2013 - Back on track, nearly….

Sorry for my absence!

What a crazy, busy end to 2012, as usual I tried to do too much with not enough time
I started a new job, now you can find me at Circa, a beautiful Melbourne institution in the Prince of Wales complex in St Kilda.
I love it!  There seemed to be no end to the masses of bookings and christmas functions over the past 2 months, however with a new year and Melbournian's relaxing and enjoying the sunshine before plunging head first into 2013, we now have a chance to breath again, and today is the start of my first weekend off in months (2 days off in a row, very excited about this)

I've also moved house and so can finally finish unpacking.  I moved between a breakfast and dinner shift, crazy - don't do it, it was a terrible idea, for days all I had was my bed set up!
I'm now in a beautiful 3 bedroom turn of last century house in Elsternwick.  Super high ceilings, shiny pine floorboards, amazing ceiling roses in all rooms, and a very large and relaxing backyard with the beginnings of what will no doubt be a very successful vegi garden

The lovely Bree will be moving in in the next few weeks and our new household will be complete along with our new shower curtain!

Salvador is becoming more comfortable with his new surroundings too, we have progressed to stalking butterflies and beetles in the backyard, but still commando crawling inside at the first sign of a slightly aggressive sounding bird

 Christmas presents:  mugs from Susan and the girls as displayed by India and a leather wine holder for my bike from my sister - she always laughs at the amount of bottles I lug around in my satchel

Mexican in my backyard under the trees with some lovely new friends

 I've been doing a bit of work for Kyha and her amazing shop One Day Bridal on Ormond Rd in Elwood, plus more hankies for Northside Wheelers.  All this has made it a very busy lead up to christmas straight after the crazyness of Melbourne spring racing season

These are some of the pieces from that week which i never got a chance to post….

So, the first day of my weekend has consisted of updating mailing details, lunching with my gorgeous friends, Regan, Sally and Rachel, checking out Bike Galleries super stylish shop - thankyou for the complimentary jersey!  Very lovley of you!  And riding around the eastern suburbs enjoying the sunshine and hills till I found my way back south to Elsternwick

 

Now off to dinner with my sister to Radio Mexico but we must keep laughing to a minimum, she popped a rib helping a friend move :(

Oh and new year new colour

I'm now a red head

Ciao!

White Riot

Last weekend a group of us from the bakery had an all white dinner party.
This came to be as Caroline from the butcher, the baker and the tea towel maker went to a party and no one ate her food!  I have much trouble fathoming this as I'm the first one at the bakery to try and sneak any of the delicious off cuts of baked goods she produces, also making my running and cycling a necessity to prevent me turning into a brownie, cannoli or chocolate and custard brioche (so amazing straight out of the oven)

Sophie and Jeremy were our hosts, we were designated a dish each and emptied our wardrobes for any pieces of white clothing.  I soon realised apart from a few jumpers I really don't own any white, and winter is not the time of year to be wearing a floaty white cotton sun dresses!  So I quickly whipped up a white 1/2 circle skirt and Jill lent me some white stockings, along with my white jumper, white clip on earings and white vintage snow fox fur collar I was set!

Sophie and Jeremy had a very dreamy set up, white lace tablecloth, white candle holders, white flowers and Phileus the Siamese fighting fish to break up the whiteness a little

Phileus

Appetisers were Sophie and Kelly.  Sophie made calamari and fennel salad and tzatziki dip, with lots of Baker de Chirico bread of course.  Kelly brought a fabulous selection of cheese.  Is there anything better than cheese???
Hard goats cheese, cheddar and oven baked Camembert.

Caroline had the main course, roast chicken in a coconut, noodle and enoki mushroom soup, infused with chili, and lime - Yum!
Esther made a delicious salad to accompany with celeriac, fennel and almonds

We can't forget bevrages... we had white wine of course and a 2 ltr bottle of Saki, all of which was consumed.

I had desert so made a cassata, a sponge lined cake filled with mascarpone and ricotta cheese with mixed nuts, fruit and chocolate.  Topped off with white chocolate leaves.

The white party was a definite success!  What colour will be next?  Red, Black, Green……

I am looking forward to the black party though, lots and lots of Guinness!

Fuzzy Kelly in everyones furs at the end of the night