BIRTHDAY WISHES & KISSES

 

 

Hip-hip-hooray, happy birthday to my darling friend. Last week we celebrated her birthday, we all met at her place with a home made dish in hand. Seema was in full swing making her Grandmother's special curry and a delicious fish curry when I entered her busy kitchen, the smells coming from the stovetop were dreamy. By dusk we were all working together to fill our plates, passing dishes and bowls at the makeshift buffet table of home made dishes, the theme of the night was curries; bean and lentil curries, fish curries, buttered chicken, rogan josh, tandoori chicken, yoghurts, mango chutney, rice, naans.....I had two full platefuls of food and my tummy was greedily bursting by the time she blew the candles on her little cakes. There was not much room for dessert, but somehow I managed to fit in a sweet slice of everything. Lemon meringue pie, brown butter and salted honey pie, NYC cheesecake and a raw cheesecake.....I was pigging. The best way to celebrate is with your friends and with food, and to have both of them together is a treat for all, thank you for a delicious evening. Happy Birthday beautiful lady, I hope that your wishes come true. xo

p.s. (How amazing is her loungeroom, big envy over her style. I drool!)

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WEEKEND ARRANGEMENTS

My weekend started with a sleep in (thank you Matty), a coffee and a kiss-kiss on each cheek from my family before I bounced out of the door to meet a gorgeous friend (and her micro-babe) for a long lunch and a shop before we embarked on a floral workshop at the Octopuss Garden.

The Octopuss Garden is inside an A-frame building. Need I say more. There was so much inspiration and beauty to choose from once inside. We were welcomed in by the amazing girls who shared some of their home made Sangria with all of us while encouraging us to enjoy the delicious cheese and dip spread. This is a slippery slope, once I start with food, particularly cheese....it can be tricky for me to move away, let alone concentrate on something else.

 

After choosing our stems we moved right into the stripping, snipping and spiral holding our stems into beautiful posies and bouquets. Working with flowers is therapeutic and there is great pleasure in working directly with beauty. Whilst we all wanted to work on more organic and flowing bouquets and posies, there was one who made a gorgeous structured posie with some cute little buds sticking out.

 (The above one is my little posie)

 (The token Kinfolky shot. Nailed it.)

My style is similar to my hair...kind of everywhere and loose, a bit bushy with a stick poking out. I made my bouquet with a good friend in mind - she was having her baby reveal the following day and I was hoping to style a bouquet that would flow with either a blue or pink sponge cake upon the gender reveal at the cutting of the cake. Lately I have really been noticing the colours purple and green in my life (they also happen to be my favourite colours) and they seem to be appearing everywhere. I couldn't resist using flowers with the captivating purple colour and I am just almost obsessed with the velvety looking gums. My large bouquet is pictured below and modelled by the lovely Laura.

My friend's wonderfully abundant bouquet below!! Gorgeous. It was interesting seeing how differently we all styled out bouquets and posies.

The day ended with two smiling mama's, a pram full of shopped items, freshly baked bread (thank you Kath!!!), bunches of fresh flowers and a sleeping baby. Is this not the best way to end the day?

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Images taken using Canon 5D Markiii//50mm 1.4

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NANA & POP'S GARDEN

This is Spring at Nana and Pop's place. A tropical landscape of palm trees, elephant ears, shrubs, climbing vines, succulents and fruit trees. Randomly placed fruit trees. They are a result of birds and bats pooping out their seeds and then germinating into the ground if the conditions are just right. If you are careful enough to look around, you will spy little tomato vines growing up trees and pineapple tops growing out from underneath shrubs.

Home is always at Nana and Pop's place. A quaint little cottage sunken into a green foliage of bushy shrubs and plants which carpet the lower legs of the tall assortment of palm trees and eucalyptus trees who stand tall above their house. Green and pink are the colours that your eyes recognise as you walk closer down the drive. They are the decorative petals of the Azalea, a plant once known as the "thinking of home" bush and also once infamous for it's levels of toxicity. But I think that they are mostly known for their beauty. Well, that's how I know of them. It is very tempting to break off a branch and shake the petals off, just because they look so soft and delicate and somehow even more beautiful when the deep pink petals are scattered acrossed the stone pavement. I let them be and enjoyed their cheerful beauty everytime I walked through the front door.

What flowers do you most admire for their beauty? Camellia's and Marigolds would have to be some of my other favourites.

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Images taken using Canon 5D Markiii//50mm 1.4

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ORANGES & EGGS

 

 

 

A bit of a wet and grey welcome to the weekend. No chance of a sleep in today as Matty is up north surfing for the weekend. So for me, an early breakfast by the window today and with some freshly squeezed orange juice made by my five year old son. He was pretty impressed with his slicing of the oranges, as was I. Today we have plans to bake in the morning and party in the afternoon.

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Images taken using Canon 5D Markiii//50mm 1.4

Please do not use my images without permission.