Spicy cold noodles (bibim naengmyeon), made by me! With soba noodles, radish, cucumber, kimchi, and poached egg. š š°š· (recipe)
Category: Photo Post
Images and videos that I’ve taken on-the-go
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Weaving
Acquiring a new skill! This is addictive. Iām starting to regret not having enough room in my house for a floor loomā¦ āŗļø
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Bailee shorts
I need more shorts, I realised recently. Maybe I didnāt notice because I was working last summer? Anyway, itās time to make some shorts. These are the Bailee shorts from Tessuti, and I made them in leftover fabric from the tiki wiggle dress I made 8 years ago. I had just enough material, though I did have to rotate the pockets and waistband off-grain. As usual with Tessuti patterns, they were mostly great but with a couple perplexing instructions. For example, the waistband piece is a long rectangle with a fold indicator on one short side, but the cutting diagrams show the long side placed across a fold. Well, which is it? If I do that, itāll only be half as long as itās meant to be! I followed my gut and did it the way that makes sense, but it was annoying. Anyway, they turned out wearable, which was all I wanted. The fabric is quite a thick cotton – almost a stretch sateen – so they donāt really drape, and theyāre really more like Hawaiian shorts. Iāll do my next pair in a drapey linen to see how they compareā¦
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Auguste!
We had a wonderful time today catching up – for the first time in YEARS! – with my old Canva friend Auguste, her husband Sean, and their baby Lucy. We visited several fine Marrickville watering holesā¦ š»
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Sydney Festival complete!
We finished our Sydney Festival experience for 2025 tonight at the volunteersā party down at the Thirsty Mile. The Festival team put on food and drinks for us, and the CEO thanked everyone for all their hard work. We got to meet the new incoming Festival Director Kris Nelson, and we even got special certificates! This was a really fun experience, and Iām glad we were able to do it.
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Vigil: Gunyah
We had our final Sydney Festival volunteering shift today down at Barangaroo Reserve. We supported the āCaring for Spiritā talk as part of the Vigil: Gunyah series of First Nations events. It was very inspiring to hear from three smart, passionate Aboriginal women about how they support each other and their communities, and how they maintain their fire in spite of setbacks. (Very relevant to the world right now!)
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Sinkhole
Apparently a Hellmouth has opened on Grafton Street in Chippendale. That seems appropriate for this week.
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Homewares
I was excited yesterday to find at a Mittagong antique shop a set of 6 placemats depicting artworks from the famous Australian artist Tom Roberts. Mr. Snook was similarly excited to find a red metal EAT napkin holder for $2 at the Vinnies. šā¤ļø
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Mittagong and Bowral
We recently learned about Rail Discovery Passes, which allow you unlimited travel on NSW regional trains, as well as extending all the way to Brisbane and Melbourne. This suits our goal of doing more regional travel in 2025, so we recently bought six-month passes. Today we used them for the first time, catching a very early train from Sydney and riding 90 minutes to Mittagong in the Southern Highlands.
We started the day by grabbing some coffee and heading to Lake Alexandra. We patted dogs, looked for turtles, and learned about the history of the Fitzroy Iron Works.
The park has a fun playground too.
We spent an hour or two shopping in town, and I got a couple skeins of wool from Victoria House. Our real destination though – and the original motivation for the trip – was Paste Australia. This award-winning Thai restaurant is run by a Michelin-starred chef who relocated from Bangkok to Mittagong, and weād heard great things about it.
We had a booking for noon, and it turns out we were the only people there! Other dates were booked out, so I think the cool, rainy weather kept people away. We had the set lunch and chose to start with the grilled eggplant saladā¦
ā¦along with the roasted duck with rice crackers.
For mains, we had Jeen Juan chicken curryā¦
ā¦and the restaurantās speciality, Sator Pad Goong, with prawns, pork, and āThai cluster beans.ā
The set lunch also came with green beans (with garlic and chilli) and rice.
Everything was delicious, and of course, the service was phenomenal since we were the only ones there! Well worth the special trip.
After lunch, we went for a wander over to Eden Brewery and sampled some of their brews. Cool place.
The weather had turned seriously windy, cold, and rainy, so we called an Uber and headed to nearby Bowral. We had several hours until our return train, so we joined every pensioner in Bowral for a showing of Conclave at the New Empire Cinema.
After the film – which is fantastic – we did some window shopping along Bong Bong street. Hey, thatās right, Don Bradman is from here!
And then it was time to head home! Our train was a little delayed so we watched the darkening sky from the platform.
From Michelin-starred lunch to a meat pie on the train. Classy Ā š
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Colour Maze Redux
Another shift at the Colour Maze! Today I was in the swinging ball room, making sure that kids didnāt brain themselves too hard or strangle themselves in the nearby rope room.
