Phoebe's birthday and stuff

Hello peeps!

Well yesterday was Phoebe's birthday as many of you will know. Here's a few pics as promised.

She was awake at 5.30am of course, and rather sneakily I'd fallen asleep in the spare room, so I had a lie in until she was un-containable at around 7am.

So, here she is opening some of her doll's house stuff from Gilly, Bill and Holly,

...her dress from Gannie and Grandpa,

one of the shirts from Molly....

and an outfit from Joe, Sarah, Sam and Eddie.

Later, as if she hadn't had enough, we went off to the shops to buy some stuff with the money that Carlene had given her. She bought this hat, some sunnies and a little handbag, all coordinated with her blue stripey dress and shoes from Joe and Sarah.

Here's Phoebe showing us how it's done...

Matilda couldn't figure it out....

we thought she should try... but she didn't get it as you can see!

Nor (really) did Daile....

so... I felt I just HAD to show them how you're supposed to do it! I'm the best at it don't you think?

Been speaking to Molly this week about her first week at Falmouth Art College. Woohoo!

She's going well, and has been stacked up with lots of really interesting sounding tasks. The people in her shared house are apparently good value too, so that's a bonus. We really miss Molly and Josh. Phoebe's been in training for 'Australia's got talent' and she's been practicing with some of Molly's songs that we've got on our computer, plus one called 'broken record' that she put onto myspace a few years ago.

Thought you might like to see some stuff that I cut out fairly recently. Some stuff for a lovely bloke that makes accordions and banjos and some chairs/stools/tables that slot together for a Japanese architectural company in the West End. This was one of three 8' x 4' sheets worth.

An enigmatic pic of the Feeb...

an embarrassed one of the Tild holding her robotics trophy...

...note she's wearing her 'escape from the wilderness' home made parachute chord bracelet. This is stuff we had specially flown over from Perth!

Since then of course, she's broken her arm (see pics above) falling off the rope bridge from the tree house to the platform on an adjacent tree. She's never fallen off anything before, so I'm under some moral pressure about the bridge... I personally reckon that you've got to let kids fall off stuff, trip up, bloody up now and again, to learn.

It's starting to be a bit hotter now and the flies are coming here and there... so I've dug out my new tennis racket fly swatter. I had one of these in the UK but get this... it was confiscated at customs on the way in. We were all bemused. Presumably it was because they thought the dead flies would be carrying mad cow disease or something. Did I ever mention that I went to give some blood last year? I was walking down the street in central Brisbane and I saw a sign for it, so I thought I would you know... public spirited person that I am. They gave me a form, i filled it in and handed it over, to be told very curtly that they didn't want MY blood! I asked why, indignantly, to be told it was because I was British! I ask you! Bloody convicts! Ha ha. Seriously though, it was because of mad cow! Makes you wonder doesn't it!

Anyway, this one's better, it's got a torch on it?!

Daile's not here... she's at work. Always at work these days. Poor girl. Don't know how she's keeping going.

Snake and Mouse movie...

Remember back along, I mentioned about a robot that Matilda was making with her mates, http://livingwithshackledraggers.blogspot.com/2011/06/early-rising-and-robotic-snake.html well finally, here's a little movie that shows the snake and mouse in action a few weeks ago. It's quite a tense moment when the mouse gets away...

The requirement in this category is that the robots perform a 'story' over set period of time. We see the mouse shaking in fear, and the snake looming in for the kill. The mouse is supposed to be frozen in indecision. If any of the team have to step onto the 'dance floor' they lose points. They lose points for things being made by the teacher or by parents, so this is entirely by the kids, even down to the choice of music. (The gunfight from Appalachian Spring)



The team are going on to compete in the nationals in Hobart the weekend of the 24th. Should be interesting to go to Hobart at the least. They've been working on another mouse on the sidelines and a collapsible tree for transportation. We're all very chuffed they've got that opportunity...

RIP IT UP!!!!... but make sure you rip neatly along these lines...

There’s something really odd about the Queensland male, especially the young ones. They have a really prominent ‘maleness’ about them, the things that they are expected to be savvy to, and the predictable ways that they will tend to behave, but it’s hollow. On the one hand, they conform to the normal ‘devil may care’ attitude that is characteristic of the young male the world over, and on the other, they have a pathological rule following mentality that has somehow been hardwired into their psyche’s. The result is quite comical sometimes, and I find myself frustrated by young boys in low set gas guzzler saloons with wide wheels, grunty sounding engines and the all important ‘wide’ exhaust add on that renders the end of their exhaust pipes the diameter of an apple, jostling to get in front of you at the lights, and making a big fuss about being ‘first’ only to stop accelerating precisely on the cusp of 60kmph.
Having come from the land of rioting for flat screen TV’s, my own predilection for rebellious behaviour runs deeper than 60 (even now)… not that I’m advocating speeding, but at that age, I was taking some serious risks. My point is that the behaviour is ‘odd’ to me. Either they’re rebels (on a path that is dictated by they’re genes and age) or they’re not, or they’re (apparently) confused. I suppose that in terms of a conforming society, it’s better to have the latter two rather than the former since it’s hard to find anyone that likes having large egos with small pudenda spoiling their enjoyment of a Sunday afternoon stroll through the park, but as a person that hasn’t had a bowel for over 20 years, I feel compelled, and uniquely placed to call this early onset anal retention. This is the time that rules are broken, and they don’t do it.

I saw something go past the other day, think it may have been something in one of Daile’s psychology mags that said that creativity is a result of a rule breaking mentality, and that Chinese authorities have identified limitations to the kind of innovation that China is capable of, based in concerns that most Chinese are ardent rule followers. This makes a lot of sense to me, and I reckon it’s the same here… but we don’t acknowledge it. On the SURFACE of Queensland society, there is a ‘rip it up and sod the consequences’ rhetoric, championed by the media, subscribed to by the masses. Under the surface however, the vast majority are died in the wool conservative rule followers (and by proxy rule enforcers). For the most part I can live with it, but when it all boils down to it, I MISS that about the UK more than I miss anything else. (Folks aside of course!) Whilst the UK is also horrendously constrained by bureaucrats, there are nacelles of creative minds that are everywhere. A book that my Mum and Dad bought me recently, about creativity and the propagation thereof discusses this. For creative minds to reach full potential, they need to be amongst their own kind. It’s a bit of a worry for the girls… who are creative but young enough to have it squashed out.

Wotto...

I spoke to josh recently on skype and he sent me a couple of pics of his graduation. I feel very grown up... it's one thing to graduate yourself, but to have your son graduate is quite another thing altogether. We're very proud. Here he is...second from right.



and here with his mortarboard on backwards, there's some strange thing going on here... 4 out of 5 graduates like to wear their hats backwards. It's a kind of academic version of the red neck cap on backwards thing I guess? Doooooowde!





..and as one officially finishes this lovely period of life, another begins. Molly starts art college in September. Nearly there Ali! Just think, could be a Grandma soon!

Last weekend we went off to 'Unbelievably Expensive Climbing and Outdoor Gear' otherwise known as Anaconda. Matilda was nagging... and Phoebe and I had to just comply. She was hankering after ANOTHER knife...for her collection. She paced up and down the knife section, really wanting one that was more than she had, and almost buying one that wasn't worth the money. In the end I managed to talk her out of it, and she went for a go on their climbing wall instead. This turned out to be an excellent idea because she won a couple of those nice aluminium drinking bottles with a karibina on the lid. One for her and one for Phoebe. It was coincidental because I'd been looking for these for a couple of weeks as we're approaching the time of the year where we really like the girls to take water into school.



After we'd left there we went to the fabric shop for Phoebe. She wanted to buy some fabric for a dress, and after another extended period of pacing up and down, she decided that she'd buy some black stuff for $4.50 a metre. When we got back home she went straight for the scissors and wanted to cut... I said 'nar hold up there just a dang moment young missy' or words to that effect. I explained that we'd need to design it, and make a pattern etc.... and this are her drawings...





sewing on the buttons....



and TAD DAR!



This weekend, I'm trying to have a little time for me. I just have to show you this from Molly for my birthday... you'll have to click on the image to get it up large enough to read the detail, and even then it's still small. It's got lots of stuff about things that are special to me, and I was really touched, it must have taken ages!



Finally, you remember the videos that the little girls did recently, well here's an animation that I found on the web... and it's about the big bang. Talk about major subject...! It's the big bang for people who find Hawking a bit monotone.. ha ha. No really it's an epic and worth a look.

The tradgedy of modern discontent...

Phoebe and I have recently begun reading ‘Farmer Boy’, a book written by Laura Ingles Wilder about the childhood of her husband Almanzo. It’s charming, set in the 1860’s and like all the Little House on the Prairie books, is based on real events and deals with the day to day functioning of the family and the interplay of the members. Reading about the processes that they used to engage in to survive and prosper in those days makes me feel like I’m displaced in this age.
Relative to the Ingles, the Wilder family were financially well to do, but the overriding message that comes across is the importance of solid family support structures, systems, principles and roles. Underpinning their resilient and spiritually rich lives are loving and respectful behaviours, in turn supported by rules and expectations of the children’s conduct and adopted values enabling a strong sense of self worth, place, heritage and privilege.
Daile and I yearn for these simple way points in our lives, and those of all the kids. Obviously I’m long enough in the tooth to know that things are not all good, or all bad, but I wish that I could have been alive in those days, when time was measured in seasons and natural rhythms rather than hours and minutes, when parsimony was valued above economic output, when generalists were valued as much as specialists, and when dare I say it, there was at least in principle the concept of honourable behaviour over profitable behaviour. Corporations were not yet in full swing, being a recent invention on the back of the industrial revolution, and wouldn’t get ‘personhood’ for another 20 years in the states. Principles held sway over profit and those who dealt dishonestly were pariah’s rather than pillars of society. Having said that, it was in 1865 that the thirteenth amendment was ratified in the US and slavery was finally abolished during Lincoln’s tenure after the Southern States seceded from the union on the threat of it, resulting in the civil war and over half a million deaths. It’s hard to imagine these days that the President was a man of principle first and an adroit politician second. When was the last time they had one of those?
I would love for some of the old concepts of thrift and utility to be more venerated in our modern society, so that craft and being in touch with natural materials and working with the land rather than against it were understood and supported philosophical positions. We need to achieve a harmonious or at least a less discordant relationship with the environment that supports us, and still has to support our kids and their families.

Those who appreciate this are left with the displaced hollow feeling that I have when they read of times gone where it was still possible to avoid the corrosive blandishments of an entire culture hell bent on retailing everything under the sun as if everything under the sun had a price and someone to buy it.
By the time most of our kids are in their teens they will have fully internalised the idea that they are not expected to actually produce anything themselves, but find satisfaction in the products of industrial society – even scoffing at anything homemade. They will almost universally think that fun is synonymous with alcohol and consumption in general, that they should be satisfied with a passive life and a minimum level of personal significance or sense of self, (with corresponding rises in teen neurosis). By the time they are ‘useful members of society’ they will see our natural heritage in terms of ‘productivity’, ‘yield’ and ‘economic value’, will view those who sit on the periphery of mainstream thinking as ‘weird’ and those who don’t aspire towards the trappings of industrial society as mildly amusing eccentrics.

By the time they reach middle management positions those views will have hardened in many, so that they will not feel (or at least will be numb to feelings) any guilt in ‘flicking’ (firing) an honest man because he’s not motivated to bust his guts in a soulless job that has no meaning other than a means to pay for the food and shelter that he can no longer extract for himself through husbandry of the land that we all inherited.

Ah, I know it’s not all bad, but it’s hard to read books like that, and not hanker for the simplicity and raw life giving and taking hardships that made you or broke you against nature itself, rather than the sucker punch of marketing machines the size of small countries.

It’s not that long ago after all that we were all living off the land, and it was that way for millennia. I guess it’s not surprising that the yearning for it seems so natural, it’s genetic programming. It’s in your genes, not your jeans.