This week I'm grateful for... oranges
Fruit and I are wary of each other. Every time I start to think I kinda like it, it tosses me a frigid manadarin or a wanton pear. When it's good, it's very, very good, but when it's bad it is just so darn awful that I start to realise that the thing about a Snickers Bar isn't that it's convenient or addictive 'cos of the high salt/sugar/fat combo... no, it's successful because you always know what you're going to get.
Fruit isn't like that. Yuuuummmmm.... Snickers Bar... sorry, where was I?
But, this week I'm grateful for...
139. Oranges - sorry, Ms Winterson, but they actually are the only fruit that seems to be tolerable most of the time.
140. Baking - flour puffs, oozy dough, greasy hands, fragrant warmth, spoon-licking goodness. Substituting wholemeal flour means it's all good for you, right?
141. My pathetic little heater - yeah, yeah, I know I said last week that I really love the cold. But that was cold days. Not, you know, later at night when you're freezing through your four layers and your feet just won't warm up without a little help. Not then. So, we thought about getting ducted reverse-cycle air-con and I got it costed up and then I realised that my pathetic little radiator heater wasn't as bad as I thought...
So, what's making you smile today? Add your I'm Grateful For post to the list below (and please, we love you, but it really does matter that your post is a Grateful one and not just a random), add the button (grab the code from my sidebar and paste it into your post) and pretty-please add a link back to me. Then pop over to visit other bloggers who are spreading a little sunshine.
[Image from How About Orange - another fabulous orange that I love to indulge in as often as possible! Thanks Jess!]
Friday Feature - Kirsten Jones
Welcome to my new series of posts, Friday Feature. This week I am sharing with you the delightful work of painter, Kirsten Jones. I first discovered Kirsten's work at the Affordable Art Show on King's Road several years ago. I treated myself to one of Kirsten prints called "Blue Bikini" as I was designing swimwear at that time. I can't wait to hang it in my new laundry room!
Kirsten Jones was born in Hartlepool in 1968 and grew up on the island of Jersey before moving to Newcastle-upon-Tyne in England where she gained a B.A. Hons Fine Art Degree.
"Kirsten is inspired by 'collections' of treasured objects and their remembered or imagined histories. Each piece has a subtle narrative,which she creates by collaging vintage envelopes, stamps, dictionary text and maps. These clues evoke memories of the places objects were found or bought. Once the collage stage is complete, Kirsten paints over the richly layered surface using gesso, inks and washes of acrylic paint."
She currently resides in Berkshire where she also runs Barn Acre Gallery, holding biannual exhibitions showing her full collection of prints and new paintings along with up to 50 other invited artists.
Happy Friday sweets!
Belly Baby
Where's your belly Liv?!
original outtake photo that I ended up liking after playing around with it!
&& tomorrow is my sonogram! I'm hoping two things: my placenta is where is needs to be and I get to see a glimpse of my little's face :) afterwards I get to spend the day with hubby and celebrate our upcoming anniversary!
Handmade Tags
I finally took some time out last weekend and headed to my favourite Scrapbook Studio to finish a few pages in the girls books. I also was able to finish off some beautiful tags that the lovely Lisa (from Scrapbook Moments) designed. These tags are just so devine as well as simple and easy to make. Great to have on hand when you need to add a gift tag to a present - you can even attach them to the front of a folded piece of white cardstock and you have a beautiful card.
I have the plain tags and gorgeous ribbons in the Sweet Style Shop if you are looking for some and then you just need to find some pretty patterned scrapbook paper and the possibilities are endless.
If you are a local Sydneysider and looking for a fantastic scrapbook and card making studio then check out Scrapbook Moments - Suzie and her team have the most beautiful and original work - I always have the most wonderful day after spending time there.
Images: Sweet Style
The messy charade
I’m tired of the charade and want it to stop.
You know the one I’m talking about.
You’re invited to a friend’s place for morning tea. You are greeted merrily at the door and ushered inside a home so pristinethat a white glove would be instantly rendered unemployable; unless it was willing to take on a shift as a duster. This house sparkles, it shines, it gleams. In fact it’s so darn clean looking you don’t even need the three second rule when you accidentally drop your just-baked bickie on the white shag carpeting.
And then it begins.
“Sorry about the mess,” your friend says distractedly.
“Mess?” You yelp, worried that your surreptiously reclaimed bickie has left offensive crumbs.
“I haven’t had a chance to clean all week,” she continues, looking disgustedly around the slovenly lab she calls home.
Ah yes, that’s the charade I’m talking about. The one where we have to pretend that (a) we haven’t cleaned up for our guests or (b) we haven’t actually stopped cleaning since we first met a mop in 1982. Either way, the house is perfectly neat, we can both see that it’s perfectly neat so why do we have to have the fake “sorry my house is such a mess” conversation every. single. time I come to visit?
Are you fishing for compliments – because I know the standard answer I’m meant to give is “Oh, no, hon. Your house looks perfect. I can’t believe how tidy you are, you should see my place”?
Or are you actually trying to distract me from noticing your anal neatness lest I judge you on having nothing better to do than clean?
Or, heaven forbid, do you genuinely think your super-neat house is messy, in which case your issues are probably even more ingrained than pasta sauce on microwaved Tupperware – an image I just know is making you hyperventilate a little bit right now*?
Any way you look at it, the pointless “sorry my house is such a mess” conversation is just not going to make you a winner.
I don’t do it. Any of it. I don’t clean up for people butand I don't make them talk about it when they come over either. On any given day my house could be messy when you visit, it could be tidy, it could be a total brothel complete with random half-clad girls wandering in and out (well, it could). But we don’t have to talk about it. You can just sit down and we’ll have a chat about far more interesting stuff than housework and you can happily drink your cup of tea (although I would definitenly advise employing the 3 second rule should you drop your bickie on my floor... actually, my advice is that even within the 3 second parametre you should probably just leave the bickie where it dropped – one of my half-clad girls can pick it up).
If I tallied up all the useless “sorry my house is messy” conversations I’ve had over the years, I reckon I’ve wasted weeks of my life. Weeks. And that’s not even including the fake “My daughter dresses herself” conversations or the fake “Look how creased my shirt got on the train” conversations or even the fake “I must have dropped that Indian curry on my sleeve at breakfast this morning” conversations. Maybe I’ve even wasted years.
Yes, I'm tired of the charade and want it to stop
Why do we pretend we’re effortlessly perfect? And why can’t we just own up to how hard we work at being perfect? And seriously, are we really worried that people are going to judge us on how well we keep house?
* I’m not cruel.
[Image by Isabel Pereira]
Aqua soaps
This week on "Wonderful World of Etsy" I bring you a selection of some pretty aqua soaps to add a pop of colour to your bathroom or cloakroom. My favourite has to be the adorable bird soap; no surprise there!
Have a sweet day!
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