glory day

47 down, 1 to go

The Rugby World Cup has been absolutely amazing.  So far 47 games have been played and I’m pretty sure I watched at least some of every game (unlike the rest of the rugby world I just can’t bear watching Argentina play so I zoned out of those games.  The Argentina-Scotland game would have driven me to drink if I hadn’t driven myself there). 

So it’s less than 4 hours til the final featuring the All Blacks and France.  I think I’m holding it together pretty well – I woke up in tears feeling like someone was sitting on my chest but the sense of impending doom has passed somewhat.

There are really only two teams I feared going into this world cup – Australia and France.  We played Australia last Sunday (and won) but the lead-up to that game was just brutal.  I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat (by which I mean ‘couldn’t eat actual meals but scoffed my own body-weight in potato chips’) and couldn’t read any rugby coverage.  So winning that game and moving on the final was a huge relief.

Now I have France to worry about – and they have form at spoiling our world cup parties! – and I’m all of a dither.  I think I shall have to go and do something repetitive and meditative, like ironing.

I was re-reading Fever Pitch yesterday and some of the phrases were straight out of my brain.  When it comes to rugby I am superstitious beyond belief, and incredibly fearful that something I did or didn’t do will lose the All Blacks the game.  The power is all with me, you see.  Unlike, you know, the actual players on the field.

It’s hard work people, really hard work, but these are the lengths I will go to in order to win the RWC for the first time since 1987.  1987.

The AB’s are the bookies choice for the win and apparently 83% of NZers polled expect to win the game.  But there will be no counting chicken before the hatching in this house!  I remember back in 2000 I’d bought a bottle of champers before watching a Bledisloe Cup game, so that if we won I could have a celebratory tipple.  Time was up, the AB’s were ahead and just as I was easing the cork out of the bottle John Eales went and kicked an almost impossible conversion, giving the Wallabies a 1 point win.  Irritating.  So there’s no champagne here, just in case.

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In news utterly unrelated to the RWC I have been a bit stressed lately about the state of my fabric stash.  There are 17 different places where the fabric stash lives and finding the exact thing I want was taking too much time, so sewing projects have been abandoned on the flimsiest of pretexts.

Here is some of the stash – and this is just the fabric that is stored downstairs:

This is about the point where I gave up and moved to Thailand just to escape the mess.

But no, I soldiered on and now everything related to the making of clothes has a place to live (even the patterns!) and hopefully in the fullness of time some of this fabric might actually be turned into clothes, let’s hope.

And after all that work, and vowing and declaring that I would never buy any more fabric again EVER I found myself outside a fabric shop the very next day.  And I bought some leopard-print cotton and some gorgeous black silk velvet and I only felt a little bit embarrassed.

This is why it’s so hard to sort out the fabrics:

Because the needs of Mr Puss will always come first!

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Oh hell.  Less than three hours now. GO ALL BLACKS!!

Jasmine and rugby, oh my

 

How fantastic to wake up on such a lovely spring day and know you have three games of rugby to watch today!

The Rugby World Cup is finally here after four years of praying and dreading.  The All Blacks haven’t won the RWC since the inaugural tournament in 1987, and we haven’t been to the finals since 1995 (as cruelly documented in Invictus).  Bloody hell, I’ve got clothes older than that!

The RWC is being held in New Zealand this year.  I was in NZ a few weeks ago, and RWC bunting was everywhere.  Many people I spoke to were “completely over” the RWC – they were sick of hearing about it, sick of the hype, sick of waiting for the inevitable All Black choke – but since the tournament started last week there seems to have been a real up-swing in public support.  I guess once something actually starts, rather than hearing about it in the abstract, it becomes easier to get behind it.

I’m loving the RWC so far.  I’m particularly enjoying the way the ‘minnows’ have really stood up to the next-tier nations – we’re not seeing the 145+ point blow-outs we saw ten years ago.  I have my favourites (apart from the All Blacks of course) – the USA team have come on really well, and I’ll always love Samoa.  And Wales.  And pretty much anybody apart from Australia.

The crowds have been amazing, the way various communities have gotten behind the visiting teams.  I really loved the USA/Ireland game in New Plymouth, where the locals dressed up and cheered for their adopted team.  And all the anthems have been done really well.  Oh, and now I’m gushing.

Come on All Blacks, let’s win this thing.

 

And tomorrow we shall lunch nicely

RUGBY:

Last Saturday we went to watch Uni play at North Sydney Oval.  The weather was perfect for rugby and NSO is such a pretty ground:

Uni dominated from the beginning of the game, and wrapped it up at 69-3.  Still top of the table.  Here are Norths on attack in the second half:

which sadly (for them) came to naught.

Rugby season is very difficult at the moment as I'm following the fortunes of Uni in the local Sydney competition, Otago in the Air NZ Cup competition (and a Shield challenge this week!  fingers crossed!) and the All Blacks in the Tri-Nations competition.  The AB's lost last week as predicted; until the coaching staff changes they are destined to be woeful, I'm afraid.

SEWING:

A whole pile of banded tops and overdue mending, not exciting enough for a photo.

MR PUSS:

He is currently yowling his head off downstairs, because he has just had dinner and isn't that a good reason to yowl?

Photographic proof that he once played with something!  (He does not "play".  We think he finds it demeaning).

LOOKING FORWARD TO:

De comes back from the States tomorrow, hurrah!

And there are lamb shanks for dinner, so that's good too

SEWING:

I finally finished the handbag I started about a month ago:

(You're right, it is a bit uneven, but it's not as bad as the photo would have you believe).

LOVING:

My new haircut.  I'm so used to having longer hair which only needed cutting every two months that it didn't occur to me that a short hairstyle needs cutting more often.  That's OK, lesson learned.

LOOKING FORWARD TO:

Decluttering ~ getting the house clean ~ buying some more jewellery ~ North Sydney Oval to watch Uni ~ All Blacks hopefully to beat Springboks ~ maybe cocktails ~ maybe Hive Bar ~

BEST NEWS OF THE DAY:

Kees Meeuws has returned to Otago rugby!  Perhaps we shall have to go over to watch an Air NZ cup game!

Words are, like ... jumbley things

HAVE DONE:

Went to stay with David's grandparents last weekend (she is still recovering from surgery) to bestow more casseroles.   And watch rugby THANK YOU All Blacks.

Last night we watched the Harry Potter movie with De and J at Gold Class Bondi Junction.  I do enjoy watching a kid's movie amid wine and chocolate sundaes!

SEWING:

So far I have sewn six different versions of this frock:

Now I am working on lurid knit skirts, as apparently you can never have enough.

LOOKING FORWARD TO:

~ seeing De when she gets home from work (she's off to the states tomorrow); steak for dinner.  Hairdressers on Friday.

RANDOM PHOTO:

De and I collaborated on a surprise! blanket for a dear friend who - in a fit of what I assume was brain-fever - ran a marathon.  As neither De nor I could successfully run to the corner we felt this feat was deserving of a blanket:

Pretentious and arrogant, certainly, but definitely pretty too.

Look at my pretty apron - vintage Australian wine bottle labels on Polish linen:

I feel the need to take up baking again.

On Friday a large group of us went to Encasa for a birthday party.  I had been drooling over the menu all day, and it wasn't until we got there that I found out we would be eating from the set banquet menu.  That news nearly broke my heart, seriously. Luckily I wasn't actually able to eat most of the banquet dishes (onion allergy FTW!) so the lovely waiter agreed to bring me a steak with a cream and prawn sauce.

It was divine and I positively swooned.  A tender, juicy steak, plump prawns, creamy garlic-y sauce and little bits of fried potato - I would marry this dish if I could.  I'm sure David wouldn't object.  And I shall be having this dish again.  Divine.

Mr Puss works that blanket like a champ:

On Saturday we watched the All Blacks lose to France.  After the inevitable wailing, rending and gnashing it was all a bit of a relief, really.  For the past few years the AB's really haven't played well yet they still keep managing to win (except for that debacle of a World Cup, obviously).  And because they've kept winning they haven't really addressed some of the basic problems (cough*coaching staff*cough).  Hopefully a home loss to an NH team will force some changes, and hopefully we haven't left it too late for the 2011 World Cup (oh please oh please).

On Sunday night we went to see the Fire Water presentation, which was a huge disappointment.  Despite watching from the Opera House as suggested we couldn't see very much, and what we saw didn't look that exciting.  We debated hanging around for a later session but couldn't really be bothered. 

The lighting effects around the Harbour were fun - particularly on the Opera House - and while we took about 957 kajillion photos none of them really came out.  This photo of the Harbour Bridge isn't too bad:

Actually that photo looks a hell of a lot better if you click and enlarge it, otherwise my apron looks three times the size of the Harbour Bridge.   Strange.

David and I were reading in the paper the other day that Sydney is not regarded as a pretty city, but that's just such bullshit.  Any city that has the harbour and the Rocks area (not to mention Hyde Park, Manly, Darling Harbour, I could go on) is a very pretty city indeed.

Fabrics and lists and friends, oh my

I have been that busy coming up with new systems and writing lists and decluttering and trying to get our lives more organised that I've completely ignored the other parts of my life - namely anything to do with sewing, pattern-making, blogging or not obsessing!  However we are over that particular project and ready to move on to designing the perfect wrap dress pattern.

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Cool things that have happened recently include:

Fabric from Green Olive!

Martine was kind enough to send me a pack of her gorgeous as-seen-on-TV fabrics which will become a wrap dress in the fullness of time.  The colours, the texture - this fabric is awesome, and check out the Tribal range as well.

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I had my hair cut.  While I really, really like it I can't help but feel I look a little bit like David Bowie circa Aladdin Sane.

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A Highlanders jersey of my very own!



For years I've been wearing an old Otago jersey which my brother unknowingly donated to me which, while very good in its own way, isn't really the same thing as a Highlanders jersey.  De was in Perth a while back and found the 2007 jersey design on sale and thought of me!  And the Highlanders have won every game since so obviously it was meant to be.

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Spotlight had a 'spend $100 get $40 off' which I thought was sneaky-clever.  I now have my own body-weight in retro florals and black crepe suiting.

We're planning to make a late comeback, no doubt

Last week was the third week of the Super 14.  My beloved Highlanders had yet to register a win as they were desparately unlucky to lose the first two games (when it comes to luck all Highlanders fans know we have only two kinds: bad and none at all).

So it was with hope in our hearts and a jaunty bounce in our step that we went along to see the Highlanders play the Waratahs in Sydney last Friday night.  The Highlanders were wearing their fetching new alternate strip:

and we settled down with our overpriced beverages and soggy pies to enjoy the game.  But sadly there was absolutely nothing to enjoy there - the Highlanders played like they were afraid of the ball and the Waratahs ran right over us.

So of course there was much ranting about how they should pay us to bloody watch them, and how hard is it to win anyway? and rash statements about never watching them again.  Honestly, Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch is so on the money for over-the-top fans it's scary.

And this weekend rolls around and we're playing the Crusaders.  The Crusaders!  The reigning champions!  Who have won the title seven times!  And we're second-last on the table!  OK, so we managed to pull out a win against them last year but that was due to last round ennui on their part and some sort of Mephistophelean deal on ours.

And my god, what a game.  Nil-all at halftime, nil-all after an hour, then we won the game 6-0.  It's the lowest score in the history of the Super 14 - and incidentally the first time the Crusaders have been held scoreless - but you know what?  We beat the Crusaders and that's all the record books will say.

I'm choosing to see this win tonight as the starting play of our inevitable and glorious finals victory, etc.  Highlanders fans are forced to live in a world of delusion and fantasy, and sometimes it's almost worth it.

Not that I really want the full-blast Sydney summer either

Today is one of those days, you know?  When it's cold and raining outside (in November, why?), and it doesn't seem worth going outside and the dishes won't do themselves you know, and it seems like the best thing to do is just stay home and tidy up.

On the plus side, however, now that downstairs is cleaned up FrockProject can continue to ramp up the pace tomorrow (the downside of sewing on your dining table is that you need to move all the food-related items off before you can start sewing).

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An open letter to the Welsh rugby team:

Wales, I have always tried to like you.  My surname was apparently derived from the Welsh some centuries ago.  Years ago when I learned Highland dancing I also learned the Welsh clog.  Your supporters are passionate yet generally polite.  I enjoy the choral singing (great work with our anthem, btw).

Your players strike me as genial and hirsute men collectively surnamed Jones (and the occasional Alfie just to keep everyone honest).  You have a long and proud rugby history and are current holders of the Six Nations trophy.  So why on earth do you persist in talking yourself down?

To be fair it's always been likely that the AB's will get a Grand Slam this tour - but Scotland and Ireland both talked themselves up, showed a bit of moxie.  Yet you have your former captain quoted as saying: a loss by 10 points or less would be "a virtual victory".

Sorry, I can't get behind this.  If you don't believe in yourselves I don't see how you can expect anyone else to do so.  So being beaten by 20 points was, really, a fitting outcome.

PS: loved your response to the haka, appropriate and spine-chilling on both sides.

~~~~~

The frock I made on Friday has a bodice printed with little reddish-burgundy dragons:

Interestingly the Welsh rugby team are also known as the Red Dragons - see how much I want to like you, Wales?

I'm wiped

Today has been made up of a lot of awesome.

I went to Marrickville with De and a friend of hers and bought the rest of the fabric I need to finish FrockProject.  Then we went to a new (to us) fabric store, which was wonderful and amazing and overwhelming in equal parts.  I bought only some fabric to make some pants (FAIL. this is supposed to be about making summer clothes!) because I worried that if I picked up any fabric I would want to have it all.  Then to Lincraft, now at a handy-dandy location in Alexandria. 

The only less-than-stellar experiences in our day was pretty much any time we had to interact with service staff - really we were unlucky in that area today.

And now I'm totally exhausted.  I'm going to cook dinner and prepare to get up at 4am to watch the All Blacks take on Wales.

Here is one of my favourite photos of Mr Puss, posing on the ironing board in front of another tuxedo cat:

CrappyCam has given him 'Children of the Damned' eyes.  He doesn't usually have those.