"Give me Brisbane Any Day" Said the Billboard

Warm weather. Super family friendly city. Great public transport - free buses and ferries. Great train connection from airport to city. Super l-o-n-g tunnels under the city to the airport. So much to do. Museum of Brisbane great - neat little exhibition on the river. Queensland Museum great too. Vaiapiano pizza/pasta made right there for you. James Street in Fortitude Valley - yikes and wow together! Walking and more walking. An apartment on the 40th floor with views to die for at an incredibly reasonable price. (But fire alarms - two of them and that wasn't funny...). Big W and Target for books. Target for 2 gorgeous linen dresses, tees and shoes and underwear - mostly on sale. Postcards. Photos. Cheap milk in supermarkets. (but bread and biscuits - RUBBISH. Where are the New Zealand choices in Aussie supermarkets? Our supermarkets are full of Aussie brands. marmite though found and cheaper (!!) in Australia). South Bank. Streets Beach. Cafes.

Ahh Brisbane. Love you. Back to a floor hitting reality with much colder weather, nonsense during the day, HIDEOUS critique essay to write, little food, laundry back log. I need to knit and drink wine quite frankly and de-stress in a biiiiiig way. Holidays. Lovely. When are the next school hols???

This Moment

Learning - about having an identity and cultural colonisation (I'm lost too!)
Deciding - which pattern to knit next - hat or scarf?
Wishing - that I had a lot more motivation
Drinking - Aussie tea
Reading - the blurb of this and desperate to read but little time to get into a book

Pondering - how the new principal will go
Considering - schools for a kid for next year
Buying - new squishy divine wool
Liking - home grown veges and cyclamens

Wearing - lots and lots of merino jerseys and tights and knitted goodness

Giggling - at Oliver Jeffer's new picture book
Needing - a brain for critiquing articles (HARD!)
Watching - nothing - news blackout for me and I watch very little tv anyway
Hoping - a pass - a pass
Getting - a TON of new books
Opening - sweet mail of wooly goodness

Looking - at my university ring binder - opening it a bit more would be good!
Smelling - new soaps
Admiring - a principal who has 6 kids (yikes - doing both jobs!)
Feeling - colder than normal
Making - 2 cardigans, 2 pairs of socks and either a hat or a scarf! Too much on the go...
Enjoying - nights in with good winter food (home made pie pastry and all)

Wanting - more time
Loving - families on holiday together

A Little Bit of Wonderful Colour Swap

Miriam did a wonderful colour swap a while back. I so loved doing this swap!
My partner was the wonderful Elaina - you can see in her post the goodies I sent her. (Oh! I have not knitted a dishcloth for over a month and so miss doing them! Usually I knit lots over the hols, but did so little knitting these school hols!)

Two weeks ago, about 10 minutes before we left for Australia, I could see a dark shadow on the other side of the front door (like a lot of NZ houses we have "holes" - yes we can see daylight coming right under our front door where there is a gap of a few millimetres!) - courier package! This was ripped into very fast, as we had to get to the airport and do a "park and ride shuttle bus thing" to the terminal.

OH MY. I had to leave the house and leave it all behind! :( It was sent to me by the lovely Sarah:

Sarah really hit the nail on the head with me - yellow, orange, tea, writing and knitting! The embroidery is stunning and as all my friends say, it is SO ME! It is now on top of my bookcase in "my corner". The tea cup and saucer sets (6 of them) were picked up from an op shop - ain't they just the most daintiest sweetest little things ever? Loving the yellow tea tin and the tea - a new tea for me (A T2 shop is a few suburbs over from me and I probably get to the shop once a year!). Sarah also sewed some funky notecards too. An amazing swap package - Sarah's first ever bloggy swap ever too. She did very well - I did extremely well from such a generous and divine swap! Thank you so much Sarah.
And to Miriam too for swap a cool swap idea!