A weekend in Balmain

This weekend Tom and I spent most of our time in Balmain and Rozelle. On Saturday we went to the market so that I could see if they had an chili plants. And just my luck they had two! I only bought one, however the woman who sold it to me turned out to be from Toronto. I thought that was neat. Tom and I dropped by his parents for some tea with his mum. When we got back I did a little gardening. Way back when I got my mushroom farm, the plant company sent me some mystery bulbs. Not having a garden, pot, soil and knowing that my fridge tends to freeze things in there longer that a few days. I put them in my closet hoping they would not grow.

It turns out not even being in plastic bag could stop these bulbs.

Released from their stretching prison.

 Post potting the mystery bulbs. The bulbs now also have a sprig of rosemary in their pot too, because one of Tom's friends came by, brought a rosemary branch (for no particular reason) and offered to plant it if we had a pot.

On Sunday Tom and I went to a fundraiser cricket match at Birchgrove Oval. We found this in our mail, the really neat part is that the cricket player who appears to be riding a horse is Don Bradman. Tom just happens to be related to him.

The match was really fun, there were lots of families and as we watched people came out and started playing frisbee, doing bating practice and flying kites all around the game. The fundraiser had set up a wine and cheese bar, though I think most people like us had brought their own picnics. I'll take this moment to remind everyone that in Australia it is totally ok to set up a chair in the sunny park and watch a cricket game while sipping on a beer or glass of wine. It made for a really nice relaxed atmosphere and drew a mixed crowd, not just young families. They had set up speakers around the oval and there where a couple of commentators that were pretty funny. In the video their conversation is a little harder to pick up than I would have hoped. But you can hear them heckling the batter a little. After halftime, when a little boy and his dad started flying a kite near the oval they started commentating for the kite too. Gasping when it nearly crashed and ooing and ahhing when it flew back up. Some times they'd even throw in comments about the bouncy castle, one of them ran over to try it out and reported back all the moves he managed. At half time when there was a batting contest and a tiny little boy (with his mum's help) tried to bat as far as he could, there were huge cheers and encouragement over the speakers and from the crowd. That was pretty adorable, I think the ball went about 4 feet.

I got a little distracted by this dog waiting for it's owner by the gate. It paced around waiting for him to come back and amazingly never tried to enter the oval. Perhaps it was the sign.

 

Right as Tom and I were about to leave I looked up into the tree above us and noticed what appeared to be sausages hanging from a branch. After further inspection I believe they were a dog toy. But the idea of a sausage tree isn't so bad either. 

 

Before the weekend I was taking a walk around Mort Park in Balmain, before doing some filming with Tom's mum. It was an incredible day, with a bright blue sky and the water was an amazing green colour. It was very tropical looking. Mort bay used to be a ship yard and dry dock. So there are these cement docks that jut out along one side. 

This grassy area is still boat shaped and is the area that used to be the dry dock. It is now the area of the park for unleashed dogs to play.

In other news I have been working on my art. My media of the moment is beads and I've been putting them together on a bead loom. Right now I am working on my first image which is sort of my practice one where I learn how to bead faster, that some beads are a slightly different width, stringing the loom takes a very long time, and I don't really like shiny beads as much. This is my loom, right now I have 51 strings on it, though as you can see it can hold more.

 The feeling of these beads when they are threaded together is really nice. It's almost like scales.

Another thing I learned when I started to use more that two colours was that I also needed a bead organizer. Thus I created a segmented bead holder. It has not failed me yet. 

This is the image I'm working from. It was originally a black and white water colour I did of the seahorse, which I scanned into my computer, enlarged, overlayed the bead grid and printed out. I then painted in the colour blocks for the beads, experimenting with how to blend solid colours  (I'm still working on that).

When I got into areas that had great stretches of solid colour I found it really hard to count the tiny squares. So I drew up these little counters on a sheet that I move up after each line. I only counted up to 10 because it's easier to do the math.

When I complete this half of the image I'll do the other side and then stitch them together. Another reason for testing this media out in small is finding out the best way to join up the pieces. Theoretically if it works I can make very large images. I'm having a lot of fun with it and have the next few ideas in the works already.

Next weekend Tom and I are planning to go to the holiday house. So hopefully the weather holds up and if I'm really lucky there may be jellyfish starting to appear in the lake and I can see them but not get stung.