Clothes for Sale!

I have had a few pieces of clothing that I don't wear anymore sitting in my bedroom for a few months now. They are things that either don't fit me or I haven't worn in ages but I like them too much to just give them to lifeline. I was thinking that I would put them on ebay but I thought first I would put them on here and see if any of my readers are interested in any of them. So here they are. I am usually between an Australian size 10 & 12 and my measurements are bust:- 97cm, waist:- 78cm and hips:- 98cm.

From the left:-

1 - Sportsgirl yellow polka dot high waist skirt.

2 - Sportsigrl cream knit dress.

3 - Sportsgirl dark brown satin bubble top.

4 - Sportsgirl cream floral blouse.

5 - Red Cherry blue batwing top.

6 - Jeanswest black floral print tunic.

So if anyone is interested in any of these items leave me a comment and I will be in contact to discuss how much you would be willing to pay for them. I am also willing to do a swap if someone if they have something they do not want anymore be it clothes, accesories or crafty items.

Projects for Uni Holidays!

So I decided to end my shopping ban a few days early so I could go to Spotlight and spend my christmas money that Corey's parents gave me. My plan of attack was to buy materials for the projects that I wanted to make before uni goes back at the start of March.

This is most of what I bought. There are a few zippers and buttons that I didn't put in the photo. So from left:-

Blue Floral Fabric - to make a circle skirt (finished - see here).

Yellow Gingham - to make my Parfait dress.

Tape Measure Fabric - might turn into some sewing project bags but really I just bought it cause it was cute. I have 2 metres of it so if I wanted I could make anything really.

Purple 'hippy' fabric - when I picked this up Corey goes "its a bit hippy" but I love it. I am going to make it into a skirt with an exposed zipper up the front.

Pink Cotton - this fabric has a very faint self stripe in it. It is going to become my schoolhouse tunic.

Red Wool - I chose this to remake my Shalom Cardigan. Last time I made this I used super bulky wool instead of just bulky and it stretched and I had to frog it so I am remaking it in red.

When we left Spotlight yesterday I said "that should keep me going for a while". Around working I think I have a few weeks worth of projects here so hopefully it will keep me occupied until uni goes back. I also have some cooking that I want to do before uni goes back so that will add a few more projects to keep me entertained.

101 in 1001 days - progress report

(this photo has nothing to do with the post but I hate posts with no pics

me and my sister on christmas day)

So I thought I would do a little progress report on my 101 things in 1001 days list. I have not really completed anything but I have a few things in progress.

12 - Take a multivitamin everyday for 2 months.

I started this nearly a month ago now. I find that since I started taking them I am not hungry all the time and I also sleep a lot better but I am not sure if that is solely because I started taking the vitamins or not. I get sick a lot so I am hoping they will stop me from getting sick all the time.

38 - Make all the patterns in my collection.

So far I have made 4 out of the 39 I 0wn. I have made the beignet skirt, eclair dress, pj pants and my rockabilly dress. So I have a while to go before this is completed but it is going to be fun making all my patterns.

51 - Have 30 handmade items in my wardrobe that I wear regularly (either made by myself or bought from etsy)

I really want to start making more of my clothes instead of buying them. I have found lately that buying new clothes does not give me the same satisfaction as buying fabric and making clothes myself. I also want to start supporting others who make and sell handmade clothing a lot more. So far I have 5 things in my wardrobe which I love!

55 - Have my nails painted everyday for 2 weeks.

I started this on christmas day so I have had my nails painted for 4 days now. I used to bite my nails really bad and when I stopped and they started growing I got really excited and bought heaps of nail polish. But I never used it so I am doing this challenge to try and encourage myself to paint my nails more often. I also need to practice painting my nails so I can do it neatly.

So that is all so far. I will probably do another update after a couple more months. Hopefully I will have some items completed by the next update!

Christmas Recap!

I hope everyone had a fantastic christmas day. Mine was lovely! In the morning we opened our santa sacks and presents with mum and dad. My sister stayed at our house on christmas eve so we could do christmas morning as a family. I got some really fantastic presents!

Corey bought me these four books which I have been wanting for ages. I knew he was getting them for me and have been hanging for christmas to be able to finally read them.

But little did I know that Corey actually got me something else as well. These AMAZING shoes!!!

The other week when we were doing Corey's christmas shopping I saw these in the window at Wittner and fell in love. Later on in the week when I was at work Corey went back there and bought them for me. I know how much he hates shopping on his own especially for presents so I was very impressed that he went back by himself to buy these. He is such a sweetheart and I love him very very much!

My mum and dad bought me the ice-cream bowl attachment for my KitchenAid which I am super excited about. I bought a book about a few months ago for $8 that is all ice-cream recipes and I am so excited to try some of them out. Hopefully next week on my three days off.

I also got a cover for my KitchenAid and some new piping tips from my aunty and uncle, an Italian learning cd that I can upload onto my ipod and some nail polish from my sister and lots of little bits and pieces in my Santa Sack.

In the morning my aunty, uncle and cousins came over and we had champagne breakfast which was very very yummy! And then later on for lunch we have a yearly tradition of going to the beach for a barbecue with our other aunty and cousins. We have been doing this every year for since we moved to the Gold Coast when I was like 2. It is such a nice relaxing day sitting in the park chatting with the family and having christmas lunch. Here are some photos from the park.

(my christmas day outfit)

(my mummy)

(Grace and her "brella")

(me, my daddy, my sister and Roxy)

This last photo my mum took because her boss has asked everyone at her work to take a photo to put on their locker of the reason they need to return home safely from work everyday and this is the photo she is going to stick on her locker.

So on christmas night we all came back to our house and sat around, had a few drinks and some food and played some wii! It was a very relaxing day spent with family and I think that is just they way christmas should be. I hope all of you had a christmas day which was just as great as mine!

Merry Christmas everyone! I wanted to pop in today and wish everyone a very Merry Christmas as I will be too busy spending time with the family to blog tomorrow. I hope everyone has a great relaxing day with their loved ones.

I made these cupcakes to take into work today for our secret santa present opening day. They are just my regular vanilla cupcake recipe with vanilla icing. I used smarties and mint leaves to make the holly.

Merry Christmas!!!

December Daring Bakers Challenge - Gingerbread House

The December 2009 Daring Baker's challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Baker's everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

I was so excited when I found out that the Daring Baker's challenge was to make a gingerbread house. This is something that I really wanted to do this christmas so this was the perfect oppurtunity. I used the recipe which Anna suggested from Good Housekeeping which can be found here. I chose to assemble my house using royal icing instead of sugar syrup and it stayed together great. Bear in mind this is my first time ever making a gingerbread house so it is not a spectacular work of art but I love it!

I used royal icing to draw windows on the front and side walls. I used musk sticks to make a door on the front.

I also used royal icing and smarties to make the lattice pattern on the roof. My lines are not very straight but this is only like the second time I have tried to do piping. Even though it is not perfect the roof is actually my favourite part of the house!

And I used spearming leaves along both sides of the house to make little gardens. I had so much fun making this house. A lot of other people said that ran into problems when rolling out the dough because it was dry but I didn't have any trouble at all. I am so looking forward to next christmas because I think this gingerbread house making thing might become a christmas tradition!

2009 in review! Part 2

So for part 2 of 2009 in review we start with May. And here we go...............

May

May started off with me throwing a baby shower for my dear friend Lauren. It was a small gathering because she is only new to the Gold Coast but it was a lot of fun anyway! I had a lot of fun decorating the house and making food for the party. When I have kids I think I am going to go a little crazy planning for their birthday parties.


And lucky we had the baby shower at the start of May because Lauren's little girl Cielle arrived just 3 weeks later. She was the most gorgeous tiny little newborn I had ever seen! She sure has grown since then but she is still the cutest little girl ever!

June

So June was a fun filled month. Not only did we have my dad's birthday and go and see the Pink concert in Brisbane but we also spent the long weekend camping in Caloundra. Me, Corey, my sister, her boyfriend and 3 other couples from our group of friends went camping in Caloundra. We had so much fun. We relaxed at our campsite and at the beach. We got ice-cream from Mr Whippy.
We played grip ball. Below is Corey demonstrating his mad grip ball catching skills!

This is most of the group that went camping. I was taking the photo and the other couple were packing their car still at the time.

While we were up there we went to the night races. I had never been to horse racing at night and it was heaps of fun. The race track up their is all open plan so you can sit pretty much anywhere and still see the track. We didn't win any money but it was fun anyway!

June also saw the arrival of another little baby. This is Corey's newest nephew Isaac. He was such a tiny little baby and now he is huge. Its crazy how fast they grow!

July

In July I took part in a portraiture workshop at Bluedog Photography and I had so much fun. I really like photography I just wish I had more time to develop my skills. It is on my 101 things in 1001 days list to try and develop my photography skills a bit more. These are some of the photos I took at my workshop.

At the end of July me, Corey, Hayley and Kieran took a drive out to my Aunty's house in St George. St George for those that don't know is about 6 or 7 hours drive inland from the Gold Coast. Its a tiny little country town and it is so cute! We went out there to go to the races which is the biggest even of the year for St George.

We also got to meet the mayor of St George. It was very exciting! The mayor of St George has purple hair! Thats right, purple hair. She is the funkiest mayor I have ever met.

And then after we went to the races we went to the St George pub which was great. There was a really good little band on and we even ran into some guys that Corey went to highschool with. You can't take Corey anywhere without running into people he knows. Even when your 7 hours away in the middle of the country.

August

In August was my mummy's birthday and as you probably can tell by now I am really bad at taking photos at my families birthdays. Not sure why but I will definately be changing that next year! So after mums birthday I took part in the RSPCA Cupcake Day. I sold cupcakes to all the people at the newspaper where my sister works. I made frogs, pigs and rabbits but the rabbits kind of looked like cats.

These are all the orders once they had been packaged up and were ready to be delivered. There was a lot and they took ages to make but it raised money for a good cause.

Also in August I helped to organise the Gold Coast Show for the 2nd year. I had so much fun this year! I had a lot more responsibilities with the planning this time around. My boss even went overseas for 6 weeks and left me in charge of everything which was stressful but great experience for when I leave uni. We organise all the entertainment at the Gold Coast Show so we do the rodeo, the animals, the night time entertainment, the skate/bmx shows and this year we had a cooking competition as well.

Okay so that is installment number 2 of my 2009 in review. It has been a pretty busy year but I think 2009 has been one of my favourite years ever! Installment number 3 (September - December) will be coming up soon!

The Tale of the Gingerbread Men

Today is my work christmas lunch and everyone has to bring a plate of food. I chose to make gingerbread men! They look so cute all iced with their little faces but these cookies were a bitch to make.I was having a bit of a debbie downer day yesterday. I woke up in a funk and just could not shake it. I'm not sure if I have mentioned it before but I have a lot of food allergies to different preservatives and additives and things and some normal food too like watermelon and coconut and even chocolate. If I eat these foods I have a couple of days where I feel super down and I will cry for no reason. Yesterday was one of these days. So I tried to shake myself out of it by making my gingerbread men but that just made it worse. The dough wasn't working for me and then I burnt my finger and dropped a tray full of cookies. I am lucky though because I have a super amazing mum and she made me some fruit slice to take to my work lunch as well because I lost half my gingerbread men. I am feeling a lot better today and I am so excited for our christmas lunch.

Sorry to crap on about my shit day but it makes me feel better to tell someone why I was in such a funk. I hope your all having a great day today!

p.s - 6 sleeps till christmas! YAY!!!

2009 in review! Part 1

Danielle over at Sometimes Sweet did a little photo post look back at what she has done during 2009 and invited people to join in if they would like to. I loved her idea and I love a good photo post so I thought why not. I am doing it in parts so I don't overload you all with photos. This 1st section will be January to April.

January

We celebrated Australia Day at my friend's house and everyone was encouraged to dress up. We had a boxing kangaroo flag that I used as a skirt and I painted my singlet.

(Corey and I)

(Me, my sister and her boyfriend)

(my sister's boyfriend Kieran)

Kieran definately won the best costume of the day with his lifesaver get up. Very impressive!

Also in January one of Corey's friends, Dave, who he has known since he was a kid got married to his gorgeous girlfriend Sherie. The wedding was up Mount Tambourine and was simply gorgeous. The reception was a hell of a lot of fun. We pretty much danced none stop all night!

(Corey and I)

(Corey, Dave, Sherie and Me)

(Corey and his brother Jason at the reception)

My aunty and cousin's came to visit us for a few days at the end of the month. My aunty and mum spent a day relaxing together while my sister, her boyfriend, Corey and I took my cousins to Movieworld.

February

Probably the most exciting thing I did all year was go to Fiji with Corey and my sister. We went over for 9 days. Our friends Joe and Kelly also came over and met up with us for the last 4 days of our holiday. We had so so so much fun in Fiji!

We stayed in an awesome safari tent.

We learnt how to crack coconuts straight off the tree.

We danced on the bar.

And we made heaps of new friends!

March

March was a month full of birthdays! We had a barbecue at my sister's for her 23rd birthday. But I can't find where I saved my photos from that night. Sorry!

It was also Corey's nephew Kai's first birthday. I made the cake. It was a chocolate mudcake with chocolate icing and decorated with mint m&m's which Kai loved and kept picking off while we were singing.

And then we went to the races for my friend Lauren's birthday.

(the girls at the races)

April

In April we went to Copa, which is on the NSW Central Coast, to visit my aunty and uncle for easter. We had a lot of fun there! We always have a lot of fun there. We played a lot of RockBand.

We walked the dog, or rather he walked himself!

We played tourist in Sydney.

But the most exciting thing I did was buy my KitchenAid! My uncle owns a restaurant supplies store in Gosford called Premier Catering Supplies and he ordered this in for me while we were there. I love love love it!

So that was my January to April. The next installment will be May till August. If anyone else joins in on this look back at your 2009 let me know so I can pop over and check out how your year went!