Last weekend we built a wardrobe

Ok, I'll be honest here, I was more than a little skeptical when A said he wanted to build a wardrobe in one of our spare rooms and, as the flat packs were not quite right or just too expensive, he would do it himself.

I do think I am somewhat entitled to be skeptical when I hear these proclamations. A couple of years ago I went off to Japan for my holidays and came back to a DIY bookshelf that A had build with a cordless drill a couple of pieces of dowel and no tape measure or ruler. He had taken to this project with a couple of beers and while fending off the amorous advances of Charlene, the crazy lady from a couple of apartments down (that's a whole other story - quite amusing - but has nothing to do with our wardrobe).

Ok, so the bookshelf was not so bad considering the circumstances in which it had been built. Sure, it had a permanent lean to the left. Sure, I felt a little nervous when it started to fill up and lean forward a little as well. But, it did the job for a couple of years until we moved here and I suggested that we didn't really need it inside anymore.

So, we set off to Bunnings to pick up some sliding doors along with whatever else we needed to get the show on the road.  The conversation went something like this...

Me: "So do you know what we need to get?"
A:  "Yeah, I've got an idea in my head."
Me: "Yes, but do you know exactly what you need to get and what size it has to be and .......do you think we should maybe go home and plan this properly?"
A:  "Nah. It's ok. I'll work it out as we go around."
Me: "Really, becuase this is a permanent wardrobe in our permanent house that we might want to sell one day and I really don't want a 'drunk bookshelf' version of a wardrobe."
A: "Ok. We'll plan it."

So we did go home and make a plan, we did make adjustments as we went along and we did nearly tear our hair out a couple of times (why is nothing in this house square?). However, we are both pretty proud of the wardrobe and I'll be less skeptical next time A says he wants to build something! Good result all round.

Here are the pictures...

Yes, I do still need to paint the cornice and the bedroom door for that matter. One job down though, carpet is next!

First look

Finally, we got into the cars and on the way. We were totally unorganized about the photography. Sure we had a photographer, we knew we would do photos before the wedding, we decided the night before that we'd go to the Fitzroy Gardens for the first look but that was about it. At this point I think a shout out to our photographer is needed. Serana from Photo8 Photography did a fantastic job in spite of our lack of organisation (and one slightly stressed out groom)!

A's family, who were driving the cars, run on something called A-time. However long his dad says he'll be, double it and add 10. Knowing this we probably should have said we wanted to be picked up at 12 rather than 1.  In the confusion, the boys had thought that we were meeting at the apartment then going to the gardens together.  By 2 we had sent the boys off and we were finally on the road. Poor A. He told me the other day as we looked at the photos that he was so mad that the cars were late and then he was dying to see me but we sent them off to the gardens and he had to wait even longer!

Waiting, waiting, waiting... 

So why did we have a first look? A couple of reasons. 

1) I wanted a bit of time with A before the ceremony

2) First look photos are lovely

3) The church had two aisles and was not really set up in a way that we could see each other as I walked down the aisle

4) it meant our guests could go straight from the ceremony to the reception without a big break between

I loved it (even if it wasn't just the two of us - see photo 5 in the sequence - although we had no idea they were there until we saw the photo). It was the only time all day that I was nervous, excited nervous but nervous all the same. So here they are....

Make gif animation

I just got the inspiration to do this from 

Anna and the Ring

A few more photos in and around the gardens, a sneaky glass of champagne and it was finally time to be married!

Things I love about summer - part 3

Apart from Australia Day and Hottest 100 of course! Off to a pool party this arvo and have a bit of a competition going with A about whose votes will be highest on the chart. We're one down each already!

Anyway, the other thing I love about summer is my garden.

Oregano & Thyme

Rhubarb - mmmmm

Lettuce

Fish pond & Hydrangea - haven't got much further
with the spa/BBQ area renovation

Water lily

More hydrangea because I love them so

There are some tomatoes coming along, parsley, basil, coriander, lemongrass, sage, rosemary and even the little lemon tree has some flowers at the moment! Here's hoping we get our first home grown lemon!

Happy Australia Day one and all!

Summer Holiday Book Review - Ape House

picture via here

Even before the first page of this book I loved it.  Who doesn't love an author who thinks to compare the intelligence of a chimp with that of a pop idol?? And does it so simply

Give orange give me eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you.  Nim Chimpsky, 1970s

Gimme gimme more, gimme more, gimme gimme more.  Britney Spears, 2007

Ape House is the story of Isabel Duncan, a scientist studying language acquisition in bonobos and John Thigpen, a reporter who visits the lab on assignment. Shortly after his visit, the lab is blown up, Isabel is seriously injured and the family of bonobos disappear. The family are soon being advertised on billboards and become the stars of Ape House, a chimp version of Big Brother. The world, in its craze for reality TV, tunes in to watch. Isabel's desperation to get the bonobos back and John's desire to beat a rival to the real story sees them team up with a host of quirky, likeable characters each with their own agendas.

It's an easy book to read as the characters are well developed and the side stories, for the most part, enhance the main plot. Bonobo DNA is 98.7% the same as human DNA so it is fascinating to consider that in language research labs bonobos can communicate and reason with humans and do so willingly. As with Sara Gruen's previous book, Water for Elephants, Ape House is extensively researched and many of the human-ape dialogues and scenes in the book are based on actual conversations and events. With that in mind, the material about the treatment of animals in medical research labs is particularly confronting.

The verdict - Read it! At least once. Twice if you are like me and find yourself reading it as quickly as you can just to find out what happens in the end that you miss some of the finer details.

Happy birthday Axel

Today is Axel's 1st birthday. When we were younger my sister and I would make our pets birthday treats (you know, make the tinned dog food look like a cake shape and top it with dry food or something equally delicious). I think we're both past that phase but I will give him some tinned tuna for dinner. Yep, it wouldn't take much for me to turn into a crazy cat lady.

When we moved into our own place, the first thing I wanted to do was get a dog but the need for a new fence and a new job with longer hours meant it just wasn't practical anymore. I wasn't so keen on a cat. You can't take them for a walk, play fetch*, etc, etc. But honestly, now, Axel has bought us so much joy and provided so much entertainment that I wouldn't change things for the world!

Looking very cute but scared on his first venture into the garden

Looking a little sheepish after destroying a full packet of cat food and spreading it from one side of the bedroom to the other. Lesson learned - secure cat food at all times!

Wrestling with a 'green bag'

Just lazing around

In other news, shopping was fairly successful if not as budget minded as I intended. Oh well. Raspberry semifreddo was delish although I didn't take a photo. We now have a massive bag of blood plums from our lovely neighbour which I am going to attempt to turn into jam tonight and on the weekend we build a wardrobe. I'll post photos later. We are pretty proud of how it turned out!
Hope all is well!

*Actually, with the right toy and a crazy cat, fetch is, at times, more than a possibility.

Job done

One of my aims for this holiday was to rid the rest of the house of the house of the tired yellow paint we inherited. Here's a picture for you so you can truly appreciate it's, well, yellowness.

As well as yellowness, we also inherited a ceiling that looked like it had only had one coat and sections that had been patched up using gloss paint. Here's a tip for any keen DIYers out there - if you need to patch up the paint on your ceiling and you don't have any ceiling paint, gloss is NOT your second best option. 

   

It is amazing though, what a new coat of paint can do for a room, even painting the ceiling gave the space a lift. And with the help of mum and one of her friends the whole job took only 2 days. The colour we used is called "Milk Cloud" and is the same as the trim on the rest of the house. It looks a lot whiter on the trim than on the walls where it looks more beige.

Sure, you can still tell that a wall was removed at some stage and that the plasterwork in that spot is not fantastic but as it's no longer highlighted in gloss paint your eye isn't drawn directly to it. The new colour doesn't clash with the kitchen tiles like the yellow did (put that yellow next to some light pink. Uh huh, not great). But I think the best thing is that it just looks like it's been painted properly.

Changing my name!

Today I went and changed my name on my license. I no longer have the I'm-really-angry-cos-I-just-scraped-and-dinted-the-bottom-of-my-new-car-because-of-the-massive-pothole-in-the-driveway-of-the-RTA-shouldn't-the-RTA-of-all-people-have-a-decent-driveway??? photo on my license. Actually, I have a half decent photo!

Going to head out shopping later today and A has requested raspberry semifreddo for dessert so I'm going to try out my new Donna Hay recipe book (another Kris-Kringle score). I'll try to remember to take a photo if it works out!

Things I love about summer - part 2

Books! I love having the time to sit and read and not feel as though I should be doing something else. The addition of my Kris Kringle hammock is a bonus this year. So far I've read Blossoms and Shadows by Lian Hearn, Ape House by Sara Gruen and David Attenborough's Life on Air. Stay tuned for reviews when I can drag myself away from the tennis long enough to write them!

Things I love about summer

Golden Queen Peaches

Growing up in Victoria's "food bowl" meant summers involved taking an empty bucket down the road to the orchards and filling it with apricots, plums, peaches and nectarines then feasting on them for days. In fact, the fresh fruit straight from the tree is what I miss most from that part of the world.  This week Mum came to visit and help paint and bought up a box full of peaches and nectarines. I'm in heaven! Thanks Mum! 

The day of - recap

I'm really spreading these recaps out aren't I?!

I was woken up on the day of the wedding at around 6 by a phone call. I answered groggily and found it was the minister who wanted to ask a couple of questions so he could finalize his service - "are you kidding?" I thought. But, no, he wasn't. He wanted to know what A's favourite food was. And what my favourite TV show was. At 6 in the morning, I couldn't for the life of me think what A's favourite food was! I took a guess because I was starting to feel a bit stupid umm-ing and ahh-ing and said meatloaf or a good steak. Turns out I was wrong, it's .... For the record my favourite TV shows are The Amazing Race and Dr Who.

There was no going back to sleep after that because I'd realised that today was the day I was getting married!

I got up and had a quick check of the flowers - they were still alive and looked very happy. Phew.

Our hairdresser, T, arrived and soon after, the makeup artist. The preparations began.

I just found out yesterday when I was showing Mum the wedding photos that T's mother who is also a hairdresser did my mother's hair for her wedding! T (who has just finished her apprenticeship) did a brilliant job - as did the MUA who was very accommodating and more than happy to change things a little from the trial.

While my girls were getting ready we headed downstairs to the cafe under the apartment who kindly let us take over the cafe for a bit for some photos.

I love my dad's expression in this photo!

The photographer left to visit the boys, we ate lunch (wrapped in a sheet so I didn't get it on the dress) and had a sneaky red bull (I still had a cold and was already exhausted). I think excitement and pure happiness* got me through the rest of the day.

Around 2ish (quite some time later than planned - the only thing we could have organised much, much better) the cars arrived to take us to the Fitzroy Gardens for our 'first look' and photos.



*along with a large amount of cold and flu drugs.

So, so sad

As I'm sure everyone else in the country has, I've been following the floods over the last couple of days but had not yet found the words to write about them. I'm still not sure I have. I am incredibly grateful that our friends in the area are safe and well and my heart goes out to people who have been affected by the floods, especially to those who have lost loved ones and to those on the land who have not only lost houses, but also livelihoods.

As I clicked through the news today I also came across these articles (here and here). Brazil, Sri Lanka and the Philippines are also suffering through heavy rains and horrendous flash flooding. So, so sad. Please also spare a thought or prayer (if you are so inclined) for these people too as I dare say they will not have the same recovery support systems that we will for people affected here.

Information and donations to the Queensland flood relief appeal can be found here.

Back to work

No, thankfully, not the paid kind of work. Work on the house-that-needs-some-love.

Preparing to paint the lounge/dining/kitchen area today. Mum and a friend are coming up to help paint on Wednesday so I need to get the filling, sanding and washing done by then! I really don't like all the preparation but I know I'll be happy once it's all done.

Goodbye gloss paint patches on the ceiling!

Goodbye yellow!

Hello progress!

The recaps continue

So far I've managed to write 2 but hopefully the arrival of professional photos (yay!) will inspire me to finish them!

I think I'm up to bouquets. We had buckets on buckets of roses, lisianthus, billy buttons, alstromeria and blue gum. We also had hydrangeas but were told that they wouldn't last out of water so used them in the table decorations.

A quick break for a fish and chip lunch, (mmmmm - it's impossible to get takeaway fish and chips here so got to make up for it in Melbourne) and we were back to the flowers. This time working on the table settings. 

We'd decided to put floral foam in the vases to hold the flowers stay in position. My sister, K, and her wonderful boyfriend had done this already which saved us some time. I'm glad we did as it meant less fussing with water when transporting them to the venue. We also took our chances with the hydrangeas as they are so bulky and take up so much space it made filling the vases easier.

At this point, Dad came out to help and got stuck into wiring roses and lisianthus for us. He did an awesome job! And before long, Mum, who swore she was having nothing to do with the flowers as she thought we were crazy for wanting to do them ourselves was out helping too. Thanks Mum!

In the end we were packing up around 8pm so it had taken about 9 hours to do the whole lot although there was a lunch break and a manicure break for K and I during that time. In the end we had 4 corsages, 6 boutonnieres, 3 bouquets and 16 centerpieces (2 per table). I think the total cost came to around $600. This included the vases and all the sundries - tape, pins, wire etc. While the bouquets and centrepieces weren't exactly as I had envisaged, we received lots of compliments on them so that was nice. 

One point to note - we did all these the day before the wedding and the centrepieces in particular actually looked a bit better the day after the wedding! They looked fine on the day but some of the flowers had opened more and they looked a bit perkier the day after. I guess my point is, if you want to do it yourself and are using the floral foam, you could put them together two days prior with no problems!

Also, if you were planning to DIY, try to see the flowers you are ordering - as I did it all over the phone I didn't see what the roses were like ( a rose is a rose, right?) and I was imagining the blooms to be larger than they were. If I'd known, I'd have ordered another couple of bunches.

So finally, about 9 we sat down to a beautiful mum-made lasagna (my favourite) and relaxed.

*Thanks to K and friend J for the photos*

Top 10 of 2010

Ok, so I am a little late to do this one but thought it would be nice to have a record anyway. Our honeymoon, Christmas, New Year extravaganza meant no internet for 3 whole weeks! I loved it!

So here are my top 10 favourite things that happened in 2010!

1. Becoming Mrs A

2. Getting gorgeous little Axel

3. The weddings of 3 close friends and engagements of 2 more

Via we heart it

4. Walking the Overland Track in Tassie

Via here (have not sorted out my photos yet)

5. Taking A to Japan to go snowboarding and watching him get to know the other country I love!

6. Changing jobs - made me so much happier in the second half of the year!

Via we heart it

7. Making little improvements here and there to the house

8. Going to Japan again - meeting a Maiko and watching the baseball

9. Seeing the students from my old school graduate and thinking - "yeah, I did do a good job with them" and having a parent thank me!

Via getfun on Etsy

10. Buying my own car - I didn't want to, we'd survived with just one for nearly 6 years, but so glad I have it now.

via we heart it

Looking back it was a pretty great year. Cant wait to see what 2011 brings!