Another Etsy item of mine (this time the large floral journal cover) made the front page of CraftGawker today! Not sure how long it will stay there, so I took this screen shot for posterity:
Large floral journal cover
[Links last checked November 2009]
We drove to Perth on Friday for my appointment with the oral surgeon and the anaesthestist at St John of God Medical Centre, Murdoch, Day Procedure Unit. What I remember of the afternoon:
So far, it’s all good!
I just added some new journal covers to my Etsy store. I made these last weekend from fabric I bought when we were in NSW at the end of October.
I really like the lizard one and the large flower one — they took HOURS to quilt, but it was really satisfying and very meditative doing it, even though my shoulders hurt like crazy afterwards (which means I must’ve been very tense and not breathing as I did the free motion quilting!). Memo to self: Breathe!
Here’s a scary thought – Christmas is just over a month away!
If you’re tired of the Christmas crowds at the malls, seeing the same old (tacky) stuff in the shops, or would like to buy locally made goods and help out your economy, then consider doing your gift shopping online at http://www.etsy.com. Etsy is where artists and craftspeople from around the world sell their handmade goods — everything from art works and photographic prints, to jewellery and clothing accessories, to scented soaps, handmade cards, quilts and so much more in between. Almost everything is unique and not mass produced.
If you have something in mind for a special person, you can search Etsy for what you want, but if you’re stumped for ideas, go to http://www.etsy.com/buy.php and browse the categories that look interesting.
If there’s something you want to buy from any Etsy store, I’d suggest that you place your orders by the end of November to guarantee delivery by Christmas.
Shameless plug: I have an Etsy store where I sell my handmade fabric items (http://RhondaMadeIt.etsy.com). Prices for my items range from $3 to $80, with all bookmarks at $5 each and all luggage tags at $10 each (plus shipping) — great for stocking stuffers!
I drove up to the city on Monday for my consultation with the oral surgeon (see my Expensive date post for why I needed to visit the oral surgeon in the first place). Yes, the tooth has to come out.
The good:
The not so good:
This is only the second stage of the process (the first was the temporary filling done on the day I bit into that date). In some months (after the gum has healed) I need to decide if I want an implant or a bridge. If it’s an implant, that means more surgery; a bridge would be done by my dentist. Whatever I decide means more trips to Perth and a lot more cost.
They say that as you age, your health starts to go. In our case, it’s our teeth! No-one mentions that. BTW, my husband has to return to Perth next Tuesday for his new crown — another trip for him plus an overnight stay.
Maybe the tooth fairy will help with the costs!
How many opportunities do you give a new business to ‘prove’ themselves? I’m about to give a new business in town one more chance.
After receiving their flyer in the letterbox, I called them last week. We made a time for them to come around ‘on Tuesday afternoon’ to assess our garden/landscaping situation (I want fire hazards removed), and to discuss with me what I want done and to give me a quote. I waited, and waited, and waited. At 6:30 PM I called the guy. No response. So I called his wife’s mobile — she answered.
She apologised and then called to her husband (I could hear her side of the conversation). Obviously he had totallyforgotten about the appointment as she said something like ‘You remember? You made the time when we were at so-and-so’s place last week…’ then she must’ve put her hand over the mouthpiece as I didn’t hear any more until she came back on the line to apologise again with the excuse that they’d been helping someone move house today.
She didn’t actually say that he’d completely forgotten about the appointment, but I suspect that’s the case. I was ready to give them quite a bit of work too (other gardening stuff after the fire hazards are dealt with). Now I’m not so sure.
We’ve rescheduled for tomorrow morning ‘after 8:30 AM’. So we’ll see if they turn up. If they don’t, that’s it. They will have lost my business.
Not a good start when you’re trying to build a new business in a new town…
Finally! While we were in NSW, the local fire authorities did a controlled burn of the bush block behind our house.
My local contact reckons it’s been 20+ years since it was burned, based on some of the rubbish they found on the block when they burned it. That’s a BIG fuel load. I feel a little safer now, though if fire gets into the crowns of the trees…
One of my olive fabric items from my Etsy store was just listed in a Greek-themed Etsy Treasury — my 10th! Here’s the link: http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list_west.php?room_id=74792 and here’s a screen shot (Treasuries are only ‘live’ for a few days, so the link won’t work soon).
We were in no hurry to get anywhere today. No arrangements had been made to meet up with my husband’s brothers, despite us leaving our flights till as late as possible on this Sunday.
We had a late, leisurely breakfast at the Sir Stamford, then, because we had to check out of the hotel by 11 am, we decided to head to Sydney Airport where I could check email, read my book, and we could wait for our late afternoon flight in the Qantas Club lounge.
Susan the SatNav couldn’t pick up a satellite signal (too close to the high rise buildings of Sydney’s CBD?), so we stopped and asked a taxi driver for general directions to get to the airport. Once we were clear of the main CBD, Susan located a satellite and got us safely to the airport. I had rebooted her several times, but she just couldn’t link in to a satellite. Not very good if you need a SatNav to find your way around a city’s CBD!
Dropping off the car was a painless experience and took minutes, unlike the runaround we had in getting it in the first place. We checked in, were offered seats on the midday flight to Perth (which we refused as we had people meeting us and it would upset their plans for the day), then went through security and into the Qantas Club. Where we sat for about 6 hours…
I took advantage of some of the time to clear some 400 or so of my 650+ emails (that’s what a week away will do to you!), while my husband watched aircraft loading and unloading procedures…
Massive A380 being taken somewhere
The flight back to Perth was uneventful and on time. Dinner was a quite spicy lamb curry, with rice, peas and dhal, cheese and crackers, red wine, bread roll and butter, Toblerone chocolate, water, soft drinks, more red wine… and later an ice-cream. Even though it was dinner, it was more like lunch for us with the time zone changes.
We arrived at 6:45 pm and our friends picked us up and drove us to one of their local Chinese restaurants where we had dinner. It as lovely to see them both again and to have the opportunity to thank them for providing us with secure parking for our car and their ‘taxi’ service from the airport.
We stayed overnight at the Crowne Plaza on Terrace Rd, Perth ($168/night), as we have dental and medical specialist appointments scheduled for tomorrow.
The reason for our trip to NSW and Sydney was the wedding of my husband’s niece, to be held on a function boat on Sydney Harbour, and leaving from the Sydney Opera House steps.
We started off with a leisurely fully cooked breakfast at the Sir Stamford (part of the room deal). The only complaint was that the tables were too high for the chairs — all part of that ostentatious French decor, but not very practical!
After breakfast we got a call from one of the brothers suggesting meeting up at a pub in The Rocks for lunch. It wasn’t far to walk, so we left the car in the parking garage and hoofed it over there. There were lots of people about on Circular Quay and in The Rocks, and a big cruise ship, the ‘Amsterdam’, was in port. It was a gorgeous day.
We joined the brothers and the groom-to-be but decided not to have lunch — we’d been overeating all week, and had had a late (big) breakfast, and we knew there’d be food at the wedding later this afternoon/evening.
The wedding guests were to meet at the Man’o’War steps at the Sydney Opera House at 5 pm, for a 5:30 departure on ‘The Pontoon’, a glass-enclosed function boat. We walked down from the hotel (5 minutes away), and waited and waited and waited. Eventually we got on board and left the wharf around 6 pm. My feet were hurting from wearing heels and walking on paving, and standing up for so long! There was even more standing while canapes were served outside on the top deck, and as we motored to the steps near the Park Hyatt at Circular Quay to pick up the bride and her father. Then it was back to Farm Cove where the wedding ceremony took place on the top deck of the boat, with the Opera House, Harbour Bridge and the city in the background. It was very windy, so the symbolic candles couldn’t be lit.
Iconic backdrop for a Sydney Harbour wedding
There was a lot more standing around until we were asked to move downstairs to the main level for the dinner. By this time it was close to 8 pm and my feet were killing me, even though the heels I had on were reasonably low.
Downstairs on 'The Pontoon'
Dinner was two courses, plus cheese and fruit platters, and coffee. There were two dishes per course and they were served alternately — person A got dish A, person B got dish B, person C got dish A, person D got dish B, etc. There’s a name for this style of catering, but I’ve forgotten what it is. You could swap with your neighbour if you didn’t want what was put in front of you. The entree courses were a goat cheese and onion tart or a ‘wild mushroom risotto with truffle oil infusion and grated parmesan’. I had the risotto — it was yummy! For the main course, the dishes were ‘aged porterhouse steak’ or a chicken dish. I had the steak. And it was aged all right — it was tough as old boots! Our dinner knives had no serration on them at all (what’s up with that??), though I’m not sure it would have made any difference. Pushing hard, it took me 33 slices to cut through each piece of the steak, and then 140 chews to break it up enough to swallow (I counted it ‘cos it was taking SOOOOOO long). That steak was very tough and I left half of the small portion I’d been served. Others at the table left some of theirs too, so it wasn’t just mine that was tough.
Miniscule portion of incredibly tough steak
The wines were from Hardy’s but I didn’t see which label. I had two glasses of the red to try to wash down the tough steak. And that was all the alcohol I had the whole wedding.
A few speeches were given between the courses, and once the dancing started, my husband and I retreated upstairs to take in the lights of Sydney at night. A few others did the same — mostly the smokers (I was surprised by how many were smokers). It was still pretty windy, but the air on our faces was better than the stuffy air downstairs. And going under the Harbour Bridge was neat!
We got back to the Opera House steps around 11:30 pm. Just before we landed, a Venetian-style water taxi came to pick up the bride and groom and ferry them off to wherever.
We said our goodbyes, and walked back to the hotel — well, I hobbled as my feet weren’t coping well!
It was a lovely ceremony and a delightful and beautiful setting, spoiled by three things — sore feet (my fault for choosing the shoes I did and not realising we’d be standing for some hours); very tough steak; and the incredibly steep, narrow and downright dangerous stairs that led down to the toilets. Those stairs were a real problem, even for those of us who were sober. In fact, I overheard a couple of ladies say, very early in the evening after they’d come down the stairs for the first time, that they wouldn’t be drinking as they wouldn’t want to negotiate those stairs under the influence of alcohol and in their (very) high heels. I have no idea how the boat catered for anyone who was a little infirm or wobbly on their feet — these seemed to be the only toilets.
