Oh my oh my.
I want.
Je voudrais as the French might say…
I think it’s time I use my gift card given to me on my birthday by my Bestie!
All images from Lisa Ho’s fabulous site [here]
Posted in je voudrais la mode
Tagged Australian designers, fashion, Lisa Ho, Summer 2012, women's fashion
We stayed at Ian & Janine’s new place in the Blue Mountains on the weekend. She captured the cutest picture of Harley that I had to share!
It’s my BFF’s 34th birthday on Friday this week, so as a surprise her sister & I organised an elaborate weekend away down in the Victorian small outback town of Yackandandah. We took her this past weekend to throw her off the surprise trail!
Here are the highlights chronicled in pictures.
Posted in malarkey
Tagged Beechworth, Brown Brothers Estate, food, restaurant, Victoria, winery, Yackandanda
After eating all weekend, it was still unsurprising that the first thing Gracie & I did on our arrival home from a weekend away was ask Jay to take us to IGA to pick up ingredients for dinner.
ingredients
While these two were cosily living a life of luxury on the couch I had to make do with my own dinner-making companion…
Jay, Gracie & Harley
my drinking companion – an old fashioned
IngredientsIn a large pot bring to the boil salted water and cook the pasta til al dente.
In a large fry-pan, heat 2 tbs olive oil, then add bacon and cook til browning.
bacon browning
Once browned slightly, add chilli and lemon rind and stir til fragrant.
bacon with chilli & lemon
Add the prawns and cook til pink and slightly charred with caramelisation.
adding the prawns
Then add the lemon juice & capers, stir through to heat for 30 seconds before adding the parsley and turn off the heat.
capers & lemon juice
final stage; add parsley and take off the heat
In the meantime, once the pasta is cooked al dente, strain, add 1tbs olive oil (and I add some olive sea salt).
cooked linguine with olive sea salt
Divide between bowls and serve!
dinner for three
It serves 3 (with one of those three being an extra large serving).
We served with fresh made garlic panini bread & a glass of Brown Brothers 2010 Tarrango.
Bon appetito!
Posted in food glorious food!
I’ve been incommunicado for the past week.
Dickens’ age old saying ‘it was the best of times, it was the worst of times‘ certainly applies for the last 10 days. Here’s why…
Firstly…I started the biggest project of my career to date. It’s for a government health department and it is killing me. I think that the PMO Manager has been put on this earth to make my life a living hell. That said, I really really really want to do well. Even though he has me running in circles and is generally making my life difficult, I have this pathological need to impress him. I’m working insane hours and the icing on the cake is that the project goes until June 2013. I fear I may develop a serious drinking problem with this project…
Secondly, we moved house. We planned to stay in our old place until we were ready to buy a place of our own (not easy when you’re saving a deposit for an expensive inner-city terrace), but the feeling of being a festering little mushroom (sitting in the cold, damp, dark) just became beyond bearable. So in haste, we sorted out our finances and fell in love with a sunny sky-home apartment a suburb over and moved over the weekend. Amongst work, exercise & tending to Harley the move was so stressfull the movers were ridiculously useless (Australian peeps, never use City Movers, ever) but the upside is that we’re done and in-love with our apartment and Harley is deliciously joyful roaming the terrace high above the hustle’n'bustle of fringe-city-life frolicking in the sun!
dusk view from my apartment
view of north end of the city from our apartment
Thirdly, one of my close friend’s father died suddenly and we attended his funeral yesterday. “Uncle Dave” as I’ve lovingly called him since I was a rambunctious 14 yo, suffered a massive stroke last week and never regained consciousness. For several years in high-school he picked me (and a few others) up at 5.30am and drove us 40 minutes for Winter Swim Squad. Only as an adult I realise what a huge commitment this was. He’s a very well respected business man and his work was extremely taxing, yet he got up every single morning during the cold winter months at 5am to drive a team of kids to swimming squad, then wait 1.5 hours for us to finish before driving us to school and then onwards on his day. Since school I only saw him every few years, although more in recent time because Nath got married to my beautiful friend and gorgeously pregnant Ms Mandy. I dragged him to the dance floor at their wedding and we had a wonderfully fun and rowdy dance! I’m so sad that the world has preamaturely lost him. Nathan, along with his twin brother Grant and their older sister Lisa, have lost the most wonderful father imaginable, his wife Jenny has lost her best friend, partner and lover, and the world has lost the most beautifully humble and generous man. I’m just so sad.
Fourthly, my fitness and nutrition has been in the toilet. Apart from daily walking Harley to the park (I should say “strolling”) I haven’t done a shred of proper intense exercise. This is made worse by the fact that I’ve been eating poorly for the past 2 weeks because I’ve been cleaning out my fridge and then had 4 days in the new place with no fridge which means we’ve dined on take-away! Excuses, excuses, I know…but it’s the truth. No exercise + bad nutrition = BAD MELLY.
Morso salmon tartar
Odyssey vino & snacks
first night amongst the boxes – Veuve & pizza
Fifthly, is something to look forward to. I’m taking my BFF Gracie away for a surprise weekend this weekend! She has little idea of what is in store, and I won’t divulge here because she sometimes reads my blog (BFF slacker!!!) but I’ll post all about our adventures next weekend. That is truly something to look forward to!
**Additional confessions of guilt; I am waaaaay overdue with my guest blog post on Steph’s blog Simply Stephanie & I have been the slackest friend ever and not wished my darling friend Tamara happy birthday from 2 weeks ago. Now that the internets are back on in my abode I’ll be able to get my life back on track 
Posted in malarkey
My brother and my dad both live and work in a remote Western Australian town called Kalumburu. I recently wrote about it [here].
My dad and I are repairing our strained relationship (10 years of emotional baggage so I wont overexcite you with that history)…But I was happy to receive some photos on Monday of him and my baby bro from their weekend of fishing.
There really is nothing else to do in their downtime in Kalumburu but fish… I wish my life was that sweet!
Dad on his boat with his Giant Trevally
Juzzy with his Giant Trevally
the old man and the sea…
Yep, that’s right!
Shake off the guilt of a missed training session or a dirty burger and own today with a killer workout and a day of squeaky clean eating.
Here’s my workouts from the last two days….
Wednesday weights session @ gym
Wednesday calorie expenditure
Thursday outdoor cardio session
Thursday calorie expenditure
Booyah baby!
Happy Friday peeps!
Posted in 12WBT, move it to lose it
Tagged 12WBT, exercise, fitblog, fitspiration, health & fitness, HIIT, Michelle Bridges, workout
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