sallymurphy.com.au

Sally Murphy, Australian author

Best Seller

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This is the cover of my newest book, Assembly, from Ready Ed publications. I was pleasantly surprised just now when I went to the Ready Ed website and found the book listed there as I’d thought the release date was February or March – although I’ve had my author copies for ages.
So, a nice surprise, as I say – and an even nicer surprise to see that it is the bestseller in its category on the site. That means people are buying the book and that, hopefully, when school goes back next week, students will be reading and enjoying my poems.
Another added bonus was to find another of my books also in the bestsellers list, with Spellbound
coming in at number nine.

I’m happy dancing!

New Reviews

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Have just added eight new reviews to Aussiereviews – the first for 2008. It feels good – hope you enjoy them.

Happy Australia Day

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Happy Australia Day. What better thing to celebrate than the wonderful country where I live. As the new Australian of the Year, Lee Kernaghan said in his acceptance speech, there is no greater honour than to be Australian.

Anyway, here I am dressed up for the Corrigin Australian Day Breakfast. I had fun with the temporary tattoos, though you can see only one in the photo. The other essential item for my annual Australia Day costume is the earrings, miniature Australia-shapes, with the flag on them (you can see them in the second photo). I’ve had the earrings for more than twenty years and remember them as being only a few dollars when I bought them, so they’ve done well.

After attending the breakfast with five of the Murphlets and my beloved, I had a relaxing day – watched the women’s final of the Australian Open Tennis, a little of the Australia versus India cricket test, and also took the Murphlets to the local pool for a cool down, and the annual bombie competition. Lots of fun.

Also finished reading three books – Victory, by Gary Crew, a wonderful Aussie author, and two little chapter books from the Captain Cal series.

All in all a pretty good day – community, family, sport, and, of course, good books

I hope you had a similarly full and enjoyable Australia Day if you’re an Aussie and, if you’re not, that you spared a thought for Australia – a pretty good country, if I do say so myself.

My Morning’s Work

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Murphlet 5 received a craft kit from his grandmother for Christmas (thanks, Mum). He’s been waiting (im)patiently for me to help him figure it out and make it. The first time I looked at the instructions with him I put it in the too-hard basket and have been making excuses ever since. But today I finally sat down with him to tackle the project.

The kit included a french knitting tool, and the materials to make a monkey. It also included instructions which were so vague they may as well have not been there. But with an old ball of wool and some long-lost memories of french knitting as a child, I managed to cast on and get started and even managed to teach Murphlet 5 how to do the stitches. Then came a search for how to cast off. My first attempt was unsuccessful and resulted in the little tube we’d created unravelling (which is why we were experimenting with spare wool). At this point I visited my dear friend Google and searched for French Knitting. Bingo – understandable instructions for casting off.

So, back to the real world and attempt two was more successful. One little tube of french knitting was soon completed and proudly adorning Murphlet 5’s finger. Then it was on to the monkey. to be made with fluffy brown wool and soft orange chenille yarn. I cast on and soon discovered that knitting with fluffy stuff was really hard – so although Murphlet 5 did have a little go, it fell to me to labour away and get the knitting bit done. Three hours and two tubes (one orange, one brown) later we then had to figure out how to assemble the thing. Again, no instructions, but with a tube of glue and a needle and thread, I managed to get the thing together. You can see the finished product here (photograph courtesy of Murphlet 2). It’s not exactly the same as the monkey on the pack, but I’m pretty proud of it – and, more importantly, Murphlet 5 thinks it’s cool.

Now Murphlet 6 is after me to help him with HIS gift from Grandma, which involves making pompom animals. That’s tomorrow’s project.

Resolutions

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One of my New Year resolutions was to blog more often, yet here it is, the 23rd of January (exactly a month since I last posted), and I’m writing my first post for the year. Not that this is a sign of complete failure – because even when I wrote my list of resolutions, I knew that most of January would be a write-off writing-wise. First, there was the annual Murphy trip to the beach, staying in glorious Dunsborough and enjoying swimming, fishing, walking, relaxing, eating and more. Bliss. Then a trip to Perth last week where the oldest Murphlet was married. That’s right – I am now a mother in law (I wonder what a Murphlet’s wife should be called – perhaps a Murphlet-in-law?)

Anyway, back to the business of writing. Am in the process of catching up on correspondence, and also on reviewing. Read a swag of books whilst on holidays, but now must write and post the reviews. Also took a zillion photos. I invested in a new camera just before Christmas (after my last one met an untimely end, dropped on a bike path) and as well as enjoying capturing the Murphlets and my beloved, I also took photos of lots of things that I think will inspire some stories and poems.

Here are two (which won’t inspire me, but may amuse you – taken by Murphlet 2 at Christmas.

This one needs no explanation – it’s me enjoying my Christmas bubbly.

This one shows off both my loverly Christmas tattoo and my new-found muscles, courtesy of the exercise regime I’ve been following the past four months. They’re not huge, but they’re coming along nicely and, as one who has been far too unfit for far too long, I am pretty proud of myself for following a program which is making me feel healthier than I have for a long long time.

So, my new (writing) year begins. It’s going to be a good one – I can feel it in my waters.

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Christmas is here! the Murphlets (and their parents) have been counting down the days and it’s hard to believe that it’s just two more sleeps till the big day.

Though I’ve not had much time this year, one little indulgence I enjoy at this time of year is playing the silly Christmas games that spring up on the internet. The very first one I ever played online was Elf Bowling (which is MEAN but lots of fun). This year I’ve been enjoying following Roony the Reindeer, a memory game which is pretty simple, but challenging. The best I could do was to remember seven Roonies, which rings a bell with something I learnt back at university about the human brain only being able to remember seven items in a list.

Anyway, in between silly games and trying to clear my desk for the holiday, have been enjoying having the Murphlets home, and also our anualtradition of reading Christmas books each night. I have a big pile of these, which only come out in December, and love sharing them with my babies.

For now I still have some gifts to wrap and some cooking to do (oh and Elf Bowling to do, having rediscovered this game whilst i wrote this post).

Merry Christmas!

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