There is no sincerer love than the love of food

As you well know (if you have read my blog for any amount of time), I researched and worried, stressed and mulled over the various aspects of Australian life. In all honesty, the one thing that truly stuck with me was how expensive everything seemed. Now I wish I could say we got off the plane and didn’t wince at the price of a bottle of water, but all in all we were pleasantly surprised at how affordable it is to eat out here. (I joke that it’s because everything is SO expensive that it’s all relative but in comparison to groceries, eating out is cheap-ish. And boy oh boy have we been putting that theory to the test. Fruit toast with lemon curd. toe curlingly good coffee, alpaca burgers and thrice fried chips, burritos and pancakes, pizzas and Thai. You name it, we have consumed it. It’s beginning to show. So much so that I no longer feel the need to do up my top button on my jeans. I can’t say I am complaining.

*Title quote by George Bernard Shaw*

I just swooned myself right out of the room

Tania Handelsmann. Now here’s a woman who has oodles of talent. I’m probably a bit late to the party with this one but I had to have this Sydney north shore residence immortalised on my blog. It’s got my name written all over it with its pale timbers, Bertoia chairs, whisper soft and cloudy grey tones, subway tiles and light fittings I wouldn’t think twice about pinching.

This, my blogging friends, is my happy place.

Source: EST Magazine | Photography: Jem Cresswell

Sssssshhhhh…

I’m currently tucked up in bed, savouring the fact that it’s cool enough for me to snuggle into the duvet (it’s been a sheet and nothing else round these parts lately). I spent the day resting in the cocoon of my bed getting over the stomach flu. Wow. I soooo needed a day like today – well, minus the stomach flu and just pure rest. It’s oh so quiet outside apart from the distant croaks of frogs and chirps of crickets, I’m watching the sun go down and I’ve got Jordan making me a sandwich in the kitchen which I am going to consume in this bed, crummies and all. Here’s a little moodboard that reflects just that – my mood.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9

Just another manic Monday

My new job has a tendency to be stressy. Who’s isn’t right? It’s busy and pressured and the perfectionist in me isn’t getting everything ticked off her list at the end of the day. (Truth be told, this causes me the most amount of excess stomach acid). Although there are days when I come home and want to crawl right into bed and sleep for a week, it’s good for me. I’m slowly but surely learning that I can’t do it all, I can’t be it all and that some days it’s ok to have a few stragglers left on your list.

Yesterday was a typical manic Monday for both Jordan and I but we needed a little reminder as to why we had moved 10 thousand miles to live in Sydney. We booked our Go Get and headed down the road to Yarra Bay. A tiny quiet little bay with a soft white sandy beach filled with beautiful shells and clear, calm blue water. My Monday evenings will never be the same again.

All images via Wishful Thinking

I’ve been to Ikea today…

Not once but TWICE today. I’m sitting on my sofa with a rather large glass of red wine (which incidentally got me into this mess in the first place) wondering what the hell happened to my Sunday. Let me start from the beginning. This time last year, we were in the throes of packing up our lives to move over to Australia. Having read that Australian beds tend to be larger than those of the UK, Jordan and I set about measuring each component of our beloved bed. (In hindsight, carrying out heavy duty measuring after a trip to the pub is probably never a good idea. You should write that down somewhere if you are planning a big move. You can thank me later). We figured that we should just about make it and so waved goodbye to comfortable sleep (and £500+) when we shipped it over last year July. We have since slept on airbeds, fold out couches and the floor. So it was with great excitement that we unpacked our shipping when it arrived after New Years… the joy was short-lived as the last screw was put into place and we realised that our new snazzy Aussie mattress was about 3cm too big for the frame. Despair and sailor swearing ensued. And since we haven’t had a free weekend since the beginning of the year, Jordan has been sleeping on the sloping bit (by morning, he has rolled down the mountain into the middle and I’ve been violently wrenched from my sleep with the realisation that something rather large and heavy is cutting off the blood supply to my arm).

So today we took back our lives by heading to Ikea early to pick up a new bed. We broke the first cardinal Ikea rule by doing this on an empty stomach. Not to mention the entire Sydney population of cranky and mis-behaved toddlers was in the bedroom section at 10am this morning. Tempers were frayed, bad decisions were made and as a result, we ended up having to go back there later this afternoon. I need peace and quiet. I’d sell my soul to spend the weekend at Christian Liaigre’s St Barts pad.

Images via Elle Decor

The night we saw Jack Johnson

Jack Johnson–Banana Pancakes

The first thing Jordan did when he got a job was buy tickets to Jack Johnson who was playing on the steps of the iconic Opera House a week after my birthday. It was extravagant and risky as he hadn’t even signed the contract yet but after months of worry and stress we needed a little frivolity and carelessness. If you have never heard of Jack Johnson before (and you live anywhere remotely near the beach) then I am about to climb through the screen and bitch slap you. Even on my worst of worst days, I find it hard to be in a bad mood when listening to him. We danced, we sang at the top of our lungs (apologies to those standing within a five mile radius of us), and when he brought out an electric guitar and showed us how it was done (in flip flops no less), I swooned. It was the perfect date night.

What they didn’t tell me about Australia

I heard many things about this great land before I embarked from the plane. I heard tales of spiders the size of dinner plates, long car journeys, blisteringly harsh heat and smiling friendly faces in the grocery store. But I missed one vital story. The story about Sydney being full of fat juicy roaches who are immune to Mortein and nuclear disasters. On my very first day at work, whilst training with a work colleague, a giant bush cockroach darted across my feet. Let’s just say I revealed A LOT about myself that first day (starting with my sailor mouth). I relayed my horror to a friend over dinner and she sort of nodded and said, yep well that’s Sydney for you. Cockroachy. It went from bad to worse when we moved into our new apartment and discovered that they are fans of things like kettles, microwaves, kitchen sinks. I’ve become a pro at wrangling them (and by wrangling I mean ending their existence swiftly) – I even have a resident flip flop that lives in the kitchen ready to strike when one of them makes an appearance. Mornings will never be the same.

Totally off topic and only relevant because I am sure she doesn’t have to put up with cockroach shit, but have you heard of Donna Hay? She is a food stylist, author and editor-in-chief of her own magazine. An all round Australian institution and I am completely awestruck.

All images via Donna Hay

Everything and more

I am getting beach withdrawals. It’s been well over a week since I felt the sand between my toes and I am all pale and shaky about it. A few months ago, I couldn’t even fathom a life where my day started with a sunrise walk on the shoreline, now I would feel like my liver was missing without it. I have a beach bag that lives by the front door, various jars dotted around the house filled to the brim with treasured shells and driftwood and most days when I get in to bed, I usually have to get out of it and brush the sand off the sheets. It’s everything I had hoped for and more.

I can’t take any credit for these pictures. These are all Jordan, who managed to drag me out of bed kicking and screaming before the sun came up to take photos…. before the coffee shop even opened. And shockingly, turns out half of Sydney is up at that time on the weekend anyway. Jogging, yoga-ing, boxing and surfing. Without coffee. Sickos.