KENDALL Koala loves to travel. She packs light carrying only a fresh supply of gum leaves and, for rugged environments, her gumboots.

She's happy enough travelling solo but what she'd really like is a bunch of travelling companions. She'll be travelling to Nepal in August and would like many, many koala friends to join her there.

IN MARCH:

I WENT TO… Brisbane for a work trip that was extended to see family and friends. It was lovely to see a beautiful friend who (though I can hardly believe it) I've known for 20 years now. I met Louise in my first real job following study to become a journalist and we've followed each other through life's ups and downs, jaunts living overseas and the peculiarities of facing our middle years. She's big of heart, wild of idea and equal measure cautious and curious by nature. She's exactly the kind of person you need to have in your life and I hope she's around for 20-plus years more.


Over the Easter holiday long weekend, the Mrs and I also did a day trip to Blue Mountains Botanic Garden, at Mount Tomah, via Brooklyn on the Hawkesbury River. We headed off with a plan to breakfast at The Brooklyn Tuckshop and lunch at the one-hat Sean Moran-led cafe-restaurant of the garden.

Many moons ago, I lived on the Bells Line of Road and passed the gardens regularly but had only been in once before. As the gardens are an easy day-trip from Sydney, and my home of the Central Coast, it seemed a perfectly lovely thing to do on a sunny autumn day - and it was.

I ATE… With so many trips away from home and a long weekend, to boot, the opportunities to eat out were plentiful. My favourites are always the locals. LiKEMiNDS is a favourite coffee hang and does a great breakfast and lunch. I also discovered Gosford's The Craft Bar: a venue I'll be making my way back to with friends. The Brooklyn Tuckshop was well worth the jaunt off the coast; and out of Sydney if you're looking for a weekend train ride or day trip north.

My partner and I had high expectations of the Sean Moran restaurant at the Blue Mountains Botanic Gardens. We'd booked a week in advance and were rewarded with a balcony seat overlooking the gardens.

However, our table was out of sight of the short-staffed venue and we had to call over staff to take our orders, clear plates and eventually when we couldn't attract attention to order a coffee and dessert we bailed and headed back down the Bells Line of Road to Bilpin for a roadhouse apple pie and coffee. The food was fair and simple - roasted chicken and veg and a home-made pasta with roasted tomatoes and parmesan- but, in short, it's not a meal I'd recommend the amazing taste, great service or finesse of.

I am no food reviewer, but if pushed I'd be left to rate the company and the view. Visit the garden by all means, but pack a picnic. We saw a good many families who'd done just that and those picnic spreads looked awfully tasty.

I OP SHOPPED… While in Brisbane I spent two days in workshops in a suburb about 30 minutes out of the CBD. During my lunch breaks I made a beeline to two op shops I'd spied from the bus on my way in. Neither looked likely to turn up any impressive finds but I had a lunch break to kill. How wrong could I be. In one I found, for a mere $5, a two-piece silk suit from the late 1950s early '60s. Even on the hanger I could see it needed love and care, and more so since I've washed it but it's in the mending basket waiitng to see what can be salvaged.

To match it, I found this Hong Kong-made bamboo handbag for $10 much closer to home.

I MADE… A new summer top. I know it's autumn, but I have actually been able to wear this in the last week because it's really a knitted cotton singlet overlaid with an open-backed tank - both of which have been made out of thrift shop finds. I'll share the finished item in a coming blog post.

I READ… I read Kim Mahood's Craft for a Dry Lake and William Boyd's Sweet Caress: The Many Lives of Amory Clay. I loved Amory. I wanted her to be a real person and imagine somewhere out there is a woman who really did live this fabulous life. Mahood's voice too is one I want to know more. Her story is real and she paints a vivid, yet nostalgic, portrait of her father and of the places he inhabited and people he endured these places with.

#images: views from the Blue Mountains Botanic Garden at Mount Tomah.

IT'S TRUE. I was in New York in April and it’s now December, which is an unseemly amount of time to be recounting travel adventures, but bear with me, New York’s been on my mind again.

Why?

For one, it was about this time last year that - after registering for every airline’s email newsletter - that the right deal lobbed and we booked our trip, saving almost half the budgeted cost of the trip on a great flight and hotel deal.

Another reason New York’s been on my mind is because a dear friend and work buddy is about to set off on a career and life adventure, moving to the Big Apple in a week to take up a contract she’s had her eye on for months, and won. She’s the perfect example of fortune favours the bold and much as I’d love to stash travel guides, wooly jumpers and oodles of Cadbury’s chocolate in her luggage I know she has to pack light for this adventure and move everything else into storage. So, my gift to my dear friend, and whoever stumbles across these pages, is this letter chronicling my own fledgling New York experiences.


Dear Aimee,

OMG! This is gunna be like walking onto the set of Sesame Street and hoping Big Bird says hello when you eventually do bump into him (because how can you miss him - or her - he’s a BIG bird).

This is my katiecrackernuts introductory guide to New York and because you’ll have so much more time, I expect every hidey hole you uncover to be documented for those of us living vicariously through you. In return I’ll send photos of my garden, small wee grandkidlets (photos, not the actual kidlets) and musings on life by way of regular letters and emails. Deal?

OK. Where to start? Where I always start. Food markets. When I was there - in spring - people were picking over beautiful looking fruit and veg in the street, under awnings, chatting or calling out hellos to people passing by. I dunno, but for a big city it felt small, like people knew each other and knew the street’s routines. I liked that. I loved watching the people. Kids with their nannies, the basketball games in the neighbourhood parks, the people on street benches chatting and catching up. People weren’t always glued to their phones and if they were they were, they were talking into them, not absently looking at them (except for that lady below, but she has ace hair, so we'll let her slide).

GROCERS
Trader Joe’s 
Time Out New York’s guide to the best grocers 



You’re talking about living in Brooklyn too. Two words. Community gardens. Get on that. I awkwardly loitered around a couple of them. There were little pockets of people growing stuff everywhere and, again, in spring, so many tulips and spring blossoms. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden has a weird Japanese Anime weekend. I cracked the shits that day, I’m not too proud to admit. Don’t go that day. I am guessing you will crack the shits too. Go on another day and tell me all about it. I have a collection of the gardens’ botanical guides from the 1970s. They’ve been updated and are still in print. And there’s historic links to botanical science, botanical drawing and awesome women doing awesome stuff. #girlgang

NEW YORK GARDENS
Grow NYC
Gothamist’s guide to the best community gardens in New York City
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Central Park (or Cath's video on the park)


You’re gunna dig the art. There is public art everywhere and it’s all dedicated to someone or funded by some generous philanthropic benefactor. I don’t think people there spend a lot of time looking at the squirrels cast into fence posts, or listening to the amazing buskers in the tunnels and undercover walkways of Central Park, but I did. It might be too cold for that kind of thing when you arrive, but you’ll have it to look forward to. While it’s cold though, you can check out the museums. Oh Lord. So much. Too much. You’re lucky, you’ll have time to go back and take it all in. My brain couldn’t handle it. Degas’ bronze dancers, Van Goghs, Gauguins in all their rich glory - so many of my favourites and I’ll bet your favourites too. That bust up yonder there is by Picasso. I know, right. Just there, with Cath swanning about pretending to be all arty in the background. Seriously, why was she just not staring at the Picassos?

ART. LOTS OF ART
The Metropolitan Museum of Art 
(Pick up the kid-friendly map. It’s hanging in my kitchen. I love it, and it’s free.)
The Guggenheim 
(Eat here. A quiet, white, calm oasis that looks more expensive than it is.)
American Folk Art Museum 
(Didn’t make it here. You’ll have to go and tell me about it.)


Actually, now that I think about it, Cath has photos of me being all nonchalant around the dinosaurs at the American Museum of Natural History. I wasn’t being nonchalent, I swear, I was thinking back to telltale signs in Jurassic Park, all ready to yell “RUN!”, hide behind a cupboard and control my shaking and breathing. It’s true, dinos are not my thing, but I loved the 1950s and 60s diaoramas (taking photos of the explanatory graphics, of all things) and wanted to live in the Margaret Mead wing. That place is amazing. We planned to spend a whole day there and we could have spent many more. We waltzed in when it opened, all like, ‘we’ll just spend a few hours here’, and had to do a last-minute dash to the gift shop as alarms started to sound to rustle up the stragglers. Don’t skimp on this one. In fact, if you were Cath and living in New York, you'd just take out a membership and go there every weekend. Up to you.

THE MOTHER OF ALL MUSEUMS
American Museum of Natural History 
(It has a Christmas tree of origami animals. Can you take a rare Aimee selfie of yourself in front of it?)


You’ll probably miss coffee. You think you’re not going to, but you will. I hadn’t had a decent coffee through the long flight and for the first day we were in the city - probably three days all up - so first chance of someone offering me a coffee I said yes. Wrong. Say no. You’ll be in a diner, all confused and jet lagged, and a man with an apron, notebook and super fast manner will have just steered you to a booth and sat you down. He’ll say “cor-fay”. You’ll be desperate, but now that I’ve warned you, you will say no. Ask for an orange juice. Say it like this: “Aww-raan-jh”. If you don’t, the coffee will be drip filter and taste like the worst version of Mocconna you’ve ever had. Now, you’ll also need to know how to order breakfast. A diner will take whatever order you have at any time of the day, but be specific. If you want poached eggs on your toast, ask for this: “two slices of toast, uncut, buttered, with a poached egg placed on each piece of toast, with salt and pepper on the side”. Actually, I can’t even guarantee that will do it, but don’t assume that what you order is what you’ll get, unless you’re very specific. I started eavesdropping on people’s orders to get a feel for what people ate and people would order salads like they were offering up project briefs for photographic flat lays. And, it was all written down, and it arrived just as they asked. Listen and learn.

So, because you’re going to miss coffee, and probably avocado on toast, my go-to became the European-style cafes. I know, defeats the purpose, but a girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do. Also, walk into cafes and make sure they have an espresso machine. Leave if they don’t. No. Seriously. Leave. I actually became quite good at sniffing out coffee. There comes a point, early in your stay, where you can smell it a block away.

Street food like quesadillas, enchiladas, and burritos are good. I was partial to the kebab stands. Falafels were delicious and cheap and chock full of salad. Again, unlikely fare for winter, but keep an eye out come spring. I also liked the street food because you didn’t have to wait to be seated and you could eat at any time. Andrea will guide you on the whole whacky ‘when to eat’ thing, but I couldn’t stick to it. My body was all out of whack that visit. Sleep and eating times were all over the shop.

Beer was also good - again, at any time. I like dark beers and there was nary a raised eyebrow if I ordered a porter - and they were delicious. Craft beers. Get on that too. There are plenty.

Oh, and Shake Shack. There's always Shake Shack.

FOOD FOR WHEN YOU'RE NO LONGER SURE
Utopia diner 
(This was Cath’s and my regular hang, mostly to hear the wait staff say “cor-fay” and watch what people ate.)
Kebab stands 
Le Pain Quotidien 
(It’s an international chain - there’s one in Westfield Sydney - but reliable coffee, avocado on toast, le sigh.)
Aussies doing coffee in New York
Amsterdam Ale House 
(There are drillions of places to drink beer, and drillions of beers, but this was near our hotel and suited us just fine. Think Cheers.) 
Shake Shack


The subway is easy to use, buses too, and absolutely anytime I was stuck, I’d just ask the people around me and would be immediately set on the right path with friendly reminders that the next stop was ours, and, “have a nice day”. That said, we walked most places. We might grab a train to be nearer our destination, but walking was our go-to mode of transport. I’m guessing though that you’ll have to rely on trains and taxis through the dead of winter. I also found it easier to get my bearings by walking and was able to observe more easily how things worked: like which taxis to hail and how best to do it and in what part of the street, and where to find subway entrances for the direction you want to go in. I was busting to try the blue tourist and commuter bikes, it seemed an easy city to bike around too, but best get some insider advice on that. Of course, the Highline is made for walking and you’ll be lucky enough to see it with each new turn of season.

SEEING THE CITY ON FOOT
citibike 
Walking tours 
(Our hotel offered free walking tours, which didn’t seem restricted to guests, just to numbers.) 
The Highline  
(You can adopt a juniper for Christmas. Don’t they make gin out of juniper berries? You can adopt a gin tree. Hells yes!)

And just in case you miss us, you can watch Cath’s adorable video about walking in New York, featuring selfies we took (note the comment about dumb tourists below.)





City attractions are definitely worth it, even tough you’ll feel like a dumb tourist. Let’s face it, I was a dumb tourist. The thing I learned early was to book ahead. If you want to be at the top of the rock at sunset, book it in the morning. If you want to ice skate at the Rockefella Centre or in Central Park, you’ll probably have to book in advance or line up. Both rinks closed on the days we visited but they’ll be beautiful for you.

ICE SKATING IN NEW YORK
Rockefeller Centre ice skating rink (It looks so pretty for winter).
Ice skating in Central Park 


PURE TOURIST
World Trade Center Memorial and Museum
Circle Line cruises
Statue of Liberty


It’s the people I found the most fascinating. I could have sat and watched the people all day. People walking their dogs (so many dogs in New York City, I was surprised). The interactions between children and their nannies at the start of the day, and then children and their peers or parents at the end of the day. Again, so many children. You realise how few children you see in Sydney once you’ve spent a day or two in New York. Aussie families push out to the ‘burbs, but here, there’s a grand mix. I loved hearing from a woman, who lived near where we were staying and we met on a tour of Harlem, about her impressions of this constantly evolving city. We asked people in the street to explain the real estate: fascinating. I eavesdropped on the diners. I people-watched on the subway. We went to Matilda on Broadway and watched to see if Americans got the dry Aussie humour (they didn’t really). I loved quizzing Andrea about her three years in the city, and taking notes about the books she’d read to understand the city better.

You’re gunna love it. I mean, really love it.

Safe travels my friend.
Happy adventures.
Merry Christmas and
Congratulations.

Love,
Kate.

PS: A few more links

Bloggers ultimate New York guide
Art lovers guide to the Big Apple
Aussies in NY Facebook page
Australians in NY Facebook group

I GOTTA stop apologising for these late posts, but again, as the end of the month rolled around, I was nowhere near a computer and definitely nowhere in cooee of a decent mobile connection.

Bliss. ;)

In NOVEMBER:

I WENT TO… on a weekend road trip, and it was sooooo worth the long drive from the NSW Central Coast to the state's Central West. We stopped to visit an old friend and and her darling new bub at Ballimore, near Dubbo, and then drove onto Coolah, with a day spent in Coolah Tops National Park. It was a classic road trip. Thermos tea and cut sandwiches out of the Esky, a Pub Squash at the Ballimore Inn, pulling up at the only motel in town (fan on, enamel sink, squeaky beds with velour spreads) and enjoying a schnitzel and chips and cold ale at the local pub before an early start to bushwalking the next day. It was all wrapped up with milkshakes and a 'slab' of Vanilla Slice at the country bakery at Merriwa on the way home.

I ATE… Nothing fancy. I had to restrain myself after last month's culinary adventures.

I OP SHOPPED… a linen top and jeans, a mid-century pottery vase and gold brocade dress, circa 1960s. I love the monthly car boot sale, and it's on again this weekend.

I MADE… a start on a summer knitting project, courtesy of hours spent in the car during the weekend road trip.

I READ… Kate Llewellyn’s newest book, A Fig at the Gate. I am a fan of Llewellyn's diaries of love, loss, gardening, cups of tea and her examinations of friends, lovers and the anyone she chooses to muse on, from the bloke across the road to taxi drivers.

I also finished Patti Smith's Just Kids. I've been reading this on and off for months but finally sat with it and read it to its end. I loved the writing, but picked and picked at it not really feeling I had the head space to surrender to the writing and telling of this story. Finishing it feels like parting with something important. M Train? Who's read it?

The final read of the month was Elizabeth Gilbert's Big Magic. I actually listened to it as an audio book. So satisfying to garden and listen to Gilbert read this one aloud. Plenty to muse on.

THIS post is late. We're three days into November, the Melbourne Cup horse race has been run and I can feel the squeeze of those last weeks in the run up to Christmas. Thankfully, this month brought a sweet moment of respite by way of a lovely tropical island break. Here's hoping that post mini-break glow doesn't wear off too quickly.

In October:

I WENT TO… Hamilton Island. The boy - now a 21-year-old man - lives there running quad bike tours. He’s the youngest of the brood and, to date, the most widely travelled with plans for more adventures in the new year. 

I ATE… The boy booked us in to Hamilton Island’s beautiful Co Ca Chu restaurant. An Asian-inspired ‘fusion' menu with sweeping views of sand, sea and island: what’s not to like?

I OP SHOPPED… Very little this month. I brought home a Lisa Ho dress for $10 without trying it on. I figured the silk was worth it if the fit was not. Turns out I’ll be keeping it for the silk alone and it’ll be made into a flowing summer tank. I also brought home a 1980s denim skirt and that string of 1970s wooden macrame beads you see above. 

I MADE… I made my first wicking bed. That seed saving day I raced ahead to mention in last month's post was a day to learn a new garden art - the art of making seed raising mixtures and a wicking bed. Hands down, it's proved the most successful seed propagating method I've used.

I READ… Three books - and none of them from that five-book pile still sitting on my bedside table. I’m pottering through that lot, unlike two of this month’s three reads which were devoured in a single day; something I’ve not done for years. 

WHAT do you want to be when you grow up?

It’s a question I often ask the girls and young women I lead as a Girl Guide volunteer and I love the conversation it sparks. I love hearing about their ambitions, or digging deeper into the things they love to do, want to study and make a career of. Occasionally, just occasionally, I might despair at a lack of diversity among the gender roles they’ll share with me, or muse that women still have a long way to go.

But all in all, the young women and girls I volunteer my time to empower have a vast array of choices open to them and I’m old enough now to have seen a good many of them embark on, and excel, at their chosen path.

Earlier this month, and well away from the usual Girl Guide halls or open-air camps I ask this question at, I was with UNICEF Australia National Ambassador Tara Moss when she asked the same question of teenage girls at a life skills program for victims of sexual violence, in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon.

Their faces lit up and the room – previously full of girls politely replying to Tara’s questions and patiently waiting for the language translation – became the noisy, excited babble I am used to.  Tara and I smiled at each other, and at them. Here were young women, all of them Syrian refugees, who wanted to and could change their fortunes. A doctor, said one.  A lawyer said another. A teacher. A scientist. A journalist, a writer – like Tara.

We went around the circle, each girl rushing to have her dream translated and share it with us.

But as quickly as their excited chatter filled the room, it stopped. One young woman, just a little older and wiser than her peers – at least in life experience – said her piece and waited quietly for the translation. Her friends, sobered, waited too.

The translation came: I have dreams, but what good are they without an education.

She’s right. The awful truth for these young girls, rebuilding their lives amid the safety of a UNICEF-supported program but against a backdrop of violence, displacement and ongoing uncertainty, is that their education is now so disrupted they have little chance of being the things they dream. Already they face pressures to marry, if not married already, and some, carrying the shame of rape or sexual exploitation, are likely never to have the security that a husband and family can bring.

They can try to learn the basics they’ve missed out on, but these other pressures are too great and their only hope is for their sisters and one day, tragically too soon, their daughters.

You asked that I share with you stories from the three days I spent visiting Syrian refugee families with author and advocate for women and children, Tara Moss.

That’s just one story.

I held an eight-week-old baby hot with fever, listless and close to choking because of a respiratory problem it may well succumb to. I listened to the conversations of my UNICEF colleagues while they tried to negotiate temporary accommodation for refugees from a camp that burned to the ground following a simple cooking fire; a fire that broke out in a camp adjoining the ones we were visiting. I listened to mothers speak, in fear, for their children while they wrestled with the decision to see family members lost to terrorist groups offering to pay their rent and bills. Their hands reached out, imploring us to find a solution while young children played outside in the dirt and older boys loitered around our four-wheel-drives.

These were but a handful of stories, from a handful of the millions who have left all they know in Syria and risked everything to be safe. Safe.




Tara Moss has a UNICEF Australia appeal open. The appeal focuses on the many, many children born into an emergency like the Syria crisis. You can read more about Tara’s trip to meet these children here, or on Tara's website here, or watch and listen to the interviews she’s given here, here and here.

If you’d like to donate to UNICEF’s work for children, especially the youngest and most vulnerable, please do. Visit www.unicef.org.au/taramoss


Little people's shoes inside a temporary learning space. Credit: Kate Moore

A WORLD view is a privilege.

Over the past seven weeks I have taken in the sights of New York and worked in both Turkey and Lebanon: the latter a more harrowing cracking open of my world view.

All the while, especially in this past week, I have marvelled at the privilege of it.

As a younger woman, setting out on my naive exploration of the world, I felt this exploration was my due and inwardly railed when life took other turns and my wanderlust was cut short, for reasons all of my own making and that I would never trade.

I am not a particularly well-travelled individual. I have my share of travel yarns, all outdated and surpassed by stories of the trials and tribulations of parenthood.

Yet, there are a few and I consider myself fortunate to have them. So many others cannot afford to travel or be away from their responsibilities. So many too wait for a day when they can travel, but life gets in the way: an illness, a parent to care for, grandchildren and adult children to support.

For me, travel is an enormous privilege and one I will never take for granted.

Bear with me while I anchor myself back into the home routine. There are grandchildren to mind, Girl Guides to lead and inspire, work emails and reports banked up to 'billyoh' and studies to finish, not to mention a long-neglected garden to tend to.

For the next two days though, you’ll find me pottering around the house, tidying things and packing things away. I may even pour myself another cup and catch up with your beautiful blogs.

IT'S been a topsy turvy month. An overseas work trip (don't go skipping ahead to see where) was a highlight but added pressure to finish things at the office and home. Needless to say, there has been plenty to do in the weeks since I've been back, and the last days of March have found me trying to calibrate and plan for the month ahead. There are a couple of volunteer projects, an autumn garden to prepare, planned autumn crafts, Easter, and, fingers crossed, a wee break at the end of the month.

I READ: Can you claim listening to a book as reading? I will. I listened to the final chapters of The Book Thief while walking the dog yesterday.

I WENT TO: Vienna. Yup. The work trip was to Vienna.

I LISTENED TO: After a podcast hiatus, I'm back on the 'walking and listening' bandwagon. Some people listen to pumping music to get their heart rate up while walking. I tend to ramble along listening to people spill forth with ideas. My most recent ramble was to Costa Georgiadis talking to Margaret Throsby on ABC RN's Midday. 

I ATE: You saw that I went to Vienna, right? (I know, I thought I'd just let that one sit there for a moment). When you're in Vienna you have to eat Austrian food. That means strudel, Wiener melange coffee, Sachertorte, beautiful breads, you name it. If it was baked, I ate it. Seriously, cake is a food group in Austria.

I SAW: Hours and hours and hours and hours on a plane means you're at the mercy of the in-flight entertainment. I have never watched so much film and television in one sitting but I did get to catch up on several years worth of movie going. I saw Blue Jasmine, Gravity, August: Osage County and the entire current season of Dowton Abbey. My pick was definitely August: Osage County.

I MADE: It home. Honestly, there's no place like home.

OH, this little blogging space. If there was someone who could break all the unwritten, and possibly written, laws of blogging, it would be me. What's a month, or so, between friends? Here, I'll put the kettle on and we can catch up.

My poor excuse for not being online is that I've been busy enjoying time offline. The Festival of 40 reached its zenith this past week and I was determined to squeeze in as many memorable moments with friends and family as possible - and it was worth it. I am one truly lucky 40-year-old woman, with glorious, generous, funny, zany, wonderfully wise people in my life, as noted against all I did this past month.

I READ: A friend and work colleague share books we like and think should be read more widely, including her most recent selection for me: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. The main character, the young Francie, is hard to leave on each reading, even more so as she drifts from her own plain-speaking, all-seeing early 20th Century childhood into adult life and a changing world.

I WENT TO: Sydney. I know. I'm there every day for work, right? But this time, instead of commuting back up to the Central Coast on the Friday evening, I stayed for a weekend and spent time shopping and eating and catching up with some of my favourite people. I splurged and booked into the Grace Hotel, spent a day shopping with a girlfriend in Paddington, met my partner in the afternoon and pottered around in the city before jumping on a train out to Newtown for an early feed at our favourite Greek restaurant, Steki Taverna. The next day, we met a bunch of friends for lunch and a Sunday afternoon of lounging about in the back of Paddington Inn. A perfect 'stay-cation'.

I LISTENED TO: I am listening to The Book Thief as an audio book. Maybe I've been spoiled by A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (see above) but I am just not feeling the love everyone else has felt for this book. No spoilers, I'm halfway through.

I ATE: God, what won't I eat at the moment. If I don't stop soon, the two dresses I bought myself as a 40th birthday present ain't gunna fit.

Anyhoot, expanding waistline aside, the salt and pepper squid at La Buvette, in Potts Point, was declared one of the best I'd tasted. More so, my dining companion concurred and for her this is a big call; she's a connoisseur of all the best dining spots in Sydney.

A day later in Paddington we were refuelling at Micky's Café after a girly morning of shopping and felt a similar passion for the polenta chips with gorgonzola.

Now, please don't judge me, but the very same day I backed up with a chocolate selection from Kakawa, in Gaffa Gallery, choosing a peanut praline and strawberry jelly bar to share and a single strawberry cream of pureed strawberry and white chocolate. It's true, if I don't stop now, nothing in my wardrobe will fit.

I SAW: Does my ridiculous obsession with the BBC's Sherlock count? Hmm, probably not. What about the return of the Dr Blake Mysteries? No. Hmm. Downton Abbey? Away from the idiot box, I saw a lot of my friends and family. There were birthdays - we have a run of them in February and March - lunch and dinner dates, coffee dates, play dates, even real-life romantic dates (and they're as rare as hen's teeth).

I MADE: There's nothing to boast of here but I did manage to pull apart a cupboard of craft supplies and purge a lot of broken down, and just plain broken, bits and pieces. That's something, right?