A Lovely Saturday In and Out

Not the best photo...but I can only do so much with my phone...

Before I get to today, we had a lovely dinner out last night. James came and met me out at Coogee and we had some yum Fish and Chips and I showed him all the things that entertain me on my bus trip to and from work. I'm back at Coogee next week, I like it there. The stressed lady is a lot nicer when she knows you, she's just a very stressed, tense person with very strong views...I'm also making some friends there, and I know all the kids in the Toddlers room's names. So I am happy to go back next week. Starting at 7:45 though, so it's going to be some early mornings!

Today was a super awesome start to the weekend. I got to sleep in until 9, then showered and went to brunch with James at Urbanbites. Mmm, it was super yum. We both got the Brekkie Stack (the photo above) and it was a very yummy breakfast: Turkish bread topped with spinach, mushrooms, bacon, a fried egg and hollandaise sauce.  :D

We then walked through the University of Sydney to get to Officeworks (I needed a new top for my Bobble bottle). I love old buildings, which is probably why I loved Durham so much, and most of the Uni that we walked through was beautiful old buildings. The building below was apparently built so that they could be like Oxford and Cambridge (I'm so glad it's not just Durham that has a weird obsession with being like them!). It's a pretty awesome building though, and if you want inspiration for some beautiful old buildings the ones in Oxbridge are pretty good inspiration. :)

 We then wandered past Gopser Lane. :D There is no parking in Gosper Lane.

We then went to Broadway to see if Target had any nice coloured trousers. (Side note: I am currently obsessed with colourful trousers, I have a bright blue pair but would love more. My blue ones do come in other beautiful colours, but they are all sold out, bummer. So, I've been looking for others) They had some, but they fit funny. We then got James a planner so he can see when his deadlines are, and then it was food shopping. Friday, Saturday and Sunday are my cooking days, and today I decided to try something from the yummy meals I've pinned. I let James choose, and he chose Healthy Baked Chicken Nuggets and Brussels Sprouts with Avocado, Bacon and Lime.

They were both really easy to make, and so yummy. I think we are definitely making them both again. :D Yum yums.

Now to do some dishes...

PS: We got our tickets for the Sydney Comedy Festival today! We're going to see Simon Amstell, Danny Bhoy and Steven K Amos. We chose all the UK comedians, hehe! Very excited!

Checklist for happiness

Check, check and check. I count myself very lucky. :)

Oh dear...

Today I was told by a three/four year old girl that no-one can look pretty without make up. I find that frightening.

In other news, annoying woman was equally annoying today...and I found out a lot of the other casual staff find her scary and annoying, plus some of the permanent staff don't think she's that great. It's always nice knowing I'm not alone in disliking someone. BUT, she won't be in the room I'm working in for the rest of the week, so YAYS! And, I think I have most of the kids names down. It takes me a while to remember some of the boys names, but I think I can now name them all, which is a HUGE help in getting them to do things and calming them down. It also helps me feel more in control and less lost when I know the names. :)

Another plus is that due to some new things the government has implemented about the qualifications required for working in Child care, yada yada, I get paid a bit more per hours! Yays!

And and, I'll be having a little Paris weekend with my mum whilst I'm back in Europe. Yays!

Now to eat and fall asleep. I am exhausted!

Quote to Inspire #29

Done by me, Quote unknown.

Work by the beach

Photo of Coogee Bay taken on my phone today.

This week I'm working out near Coogee Bay. This means taking a pretty long bus ride out to work, it's between 30mins to an hour. It's not that bad, and it is quite nice to see the beach before and after work.

I'm not really sure some of the staff at the centre make it worth going all that way for work, but it's only early days, and people have bad days. The staff member I was working in a room with today was really quite horrible, she was very negative about everything, barely interacted with any of the kids, never smiled and made the room feel very tense. If it wasn't for the kids being lovely I would probably have asked to not do the rest of the week, but the children counteract her attitude. I may think twice about working out there again though, we'll see how much we need the money. :P

101 Dreams - Dream 23

Dream 23 - Have a calm/chic bedroom. Eventually I want to have a bedroom that is like a little calm haven to escape to at the end of the day, somewhere to relax and somewhere that makes me feel happy. I don't yet know what that room will look like, but I have some rooms that I am already loving. One day.

What would your ideal bedroom be?

Gift Package

The gift package from my mum arrived today! Yays! I love getting little gift packages, they make me all happy! :) I was very excited!

It was very well packed: parcel, wrapping paper, box and another box.

And finally I got to what was inside! Eeeee! It was all packed ever so nicely!

I got some lovely napkins and teatowels. So very pretty. :) It may take me a while to use them because they are so lovely!

A super awesome bottle opener (for all that beer we like to drink), it's super light and super elegant. James and I are both fans of this little gift!

And a beautiful scarf and a lovely black jacket (no photo of the jacket). I absolutely LOVE the scarf, it's gorgeous! Such a wonderful colour and so beautiful. :)

I am very happy with my little gift package, definitely a great pick me up! Thank you Mother Dearest! :)

Control Freak

Season 2, ep 3 of My Little Pony Friendship is Magic - Twilight Sparkle goes a little crazy because she doesn't have a friendship lesson to tell Princess Celestia about, and it must be done EVERY WEEK!

Sometimes, I feel like that on the inside. I am a total control freak, very structured, very organised. I love my to do lists, I love planning what I'm going to do, I love control over what I'm doing. I get all uncomfortable and stressed when I don't know what is going on, even more so when I don't know directions to somewhere...I hate not knowing where to go or what I'm doing when I'm travelling. I am a super pre-planned traveller, always way too early for everything (check in was never open for my flights when I was flying home from uni...) I need things to be a set way. I over-think a LOT of things! My brain does not turn off... I'm really not as laid back and relaxed as I would like to be.

I think I used to be a bit more chilled, a bit more spontaneous...but now I am working, earning money, budgeting money...no longer living in the carefree world of childhood, I feel the need to control more. But at the same time I really want to stop caring so much about these little things and just enjoy life, maybe even find a balance between the two...it's so hard though.

I'm currently stressing about money. Not because we don't have money, but because my super control-freak mind wants to stay above a certain amount of money, just so there is something around 'in case of emergencies'. As a consequence of this though, I'm only really spending money on food and rent and not much else, and that's a pretty boring life. The danger is that I know if I just forget about budgeting I am going to easily spend my money...I am pretty good at making money disappear. I definitely need to find the balance...oh brain, why do you treat me like this?

My Life in Song #5

Low Rider. This is on the Knights Tale soundtrack, a CD we listened to a lot at a certain point in time. I love the whole CD, but this song in particular because we would all 'play' the different instruments and do the "ba ba ba ba baaaa ba ba ba BA baa" bit. I love this song, and hearing it makes me think of sitting in the car 'singing' along to it. I am not sorry if you get it stuck in your head. :P

21 Jump Street - Go watch it NOW!

Tonight we went to watch 21 Jump Street, and it was hilarious! I definitely recommend going to watch it if you enjoy comedy movies, it was a real good laugh. :)

We've not been up to much this week after our many dinners out last week. Tonight was our first proper 'outing'. I spent the last three days working...and seriously, working with kids is exhausting! Oh my! I love it. I love the kids, and like the staff, and enjoy the work...but it's one of those jobs that involve being awake and attentive ALL the time, you zone out and a kid could have some kind of major accident. So today, I slept pretty much all day. I got up at 10, had lunch with James, and went back to bed at 1 until 5. Haha! It sounds incredibly lazy, but I was knackered! So tonight we went out for dinner with some of James' uni friends (not quite calling them my friends yet, some day I will, but not yet) and convinced them to go see 21 Jump Street. We were thanked. :P

Tomorrow we are off to Canberra for a weekend visit to celebrate one of James' uncle's birthday. Should hopefully be a good weekend. :)

PS: Go watch 21 Jump Street.

Love this Hat

Dune Lace Straw Cat Eye Sunglasses Hat

I love this hat from Kate Spade. In fact, I love a lot of things from Kate Spade, but I can actually see me wearing this. Part of me would love to feel comfortable wearing all the lovely bright and beautiful outfits from Kate Spade, but I'm much more of a Safari girl. I think anyway...my wardrobe is a place of much conflict in my life. Anyhoo, that little ramble over, I LOVE this hat. It's so cute and awesome. I would wear a hat so much more if it was this one! :)

Quote to Inspire #28

Photo by me, Quote Mark Twain.

101 Dreams - Dream 49

Photos found on pinterest.

Dream 49 - Visit Zumbos with James.
Ever since we saw the wonderful creations of Adriano Zumbo on Masterchef (in particular the V8 cake) we have wanted to visited his patisserie in Sydney. I'm not the most adventurous dessert person, so I don't think I'd like some of his weird creations, but there are some that look mouthwatering. So yeah, we would LOVE to go there sometime. We might use our free Fridays to do this sometime in the future. :)

My Life in Song - Sex Bomb

Haha. I love that this song makes me think of a summer spent making a cardboard table as an Art project for the IB. It took quite some time to make, and I seemed to enjoy listening to this song on repeat, so it is heavily associated sitting in the living room, beautiful summer sunshine coming through the window, sticking cardboard together and painting it. It's a very odd thing to think about when listening to this song, but it makes me smile. :P

Kookai Australia

So, if you know me well, you'll know that I LOVE Kookai. They just make such lovely clothes. Since we are coming up to the beginning of Spring/Autumn (depending on where in the world you are) I am following the slow release of the new collections in both the UK/France Kookai and the Australian Kookai, and man am I loving some of the stuff I'm seeing. The European Kookai's often have several different themes for their collections, and they seem to quite consistently have a Safari like theme every season. I do love Safari like clothes. I am happiest with my wardrobe whenever we are in South Africa, so I am always happy to see Safari like items in collections. The Australian Kookai seems to be going for a Paris look this Autumn, which I am also quite fond of. This new collection has one item in particular which fits nicely into Safari and Paris, so I am super in love with it. It is also super beautiful and a kind of timeless piece. The beautiful suede vest jacket above...oh the love! I am going to have to save up some of my money to buy this when it comes out in the shops.

Are there any collections you're excited about coming out soon?

Quote to Inspire #27

Done by me, Quote unknown.

101 Dreams - Dream 18

Dream 18 - Have the most wonderful wedding.
I don't have an idea of a perfect wedding in my head, because I think it's the getting married that makes it special, but I do have an idea of things I like. :) I would like something outside, something cute, something personal and something small. I have a pinterest board for my little dreams...it feels kind of silly, but doesn't every little girl dream about their wedding? :)

I would be pretty happy to just have pretty outdoor areas like these for casual evening parties with friends. :P

Moustaches

I put my little ideas book to use yesterday (in an extremely neat way...why am I always so neat?). :) Just felt like sharing.

It's raining again today, so another lazy day. We're watching Wayne's World now, and then one of the two Disney movies I bought. I like lazy days.

Resolution Progress - February

1. Learn more about Photography

I got a book! I have a book and a pen for my self-learning of photography. I would so love to do a course too, but I'll see how much I can learn on my own. Now I need to make time for it. I think I can use Thursdays since they will be my 'Me' days. :)

2. Lose at least 5kg

I've not been actively working towards this goal, but we have been trying to eat healthier and do some exercise. We have been doing much better with our eating (although we do have the odd 'bad' day like today) and we have to do a lot of walking to do most things outside of our place, so it's going well. I think I'm down about 1.5kg since the beginning of the year, so we're definitely doing something right. :)

3. Cook something new and healthy once a week
I am ready (ish) to start! I am planning on starting next week! Yays! BUT we don't have all sorts of trays and stuff...so I may need to do some money spending on that...hehe. The above is what I am currently planning on attempting next week. :D

4. Bake once a week for a year
Also, ready (ish) to start next week. We have NO baking things, so I will almost most definitely need to buy some stuff for this goal. Agains, the image above is what I am currently planning on making next week. Yum!

5. Create Moustache notebooks
6. Create an Art Portfolio
Neither have any progress yet...but there is time. :)

7. Learn about Aboriginal Art
I have a book! I am super excited to have books for this and the photography goal because I have really wanted to start but had nowhere to put in my research and things. Again, I think Thursday may be a good day for progressing on this. :D

8. Use my 365 book somehow
Yeah...not done that yet, BUT it is staring at me every day, so I really want to start soon.

9. Try and achieve at least one of my 101 Dreams
I hadn't thought this one through, because I did accomplish it pretty fast. I would like to achieve another one some time this year...maybe liking my wardrobe? Haha...I don't think that one will ever happen. :P But a cruise to New Zealand doesn't seem too difficult to achieve at the moment. :)

I think I've got alright progress. Me being me I'd love to be closer to accomplishing ALL my goals, but then what would I do with the rest of the year? So it's good. :) This is definitely the longest I have worked at my resolutions! :P

My Life in Song - Heaven

Heaven by Bryan Adams. :) This is a song I associate with the beginning of mine and James' relationship, a very specific moment. Slow dancing in his living room. It sounds so lame now, especially because our friends were there too, but it as lovely and we were 16...later that evening we also had our first kiss, oh the wonderfully happy awkwardness I feel when I think of this. We got left alone by our friends for some reason. We sat next to each other. We kissed ever so delicately, I remember thinking his lips were very soft. Then we got interrupted to be told my mum had arrived to pick me up. Haha...teenage life. It's a lovely song to have linked to such memories though, I am happy it was this. :)