their peachy nude tones.

Now the little monkey has scampered back to his tiny tribe so I am once again free to mix my colours at will, without his insistent demands for monochrome and mangoes haunting my every move. I am still feeling oddly drawn to outfits in a single shade though - Simian Stockholm Syndrome, perhaps?

Skye

PS. Not many words today, my word herds are depleted after yesterday's Wall Of Text extravaganza. I have put the few remaining small one syllable wordlets in a nesting box with some coconut fibre and fresh pawpaw and I'm hoping that, with a bit of gentle coaxing, by tomorrow I'll have a big enough breeding population to construct whole paragraphs again!

A Highly Scientific Experiment

2009-09-23T02:48:00.000-07:00

This post is a bit of an experiment with Wall-Of-Text type posting of a kind I usually steer away from. First of all the backstory - I was asked to write this little piece on the secret of a happy marriage as a guest post for fatmumslim, and I liked it enough to post it here too (even though it's rough as guts and I did bang it out in record time because I forgot my deadline). I have been considering the occasional posting of non-style/non-photo based stuff for a while but am not sure if anyone actually wants to see it, but since I had this one sitting there I thought I'd give it a go and see what happened.

In order for everyone to give me their honest opinion, that no one has to feel bad for telling me NO to the Wall Of Text, I am running a poll on the subject. Please vote either way!

Anyway, on with the show...

I asked my husband what the secret of our happy marriage is (assuming we still have one, and I’m not jinxing myself by writing this and next week we’re filing for divorce and fighting over custody of the cat and the free Christmas carol cd that came with the Sunday papers) and his answer was this:

“No unrealistic expectations.”

Which threw me for a minute, because I had some very unrealistic expectation that he’d say “A well-developed sense of the absurd” or “My vast and mighty love for you O goddess-like one.” And also because I thought he meant “Low expectations.” You know - don’t expect much and you won’t be disappointed, aim low and any scrap from the marriage table will seem like more than you deserve. Which doesn’t seem like the secret of a happy marriage so much as a recipe for dysfunction, low self-esteem and generalised misery, with a garnish of secret drinking and prescription drug abuse.

Now, our house may have its share of chaos and madness and out-of-tune ukelele playing, but we don’t have any of that low expectation stuff. Not one bit. Some further investigation (aka hassling of the husband) subsequently revealed that unrealistic expectations include:

1. Large diamonds
2. Either of us being someone or something we’re not.

Fair enough, I thought, so what are realistic expectations then? Some meaty husband/wife style conversation resulted in a list a bit like this:

Respect
Trust
Commitment
Love
Communication
A mutual capacity and willingness to evolve and adapt as a couple

And all those Dr Phil-type truisms which seem so trite and obvious but actually encompass vast oceans of meaning. I know a Dr Phil-ism when I hear one because I must have absorbed several volumes worth during my first year of motherhood, otherwise known as The Year of Being Stuck in the House at Nap Time But Too Sleep Deprived To Do Anything Except Watch TV. Don’t ask me for advice, don’t even hint that you might need guidance on an emotional issue, because my eyelids will flutter, my eyes will roll back in my head, and before you know it I’ll be dishing out endless neatly packaged southern accented soundbites of wisdom, originally picked up by osmosis while slumped on the sofa zombie-like, too tired to sleep.

So what’s the secret, why don’t we have the dreaded unrealistic expectations, how have a pair of contrarian reprobates like us kept this all-singing, all-dancing, occasionally yelling, show on the road for the last seven years through the vagaries of the film industry and kidlet and a creative life full of unknowns? There’s no real answer of course (apart from my general ambivalence toward diamonds of any size at all, and the fact that he does most of the cooking), but my personal theory - vigorously refuted by husband - is that it’s because we didn’t like each other at all when we first met. He was a cocky arrogant male chauvinist (he actually told me “Save your breath sweedhard, you’re too cute for me to take you seriously.”), I was a loud and bossy little beast with a bad case of my-way-or-the-highwayitis, and together we were disastrous. Well, we were very unprofessional when we should have been very professional, and had a big fight in front of people we were working with and were the talk of the town for all the wrong reasons.

We then got together in a pink cloud of romance which included mutual dislike, too much cheap red wine and some unsavoury acts in a back alley (“I hate you” sloppy pash “Me too” drunken grope, etc etc.) and a taxi (sorry driver, wherever you are, probably permanently traumatised), and then continued to knock along in a ramshackle haphazard fashion for ages before we worked out that we were utterly, thoroughly, gleefully meant for one another and nobody else. It's almost as though we started our relationship in reverse, starting off at rock-bottom, but finding mutual respect and admiration and pure unadulterated fun as we went along, falling in love in the giddiest way only after we’d actually decided to get married. Knowing all our weaknesses but discovering our strengths and wonders together over time. Now I’m sounding like those people you see in Marie Claire articles and random Lifestyle Channel dating shows promoting arranged marriages as the most sensible way of building a strong relationship. Hmmm, perhaps it's better if I do channel Dr Phil, after all.

In any case - there you have it:

Cheap red wine + mutual loathing + an arranged marriage = marital bliss!

xx
Skye

PS. That photo up there was taken at about 2am at the end of our wedding reception (in a cocktail bar round the corner from our old place in Bondi), the orchids are wilted and many peach bellinis have been drunk and we are just about as warm and fuzzy as two happy little humans can be.
PPS. Yes, that's another appearance of the rarely sighted husband. It's now officially full steam ahead on his new movie (with gratifying front-page-of-Variety articles and suchlike to make us feel legit), so it's nice to see him here on my blog, since in real life he'll be in the studio for the next six months!

An Elder of the Tribe

2009-09-22T02:17:00.000-07:00

Fleur Wood silk Vera dress - from My Clothes Horse

Mollini "Opening" in taupe grosgrain - full price retail (!)

Forever New pear stud earrings - $10

Despite absolutely no demand at all, and not a single person clamouring for this post - behold my re-creation of the outfit I wore to my little sister's wedding a couple of weekends ago:

You'll have to believe me when I say that on the day I blow-dried my hair, ironed my frock, applied visible lipstick of a flattering pink shade, and was in all ways a tidier and more fragrant version of myself (at least until I'd had a few drinks). No blow-drying or ironing occurred in the making of these photos, so some imagination and judicious squinting might be required to achieve a closer approximation.

Sweet, demure, lady-like - all adjectives NEVER applied to me, but perfectly apt for these earrings.

When choosing this outfit I was very mindful of my odd, and somewhat transitional, position in the hierarchy of the clan. I'm still a part of the junior generation, but I am the oldest of all the "kids" (most of us in our thirties now) and somebody's mother (mother of the pageboy, no less) and therefore inching my way bit by bit toward elder status. I'm at the stage where it behoves me to dress with decorum, but where I can still dance until 3am with the youths (albeit in sensible-ish heels and pretty much only as the crazy old lady of the crew).

Grubbiness is due to stumbling home in darkness and drunkishness.

I feel like I'm gearing up for the day when I'll take my place in the line-up of matriarchs - ready to sail through the family wedding scene, bestowing my approval (and advice) as I see fit, dispensing compliments and making a little trouble, laughing in a full-bodied fashion and giving hugs of an all-encompassing nature, all of it while wearing a hat of great majesty. Something to aspire to, I think you'll agree!

Silly!

For now I'm just starting small - a pussy bow here, a knee-length hem there, some amateurish dabbling in advice-giving and trouble-making and the bestowing of satisfactory hugs - I still have a ways to go on my journey from naked kidlet running around seventies backyard barbecues to magnificently be-hatted elder stateswoman of the tribe.

This is a very lovely dress to wear, it flutters most delightfully - and there are few things which go better with champagne and dancing than a delightfully fluttering frock. I'm biased because I chose it, but I do think the dress manages to bridge the gap between girlish and grown-up - which is just as well because I'm halfway across that gap, and trying with all my might not to look down...

Skye

PS. The lovely Chantelle of fatmumslim asked me to do a guest post on the secret of my happy marriage, you can check it out here.

Raging Rivets

2009-09-17T01:15:00.000-07:00

Seventies Walter Steiger metal platforms $5

You don't see a lot of seventies stuff on this blog. Not for me the Ossie Clark frocks and the polyester maxi-dresses and all wide-collared points between. An ABBA track on the PA won't get me boogying in the supermarket aisles, and I've never felt the slightest inclination to start collecting brown ceramic things or oil paintings of big-eyed children. Even in the last known full-scale seventies revival (early-mid nineties) my involvement was limited to one black sheer body shirt, and one very ill-considered pair of front-lacing purple velvet hipster flares. All of which makes the purchase of these heavy metal babies the other day from the RSPCA Bargain Barn quite unexpected.

As of right now I could probably get away with wearing them, the platform thing still raging out of control as it is, and they do fit me, but really I think I bought them just for the sake of the tiny little rivets holding the metal onto the platform. I didn't get a photo of them, but somehow that tiny little detail of pure insanity was enough to get my five bucks. Vintage platforms are a bit of an endangered species too, a lot of them fell victim to the seventies theme party era (remember those? People used to have them before the eighties parties took over, I dare say the youths are having nineties parties now) and ended up thrown in swimming pools or spray painted with purple glitter and consigned to the racks in suburban costume hire shops, only to be thrashed to death by footy players on end-of-season drag jags.

Also an endangered species: things in op-shops (or anywhere) not made in China.

In a slightly odd coincidence these weren't the only pair of metal riveted shoes to fall into my lap that day. I got home with my Steigers and found a parcel had arrived containing one of my very occasional random Ebay impulse purchases - a matching Charles Jourdan eighties leather bag and shoes with little metal panels here and there. No one else wanted these, so I ended up paying $6.50 for the set. Perhaps the very idea of a set frightened people away, matching shoes and bags being (except for the Chloe Paddington frenzy of 2005 or 2006 or whenever the hell it was) more or less extinct. Perhaps I should alert the National Geographic about this set?

It's a sort of dull metallic gunmetal grey with silver metal.

Of course the secret (you'll be ASTOUNDED by this) is to wear the bag and the shoes separately. I know, I know - believe me, it's hard work being this ingenious. The bag is terribly cute, the base is a sort of squishy triangle shape, with more of those dear little rivets. Every time I look at them I get the urge to wear the bag and the shoes both at once and look like I'm on my way for a night of "raging" with various Vulcans and whatnot in the Holodeck. Did anyone other than Australians call nightclubbing/partying "raging" in the eighties? I might have to try and bring it back...

I need to get some Silvo or something onto the metal bits of both pairs of shoes and the bag, there's some heavy duty smearing going on, the origin of which I do not wish to speculate about further. If anyone has cleaning tips for this kind of stuff I'd love to hear them.

The "Made in China" tag is so ubiquitous at this point that I can get a tiny thrill when I see something marked "Made in Turkmenistan" or "Made in Australia" in an op-shop, even "Made in Taiwan" seems exotic now. I'm sure all kinds of awful crap are made in Italy or France, but it still impresses me, gauche little culturally cringing Aussie that I am. Those shoes had to come right around the whole world to get here, and then survive 20 or 30 years of raging to get to me!

Skye

PS. Do you match your shoes and bag? Is it verboten or is it coming back? Does it matter?

Hey you!

2009-09-12T00:27:00.000-07:00

Warning - thong thieves operating in the area!

Person who stole my old green Havaianas thongs (4 years old and it showed) from the beach today while I was running - you should be ashamed of yourself.

Everyone else have a lovely weekend!

Skye

PS. Reminder to all non-Australians - thongs are rubber things you wear on your feet, not underpants which go up your bum...

Preliminary Findings

2009-09-08T21:47:00.000-07:00

I bought this dress today and I'm not at all sure how I feel about it. True, I was charmed by the tiers, the shoulder tie and the kooky patterns (including those rather Seussian fried egg-looking things on my chest), but I was mostly guilted into buying it because the op-shop ladies had to get it off the mannequin for me to try on. They had to take her arms and her mangy old wig off, and all in all it was quite a production - involving much tutting, tsking and a small quantity of genteel old-lady type bad language. Under the circumstances I felt honour bound to buy it, but I feel that it requires further investigation before I can form a definitive opinion.

I think I was still in wedding mode and therefore vulnerable to a swishy frock, having been exposed to many of them over the weekend. What a fabulous weekend it was too! If I could work out how to post about a wedding without including any photos of human beings then I'd do it in a flash - although I suppose it would look like this...

By this stage we were all on the terrace, Pimms in hand.

...and be frustratingly lacking in such vital detail as the (beautiful) bride's dress, the bridesmaids frocks, and my outfit (I may have to do a reconstruction of the scene for that)! I can always be relied upon to have photos of this guy though:

The little dude carried off his ring delivering duties with aplomb, and then spent the rest of the night on the loose, roaming free, hitting the dance floor, and availing himself of the open bar service...

I'm assuming that's water.

...until finally conking out at the end of the night, and being taken home to bed by his fabulous father - leaving me to dance like a mad thing until 3am. An excellent result!

Edit to add: sorry about the lack of detail photos of the dress - I really just took the photo to see what it looked like (our full length mirror is positioned in such a way that I have to stand too close to it to get a good view) and then decided to post about it all of a sudden. We have house guests today but I will deliver more dress detail soon. Promise.

Skye

PS. It really was a wonderful party and I want to send a huge thank you to everyone who made it so damn good. I love youse all!

A suitable boy

2009-09-03T16:58:00.000-07:00

We are setting off this for my sister's wedding weekend by the sea, a lovely family party which I expect to be full of good food, music and laughter and love by the bucketful. The little dude is primed and ready to go for his ring-bearing duties (we have been training him in order to avoid any refusal-to-hand-over-rings toddler situations arising), and madly looking forward to wearing his special "Obama Suit". We're not sure exactly what makes it Obama-esque, but we think it's the tie. After this trying on session I had to wrestle the tie away from him while he very earnestly protested:

"But I need my tie, like Obama, I have a very important job to do."

Indeed, little dude, indeed!

Hope your weekend is full to the brim with good things too!

Skye

PS. This is a little poem that (along with The Owl & the Pussycat) was one of the readings at our wedding. It came from a framed 1920s print my mother found in a junk shop when I was but a wee one, and I think it is the loveliest wish to give anyone embarking on a grand adventure...

Black & Tan

2009-09-03T01:33:00.001-07:00

Another mini-post because I'm still dialing it in from the land of limited broadband, although a mini-post is perfectly apt for this mini-bag.

A little tiny truncated leather doctors bag - today's new addition to my ever growing tan bag collective. Two dollars from the animal welfare op-shop down the road, scene of an ongoing feud between the old lady volunteers who like to put price tags (actually bits of masking tape with prices written in shaky handwriting on them) on the merchandise, and the rebel old lady volunteers who like to free wheel it and price stuff on the spot. I'm not sure which faction I'm aligned with, since both sides are pretty arbitrary with their pricing, but it can get ugly in there. The other day I took a jacket to the counter, expecting to pay the $4 marked on the bit of masking tape stuck to one lapel, only to have the maverick Non-Pricer on duty go rogue, ripping the tape off and rasping "Eight dollars, and I should charge you fifteen." at me through pursed coral smeared lips.

She brooked no protest, so I left without the jacket, quite possibly lucky to escape with my life. I usually try to go in there when I have the little dude with me, since regardless of factional loyalties the volunteers are helpless in the face of his curly headed charm offensive, and consequently morph from gorgon to grandma in the blink of an eye. He gets biscuits from the jar behind the counter, and I get to shop without fear of factional violence breaking out around me!

More black and tan, here in the form of one of my mother's corgis!

Skye

Broadband Schmroadband

2009-09-02T03:36:00.000-07:00

New:

hair cut and colour (this is the first time I've coloured my hair since the little dude was just a gleam in my eye).

Old:

we've burned through out broadband for the month like a mob of reckless broadband burning beasts so no big fat posts until next week when we are free of dial-up dreadfulness once again. Small ones will still appear though!

Skye

Stuck in the Middle

2009-08-28T01:44:00.000-07:00

Black jersey singlet dress - $10 Cotton On

Jeffrey Campbell brogues - courtesy Solestruck

White silk shirt - $4 op-shop

I am so tired tonight I can barely keep my eyes open, partly because the little dude woke me up three times last night asking for a glass of water or a hug, but mostly because I'm coming down off an extreme fairy floss sugar rush. Yes, today was Show Day.

I needed the sugar just to survive the riot of sideshow alley, dodgy looking rides (which are genuinely scary because I know they were all just put up the day before by some guy with a mullet), circus, dagwood dogs (bleurgh), formation dance routines by local talent school students (the spirit fingered jazz ballet of my youth has given way to a sort of hip-hop pole dancing without the actual pole, even for the tiniest little girls), men in giant bouncing kangaroo suits (complete with huge furry testicles), camel rides, laughing clowns, kewpie dolls and all the rest of the weirdly alluring and utterly dubious attractions of the Show.

I actually wore it like this as the knotted version had some unfortunate mutton-ish qualities.

Maybe that's why I wore an outfit which is pretty much the dictionary definition of "plain" - no point in trying to compete with the glow sticks, neon afro wigs, and talent school teens wandering around in orange body makeup and fluoro green leotards.

Once upon a time (in my misspent youth) my friend and I wound up in a Mcdonalds at about 3am while we were tripping, and we got really freaked off by these people in there with strange faces and orange skin, which alarmingly seemed to be peeling off their bodies. Everything about them (eyes, mouths, hair) was too big and they seemed to be glittering and shimmering before our messed up little eyes. We fled the scene and took our poor old brains somewhere less hallucinatory - and then the next day discovered that the Australasian Ballroom Dancing Championships had been held the next street over. So it wasn't the acid at all, they actually were orange body painted glittering freaks. No tripping today (except of the not-watching-my-feet kind), but that orange makeup still does my head in.

I had the sweatiest toes in town today, but sensible shoes are the way to go in any place which combines a sea of humanity with various kinds of animal poo (goat, alpaca, cow, camel were all sighted and narrowly avoided). I always thought I was the only person in the world who wasn't buying the old "every woman must own a white shirt, it is the most versatile garment blah blah blah" thing promoted constantly in women's magazines since the late triassic era, but enough other bloggers have posted about it that I now realise I was just one of many sceptics. I do remain unconvinced by the whole white shirt thing though, for me it says just one thing:

"hospitality job."

Two of the most chilling words in the English language!

I must admit all day I was having flashbacks to my stellar career as the world's crummiest silver service waitress, and the all time lowlight thereof - the Night of the Zoloft Zombies. Which was not at all what you might be thinking, but something far more terrifying than I can ever convey in mere words. I will attempt it though!

The time: 1996

The place: the Imax Theatre, Sydney

The event: a presentation (with drinks and nibbles) for doctors about the newly introduced antidepressant Zoloft, catered by the company I worked for, supposedly the most prestigious caterers in the city at the time.

Sounds innocuous enough doesn't it - what could a bunch of mild-mannered suburban family doctors, standing around a cinema lobby decorated with giant cardboard daisies at 6pm on a Wednesday evening, possibly do that would be so awful?

I still don't really understand what went so horribly wrong, but somehow this particular group of people got so rotten drunk so incredibly fast that they lost their minds and started to literally behave like animals. When we carried the trays of food through the room they mobbed us and were grabbing fistfuls of food, dragging the platters out of our hands, smearing food on walls and floors, throwing glasses, pulling our hair and clothes, howling like maddened beasts.

At one stage I had a woman actually hanging off me as she attempted to grasp at food I was holding, I'm only 5'2 (and at the time was a mere scrap of a thing of about 45kg), and she was on me, hanging onto my back with her arms over my shoulders. I couldn't shake her off, and only the press of the crowd mobbing me stopped me from actually falling over. Finally one of the barmen leapt the bar and dragged her off me. It was a scene straight out of Hieronymous Bosch.

Somehow the publicists eventually managed to herd the beastly crowd into the theatre and the catering company supervisors gathered the remaining staff together amongst the debris to try and rally the troops for the final battle (ie chocolates and apperitifs after the presentation). Half the shift had already walked off the job, effectively resigning rather than continue - the rest of us were a sorry sight, liberally coated in mashed finger food, bits of blue swimmer crab spring roll and aioli in our hair, our designer label white shirts barely white at all anymore. A couple of people had been bloodied, one barman taken to Casualty for a suspected concussion.

The supervisors were a pair of cockney wide boys, tough, fast-talking, nothing-could-faze-them guys who'd seen the world and been around the block a time or two. Yet they stood there before us shell-shocked, stunned by what they'd seen, they begged us to stay for the rest of the shift but they told us if we left we wouldn't lose our jobs, they understood that no one should ever experience what we'd just been through, they'd never seen anything like it. They offered us free booze and extra pay to stay, but in the end the publicists pulled the plug and just got the doctors out of there once the presentation ended. Apparently there was a fair bit of vomit in the cinema, and no one wanted to take any chances with trying to hand out the free Zoloft branded chocolates in case a riot ensued. We got the free booze and extra pay anyway, danger money (oh, and I took home about a hundred bags of undistributed promotional chocolate as well).

I guess the experience did stand me in good stead for toddler wrangling, although the little dude at his most feral is still a million times more civilised than the Zoloft Zombies!

Flash!

Damn papparazzi!

There is some white be-shirted cuteness afoot too - my little sister's wedding next weekend, complete with little dude in the role of pageboy. It's all suitably top secret for now, but rest assured photos will be posted in due course!

I promise I will iron the shirt and wipe the vegemite off his face before the wedding, so he doesn't look like he's already gone a couple of rounds with a pack of marauding GPs in search of free food...

Skye

PS. Sorry about that whole Zoloft Zombies wall of text, catharsis can be very wordy!

PPS. Little dude's t-shirt from Love Police.

The Giant Quinkin

2009-08-25T05:55:00.000-07:00

Black lame (how do I get that accent in there?) top - $30 Country Road sale (ages ago)

Eighties print shorts - $1 op-shop

Mirrored resin bangle - $5 Diva sale

Black leather Sportsgirl heels - $10 op-shop

The main thing which springs to mind when I look at today's photos is my dire need of a haircut. At the moment it's six parts lank, four parts teen emo sweepover (as seen on the pimply youth who works in our local Kwik E Mart and is bizarrely flirtatious with me, including once actually winking at me while packing my groceries. I assume he does this with all the senior citizens), and all bad.

Just add lank and you too can have hair like a Gold Coast housewife.

Photos courtesy the fascinating world of emo hair blogs.

I wonder if emos will stay emo for the rest of their lives, like old goths, or the ancient withered bodgies and widgies I see wandering around the Gold Coast with their remaining nine hairs carefully brylcreamed into a duck tail. I know that my own eighties coming of age often leads me into uncertain sartorial territory, these shorts being a case in point.

The eighties in Australia was a strange and golden era in many ways - the confidence of the boom years found its expression here in an exuberant jingoism, a mad blossoming of national pride which gave us some great art and some even greater kitsch. Sometimes all at once. There were boxing kangaroos and boomerangs plastered on everything from earrings to underwear, and indigenous design (or more usually, indigenous inspired design) hit the mainstream really for the first time.

It's rare that something I pull off the one dollar rack plunges me into such a sea of fraught cultural politics - the area of appropriation and co-opting of design and art which is quite often spiritually significant to the makers tends to be pretty tricky territory. There are some legitimate indigenous design houses out there putting Aboriginal designs on corporate uniforms (like those for Qantas) and premium homewares, but there are even more dodgy manufacturers ripping off traditional art and whacking it onto tea towels and souvenir t-shirts. These shorts were made by "Toucan Funwear" so I'm guessing more from column B for them - but how do I play it if I just like the print?

I actually tend to steer clear of a lot of Aboriginal art and design because there's a lot of brown going on. That's all down to the traditional use of ochre and the fact that vast tracts of Australia are, well, brown. I'm not known for my great affection for brown, and I'm still not wholeheartedly embracing it, but there has been a slight upswing in my brown tolerance capacity in recent times. Which actually just means we finally bought ourselves a dining table and it's brown:

This is a big deal for us because we haven't had a dining table in many years. Back in Bondi when we had people over we either had to eat in the backyard or at the coffee table. Well, two of us would eat at the coffee table, one person would have to balance their plate on their lap, and one person would have to perch at the computer table - any more than four and the extras would have to sit in the hall or our bedroom to eat their dinner. Now we have a table which seats eight whole humans, this pleases me greatly!

That strange fuzzy artefact is what archeologists call a Toddler Bite. It pleases me not at all.

Three year olds who bite brand new tables might well be in need of a visit from the Quinkins, a scary bunch of spirits with a taste for juicy little kidlets. Well, the Imjim Quinkins (fat, big ears) are the scary guys, luckily the Timara Quinkins (long, very skinny, good at disguising themselves as trees) are around to foil their fiendish plans.

The little dude loves a scary story, and the Aboriginal stories collected by Percy Tresize and illustrated by Dick Roughsey are the best kind of scary - the kind where everything turns out ok in the end. I loved these when I was small, and I love reading them to my own small beastie now. Percy Tresize was an interesting guy - he was fascinated by Aboriginal rock art and catalogued many galleries, particularly in Quinkin country, and collected the stories which went with the paintings. Aboriginal artist Dick Roughsey collaborated on the stories and also illustrated the books in a way which incorporated the traditional figures seen in the rock art galleries, as well as showing us the land those galleries are found in.

Click to enlarge.

The big battle scene is the little dude's favourite, no surprises there.

I found The Quinkins in an op-shop, but I'm gradually tracking the others down from Ebay and our local library. The one I'm really hanging out to get my hands on is The Giant Quinkin - it's the scariest, the illustrations are the coolest and I know the little dude will get a massive kick out of it. I'm already under constant threat of bloodthirsty attack from the pirate/dinosaur/gorilla/imjim hybrid he morphs into for maximum terror effect, once he gets a look at the giant quinkin I think he'll be unstoppable (and my nonchalant slouching days will be over forever)...

Skye

PS. This little video is from a current exhibition of contemporary Aboriginal fibre art at Brisbane's GoMA which I have it on good authority is well worth checking out if you happen to be in Brisvegas. Toucan Funwear eat your heart out!

PPS. Just so you don't think I've gone all highbrow on you with the GoMA and the appropriation and whatnot, here's the greatest cultural product of the days of my long lost youth...

Banana Fritters

2009-08-21T16:21:00.000-07:00

I think I'd be making that face too if I had to wear that furry vest, although the little dude is in fact giving us his best Scary Grilla face. Never get between that guy and his bananas, consider yourself warned!

I call this look Chocolate Box Chimp.

These furry follies were prompted by the redoubtable Sister Wolf 's call for contributions to her handy guidelines for selecting fur vests, and I have one, and only one thing to say on the subject:

If you are under the age of 5 then wear your furry monkey vest with glee. If you are any age older than that magic number, then leave those hairy horror shows on the rack and flee.

Once again, consider yourself warned...

100% of surveyed mini-simians said bananas are their preferred breakfast selection.

Hope you're having a veritable cornucopia of a weekend, overflowing with fabulousness and base simian pleasures (like guzzling tropical fruit, scratching your tummy, and eating honey ants with a stick)!

Skye

PS. Thank you to everyone who voted in my price poll - the results are overwhelmingly in favour of prices persisting, so they shall. Good thing too, everything I've bought lately has cost me a dollar or fifty cents - not saying any of it is any good, but it's all cheap at least.

Nipped!

2009-08-20T01:37:00.000-07:00

Grey AA ribbed tank - fifty cents op-shop

Tigerlily fuschia silk skirt - $30 (clearance sale)

Purple eighties jersey cardigan - $4 op-shop

Clear plastic sandals - $2 op-shop

This post is essentially part two of the Op-shop Mission of the Damned series from the other day - a catalogue of failure and dubious purchases and a grab bag of randomness thrown in for good measure.

It's hotting up out there and I need some summer clothes - little dresses, loose tops, skirts, shorts and sandals - I do not need any more jackets. Yet somehow all I ended up with is more damn jackets (and those rather unsatisfactory plastic sandals). How does this happen?

The obvious explanation for my jackety lapse is that I was overcome by a terrible desperation to find something, anything, and therefore justify a morning spent trudging to nine different op-shops. The less obvious explanation is that my thwarted lust for summer colour found its only outlet in this big blocky wad of purple jersey. The even less obvious explanation is that the jackets are eating all the other garments. Perhaps this cardigan was once a cute 80s mini dress, until it felt the bite of a predatory parasitic jacket as it hung on the rack in the op-shop back room, and began its slow transformation...

In the next phase the jacket will develop larger shoulder pads, then the jersey will gradually harden into a stiffer fabric. When the double breasted buttons appear the process is almost complete.

I was told this theory by a wild eyed senior citizen - her perm standing on end, her twin-set torn asunder, she clutched at my hands and whispered to me of the things she'd seen in the back room, behind the ironing board and in the shadow of the tea urn. Tales of chiffon blouses turning into tweed blouson jackets overnight, of embroidered balinese sundresses sprouting brass buttons and pointy lapels, and the unnatural sight of a denim skirt twisting in unholy ways and breaking out in a putrescent acid wash rash as it became a snow wash denim jacket.

I don't know what this 100% cashmere jacket was before it was bitten, it might have been the only fifties frock which would ever suit me or a slinky silk slip dress, but somehow it ended up on the one dollar rack - and I am powerless in the face of the one dollar cashmere...

...even if it does look like something which escaped from the wardrobe of Hillary Clinton or Raisa Gorbachev. Hmm, the Eastern European connection - perhaps this is the jacket which started all the trouble, I'd better go and check my wardrobe right now before it's too late and all my skirts, shirts and dresses have succumbed to the Curse of the Jacket.

If anyone has any styling ideas which could possibly save this from corporate hell, I'd love to hear them. It's a beautifully made jacket and fits me perfectly, but I can not see any place for it in my wardrobe at all.

Apparently shoes are immune to the fiendish bite, because the op-shop racks are still crowded with worn out pairs of platform thongs, bowls shoes and kitten heeled mules, leaving me no option but to finally buy a pair of these glittery sling back sandals. I've been avoiding them for years but they got me in the end. I think you can get these from Target for about $8 so my $2 pair (brand new at least) was only a marginal bargain. I like the illusion of no shoes they give, but their soft rubbery plastic does have a clammy quality which is somewhat disquieting.

Also disquieting.

If anodised aluminium was the Official Metal of the Nineties, then I reckon that the Official Shoe of the Nineties has got to be the mule in all forms (particularly kitten heeled). After I posted about Wannabes last week I remembered another pair I owned, and on reflection I think they might be the most mid-nineties (and arguably least sexy) shoe to have ever existed:

Black nylon satin Wannabe loafer mule slides.

There was nothing that couldn't be made out of black Prada-handbag-style nylon back then, I had skirts, coats, bags, jackets, shoes, tops - everything except my underwear got the black nylon treatment. The underwear was made of bits of elastic and black jersey, of course. It was a grim old time, with all of us (well, me and everyone I knew) wandering around thin, miserable and smelling of ck one. Thank god Tom Ford came along and saved us all from the asexual nylon scourge, perhaps he knows how to sort out this jacket situation before it's too late!

Skye
PS. Yesterday I read The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, perhaps you can tell? If you like fast plotted trash then I highly recommend it, and I must say it was very refreshing to read something where vampires were repulsive, monstrous and EEEEEEEVIL rather than all sparkling and stalkerish and supposedly deeply attractive. Actually here's another question for you ladies - what's so appealing about vampires anyway? Having someone/something suck my blood out has always seemed, like, totally gross to me.

PPS. On the subject of out of control plagues, the Sydney Morning Herald had a really cutting edge fashion forward story today about the coming season harem pants. Seriously, haven't they pretty much been and gone out of fashion again now?

Bare Faced Cheek

2009-08-19T03:25:00.000-07:00

No make-up, wet hair, wearing a towel and looking every bit the freckly, sun-damaged, low maintenance, sleep-deprived 37 year old I am. And I am not even slightly ashamed!

I often feel like a bit of a bullshit artist when I'm taking my photos, with my fringe strategically covering the lines on my forehead, and my panda eyeliner on, and my layered scarves and all the rest - so I thought I'd come clean and share this picture with you (and the rest of the internet). This is what 37 looks like (well, in my house, anyway)!

Skye

PS. proper post tomorrow.

My Good Fortune

2009-08-17T02:44:00.000-07:00

Red silk pants - $1 op-shop

Souvenir t-shirt - $1 op-shop

Grey patent Mollini maryjanes - $20 (new) op-shop

The default shoes to go with the default pants

These red pants are my default op-shopping uniform - I seem to wear them every time I'm in the mood for a rummage. No idea why, but I often op-shop when I need a pick-me-up, so maybe I choose my happy pants when I'm feeling flat, a kind of personal feng-shui?

Exotic view of our blender reflected in the mirror!

I haven't bought anything for myself for an age, just little dude stuff, but I went out today (29 degrees) with strict intent to find summer clothes for me, me, me. Of course since I went op-shopping with something specific in mind, I failed miserably and the red pants brought me only the tiniest smidge of good fortune. The first commandment of op-shopping (and parenting for that matter) is "Thou shalt keep an open mind and have ZERO expectations."

Please note strategically placed mini-hand.

The little dude has a fine array of souvenir t-shirts, I only have this one but I do feel like a bit of a fraud walking around in a shirt from somewhere I've never been - this shirt commemorating a trip to Southport Lifeline rather than the gorges of China. Then again, I've never been to the 1960s either, but it didn't stop me buying this souvenir silk scarf ($3) from that bygone era - a time when airline souvenirs were obviously a cut above the tube socks and eye masks my husband brings home from his LA jaunts these days.

Waratah & bottlebrush.

Sturt's Desert Pea

Even in watercolour silk scarf form Australian wildflowers are spiky and bold, with their vivid reds, purples and yellows. A far cry from soft pink full blown peonies, but lovely in their own prehistoric martian sort of way. I think this scarf is probably destined to be a cushion cover, because I don't wear a lot of red, but I always have little touches of really intense reds around the house. Some of my favourite things are cushions and table runners in this distinctive chinese peony print:

If you know where the peonies grow, please let me know.

I already have three or four cushion covers in this print (seen most recently here) and when we got our new dining table a couple of weeks ago my husband commented that we needed a few more to put on the bench seats. I sadly informed him that I'd looked everywhere (including online) and had failed to find even a hint, not even the fabric itself. He just looked at me and said "Ah well, it will turn up." with supreme confidence. I'm not sure what message he sent out to the universe, but what do you know, these three cushion covers showed up in an op-shop for fifty cents each. Another one of those spooky op-shop moments!

Where there is red there must be gold, in this instance these leather eighties flatties - continuing my slightly nana-ish slip-on loafer theme ($3). I really need some sandals now (that sounds slightly insane, but really summer is here), but I think I can still eke some wear out of these shiny little critters before the heat gets to full surface-of-the-sun levels!

We can never have too many Dr Doo (tm little dude) books, especially for fifty cents.

I think those two pages sum up exactly what I love about my op-shop treasure hunting missions - I never know what oddities I'll turn up, and how those odd and bods will fit into the nooks and crannies of my house and life. The little dude loves to come on my rummaging travels too ("Can we go to the toy shop mummy?!", one day I suppose he'll find out that there are actual toy shops where the toys aren't mostly missing wheels or heads and come in nice shiny boxes), I wonder if he'll grow up with the op-shopping urge and be one of those blokes you see at garage sales carefully examining old sprinkler systems and vinyl records and half built airfix model planes? Is op-shopping genetic, are you first generation (like me) or do you come from a long line of scavengers and treasure hunters?

Skye

PS. How cool is Clark?!

Wheeeeeee!

2009-08-14T02:58:00.000-07:00

We're zooming off for the weekend away full of parties aplenty so I'll see you back here on Monday. Have a splendiferous weekend and don't do anything I wouldn't do etc etc!

Skye

PS. Yes, that is a crocheted space alien in a toy racing car. One of the joys of having a little dude in the house is finding little installations like that one around the place (and having an excuse to have a whole crocheted space ship full of amigurumi space aliens as well).

Hugwash Returns

2009-08-13T01:55:00.000-07:00

Big black bag - $60 General Pants
Tan/black leather brogues - $5 garage sale
Ksubi/Tsubi Skelerope leggings - $60 Vogue Forum
Pirate hat courtesy little dude's toybox/op-shop

Most days around here have a fairly piratical vibe - there's an awful lot of leaping about with cutlasses, forced plank walking, and very vigorous "Arrrrrrrring" - the pirate lifestyle (and accessory range) being mysteriously attractive to small children (and hormone-addled teenage girls, but more on that later). Today was super extra piratey though, because it was the much anticipated Happy Pirate show day at the little dude's kindy, and it was of course vitally important that we were both flying our sartorial jolly roger proudly and loudly.

The most terrible pirate afloat, captain of a crew of dreadful desperadoes!

The little dude did it in fine style, being the proud (and possessive owner) of a dress-up box well stocked from the fancy dress bins of op-shops from one end of the Gold Coast to the other. I had to get a little bit more lateral with my pirate look, my own dress-up box being a bit lacking in the eye-patch and telescope department, and my more piratesque items long ago co-opted by Captain Hugwash up there (Moroccan belt being a case in point).

Knobbly!

The Ksubi (it'll always be Tsubi to me) leggings combine ropes and skeletons and that seems a perfectly buccaneering combination to me. Some might argue that they say Oldest Emo in Town rather than Cut Throat Jake, but phooey to that. Here they are providing a thoroughly classy frame for the pirate show, and the little dude (who's up on his feet due to a burning need to do his pirate dance):

Spiderman made it to the show too.

The leggings, and the big black bag are two of the handful of things I bought at the start of winter, and (this will shock you), I haven't bought anything since, not even from op-shops. Not on purpose - I wasn't conducting any experiments in expenditure or attempting to rein in my consumption for any high-minded ideological reasons - just a combination of no money and no need for anything new, and a big helping of fashion ennui.

The thing is this, all the stuff that have been my wardrobe staples for the last five years (oversized, layered, sequinned, 80s-ish, batwinged, big heels, hammer pants, tomboyish and girly all at the same time) can now be found in every store. Nothing wrong with that at all, but I've found myself a bit overwhelmed by the fact that just by spending half an hour in Sportsgirl or General Pants and dropping some cash I could not only totally replicate my entire wardrobe, but do it much better.

Yep, nice shiny new brogues are in every shoe shop too, but I still like my old ones.

Not having any cash I've been skulking around in my old cobbled together version of a look which is now flooding every store in the vicinity, and feeling oddly bored by the whole enterprise. My sewing machine suddenly gave up the ghost completely (not even a small ancient gnarled retiree with a million years of sewing machine repairing wisdom could save it) which hasn't helped, but I am not exaggerating when I say that the only thing that's remotely inspired me fashion-wise in an age is the glowing fluorescent body paint in Kanye's Love Lockdown clip. I'm in fashion lockdown and I need to get out!

I've rarely been as inspired by a music video since I was whipping up Whitney Houston-inspired lycra frocks as a 15 year old (Dee-Lite's Groove is in the Heart, Bjork's Venus as a Boy and...there must be more) and apart from the relentless marketing campaign for the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise I don't think I've been as pirate-aware since then either.

Ick!

Now it's all toddler incited pirate-mania and Captain Pugwash books, but back then it was my out of control lust-crazed addiction to big fat historical romance novels and the swashbuckling "manhood" wielding heroes contained therein (yes, including many books with Fabio on the cover). My best friend (and partner in boy-crazy hormonal insanity) preferred knights in armour, and I liked those too, as well as vikings, and assorted warrior types from all historical eras, but my heart always belonged to the pirate captains with their bronzed chests and roguish ways. I'm always admitting this teenage transgression to other women, but am yet to find anyone willing to admit that they too spent way too much time on feverish daydreams concerning sword wielding renegade adventurers and "mounds of pleasure". So come on people, confess!

Skye

PS. I shouldn't knock the shiny new brogues, after all I do have a lovely pair of my very own thanks to the good people at Solestruck. They sent me these two-tone beauties ages ago and I've been such an appalling slacker that I haven't posted about them until now. I did send them a very nice thank-you note, so I'm not completely without manners, but really I have been unforgivably lax. They are lovely shoes and it is such a rarity for me to get a brand new pair in their box that it was a genuine thrill to get the parcel. Thank you so much!

Should I Stay or Should I Go - Crazy Paisley Edition

2009-08-12T02:20:00.001-07:00

Paisley robe/dress thing - $1 op-shop

Black tank - $20 General Pants

Sequin leggings - $20 Sportsgirl sale rack

Ah sequinned leggings, the housewives friend! Much like cheap booze they make any mundane occasion the tiniest bit sparklier. That's the thing about this electric paisley seventies renegade robe thingy - it said "Almost Famous" groupie girl to me when I took it off the one dollar rack, but in actuality something about it makes me feel like I should be stumbling through my days in a Valium-fuelled haze, taking nips out of bottles of gin hidden in my shoe cupboard or guzzling the cooking sherry on the sly, and leaving coral lipsticked butts in ashtrays strategically located all over the house. Particularly when I wear it in its shirt dress incarnation:

Is there not something ineffably sleazy about this photo - the half-closed eyes and too many buttons undone - as though it's gin o'clock, you're the pool boy or the mowing guy, and I'm just about to be a little bit inappropriate? You could blame the flash photography, but I reckon it's all down to the dress - the static electricity generated by all that slithery polyester has fried my brain as effectively as any prescription painkiller addiction ever could.

Things get a bit better without the flash, but I still think it might be the kind of thing best left to Eva Longoria Parker or one of those other neatly proportioned olive skinned women who actually do wear coral lippy (and unironically at that) and can be accurately described as "pert".

I shot that mock croc myself, dontcha know.

It seems case closed, doesn't it? Go, go, go. Yet there's something about that pattern that I really do love, and some days I just want to throw a big can of fluoroescent pink paint all over the lovely neutrality of our new house and my current wintry wardrobe. Those are the days that electric paisley seems like a good idea, even though I'm clear eyed and clear of conscience!

Don't you feel the paint throwing urge coming over you, looking at all that pristine blankness? That's my new photo spot, by the way.

Right, let's do the accounting on this so we can all go back to swigging illicit booze in the privacy of our broom cupboards, shall we?

Stay:

- that pattern makes me happy, it's just so intense.

- the poly is the lingerie-ish slithery kind rather than the scarier variety.

- shouldn't it always be gin o'clock somewhere in your wardrobe?

- the robe incarnation is actually pretty wearable without scaring the mowing guy too much.

Go:

- Maybe it's too intense and actually scary to dogs, small children (and gardening staff).

- Soon it will be too humid to even say the word polyester, let alone wear it.

- long robe things worn open like that are dangerously reminiscent of Kirstie Alley's wardrobe in Veronica's Closet.

- Almost Famous groupie girl is one thing, but Desperate Housewife is quite another, and after all I'm really quite nice and sweet and well behaved.

See, modestly covering cleavage!

Ok, you know what I need to hear - does it stay or does it go?! Do I send it off to the great Paisley Park in the sky, or does it get to keep its place in my new walk-in wardrobe (which makes a tiny change from the 90cm rack I used to share with my husband back in Bondi, for anyone who remembers back that far). Warning: gratuitous wardrobe shots ahead.

Skye

A tiny wee favour?

2009-08-11T21:18:00.000-07:00

I need to ask a tiny wee favour (feel free to ignore it, at your own discretion). During my shonky template renovation job on the weekend I accidentally deleted my analytics tracking code. I only realised today when I went to have a look and saw that my traffic for the last month was down 99.98% because my tracking was disabled and my new visitor total was 2, for the whole history of my blog . Eek!

So if you're popping by in the next 24 hours can you leave me a tiny wee comment (here or anywhere), it only needs to say hello if you like - but I'm sitting here all alone with no idea if I have anyone readers left. All my own fault of course, so I don't expect any sympathy!

Skye

PS. Still on track with my post a day for seven days challenge, there'll be a "Should I Stay or Should I Go" later tonight...

PPS. Thank you all so much - by tomorrow my new tracking code should be activated, sad to lose all my old numbers though!

Grey Lady

2009-08-10T19:46:00.000-07:00

Grey pashmina - $5 garage sale

Grey marle ribbed leggings - $2 op-shop

Grey marle oversized tank - $20 General Pants

Cream silk jacket - $10 op-shop

Mogil grey ankle boots - $8 op-shop

Remember these? I still love them.

"I saw a lady today in head to toe grey in the same shade. Scarf, singlet, leggings, cardigan, shoes, even her hair was grey. The weathers depressing enough without being decked out in all grey :|"

That post on the Vogue Forum stopped me in my tracks a few weeks back when I realised that, except for the grey hair, that anonymous Grey Lady could have been me, needlessly depressing sensitive young fashionistas all over the place and leaving them wilting in my path. Oops!

I've been snuggling up in a sort of portable cocoon of grey things all through our funny truncated sunshiney winter - I even have a grey cardigan I've been throwing over the top of it all (maybe it was me she saw, and the grey hair was just a trick of the light) - because I find it strangely comforting and somehow reassuring. Perhaps though, while I've felt like a happy little caterpillar curled up in my monochrome nest, I've actually been looking something like this to the general populace:

I'm assuming a remake of this is imminent. Lamest aliens ever!

Winter here is warm and golden, a bit like the nicest early autumn or late spring day you can imagine, so there's no need for coats. I've been wearing my array of robe-like things, and sloppy oversized things, and jackety things of all descriptions, but except for this silk jacket I have given up on the structured blazer front. We just aren't meant to be together and I'm not going to fight it any more!

This jacket just sneaks in under the wire because it's mostly unstructured enough that it doesn't fight against my body shape, but still has a pleasing squareness to the shoulders for a tiny bit of edge. I do love my batwings and egg shaped bits and pieces and carrying my cocoon on my back, but to avoid the Anterean Effect I think a few sharp angles are called for!

Sharp angles are something we are thoroughly well supplied with in our new house (it doesn't have a name yet, will take suggestions) which is essentially a very shiny white box. This makes a refreshing change from the Love Shack which towards the end felt like it might collapse at any moment and was full of marauding wildlife and alarming fungal growths. We're not scheduled to be here for a long time (probably around 6 months) so it's nice to just enjoy a place which is clean, full of light and space, and with a pleasing lack of history. When you are just passing through, a neutral space can be just the right thing.

Afternoon & morning in the upstairs bit of the house - we do have a dining table now though.

(note little dude and other lurking presence)

In some ways this place is the house version of my grey outfit - neutral, comfortable, perfect for cuddling up on a golden winter afternoon and feeling snug as a bug in a rug. Unlike the shack where you would quite probably find a bug on your rug, or more precisely an army of giant ants falling into your lap from their vast nest in the ceiling...

Skye

PS. We do feel like total frauds living somewhere so modern and fancy pants (so many walk in wardrobes and shoe cupboards and automated things!), and moving day was one hundred percent pure Clampett with all our motley old stuff tied to the back of a ute and stuffed into the back of our twenty year old battered station wagon. The real estate agency forgot to give us the code for the alarm system too, so we opened the front door for the first time and all hell broke loose, and all the neighbours were out in the street in their dressing gowns thinking that some kind of criminal invasion was in progress. How right they were...

PPS. Here's the little dude getting in on the grey marle action!

Making Space

2009-08-10T04:40:00.000-07:00

Black 80s embellised jumper - $4 op-shop
Black pleated trousers - $10 Cotton on sale rack
Black leather/patent loafers - $60 Pulp

This is a post which I've had sitting on the shelf for a while (you might notice that it still features the Shack in the background) which is only seeing the light of day today now that the global MICHAEL-JACKSON-IS-OMG-DEAD mania has died down almost completely.

You see, there I was sitting at my computer composing the original version of this post when I clicked over to a news site and read the OMG-MICHAEL-JACKSON-IS-MAYBE-DEAD news, and (after saying to my husband "Hey Michael Jackson is dead, prepare for a media storm") made an executive decision that I wouldn't post after all. Not because I was overwhelmed with grief (that guy died many a year ago in any genuine human way), but because I really didn't want anyone to think I was posting some kind of lame-arse MJ tribute with my embellished shoulders, trousery trousers and...little slip-on patentish loafers. Here's some dodgy photoshop to show you what I mean:

Ready to moon walk!

No way I was posting that when the global media, was in the grip of an almighty feeding frenzy, and every blogger and her dog (I'm sure I saw at least one shih tzu in a single spangled glove) were making actual heartfelt tributes to poor old messed up Mike. Funnily enough, though, the outfit was supposed to be a tribute of sorts - an attempt to cobble together a version of this outfit of mine from the olden days (circa 1995 or 96), using bits and pieces from my current wardrobe.

Boy-tailored Zimmermann trousers + Black lambswool cap sleeve t-shirt + Cutler & Gross chunky 60s styled sunglasses + pea jacket + Wannabe loafers = quintessential mid-90s.

The whole thing started when the extremely lovely Chantelle tagged me to share my favourite photo of myself, and on that particular day, for whatever reason, this was my pick. I don't even remember why I chose it now, probably just because I look so bright eyed and bushy tailed - and because I'm doing a very Skye thing and having a little garage sale of my old clothes. I just had a market stall the other day and sold the Michael Jackson embellished jumper among many other things.

Bye bye!

I actually remember all the clothes in the photo, I really should be using that brain space for more useful information - if only I used my powers for good, instead of pointless! Does anyone else have detailed memories of their wardrobes from decades ago, or is that only me?

clockwise from left:

1. Black leather 70s jacket from an op-shop somewhere. Remember when everyone wore these? We used to call them Pacino jackets, check out Serpico (or the Max Fischer Players version) and you'll see why.

2. Pink early 60s suit which cost me a dollar, and I tailored the skirt (by hand!) so that it was a super tight pencil. I used to wear this to work, no doubt looking like a scruffy little nutter, but imagining myself a femme fatale (in the Mad Men mode).

3. Burgundy cable knit Country Road jumper, which was my mother's and totally unfashionable (it was a remnant of their Man from Snowy River inspired collection of 1982) but I kept it for years because it was so warm. I used to wear it to bed in winter!

4. Checked little boy's donkey jacket - a leftover from the grunge era (goes without saying). I sold this to a girl who thought it would be good to wear to the rugby - do you think by typing that out here I can free up the bit of memory space currently taken up by that profound conversation?

5. Hideous brown leather 70s overcoat styled along classic Waffen SS lines, which I never wore but only bought because it was a dollar in an op-shop and those were popular back then. I sold it for $20 and was very pleased with my profit.

6. I can even identify all the individual items on the table, but I'll just mention the horrible multi-coloured striped Stussy trousers, because they were one of my greatest buyer's remorse moments of all time. They weren't unflattering, but they were just so not me, not even a little bit, and they were nineties in the worst possible Jamiroquai kind of way. Blech.

These weren't mine, this is just a photo I snagged from a random ebay listing ages ago.

Nineties in a way which I thoroughly approved of though, were my Patrick Cox Wannabe loafers. I loved those chunky little guys so much, wore them everywhere and anywhere and with anything for years. I loved these ones so much I had two identical pairs (unlike our own Likkle Girl who had about a billion pairs it seems) plus an original low heeled pair of mock croc man-styled ones which made me feel like Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction (before the whole needle in the chest bit). Doesn't get much more nineties than that. Or this:

I borrowed Posh's book from the library a while ago, and although the style tips (heavy on the pencil skirts and Hermes) weren't much use to me, I did enjoy the little insights into the mind of Madame Beckham. My favourite tidbit was the story of how she and her sister were so desperate for a pair of Wannabes that they lined up for hours (must have been at the peak of Wannabe fever as detailed in this article from 1995) and then, due to brokeness, bought one pair which they shared.

That story made me feel like Victoria and I have something in common, along with the facts that:

a. we are ostensibly of the same species (this is open to debate however)

and

b. we both have a son whose name starts with "R".

You see, we're practically twins!

Now I'm going to moonwalk myself upstairs for dinner, so goodnight until tomorrow!

Skye

PS. My actual celebrity doppelganger (this might be one just for the Australians):

PPS. I briefly contemplated the idea that Wannabes might be ripe for a comeback (as loafers have started appearing here and there around the place, including those funny little pointy ones of mine) but I found a pair in an op-shop the other day and I wasn't feeling the love. Wannabe might be the greatest diffusion label name ever, but I don't want to walk around with it spelled out in chunky anodised aluminium lettering across my instep!

PPPS. Is anodised aluminium the Official Metal of the Nineties?

Leo the Lion

2009-08-08T18:55:00.000-07:00

Palma cape dress - $110 (on sale) from i hate my skirt
Mollini grey patent leather concealed platform Chloe knock-offs -$20 op-shop

The wearing of a party frock generally indicates a party somewhere in the vicinity, so this one probably feels a wee bit cheated by all the mundane events and locations it is usually worn to (kindy drop-off, supermarket, dentist). It does make it out of the domestic doldrums occasionally, getting a chance to twitch its skirt and flip its frilly cape and give us a glimpse of its flirtatious potential - but even the parties have a tendency to contain far more toddler wrangling than a little black dress is given to expect.

Please note new photo location, more on that later in the week.

I don't know much about Palma, the label this dress is by, other than the scarce/nonexistant detail on their website and the fact that (like a host of australian designers) they do their manufacturing in Bali. I'd like to know more though, as the two items I've seen from them (this dress and a cape thing in the same chiffon) are really lovely. If anyone knows anything about them, let me know!

I do feel a tiny bit guilty not keeping the frock in the style to which it is accustomed, but it seems to me that a third birthday party is a social occasion entirely worthy of even the fussiest of cocktail dresses.

"Wait a minute, did you just say third birthday party?"

Why yes, yes I did! While I was away neglecting my blog the little dude did in fact turn THREE. Three seems like a proper boy age to me, the last bits of babyhood starting to fall away as my little fellow rockets up through the stratosphere into the golden light of boyhood.

The cot was retired (it's been in bed form for ages now, but was still recognisably a cot) to make way for a racing car bed (thank you to Granny in Scotland, online shopping fiend), many presents were unwrapped:

The aftermath

...and we had a very frock-worthy party to celebrate. Here in Australia we have a curious custom known as Christmas in July (or Yulefest to those seeking to avoid offending the more religiously inclined), which is all about eating huge mounds of rich, heavy traditional English/northern hemisphere Christmas food while the weather is cool enough to make that prospect seem appetising rather than oppressive. The little dude was born on the twenty fifth of July, and I've always called him my little Christmas in July present (I also call him The Ferret and about a bazillion other things, but bear with me, this is going somewhere), so we decided to put on a Christmas lunch for his birthday. There's some kind of deranged logic to that, isn't there, maybe?

I made a tower of treats - from top to bottom:

White Christmas with pistachios and cranberries

Mini ginger cupcakes with lemon icing

Chilli & Parmesan biscuits

Snack mix and nuts (from the supermarket) in little paper Christmas cups

...and my husband (deadset legend/madman) cooked up a roast lunch for 11 people in two hours in someone else's kitchen. I am not sure how he achieved this mighty feat, but I'm very glad he did because it was one of the best Christmas lunches I've ever eaten, despite not actually being anywhere near Christmas day. Actually the non-christmas-dayness of it was probably the key, as I think attempting this kind of thing on a typically 35 degree furnace-like Christmas would have left the poor man tragically drowned in a pool of his own sweat, and the little dude and I left destitute and alone and reduced to eating tacos for every meal (such is my limited culinary range).

If you are carnivorous (or omnivorous for that matter) and currently hungry then I do apologise for posting that picture without prior warning. It's stirring desperate cravings in me, and I was there on the day (and in fact devoured this very plateful of food).

Menu:

Rolled loin of pork with crackling and jus reduction and white shiraz & sage apple sauce

Broccolini and green beans wrapped in prosciutto

Roast shallots, garlic, carrot and pumpkin

Potatoes dauphinoise

That bizarre picture up there is the 3D pre-visualisation drawing of lunch (!) that the crazy maniac I married made, using the software he usually uses to make animatics and storyboards. I shouldn't mock it, as the magnificent end product would seem to indicate the pre-viz was worth it, but it's just so damn ridiculous and cute (although not remotely appetising). The only thing that would have been better would have been if he'd animated the individual items (I particularly like the "broccolini") so that they danced around the plate and maybe sang a little song.

As a special bonus for anyone who's still reading this blog after all my slacker behaviour of late, this is a photo of the crazy maniac himself - my hitherto unseen husband, in full kitchen ninja mode, the eye in the storm of Christmas lunch preparation.

Happy birthday, merry Christmas and lots and lots of love!

Skye

PS. When I started this blog I decided to always list the prices of my clothes and shoes, to highlight the fact that you don't have to spend up big to have an interesting wardrobe (since 75% of the things I wear cost me well under ten bucks). Lately I have been wondering if that is a bit hubristic (who am I to say my wardrobe is full on interesting bargains, rather than just cheap junk?), and the occasional person has pointed out that any discussion of money spent is just not the done thing. So I'm going to run a little poll to see what people think - prices or not?

Hopping Mouse

2009-08-07T16:01:00.000-07:00

Scene One:
Day: small CREATURE crawls out from under rock, blinking into the sunlight. Looks around, scanning for predators and snacks, considers scurrying back to safety of burrow, decides to stay anyway. Extends tiny paw and waves hello.

Yes, that small scuttling beastie would be me, and I have been hiding under a rock, but I am making some efforts (with much sun blinking and cautious sniffing of the breeze) to come out to play in blogland once more. My plan is to start small, with some little posts every day this week, and hopefully just keep rolling on from there.

xx
Skye

Be Back Soon

2009-06-24T23:58:00.000-07:00

Sorry, the lights have been out and the shutters down with no explanation - a combination of blogger ennui, a household full of winter sickness (I've lost my voice, and there is a river of snot flowing through the place), and the fact that we are packing up and moving house again, is to blame for the eerie silence. Be back soon, I'd estimate a bit under a week before the boxes are unpacked and the broadband is back on...

lots of love
Skye
PS. The little dude saying bye bye to the Love Shack in a rare (and shortlived) moment of toddler contemplation:

One Stop Beyond

2009-05-30T00:03:00.000-07:00

Black tank - $20 General Pants
Black leggings - $10 Valley Girl
Blue rose print jersey 80s bomber jacket - $3.50 op-shop
Brown 90s Italian granny boots - $6 op-shop

So I'm not pregnant, not yet anyway. However, I am still working away on that little project (I was going to say "beavering away" but that seemed very wrong in a Beavis & Butthead kind of way), which has had a rather strange side effect - not on my body, but on my wardrobe. The weather here has just started to give a tiny hint of slight wintriness to come (and I mean slight - I'm sitting here in a tank top at 8pm with nary a goosebump to be seen) and I was faced with the dilemma of needing to buy winter clothes but not wanting to invest in stuff which might only get five minutes of wear if I do actually get pregnant. With the little dude I morphed from human lady to spherical whale creature in very short order - within two months people were asking me when I was due and giving me their seats on buses.

Ok, so I was more than 2 months pregnant here, but not that much more. Alarming!

I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but spherical whale creatures don't wear things with structure, they wear black slouchy things made from soft and forgiving fabrics. So I have been trying to collect stuff which might kind of sort of work for a non-pregnant person (me now) or an SWC (me maybe some time this winter) and today's outfit is a classic example.

I think this blue bomber jacket might be The One I have been seeking for a while, certainly I have worn it every morning (for the cold couple of hours before the sun resumes business as usual) since I bought it. It does an ok job of covering up the SWC uniform of loose tank and leggings which I wore for an op-shopping ninja mission to the Lifeline Winter Clothing Sale this morning. Picture a small warehouse full of tables covered in mounds of clothes (all of which are $2 each), and many frenzied women rummaging and grabbing and kung-fu fighting each other for stuff, and you've pretty much got the picture. I rustled up a pile of little things for the little dude, and a large heap of stuff for myself which I then whittled down to a handful of things I'll actually wear. In a land without change rooms the SWC ninja suit was a most perfectly appropriate costume because I could just chuck on whatever I needed to try over the top of my clothes.

I managed to get out of the sale with my dignity mostly intact - there was one gnarly moment when I grabbed a jacket sleeve and actually engaged in a momentary tug-of-war with a white haired lady over a brass buttoned navy blue wool blazer which was not only size 16, but something I would never, ever wear unless by some freaky twist of fate I actually ended up as a retired admiral. At that point I made a tactical retreat, before I could get into some kind of Incredible Hulk-style roid rage and give the next aggressive granny in my path a roundhouse kick to the head with my granny boots. Which would probably have sparked an all-in brawl (tensions were running high in that room) and ended in mass carnage and blood on the floor. Much better to sit outside in the sunshine and review the fruits of my scavenging:

Meet the two dollar leather biker jacket. Battered, needs about a gallon of leather conditioner, a bit long in the arms, but two bucks! Two bucks! I'll say it again, two bucks! No weird pleated bits, odd extraneous flaps, or bulbous shoulder pads, just a classic cut black leather biker jacket.

Khaki is a colour I don't really wear on my top half (or on my bottom half since the Age of Cargo Pants has more or less ended), but sometimes a khaki shirt or jacket or whatever the hell this thing is, comes along and makes me think I need to hit the khaki more often. My eyes are hazel, half green and half brown, and at best they're a kind of swampy shade of...khaki, a bit like this washed silk shirt/jacket:

Click on this photo of me and my lunch and you can see my khaki eyes - if you can see past the antennae of my tiger prawn friend there. We stopped off at the trawlers on the way home from the Lifeline sale (and an adventure playground stop for the little dude) and in a fit of gluttony acquired some spanner crabs and a kilo of mega-prawns for lunch. Very good!

I think this might just be the greatest photo of me ever taken.

Poor spanner crabs didn't stand a chance, reduced to a bowl of shell shrapnel in minutes!

I'm not quite sure what I should do with this oversized 80s jacket. It's made out of that weird fabric that used to exist in the eighties which sort of looked a bit leathery or a bit vinyl-y but was really just a kind of heavy jersey polyester stuff. I thought I might crop it and make it into a jacket a bit like this one from Shakuhachi's A/W08 collection, but then again voluminous all-encompassing garments can be a friend to an SWC in need. What do you reckon?

Unlike my new biker jacket buddy, these leather pants are in no need of leather conditioner - they're ridiculously soft. They are in need of a bit of a clean, so I might save them and their excellent geometric flourishes for a day cold enough to actually wear them.

I only picked up this ikat bag so I had something to cart my finds around in while I browsed/skirmished, but by the time I reached the checkout I'd taken a shine to it and it's tiger-ish neutral tones so handed over an extra two dollars for it. Here it is still stuffed full of little dude stuff from the sale:

A very small stowaway might also be lurking in the bag up there - I know I'm probably jinxing myself buying anything for a little baby but could not resist this tiny wee elephant jumper.

After all, we are the crazy pachyderm people and need to indoctrinate our offspring as early as possible...

xx
Skye
PS. Guest photographer today is my magnificent husband, who toddler-wrangled while I shopped this morning, and indulged my spur of the moment crustacean cravings, and took all these photos one stop beyond so that you can actually see something for a change. Bonus: he makes me laugh (and made chicken and leek pies for dinner too)!