birthday dessert ideas: books

Showing posts with label books. Show all posts

Showing posts with label books. Show all posts

{Details of the girls bedroom}

Olá, queridos amigos! O quarto da Carlota e da Conchinha continua um caos, mas já fomos arrumando algumas coisas... Não vejo a hora de o pintar e mudar o papel-de-parede!

Algumas das estantes de parede do Ikea que já montamos (aquela parede vai ficar branca) - ainda não decidi o que fazer em relação ao assunto prateleiras, pois tudo o que envolve furar as paredes põe-me sempre a pensar... Para além de elas terem montanhas de livros, têm também muitos brinquedos bonitos que eu gostava de expor, mas não quero uma parede só com estantes. Vamos ver o que sai daqui! :)

Hello, my dear friends! The girls bedroom is still chaotic, but we've managed to assemble these Ikea shelves - the wall is going to be painted in white. I can't wait to have the new wallpaper and the light that comes from white walls!

I still haven't decide on what to do about the shelves issue - what kind and how many - as they have thousands of books and beautiful toys that I would like to display as well, but I don't want to fill the walls only with shelves... Let's see how this is going to turn out! :)

Pine Cones

Over the past week or two I have collected pine cones in Botanic Park on my bike trips to and from work.

I have filled each of the fire place grates with them. They make a great decoration but will burn well too the next time we light a fire.

Pine-cones for the fire.

'They are best,' she said.

'Because they burn at the heart

And burn long,

Even smothered with ash.'

From Jennifer Strauss, "Pine-cones and My Grandmother."

Wall decoration + Beautiful Ninainvorm

Fim-de-semana a chover não está com nada mas, enfim, reclamar do tempo é daquelas coisas que não vale mesmo a pena - não o podemos mudar! :)

Hoje falo-vos de decoração de paredes - não papel-de-parede, mas antes de quadros, pratos, etc. Eu não tenho qualquer formação em design, arquitectura ou decoração. Zero. Tudo é baseado em instinto e muita imagem que passa pelos meus olhos - e, claro, um gosto inato pelas coisas bonitas desta vida. Mas muitas vezes penso que gostaria de aprender algo mais. A noção do espaço, o equilíbrio entre as peças, o aproveitamento da casa, um sem número de coisas que a decoração de interiores abranje e que, a mim, me desperta imensa curiosidade. Daí que, ao longo destes anos, tenha feito (e ainda faço) muitos erros em termos decorativos, muita aprendizagem pelas tentativas, remodelações e mudanças. E, se pudesse, não pararia por aqui, pois adoro mobilar e (re)decorar a minha casa! Há sempre algo mais que pode ser feito! (Acho que este é um problema muito comum entre as mulheres! :)) Daí que, dentro desta coisa fantástica que é a decoração, as paredes sejam um dos meus calcanhares de aquiles - tenho sempre alguma dificuldade, ou melhor, indecisão, quando toca à decoração das paredes. Não quando falamos de papéis, aí acho que sei escolher. Agora quadros, é um dilema! E que moldura? Branca? Preta? Madeira? Moldura com linhas rectas? Ou arredondadas? Mas a cor combina com a gravura? E o conjunto? Penduro mais acima? Ficará bem naquela parede? Os pratos? Opto pela mesma cor de base? Ou misturo tudo? Eu sei lá, só sei que demoro dias, semanas até fazer alguma coisa!

Então se as minhas queridas leitoras e leitores me pudessem dar umas dicas de decoração de parede - links, revistas, etc. - esta vossa amiga ficaria eternamente grata.

Mostro-vos o meu pratinho novo da Ninainvorm (mais um daqueles namoros prolongados) - este sei onde o vou pendurar! :) As cerâmicas pintadas pela Nina são lindas de morrer, vejo-as e revejo-as vezes sem conta... Até o toque das bandeirolas tem a ver comigo! ;)

Espero que aproveitem este Domingo. Se eu conseguir, ainda cá volto.

Leituras de fim-de-semana: enquanto os meus livros novos não chegam,

vou relendo os mais antigos

Weekend readings: while I'm waiting for my new books to arrive,

I read the old ones once more

It's raining this weekend, but the weather is one of those things we mustn't complain: the fact that we do doesn't change it, does it? So we might as well go ahead and think (and do) other things! :)

Today I'm writting about wall decor - not wallpaper, but paintings, plates, etc. I have zero education in terms of design, arquitecture or decoration. All I do is by instinct and the thousands of images that I see along the way. And also because I love to be surrounded by beautiful things. So I've made lots of mistakes in terms of decor (I still do), I've changed my place about 2 million times now, I've tried and failed and learned in the process. If I could, I'd keep on changing my small house, there's still so many things I could do here! But I guess that changing our homes all the time is a woman's thing, right? :) Sometimes I think I should learn more about interior decoration: the spacial notion, equilibrium, things that work and things that don't, all of that is part of the decoration process and isn't as intuitive as one might think. So when it comes to wall decor, I take weeks before I do something - what kind of frame should I use? In white? Black? Wood? Sharp edges? Round edges? Should I hang it higher or lower? And the plates? The same colour basis? Mix different styles?

That being said, if my lovely readers can provide me some information - links, books, etc. - on wall decor, yours truly would be very pleased! :)

I'm also showing you my new Ninainvorm plate - one of those long woo - but this one I know where to hang! :) Nina's work is amazing, I keep seeing her ceramics from time to time, just to please my eyes! Even the garland detail in this plate has to do with me! :)

I wish you all a lovely Sunday. If I can manage it, I'll come here later on.

Books I am Reading: a Look at WWII Thriftiness

Do you ever read books on a particular theme together?

Lately I have been reading a great deal about World War II and the lives of families on the homefront, especially in England. I feel that I have a great deal to learn from the thriftiness, resourcefulness and self-sufficiency of those who survived the Great Depression and the Second World War.

Probably my favourite recent book on this subject is Jane Fearnley-Whittingstall's

The Ministry of Food: Thrifty Wartime Ways to Feed Your Family. As the author points out, issues such as reducing waste, growing our own food and eating seasonally are now issues all over again, if for different reasons than during the War:

Today, instead of fighting Hitler, we are combating economic recession. But unlike our forebears, we are fighting on several fronts – against waste, junk food and the depletion of fossil fuels. In hard times the battle for survival can be exhilarating, and it does bring rewards: the satisfaction that comes from self-sufficiency; pride in seeing children grow up strong and healthy; and the friendships that develop through co-operation with neighbours. (p.13)

Written as part of a 2010 exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London, The Ministry of Food is a wonderful combination of social history, cookery book and gardening guide. It is filled with fascinating anecdotes, recipes and posters from the period. Highly recommended.

Also of interest to those wanting to learn from wartime thriftiness are two smaller books;

Make Do and Mend: Keeping Family and Home Afloat on War Rations

and Eating for Victory: Healthy Home Front Cooking on War Rations. These books are fairly basic compilations of official Second World War Instruction leaflets. I have only read Make Do and Mend so far, and while I found its tips and hints fascinating (I didn't know there were so many ways to darn a garment!), I felt it could have benefited from an index.

The next book on my reading list is Nella Last's War: The Second World War Diaries of 'Housewife 49'. As stated on the back cover, "In September 1939, housewife and mother Nella Last began a diary whose entries, in their regularity, length and quality, have created a record of the Second World War which is powerful, fascinating and unique." While this Mrs Last's wartime diaries were first published in 1981, I have only learnt about them recently and can hardly wait to get my hands on a copy.

What are you reading at the moment?

Getting the House Ready

Katy worked with a will for the next two days. Twenty times, at least, she went into the blue room to make sure that nothing was forgotten; repeating, as if it had been a lesson in geography, "Bath towels, face towels, matches, soap, candles, cologne, extra blanket, ink." A nice little fire was lighted in the bedroom on Friday afternoon, and a big, beautiful one in the parlour, which looked very pleasant with the lamp lit and Clover's geraniums and china roses in the window. The tea-table was set with the best linen and the pink and white china. Debby's muffins were very light. The crab-apple jelly came out of its mould clear and whole, and the cold chicken looked appetising, with its green wreath of parsley. There was stewed potato, too, and, of course, oysters.

From Susan Coolidge, What Katy Did at School, (first published in 1873)

Sunday at home

Domingo enevoado, mas com boa-disposição! Bom-dia!

Já aqui falei dela, mas é natural que o faça mais vezes, pois quando as pessoas nos inspiram, acabamos por lhes fazer referência de uma forma recorrente. Tal é o caso da Yvonne, do Yvestown, cujo blog não prescindo de visitar quase diariamente. Quando vi uma das compras de Natal que fez para ela própria (aqui), fez-se luz na minha cabeça... é que isto de andar atrás da Conchinha a tentar evitar que dobre ou rasgue as minhas revistas de decoração, tem muito que se lhe diga! Então, pensei: em vez de as ter em cima da mesa da sala, porque não transportá-las de um lado para o outro? E mandei vir um porta-revistas como o da Yvonne. Adoro, e é feito em material reciclado de piso de court-de ténis - ajudamos também o ambiente.

Já dizia Charles Colton: "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery". Couldn't agree more.

O meu (mais gordinho):

Mine (a little fatter):

O da Yvonne (mais magrinho):

Yvonne's (a little thiner):

Last image: The Yvestown Blog

Vou ainda deixar-vos uma foto de outra toalha-de-mesa, para alegrar os vossos corações e começarem a pensar em optar pelos motivos floridos em vossas casas. Depois não vão querer outra coisa! :)

Hi everyone! It's cloudy today, but I'm in a good mood!

I already wrote about this lady, but it's only natural that I will do it many more times again. She's Yvonne, the writer behind Yvestown, a blog that I visit on a daily basis. When I saw the Christmas present she bought to herself (here), light came into my mind! After chasing Conchinha and trying to avoid her damaging my magazines, I thought this would be a great solution: instead of running around after her, I could carry along the magazines with me. And so I bought one of these collectors - you know I love green. It's made of recicled sports-felt.

Well, as Charles Colton would put it, "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery". Couldn't agree more.

I also leave you an image of another floral tablecloth, for you to get inspired and start using some at home! You won't want something different from this afterwards! :)

Have a nice Sunday!

BBC 100 Books Meme

I saw this meme on my friend Ben's Facebook page and thought I'd join in. After all, I haven't done a meme in at least two years.

Although I can't see any evidence for this claim on the BBC website, the BBC apparently believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books listed here.

I have read 70 (if you count most but not all of Shakespeare's Complete Works), which is quite good but I think could be better. Shamefully, there are some great classics such as War and Peace, The Heart of Darkness, Anna Karenina and Les Miserables that I haven't read. I don't thinking that having Les Mis as my favourite musical counts, do you? As an Australian I should probably have read A Town Like Alice, but haven't read that either, although I saw the Bryan Brown miniseries as a kid.

I was pleased to see that there was only two books of which I have never heard, A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole and The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks.

Even if ths meme isn't authentic it's a lot of fun and gives bragging rights to bookworms. Why don't you join in too?

I have marked in bold the ones I have read.

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (most)
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy.
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth.
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt.
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Miss Ladybird

ladybird on one of my rosebushes

'Oh my!' said the Ladybird primly. 'What a heavenly taste!' She looked up at James, and she smiled, and James smiled back at her. They sat down on the deck together, both of them chewing away happily. 'You know, James,' the Ladybird said, 'up until this moment, I have never in my life tasted anything except those tiny little green flies that live on rosebushes. They have a perfectly delightful flavour. But this peach is even better.'

Roald Dahl, James and the Giant Peach

Cool like dat

"Great design starts with a good idea".

É assim que chegamos à loja online da Uppercase, uma revista canadiana de design. Com ilustrações e fotografia maravilhosas, a revista tem o charme vintage que tanto me encanta.

Visitem o site, onde podem ver online as últimas edições, ou naveguem no seu diário Uppercase - journal. Design all over, com edições hard cover lindíssimas. "A magazine for the creative and curious".

O meu presente de anos perfeito!

"Great design starts with a good idea".

That's what you find when you arrive at the online shop of canadian magazine Uppercase. With wonderful illustrations and beautiful photography, it has the vintage touch that I love so much.

Visit their site, where you can flip through their magazines or go to their blog Uppercase - journal. Design all over, with amazing hard cover editions. "A magazine for the creative and curious".

My perfect birthday present!

Sea Fever

Palm Cove July 2010

This post is dedicated to my mum, who used to quote 'Sea Fever' to me when I was a little girl.

Sea Fever

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

by John Masefield, 1902

Decluttering Books

Of all the things I find hard to declutter, books are the very hardest. I am deeply attached to my books.

However, we have limited space for bookcases and limited funds to pay for them, so I am going to have to donate some of my (hundreds of) books.

Our red house in Melbourne had fabulous storage. There was a wall of bookcases with cupboards underneath in the Family room and each of the kids' rooms had long built-in desks with bookshelves above. We gave most of our freestanding bookcases to friends and charities because we no longer needed them.

The house we rented for our first 18 months in Adelaide had almost no storage so most of our books lived in boxes for 18 months. We have now bought two tall bookcases for our new house but at least half the books are still in boxes.

While rationally I know that I will never read all these books again there is the chance that I might. I love knowing that my library is at hand should I think about something in a book or remember a quote and need to be able to find it. I know I could use the internet but books are just better. And they feel good. And I love my collection of old second-hand books that are filled with other people's memories as well as my own.

I now have a box of books that I am planning to give to the Salvos - if only I can bring myself to part from them.

What possessions do you find hardest to declutter or give away?

We Love to Read

After school and on weekends I often come upon scenes like this,

and this.

All my children are avid readers.

And I know where they get their love of books from - I was an extreme bookworm as a child. I carried books with me everywhere, even into the shower (cleanliness wasn't much of a priority when I was 8). I even had a book under my arm when I was drying the dishes. Chances are, if I didn't have a book with me I would be daydreaming about books.

While I am not so obsessive now, I do often read during the half hour I have for lunch at work.

Thanks to the generosity of one of the school mums who loaned it to me, I am currently reading Mao's Last Dancer, and I am loving it. I hope I get the opportunity to see the movie.

My friend will be pleased to know that I no longer take books with me into the shower.

What are you reading at the moment?

Easy Cupcakes by Colour

For months, every time I have wandered down the magazine aisle of the supermarket I have been tempted by the Australian Women's Weekly's Easy Cupcakes By Colour cookbook. Many a time have I leafed through this book without buying. That is, until today.

I couldn't hold off any longer. Spring is just around the corner and with it comes the desire to bake pretty, spring-like cupcakes. Lacking inspiration of my own, I knew this cookbook would provide ideas. And it does, in abundance.

Easy Cupcakes By Colour is divided into five chapters based on colour: pink, white, yellow, blue and green, and chocolate. There are over 100 pages of scrumptious pictures of cupcakes and descriptions of how to decorate them. Pictures of the various decorations, along with cake and frosting recipes, are at the back of the book. Included are dairy and gluten-free cupcake recipes for those with restricted diets.

Mind you, I have had very little opportunity to look at the book since I arrived home as the kids keep disappearing with it. I can see that cupcakes are going to feature heavily in next week's menu.

Let the baking begin!

Blue Sky in Winter

And they were canopied by the blue sky,

So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful,

That God alone was to be seen in Heaven.

Lord Byron, The Dream

Favourite TV Adaptation

Having spent Sunday afternoon watching period dramas whilst attacking piles of ironing, I have decided that, despite numerous excellent adaptations of books including Middlemarch and Cranford in the years since, the 1995 Jennifer Ehles and Colin Firth version of Pride and Prejudice is my favourite TV adaptation of a book, ever.

Even if P & P were not my favourite book and Jane Austen my favourite author, I think that I would still love this adaptation. I like it better than any of the film versions of Pride and Prejudice, including the recent Keira Knightley version.

Poor old Colin Firth has become typecast in Darcy-type roles ever since. I don't know what happened to Jennifer.

What is your favourite TV or film adaptation of a book? And why?

Wildred Owen on War, Anzac Day, 2009

On Anzac Day 2009, 95 years since the outbreak of World War One, it seems fitting to share the most famous poem of that war, "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfred Owen.

This poem still has the power to shock and horrify.

Dulce Et Decorum Est

by Wilfred Owen (18 March 1893 – 4 November 1918)

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots

But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And floundering like a man in fire or lime.

--Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,

--My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.

"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" is a Latin quote from Horace meaning "it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country."