Catfacehorse

Once again, I am participating in Meet me at Mikes Words and Pictures write-along.

As a kid, I loved making little things. Little loaves of bread from cut up corks, little painted pictures for the walls of my doll house (made for us by my dad - a square house for me, a triangular one for my sister). I also made lots of little books - one was entitled ‘Rid the Flat’, and was about a world-travelling cat called Rid, who meets with an unfortunate end. This booklet is sadly in Tasmania at my parents house still, so will have to be shared another day. I did find another booklet however - the slightly less imaginatively titled ‘Holiday Booklet’.

Click through to view on Flickr, I have put in little notes about the story.

When Meet me at Mikes had an open invitation to share stories about school lunches, I thought I would join in too. There are so many gorgeous, hilarious stories, if you can, you should read every one. A few of my favourites are Pip’s of Meet me at Mikes, Claire’s of Loobylu, and Nanette’s of Rummage.

For several years, when I was too little to make my own lunch, my mum had me on a really healthy diet. When the other kids in my class had white bread sandwiches in clingwrap, I had soda bread in greaseproof paper. Where they had Tiny Teddies and Le Snaks, I had banana chips or carob. I would dread the sound of ‘eeeeuw, what’s that?’ as the other kids would peer into my lunch box. I craved Tiny Teddies, but I didn’t have anything that I could reasonably get anyone else to eat to swap for those precious little biscuits.

Once every eternity though, I was allowed a ‘lunch order’. The lunch order was a white paper bag printed with the canteen menu on the, with boxes to tick. I would put my coins in the bag, and off the bag would go with the lunch monitor. (Like Pip, I never knew what happened then - it was a deeply mysterious process.) The bags would come back filled at lunch time, change rolling around in the bottom.  I remember eating my  party pie and sausage roll on the deck outside the class room - every single time dropping my straw between the slats so I had to drink my lime flavoured mineral water straight from the can.

Now,  I would love soda bread for lunch but I rarely get around to cooking it. I am so impressed that I had these lunches made from scratch for me every day - thanks Mum!

On Saturday, I put aside the day to paint while Owen went out on a photo walk (a walk to take photos). I had the house to myself, some new art materials and nothing to distract me. Only problem was, I had nothing new to paint.

On the way back from a delicious brekkie at Gingerlee on Lygon St I spotted a garage sale. I had a good look through for something interesting to draw, when out popped a selection of tools. Gorgeous, rusty metal tools. (I had no idea what these tools were called.) Of course I felt like a complete idiot when I asked how much the, um, …tools were. Especially when I discovered that with only 60 cents in my wallet, the princely sum of $4 for all four tools was out of my price range. I went to the ATM and came back to purchase my treasures. I painted all day, and even had a play with some new acrylic paints. I had to buy brushes specially, as I discovered the hard way that acrylic paint destroys sable brushes. (Though I lost only one, and it was pretty old). Hopefully I can make it a bit of a weekend habit - it is so much easier to focus with a few hours up your sleeve.