What been occuring lately...

I've been finishing off various projects, unfortunetly forgot to take photos before posting some of them, but I may get some after shots.

There's been some tapestry...  too late to enter the small tapetstry award from  ATW this year

Some 'photo-shopping' for a colouring book for a 5 yr old friend...

Some knitting...

This one should be up for sale on Yesfia's House soon

Some baking with Mars Bars...  it's been a year and the year's supply hasn't run out

mars bar slice

mars bar mud cake

Some building a box... to house my lovely Georg Jensen cutlery (designer Arne Jacobsen)

Some signage... although technically I made this a while ago, I fixed it up and added to it for Blackbird Markets and the upcoming North Melbourne Market

Some cutting...  these too will be on the shop soon, next to other Ripped T's

A little bit of stitching...

 

 

And, of course, some cooking - strawberry icecream to kick of spring!

Melbourne International Film Festival 2011 - MIFF ready

Films I'll be seeing or looking out for this year and or hopefully they will be in the cinemas soon.

Submarine - Richard Ayoade's (IT Crowd/Garth Marengis dark place) debut, offbeat coming-of-age tale

You are Here - mind f**k

Jane Eyre - A stunning version with Dame Judy Dench

MAGIC TRIP: KEN KESEY'S SEARCH FOR A KOOL PLACE - LSD, Bus, Road trip, camera, film is finished 47 years later

MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE  - a girl flees a compound with the deranged cult leader on the hunt


Melancholia - Lars Von Trier's latest, Kirsten Dunst won best actress for in Cannes

Neds - Teens in 1970s Glasgow from The Magdalene Sisters' writer-director

The Future - Miranda July, 2 30-somethings avoid responsibility and decide to change by preparing to adopt a cat

The Mill and The Cross - Bringing to life The Procession to Calvary by Brueghel, 1564

The Turin Horse - 19th century Nietzsche, and a horses life

Tiny Furniture - Manhatten hipsters soul-searching, Woody Allen style

Tyrannosaur - Angry man gets turned around, from Paddy Considine

Little Rock - Young japanese on road trip in america - indie film

13 Assassins -  Takashi Miike remakes a classic Akira Kurosawa

Bi, Don't Be Afraid - a 6 yr old boy in urban Hanoi

End Of Animal - South Korean thriller


Journals of Musan - a north korean lost in south korean life

Norwegian Wood - Love story in Japan in 1960s from Tran Anh Hung

Outrage - Takashi Kitano on the Yakuza

Winter Vacation - Comedy in winter in rural China

Shut Up Little Man - An Audio Misadventure -  Some guys taped their argueing neighbours - one a extrovert gay, one a complete homophobe

Elite Squad: The Enemy Within - Brazilian gun thriller - will have to find the first of the series

Polisse - Juvenile Protection Unit in Paris

Viva Riva! - Crime action in the Congo

Being Elmo - the giant behind the muppet

Cave of Forgotton Dreams - Werner Herzog takes a camera to film a 32,000-year-old artwork in 3D

El Bulli: Cooking in Progress - about the famous spanish restaurant only open for 5 months of the year

Page One: Inside the New York Times - should come to general release

The Bengali Detective - modern times and crime fought by a private detective

Think Global, Act Rural - following on from Food Inc, shows the implications of mass agriculture

MIFF's 60th Retrospective is showing:
Barking Dogs Never Bite - South Korea
The Beauty and The Beast - 1952, Jean Cocteau, France
Gummo - USA
The Apple - Iran
The King of Comedy - Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese


Life In A Day - 80,000 clips from people on a single day posted on you tube

Fleurs Du Mal - Political love story set around social media

I Wish I Knew - Doco on Shanghai and interviews with people about the history and their own personal stories

Pool Party - A disused pool is used as a hang-out in the 80s, then redeveloped into a venue in the 00's

Triangle Wars - about the proposed development in st kilda

Clay - a 1965 film about an artist and a stranger, set in Monsalvat in Melbourne

Autoluminescent: Rowland S. Howard - Sadly sold out straight away. Can't wait to see a doco about this great melbourne musician

The Ballad Of Genesis And Lady Jaye - Throbbing Gristle front man and his dominatrix missus get sugery to look like each other...

Prime Time: tv series on film
Dreileben - Beats Being Dead - 1st of 3 german films set around an escaped criminal in a small town

The Slap - series from an award winning novel, about australian families

This is England '86 - The same characters as the first film, 3 years on

Next Gen (for the younger peeps)
Falling for Sahara - 3 young african refugees fancy the same girl (set in flemington estate)

Under the Hawthorn Tree - youth in the chinese cultural revolution

The Ugly Duckling - clay-mation that took a 69-yr-old legendary russian animator to create

Nightshift (late night film)
Super - Troma man James  Gunn brings a crime-fighting story with Liv Tyler, Kevin Bacon and Ellen Page

The Woman - A family decide to "adopt" a feral woman

Troll Hunter - Norwegian mockumentary about keeping Trolls at bay

Zebraman 2: Attack on Zebra City - Takashi Miike brings us a superhero. Again, have to find the first one

Kill List - drama to thriller, 2 friends return to being hitmen

Short Film - includes a killer line-up as always.
I will miss the Misfits session which has some great sounding films, but always try to see the Animation Shorts.
The O Canada! selection includes the lates film from Spike Jonze with Arcade Fire - Scenes From the Suburbs


Happy Viewing!!!

Carl.

We have lost a huge part of our world, when this old man decided to be in the road at the wrong time, once too many, and was hit by a car.
Carlsberg was a little over 15 years old, but still full of life.  Cars constantly race down our otherwise small and quiet street, each time cause a pain in my stomach. 

Carl was my compadre, my muse, my fuzzy hot water bottle, my partner in crime, my supervisor, my comfort.

There was and never will be a cat like him. Even though I am not buddhist, I believe there was a wise and compassionate old man behind those eyes.

more food

Well, the market wasn't very fruitful, not many stalls and a small amount of traffic.  But at least it was helpful to have the first stall over and done with, the hows and whys answered, the list of what can be done next time, and of course the first-timers nerves.


Here's what has been happening in the kitchen anyway :

heirloom vegies, purple carrots and white beetroot!

squid fettuccine - sustainable seafood feast!

Monsieur Noir's birthday chocolate cake!

To Market, To Market

I will be appearing in my first real-life market!  

A new monthly market has been set-up at £1000 Bend in Melbourne CBD, and I will have a stall there on Sunday the 3rd of April. 11am-5pm.

Please come along and support local handicrafts and all the cool sellers, and have a relaxing hot cuppa or cool beverage in the cafe.

www.hideandseekmarket.com.au

Thousand Pound Bend

361 Little Lonsdale St

Melbourne

Soft

Here's my first attempt at making a soft toy doll from scratch, including the pattern/template.

  She doesn't have a name yet. Of course there's a few things I'd change, but I still think she's got a little charm. 





I also had a go at making vegan marshmallows, inventing my own recipe from the gelatine variety that worked so well before.
Using Agar agar flakes is not such an easy substitute, the mixture sets pretty quickly before you can whip it up, but what I ended up with was some pretty tasty soft
vegan jellies!

Recipe:

4 teaspoons agar agar flakes or powder
1 & 1/2 cups water
2 cups raw organic sugar
1 teaspoons vanilla (I prefer vanilla bean paste here)
2 tablebspoons lemon juice
2 tablebspoons maple syrup
1/4 cup coconut - toast if you wish carefully under a grill


Sprinkle agar over water in a saucepan, bring slowly to the boil.
Boil for 5 minutes or until you see the agar has dissolved.
Add sugar and bring to the boil again to dissolve.  Boil for 5 minutes uncovered.
Cool mixture to warm or luke warm.
Pour into a mixing bowl with vanilla & lemon juice and beat for 10-15 minutes on high.
Pour in the syrup slowly whilst beating.
Prepare a tin or chosen container by rinsing with cold water.  Pour in the mixture and refrigerate to set.  This won't take too long.
Once set carve into squares and toss through the coconut.
Mmmm... I've had 3 today already!

My very own stamp!

In a matter of 2 weeks I found a local stamp maker on Etsy, designed and purchased a stamp for my own Etsy store, and wowsers I was impressed.

After some deliberation I cut out a house logo and went just for the text. Being a very stylised font I was worried about how it might turn out. The letters are very thin shapes, but Holly did a fantastic job and better than I ever expected. The font is given a special character by the hand carving and looks very special.

Plus Holly has posted on her own blog, and told of her joy for carving rummer stamps. I'm very glad to help out a fellow local crafter.

New Stuff on Etsy

Come and get it