paddington love

Until last year I didn't know Paddington in Brisbane existed. This year I have been there half a dozen times already! I love taking friends and family there when I see them in Brisbane. It doesn't hurt that my  wedding dress boutique is in Paddington either! It's hard that I am in MAJOR savings mode for the wedding! :( So many pretty things.

I tried on MY wedding dress today for the first time. It was a bit surreal, and now my wedding seems real. Not just some distant concept. Realising the other nights that it is next month was a bit scary too!!

I go to drop into a few of my favourite shops-I'm lucky I don't live close by I think! Blake and Taylor is one of my favourites. I wish I could have the whole shop, including all the beautiful furniture.

I picked up a little wooden caddy for the kitchen. It was constantly annoying me that we would have salt and pepper dropping on the shelf, and a yuccky oil mark from the bottom on the olive oil bottle. Not anymore!

I also picked up two sweet clay charms, with french quotes on them. Not sure what I will do with them yet.

There is only one happiness in life, it is to love and be loved
I love you to the depth and width and height my soul can reach

I love walking around Paddington, and seeing all the houses that are of a similar era and style to our blue house, that are already done up. I find it so inspiring, and great for ideas. I took a few pictures on my wanderings-excuse the awful iPhone shots!

I kept going up to the Antique Centre. I love how every time I go there are different things to see. Again, I would love to take so much of it home with me! Here are a few things that particularly stuck out for me. Again, bad iphone pics, TERRIBLE lighting, and not much room! Sorry!

Love this-but would have to paint it to get it into my house!

Pretty silver

Beautiful old wooden furniture!

This makes me sad. My grandparents had this exact sideboard in their dining room, it was an oiled teak, with a matching table. I didn't want it at the time, and didn't think it was very practical-partly I was moving between addresses regularly, and they were mostly smallish share houses, and partly because it was so delicate-you couldn't put hot or cold things directly onto it, you couldn't spill water onto it... So it was sold. For a really low price, because we just needed to get rid of it, and it was in a country town. I wish now I had kept it.

Just like my grandparents' old sideboard

Being a bride, of course I am going to love the bridal fashions! Last visit I showed L the frilliest, puffiest, laciest ones I could find and told him they were my dress. He was not impressed.

I'm home alone for a few days, and have a few plans to complete. One is a house job that involves paint (and is already trickier than I hoped!) and the other is a wedding job that involves a sewing machine. Let's see how we go!!

I'll be back again next month Paddington! :)

bits and pieces

After 3 and a half solid days of painting, we've taken a break. We haven't quite finished the tricky bit above the stairs, but we had some other things to do, and were a bit sick of painting.

Chocolate coconut cake-yum!

I baked L a cake-such a sweet tooth. Didn't stay whole like this for long!

I've managed to buy 7 vases in the last week or so. I found four glass ones that I picked up at an op shop for a steal, and also got a gorgeous cake stand. That I should have put my cake on! Duh. I also bought three white ceramic vases too, on two different days at different shops. Now just need some flowers.

Two of the white glasses are on the top left of the shelves-in front of the pictures and the big one is down with the teapots

My new cake stand-I brought it out specially!

A close up because it's so pretty!

I've been drinking my green smoothies almost every day. They aren't too bad! I've been having berry and banana in with my greenery, so that sweetens them up. I won't show you an after-lets just say it doesn't look green once it's all blended-red and blue berries plus green equals brown. I've been adding some extra goodies too-chia seeds and goji berries at the moment. Might add a few more good things in the coming weeks too.

When it still looks nice! Before that colour mixing!

Our wedding is starting to seem much closer! I think our invites are pretty much sorted. Just have to get L to confirm bus times for the ceremony, and we should be set.

Did anyone see the cover of last month's House and Garden. I think I gasped in the middle of Woolies. I love it. Everything about it.  The grey, they crisp white windows, furniture and pots, the deep green of the plants. Just gorgeous. Would love to paint our place that colour, but (especially after the weekend!!) think it would be just too much work to drastically change the colour, so we will probably go to a blue/grey with white trim. We have navy poles that we can't really change anyway, so I don't think a true grey would work quite as well.

it's raining, it's pouring...

Not too much happening around here. It's cold, the wind is howling, and it's been pouring rain for days!   Everything is starting to feel damp, but damp's best friend mould and mildew can stay away! Very much stay inside weather. 

L is cooking up a feast of boeuf bourguignon. He is the definite cook in our relationship!!! He doesn't really use recipes, cooks all types of foods-currys, pasta, pies, he has even cooked a lemon meringue from scratch-pastry and all. I'm a lucky girl. Perfect weather for a cold night.

All our planned house jobs at the moment are outside-painting the cream posts on the outside deck white, and L is meant to be sanding the decks. 

I might hit up the shops this weekend-we were given some money from our parents for our engagement to buy a hall table. It would break the hall up a bit, and I want a nice mirror and maybe some frames around it.  It has been pretty difficult to find. It needs to be quite narrow, we would like wood, and we want it to be something we have forever-it is an engagement present. We found one we liked a few weeks ago, at Domayne. Unfortunately it was over $2000, which I think is insane for something quite small and simple. 

Our hallway, looking back toward the front door (at the end of the hall, and around the corner to the left)

We would put the table across from the opening to the lounge room. Not only would it give us a bit of a feature through the opening, the hall is only about 1.05m wide, so anywhere else even a NARROW table would be on the way. 

xmas bargains, shopping bans and makeup tidy

I've had an iphone 3 for almost 3 years now. I have dropped it on cement, tiles, bitumen, you name it-countless times. It's a bit dinged up, but I've never cracked the screen. But it was full, the photos weren't great, and I just wanted a new one. 
But we couldn't get a good deal on a 5, and between the wedding, and house we didn't really want to up our plan too much when I had a perfectly good phone. I was also a bit afraid of updating to a 5, and dropping it and breaking it within the first week!!!


Anyway, a friend updated their phone during the week, and offered to give me their old iphone 4! Yay! Is also a bit afraid of updating to a 5, and dropping it and breaking it within the first week!!! All I had to do was pick up a new SIM card. 

My new white phone :) 

When I got to Telstra today there was about an hour wait to be served, so I had some time to kill. Seeing as I am on a MAJOR personal shopping ban at the moment, having an hour to wait around at the shops is dangerous. I've been avoiding shops like the plague, and been in and out when I have had to go there. 

Although quite simple, and not overly wedding-ish, the wedding dress I have fallen for is more expensive than I had planned for. When I add in a veil, a belt and alterations I am horrified at the thought of that much money for one dress. I am still looking at dresses, BUT am in huge savings mode-I REALLY love this dress. The sales assistant recommended I try it on, I was shocked by how much I loved it, and it made both my mum and FMIL cry. Good sign. SO I am trying to save as much of my money as possible to cover the difference in price, between what we budgeted for, and what this one will cost. It's the money I would spend on clothes/makeup/hair anyway... 

So I went to Target, so I wouldn't be tempted. They had Christmas decorations HUGELY reduced. Including these angel tea light holders. They are bout 30 cm high, and will look gorgeous all lit up next Christmas. For $5 each I though they were worth the spend. 

Anyway, new phone is sorted, and I'm loving it! 

Did a quick tidy of my makeup drawer over the weekend-I love how a quick job can make such a difference!

Before

 I don't wear makeup daily-sunscreen is all I need for work-but having been away a few times in November, December, and then a big trip away over Christmas and early January, I just hadn't put it back into any sort of order. 

After

 Cleared out a few things I didn't even know I had-mostly freebies. The party feet blister packs are AMAZING. Expensive, but incredible if you have an event coming up. 

Bin...