Thalia.

This is Thalia:

She is one of the nine muses who preside over the arts and sciences, her particular forte being comedy an poetry. Now she sits on our mantle piece in the living room. We bought her from the Vatican Museum in Rome:

She came with a certificate proving that she is a fake yet we still had to have a security escort from the museum to prove that we hadn't stolen her. She is made from marble dust, yet she weighs a tonne. I like to think that she surreptitiously inspires everyone who lives in our house. Maybe that's just wishful thinking....as I can't say that any of us are particularly comic or poetic.

Isn't it strange the memories that you remember from holidays. One of the most vivid from this trip to Italy nearly two years ago was driving in the hills behind the Amalfi Coast:

Along a very narrow, very windy road one of our children (who is a notorious chucker) lost his pasta lunch which had been consumed less than an hour before in a restaurant perched high above Positano:

Lunch had been idyllic (our children adore Italian food and they never had to be bribed or cajoled to eat anything in Italy) yet the consequences were not. Don't think we were totally unprepared....we had trained him to vomit into a bucket, yet on this particular day he opened the car door and promptly tipped it onto the road. Except that it wasn't a road but rather someone's driveway and they were sitting in their garden. Even the sight of my husband picking up vomit with his bare hands and a very pregnant me assisting him (which of course meant doing everything other than touching it) couldn't make them relax their froideur. We were given the hose.....luckily our Italian wasn't up to translating exactly what they were saying about us. Just as we were about to leave we opened the back door of the car (to reunite the bucket with it's owner) and they saw our three children. Instantly, their crankiness evaporated. They were beaming and exclaiming and squeezing the cheeks of the chucker....and even we could translate 'tre angeli'.

Yesterday, I had lunch at Smolt at Salamanca Square:

It's good there. If you live in Hobart or a planning a trip.....book a table. Their food is a little bit Italian. This was the roasted beetroot, asparagus, artichoke, caramelised pumpkin puree, hazelnut and Persian fetta salad:

It was the perfect salad for a winter's day, although you would think that 'salad' and 'winter' wouldn't usually go together. I'm happy to tell you that they do. If you can't get to Hobart, never fear. You can cook Smolt's Cauliflower and Taleggio risotto with anchovy pangrattato at home:

(Image: Gourmet Traveller)

Find the recipe from Gourmet Traveller here. Cook it. It is delicious and it is exactly what you want to eat over the weekend in front of the fire.

This is what I wore:

And just because I can, I'm doing Tree Stand. If you are inclined, you can read about my jeans here and my jacket and scarf here. My favourite handbag got an outing and then at 4am this morning I realised I had left it within reach of the beagle who has been known to chew his way through handbags on his quest for food. I don't know about you, but with a baby I always have food in my handbag as it's the 'get out of jail' card in a sticky situation. It is instant appeasement. So I panicked. And I had to get up and go all the way downstairs to check......on this occasion my handbag was safe. Phew

R