Wendy's garden

We got going early on Saturday after two rainy, cold days in Sydney and found a good (free) park in Lavender Bay. We walked east along Lavender St admiring the view.......

This gentleman's reverie between the palms in Clark Park drew me in.

I walked to the edge of the grassed area and found little pathways inviting me into a much wilder area of garden.....then more pathways and winding rustic steps......then little clearings with picturesque mould covered seats, tables and quirky sculptures...opening up to....what had to be a Brett Whiteley carved wood sculpture.

Then looking up, we saw Brett's and Wendy's Lavender Bay house and realised we were in the garden Wendy has created over the past decade or so..........

WENDY WHITELEY: I'm obsessive about it. It was all landfill originally, for the railway line, and subsequently over 50, 60, 70 years, it was dumped, a lot of rubbish and weeds, old fridges and bits of metal and broken bottles and plastic bags full of clothes, and it was just impenetrable and quite dangerous. And I just started at one end and I've now gone right to the other end and it's still all railway land, but, you know, it's now got a garden. Bit of engineering skills have come into it too, from...must have inherited it.

The garden, the studio, friendships, somebody's life, are all those things that keep you going. I don't feel any great urge to actually paint again. I want to just go and be the mad old bag lady in the garden. I love the fact that Arkie participated in it a bit and loved it. Sometimes I suddenly realise I'm talking about her or Brett or anybody else in my life as though they're still alive. And in a way they still are. And then you realise that they're not there anymore, except in your memory. Or in your bones. In Arkie's case, she'll always be there. And in Brett's case, he'll always be there in part of me. You know? But in her case particularly.

Outside the side door (next to the turret) was a blue and white pale wood handled umbrella. Everything looked neat, ordered and architectural. The house was a symphony of perfectly maintained and freshly painted white.

At the bottom of the Walker St steps - no road - just steps - we saw the wooden pier, stretching out into the harbour, a favourite subject of so many of Brett's beautiful Lavender Bay paintings.

Eventually we remembered we'd actually come to visit the Kirribilli Markets: full marks for the setting but quite dreary with its focus on tacky wardrobe clear outs for the fashionable young set on the inner north shore.

We know that K Rudd does weekend quality time with young Marcus around here when he is in Sydney. Was this K Rudd in disguise?

In heavy rain we checked out the Italian eateries in Haberfield on Thursday - saw Helene Chung (SBS) sitting in the sublime Sulfaro Pasticceria Italiana drinking a solitary coffee and no doubt thinking about the release of her memoir of growing up in Hobart in the 50's: "Ching Chong Ching Girl".

We didn't eat in Haberfield, preferring to head over to Drummoyne for some couscous at La Kasbah in Victoria Rd. We're still hoping to find the "La Graine et le Mulet" (The Secret of the Grain), but no luck yet!

Still raining, and cold as well, we explored Eastwood on Friday - a bit like suburban Hong Kong but without the mayhem. We decided not to go Chinese and chose Korean instead for lunch: Insadong. It was an amazing meal and we loved it.

Dear Mr Rudd

We know Ignatious Blanchett-Upton did his best to represent the "Teens in 2020" group at this weekend's summit but we hope he didn't miss out on expressing the "big ideas" of this group of his constituents:

More bananas, bananas, bananas, bananas, bananas, bananas......

We need a girl for President (of our Australian Republic, by 2020).

Everybody (but especially kids) needs to paint, draw, dance, sing and make music.

Autumn is creating ever changing colour waves in our garden, and there's been no wind or rain to blow the leaves to the ground.

Rob & I missed the big 2020 Summit weekend, visiting Coogee instead where it was cool and showery. We checked out Oxford St Paddington on Saturday: the Markets at the historical Paddington Uniting Church, coffee and panini at Love Supreme & Sourdough Sisters Bakery, and window shopping Sass & Bide, Scanlon & Theodore, Dotti, Joshua and Sean, Sweet Art and all the other big names along Oxford St.

We found "The Secret of the Grain" was showing at the old but hip Verona Cinema and spent an enthralling (nearly three hours) absolutely immersed in this wonderful French film about a family of Tunisian immigrants and "the couscous" (this is an extreme summary)!


We were so moved we had to stop off at Little Istanbul (up at the Spot) later that night for Middle Eastern food. Although we found the food wonderful there was no mullet couscous nor any sighting of the wondrous Rym (Hafsia Herzi) and her amazing, life saving belly dance.

Amazing sights this week

I was amazed to be greeted by this, parked right up to close to me, when I returned to the car after getting my hair done at Griffith on Thursday. The alpaca's hair looked better than mine did!
This morning we woke to the sound of rain falling. It cleared quickly but washed all the dust off the claret ash - still looking OK in Autumn after six(?) years of drought.

And the Manchurian Pears next door are just looking wonderful this week.

But most amazing of all was watching Miss E in full flight for the first time, walking the length of the kitchen, laughing delightedly in her new black Mary Janes (with a bow).

She had just finished a huge meal of Turkish pide (mushroom filled), pumpkin, potato and banana. Unfortunately some of the contents of her water bottle ended up down the front of her trendy grey marle top from London.

So Pho so good

We found this great restaurant byline at An's (Vietnamese) in Greenfield Pde Bankstown yesterday. It may also finally teach me how to pronounce this delicious dish (and An's rare beef noodle pho was truly delicious).

We trawled around the Bondi Markets for the first time this morning after killing our extra end of daylight saving hour at our fave Gertrude and Alice in Hall St.

I loved Nth Bondi PS (site of the markets); only 270 pupils learning how to learn opposite the beach on the most expensive real estate strip on the eastern seaboard (the school was built for over 800 kids apparently).

The markets disappointed me: a mixture of Asian imported bling and beach bohemia mixed in with some pretty twee looking local fashion. We much prefer the urban flea market edge of the Rozelle & Glebe markets.

Sabbaba was quiet at lunch today. The end of daylight saving has confused everybody. To end off our foodie weekend in Sydney we found our first artisan baker on the corner of Warners & Glenayr Avenues in Nth Bondi and celebrated by buying a $10 loaf of bread.

Miss E attended her first wedding this weekend and had a ball apparently. She took her first (little) steps unassisted this week. We saw her in action on Thursday night.

The Nannablogger

Ollie's own camera work shows the nannablogger in full flight. This is how Miss E mostly sees me, with a big black glass and plastic thing attached to my face.

She's never stopped smiling though, despite the scary nanna apparition waiting for her every move.


Miss E returned from her weekend down the coast this afternoon, in time for a big afternoon tea of leftovers (frittata & banana muffins) before taking Nellie the beagle back home.

Nellie had a great weekend here checking off her list of favourite things to do. The long walk to the Woden Farmer's Market on Sunday morning is especially good but so is finding all the ancient bones from 100 years ago in our garden.

We enjoyed cool clear Autumn weather this weekend, the leaves are changing colour and we can start to hear the distinctive Autumn bird sounds. We bought the last of the local plums at the farmers market this morning + some sun dried versions. After a guided tasting we also developed an instant passion for the local Lowanna's Paddock olive oil and have been dipping into it all day with slices of freshly baked Dom's Italian olive bread.

Quite a bit of real estate movement around us at the moment. the house over the road is up for auction next month after its four year long makeover. Will the interest rate rises affect interest in this market?

I am the spokesperson for the new ACT Public Education Alliance (comprised of the local teachers' union, the ACT Principals Association, P&C Council, the Preschool Association and the Save our Schools Committee). The Alliance was launched last week and a little bit of media interest was generated. The interest was at quite a shallow level however. They just want to know which politicians we want to support and which are in our bad books (it is an election year this year in the ACT)!

The Easter story

Our family's take on Easter is a tricky one. We're all agnostics so we don't get into the Christian rituals; none of us like crass commercialism so we don't do the Easter Bunny (or even Bilby thing) either. We're all into sustainability, limiting our carbon footprints and getting into whole foods, minimising refined sugar and processed food etc......... which means making up our family's Easter story is a challenge.

We started at Weston Park, the only place left in Canberra with green grass - great to roll around on.
Rob & A. tried to ascertain where the choo choo train was, in the case a ride might eventuate later.

Little A. learnt how to kick a soccer ball with the big boys.

Big O talked to the swans about our Easter dilemma.

Miss E weighed up whether she would feed the swans her piece of Great-Granny's coconut cake or eat it herself. She wisely decided to eat it herself.

One last kick before the Easter egg hunt.

By following the green string lines - woven all through the gum trees, the boys found glittery, pretty, pastel coloured, non edible eggs. It was quite an exciting process 'cos the string actually made it quite dangerous for the boys to navigate and not trip over, and at one stage the circulation to big O's hand was placed at risk by having the string so tightly wound around his wrist.

Little A found yellow ones which was lucky 'cos that is one of the words in his rapidly expanding vocabulary.

Miss E thought her pretty pink glittery one was rather entrancing (better than her dummy!).

Luckily, at the end of the hunt big O found the real deal - the proper chocolate version (all natural ingredients).

Miss Ella doesn't know about chocolate yet and was thrilled with the growing number of Autumn leaves in the park.

And walking around and around with her favourite Mummy.

Tetsuya and Archibald

This was our long anticipated "Tetsuya's weekend": celebrating Judy L.'s birthday at one of the top five restaurants in the world (according to London's Restaurant Guide), right here in Kent St Sydney, the most unlikely end of the city to find this exquisite, perfectly proportioned, Japanese style pavillion building surrounded by zen like gardens.

12 courses in the degustation menu, thirteen if you include the Pacific oysters from Tasmania, each prepared and presented with exquisite balance and refinement, with Japanese references obvious in each course.

Tetsuya’s signature dish was our favourite: confit of ocean trout served with unpasteurised ocean trout roe, daikon & fennel, but the double cooked de-boned spatchcock with olive & caper jus was an amazing dish too. I found the grilled wagyu beef with lime and wasabi delicious, but extremely rich.

We shared the degustation wine list between two people, which was just as well as 9 glasses of wine (each only a bit smaller than a standard glass) would have had as all under the table. Having the Fischer's there to guide us through the aromas and the layers of flavours made it a very rich experience. The Margaret River Merlot was our favourite.

We fitted in a visit to the 08 Archibald Prize Exhibition (& the Wynne & Sulman) at the Art Gallery of NSW this weekend too. Its always a fun experience to see the Archibald entries and pass comment on the judges' choice and marvel at and/or turn our noses up at the work of the up and coming and/or established portrait painters. Our pick was the Jon Farriss (from INXS) portrait - and a thumbs down for the winner "You are what is most beautiful about me".

The L's & Fischer's stayed five star at the Meriton World Towers Hotel with the stunning full length glass window city views and we stayed 2 star(?) at 8/85. The morning walks at Coogee are 5 star however, as is the general ambience.

Once again we were able to catch up with J&J and Miss E on our return to Canberra. Miss E enjoyed the organic crackers and Baba Hummus we brought her home from Maloney's Grocer at Coogee. I was lucky to capture her doing her new yoga pose on the floor: "the downward facing dog". Jody says she does it when she is tired of standing up. I used to hate this pose in my yoga days, but Miss E looks like she can do it with ease!