The school loves NZ

 

 

And NZ loves the school.

Well, I did it, I got brave, I became my alter ego (the love and ginger ninja) and I went to Megan Morton's science of styling course in Auckland.

Ok, so my friend Caroline will tell you that I almost didn't get out of the car when she dropped me off in the morning, and I may have fantasised about her coming in and standing at the back of the class until she saw me settle in and make a friend. But then I remembered that in a few short days I will be 30 and that I was being ridiculous, I didn't need Mama Caroline to look after me.... I just had to go in there and hope that everyone wasn't so cool that I would be rendered mute and weird.

Result, everyone was very cool but also very nice!! The first girl I met was Hayley of HHD Event Styling, we realised quickly that we attended the same high school, she recognised me and I quickly remembered her as the 5th former with the bananas in pajamas backpack who I thought was super cool (in case you weren't a 90's teenager...they were the business, I had a matching b's in pj's watch with my best friend) and coincidentally that friend had her unbelievably beautiful wedding styled by Hayley earlier this year. Small world. Hayley really has an amazing eye and I can't think of anyone quite like her in the (03) area, so I thought it worth mentioning to all of you Canterbury brides.

 

 

 

Enter Megan Morton, this super tall, gorgeous woman with ridiculous blue eyes (sorry do I sound like I have a crush on her, ok I'm not sorry, I do) she is such a warm and approachable person (not that I was brave enough to approach her all on my own) and actually kind of hilarious. You know how you watch interviews with Cameron Diaz and you think "yea, I wanna be her best friend" she's like that!!!!! She was full of shiny pearls of wisdom when it came to making spaces look like they just fell into a house looking amazing. Actually some tips included just actually letting things fall. But that's all I'm going to say because next time she is in town, you must go.

 

 

 

I also went to Stephanie Stamatis's (aka IG user Stephanie_somebody) class on instagram, that girl just captures things so beautifully and makes every corner of the world look amazing through her iPhone. We were very lucky and were given some photos of hers. Which I love! Again, a very inspiring woman, who is letting her creativity and natural talent cut it's own path for her to follow. Note to self: be more like that. Stephanie and her fiancé have taken off for a quick trip around the south of the South Island, I'm looking forward to seeing the photos she captures of that area and if you are too, follow her on instagram

I so wished I could have gone to Kara Rosenlund's vignette class (damn, regret!) it would have been awesome to do some hands on styling and it looked so great on everyone else's instagram feeds. Check them out on #theschoollovesNZ

 

 

Image by Gemma from www.blackbirdgem.blogspot.co.nz

 

 

Auckland in General was also just incredibly good fun. It helped that I was swamped with freakin gorgeous friends to catch up and hang with. But honestly, the food. THE FOOD. I pretty much ate my way through Auckland and Holy Cronut! It was good. So here is my list of where you should eat.....

 

 

Late night Diner - because mac cheese and chilli con carne at 12am is ALWAYS a good idea

Mexico - the guac and corn chips and the beef tacos....just, YES.

The Food Truck Garage - you probably saw him on tv, going here is so much better than licking the tv screen

Depot - we ate tapa after tapa and had red wine after red wine in tumblers like cool kids. Delish

Federal Deli - the Banoffie Pie, I just... Have no words. But there is a little drool in the corner of my mouth. Ew

Petit Bocal - the best breakfast with the most delicious bacon. And they are all French and beautiful! Legit.

Zomer - best juice in town surely. It was like drinking raw liquid energy. And some damn good Guac.

 

 

 

 

 

Oh yea, I had my first Cronut. Endangering waist lines everywhere. And I'm the rebellious type.

 

 

 

 

I also got to Junk and disorderly which was at the top of my list. My heaven on earth. I found a few treasures to bring home with me. I also found many treasures that I couldn't logistically bring home with me. stupid baggage allowance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

So in Summary, l do love the School I also love Auckland. It was good to me.... Better than good. And for those of you that have a 'Jafa' attitude towards AKL. I will leave you with this short story.

 

On Saturday night after gorging myself on tapa's and banoffie pie, my friend Cecil dropped me off at our friend Caroline's house where I was staying. Caroline was out babysitting and her flatmates were either out or asleep. I tried my key, I heard a lock turn and I tried to open it. Nope. Something was wrong, a deadlock had come into play (*more on that soon) and I was locked out. I checked my phone, flat as a pancake... No surprises there. I knocked for awhile, no one heard. I was outside, phoneless, with no idea where I actually was because I have absolutely no sense of direction. Usually I just follow Guy while I look at everything....yes, kind of like a toddler. There was no other option (in my eye's) I needed to charge my phone and coming from Waikuku where all the neighbours are amazing. It seemed the best thing to do at 11:30pm was to go and ask the neighbours if I could charge my phone. So I wandered next door and a man named Roger answered.

 

 

I know what you're thinking. She was murdered. Well..... I wasn't.

 

 

I put my phone on one of their chargers and popped upstairs to polish off a bottle of his Syrah with him while we chatted away about not much really. He was so lovely....I didn't meet his boyfriend Jason, he was already in bed and probably pretending to be asleep while listening to the crazy girl in his living room thinking "what the?!??". I was having such a good time I actually totally forgot that I was stuck for awhile. Eventually I went down and grabbed my now charged phone to call Caroline who thought I was mental. And who decided to return home to get me immediately (in case of murdering). I bid Roger farewell and went next door to bed, where my room looked directly into the living room I was just in, I gave him a big wave and hit the hay.

A testament to humans, Aucklanders and computer software programmers everywhere. I made sure to leave them a card and a replacement bottle of Syrah before I came home. Thank you Roger, for not murdering me and for giving me wine.

 

*turns out I was just unlocking and locking the deadlock! not the actually handle lock. I know this because I did it again the next night after my class with Stephanie, but this time Caroline was there to wake up (you should never wake Caroline up) stare angrily at me, and tell me. "ITS NOT THE DEADLOCK, ITS YOU!"

 

 

 

X

 

Glass all the way

 

I've long been teased by a certain 'pack' of cousins about my intolerance for plastic drinking bottles. I swear "I CAN taste the plastic!!!!!". It's meant I've always drunk from my antipodes water bottle, they are the perfect water bottle/vase/candlestick and I will always have a few lying around and a compulsive "must buy one" reflex when I see them in a cafe.

But since I've been drinking my morning smoothies enroute to the building site most weekends I've been looking for a glass takeaway option. Well, three cheers to me because I found one!!!!! The Mason Bar Company have a gorgeous range of mason jars with screw tops and BPA free lids and straws.....ummm winning. Not to mention its a good 600mls worth, no more having to fill two glasses on the go.... Foooor goodness sake, would you just look at my pre-masonbarcompany-find self... I don't know what she's smirking for, she looks ridiculous.

 

 

 

Go and have a looksy for yourself HERE

 

Upholstery girls

 

A few weeks back my friend and I organised a gaggle of girls to come out to the shed in Waikuku and bring an old dunga of a chair with them (or in Alice's case, a 2 seater sofa, girl got skills) we had a lovely upholstery man called Nigel come along and teach us how to turn these chairs from smelly-yuck to spiffy-wicked in two days.

Not all of us finished the chairs/sofa in the weekend but we all got pretty close, even Fliss whose chair had lived a hard life and was covered in bullet holes, had broken springs and a feared possibility that something furry and alive could have been living in it.

Unfortunately our 'after' photo was taken by Nigel and featured more of his finger than the chairs.... I'll hopefully get some photos from the girls over the next few weeks and show you their before and afters, until then it's just going to be my little fella.

 

 

Here he goes, my little chair's extreme makeover (upholstery edition)

For those with a keen eye, you are right, I have not quite finished..... I just need to staple the underneath cloth down and cover with some calico.......soon.

 

 

 

Fabric from Femme de Brocante ....the girls there were super helpful and friendly which was a real bonus on top of the fabric find!

 

If I can offer any advice for a weekend like this...

• Keep your class small
• Try and pull all of the old fabric and staples out before you go, the first half of our first day was filled with chiseling, ripping, pulling and cussing
• Keep it simple splashy, I was so pleased I didn't choose anything with arms to sew.... In fact my makeover required zero sewing, only a few hand stitches. Although in saying that, it meant I didn't get to learn any of those skills. Pros and cons

 

 

 

Oh yea, this is my sandwich. Haha. The reason I'm sharing is because feeding 8 girls over two days ended up being really easy, this is how I went about it

• Fresh ciabatta rolls
• Baked free range chicken breasts coated in spelt flour, chilli powder, turmeric and salt+pepper, then shredded
• Salad greens
• Beetroot salad (this recipe from the ripe cookbook) without sultanas and with chia seeds and sliced almonds and maple syrup instead of the molasses
• Parsley dressing (my mother in laws recipe)
• Feta

We all just made our own sandwiches and then we ate cookies.

 

It was such a fun weekend and we're all keen to keep catching up over crafty workshops. I'm thinking the next one could be macramé.....

 

chocolate bunnies

4 glorious days off work, one day trip to Hickory bay with friends Penny + Seth and baby Jack, 3 days working on the section, 100 gazillion chocolate bunnies in our tummies. Win!

 

 

Little river stop off for possibly the best spinach and feta scone ever...

 

 

Board bags come with nappy bags for Seth these days

 

 

Walking in to Hickory Bay

 

 

 

There's always time to cut some beach shapes

 

Penny and her delicious wee man Jack

 

Then I stole him....baby hog...... And he fell asleep! Awwwww

 

Surprise! Ju and Caleb arrived.... Ju got in on some Jack love as well.

 

 

Walking back over the hill to reality....

 

Dinner at the Akaroa hilltop pub....that place is amazing these days! If you haven't been lately, do go!

 

We also watched baby seals jumping, diving and frolicking in the water while we ate far too much cheese, focaccia and chips..... although too much of those three things is never enough in my opinion. All in all, it was one of those days that made you feel incredibly lucky to be living in New Zealand...

Such a great day out and soooo many photos that I think I will post about the section work another time. I am planning on getting myself a proper little point and shoot camera at some stage....the iPhone is just so damn easy but not the best when it comes to picture quality I guess.

Hope you all had a great break and ate plenty of hot cross buns with creme egg chasers..... X

Mediterranean nemo

Ok, I feel a little fleck of pride right now.... I created a fish dish. Katrina, the girl who would not eat fish until she was 25 years old, created her own slippery sea dweller recipe....and it wasn't half bad despite what it looks like in the photo!

Here goes...

Preheat oven to 180°c

In a lined baking dish mix

• a couple of handfuls of cherry tomatoes, slice a few in half
• A few cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
• torn basil leaves
• Salt and pepper
• A little olive oil toss through and coat everything

Pop it in the oven for a few minutes and then add

• 2 fillets of tarakihi or another firm white fish
• Salt and pepper
• Lemon zest
• sliced spring onions
• Lots of Feta

Roast until the fish is cooked through, no idea how long it took, I will pay attention next time and update.

That is the danger of my kitchen, you will never see measuring tools or timers on my bench. I am very much a throw it in, hmmm and add a little more... kind of cook. My kitchen motto is "I'm not a baker, I'm a rule breaker".

Don't be intimidated by my culinary toughness

Now to serve up, pop this onto some grilled bruschetta or eat up with a few buttered new spuds. Or if you are like us, bruschetta and spuds.

 

The NOM NOM club

 

#thenomnomclub

I sent out a request to my instagram community the other day and it went a little something like this...

IG friends, I am one of those people who likes to plan a menu for the week...its good on the budget and hopefully the waistline. But I get super sick of recycling the same meals... So, I'm gonna start posting some pics of our meals with #thenomnomclub and post the recipe on my blog...this is ALL in the hope that some of you do the same and have a few good noms to share.

If not, the nomnom club will be short lived...As then I'll have to start recycling my own noms.... Awkward.

Get amongst it, share your noms, it's what friends do.

So that's it, hopefully a club is born full of ideas for easy food.... Just use Pinterest I hear you say? Well good point, but if I jump on Pinterest to look for meal ideas, all I end up doing is repinning 30 non food related pins, then I stare at the food pictures, feel even more hungry but ultimately overwhelmed by the fact that I don't have time to make the 5 layer cheesecake that I want to eat for dinner.

Hopefully the NOM NOM club will be a direct link to some quick meals, I will also be posting my weekly meal plan when I can, so that might be kinda helpful. If you're into it, share it around, post the NOM NOM club pic to your feed and get recruiting....lets get a good group of nommers going!

Oh hello there

I have a few things to share...

 

1. Coconut water.... Where the hell have you been all my life (and yes I realise I am the last person to jump on this bandwagon) my lovely client bought me a little box of this goodness and I used it in my morning smoothie instead of just boring old H20 and it was delicious. I had a read online and there are some serious benefits to drinking from this liquid cocobox. I ordered a 12 pack quick smart from here this morning and I can expect it to arrive tomorrow! How's that for pronto postman!

 

 

2. I bought this tshirt from cotton on and I'm a big fan... update: I wore it at work and covered the side of it in dark brown tint.....fail.

 

 

3. These frames from the dollar saver store in Northlands Mall are $3.90 they are about 2kg each frame and made from a heavy resin. I'm into them.... And I've used them before here. If you are in the area I have kindly left a few there to buy haha, go get some!! Oh and once again, cotton on charity bags are just the best!

 

 

4. We had our third wedding anniversary on the 10th of January, Guy handmade me a card which I was over the moon impressed with annnnd I wore my wedding dress for an hour or so, no big deal.....

 

Found

 

I know I don't usually bang on about products on here..... But I'm gonna.

Because I found the blueberry Mecca and I think you all know how I feel about my daily blueberry smoothie! Yesterday I went to Countdown, not my usual supermarket, but I was on my way home from the section after a hard weekends work and I needed blueberries...

That's when I saw them, in all of their beautifully packaged, NZ grown, certified organic glory... OOB blueberries.

I had my first smoothie using them this morning and the taste was soooo much better than all theother smoothies I've made for the last 3 years, I actually feel jilted. Perhaps they're a sign, a good omen.... 2013 is going to taste awesome and look good.

Check out their website for a list of stockists so you can get some too (sharing is caring) and beware because they also have crazy good looking ice cream and sorbets.

 

 

Merry Christmas

Some snap shots of our day

 

We had a great day with just a little bit of family... With my two sister's living abroad and Guy's two brothers calling Brisbane home... It was just us and the parentals this year. We had such a chilled out typical Kiwi Christmas with, barbecued lamb, roast ham, new potatoes, a giant yummy salad, yummy ambrosia for dessert and plenty of beer, wine and pétanque in the sun. We topped it off by visitng my extended family at thir nearby farm and then camping out at the section. Hope you all had a wonderful day with the people you love. X

 

 

 

Sharing is caring

 

I don't know if I can credit this recipe to "the chicken for my salad didn't thaw in time" or "pumpkins are dominating Pinterest right now and filling my head with possible pumpkin uses" either way this little recipe was created in my kitchen by accident one night and its become a staple. In all honesty, I'm not the biggest salad fan (I pick the side of fries every time) but there is something about the weather warming up that makes you crave a lighter meal in the evening isn't there? And a beer. This salad has just the right amount of 'fill you up' ingredients so that you don't feel like you're eating at a restaurant run by giant rabbit chefs.

Roast at 200 degrees Celsius until golden and cooked through

• A wedge of pumpkin big enough to feed the amount you're feeding, chopped into cubes
• Raw almonds
• A can of chickpeas
• Olive oil & Salt and pepper or some spices if you're feeling spicy

Once they're done set your salads up in separate bowls, we used

• Baby spinach leaves
• Avocado
• Sliced red onion
• Feta
• Tomato

Pop your roasted trio on top and squeeze lemon juice and balsamic vinegar over the whole lot.

• Eat it

The above salad is what Guy called "man-salad" man-salad is achieved by adding leftover roast lamb from the night before.

Lady salad

 

Excuse the photos, I'm no Donna hay and my balsamic vinegar is going to splash on my bowl and I'm not going to wipe it before I take the photo.... I was ravenous at this point and taking two photos before digging in was hard enough. I don't know how Don's does it...

 

NOM NOM NOM

 

Neglected

The blog has been grossly neglected as of late, so as a quick way to get you up to speed this is our life in pictures... Prepare for the bomb and brief explanations.

macarons from a lovely client

eating macarons with lovely client

lovely client

sharing macarons after lunch in the sun with Guy

and Jed, who was on watch

meeting baby Willem....huge fan!

are you smooching the screen, I'd forgive if you were

guitar and beer sessions with the fella.

 

So, that's almost it apart from.....

 

 

Would you just look how much this wee man has grown and how lovely Olivia looks!!!!!!!! They are all such troopers.....power and positive vibes slamming their way.

 

 

 

Oh and today we are the official owners of 2.5 acres, no big deal. I'm lying.....

 

IT'S A HUGE DEAL!!!!!

 

Off for a celebratory drink now if you'll excuse me. Yeeha.