Sleeping Cemetery

I had wondered if it was going to be creepy, sleeping near a cemetery. Often, when passing by houses next cemeteries saying "I could never live there".

I was a bit excited and inquisitive to find out that our Port Fairy campsite was next door to the local cemetery. I was prepared for ghost sightings, spooky noises, even random chills. (I'm easily sucked into those haunted house shows :P)

It was a beautiful place. We wandered about at dusk.

It was quite touching; reading out wonderfully old-fashioned names, admiring long lives and what they must have seen and the brief glimpses of others.

We all slept perfectly peacefully that night :)

Port Fairy

Over the long weekend, we joined Mr. Loverboy's friends for a camping trip down to Port Fairy while the Port Fairy Folk Festival was on. While we didn't actually go into the festival, it was a wonderful weekend getaway.

I've never been to Port Fairy before, and it is truly a beautiful place. Just look how blue the ocean is!

It's a four hour drive away from us, so it's quite a drive! Luckily for the boy and I, drives are our favourite bits of any adventure. We listen to podcasts, music (yeah Jaydiohead!), chat, eat, drink, flirt and blab. And I must admit that I was super excited to realise that my Mermaid Blue Ford Fiesta matched the colour of the Port Fairy ocean. I always knew it was a mermaid!

We surprisingly (for me, at least) managed to get our tent up with ease. I never knew my Mr. Loverboy was such a pro at tents! Bing, bang, BOOM! It was up! No swearing or nothing! haha Taking it down and folding it up? Yeah, I might have gotten a little cranky then :P

We spent the time hanging out with our friends playing card games, drinking and checking out the main road with its market stalls and buskers. It was a lovely weekend away :) I'd love to go back and explore it some more!

Pony Pals

I got to have some fun down the beach away from the beach being a Pony Pal!

(Please tell me someone else loved Pony Pals as a kid?)

My horse liked walking into the butt of the horse in front of me. Which was funny, and then gross with how much it kept pooping on the walk! hahaha

My horsie, Finley. Cutie :)

Super cute speckled horse that everyone secretly wished they got to ride, and the cute one next door.

I always wanted a horse when I was younger. I'd still like one, please :)

Beach bits

My summer beach days are sadly over. I had such a wonderful time. It reminded me of when we used to go to the beach in summer when I was younger. Swimming, sunburn (luckily not too much this time!) and the pub for dinner with a red lemonade (they always taste better at the pub).

Much ice cream was had at the fantastic ice cream shop. Flavours included:

• honeycomb
• bubblegum
• chocolate coconut rough
• fairy floss
• turkish delight
• apple pie

And that's the real reason one goes to the beach!

I want to go back so much! Especially now that Melbourne is sweltering again!

Beach!

I'm off to the beach! I'm so excited! Sun, surf, ice cream, reading and warmth. Cannot wait!

See you soon lovelies!

2012

Happy New Years!

How did you spend your New Years Eve?

The boyfriend and I went down to a friend's beach house with a bunch of people. We spent the final hours of 2011 on a deserted patch of beach, lit only by the glowing Milky Way and the glow sticks playing glow-in-the-dark frisbee. Haha There was a lot of glowing going on :)

After the count down, another party of people joined us on the beach and set off some illegal fireworks. It was amazing and so beautiful! I had never seen them so close before!

We spent the night (or what was left of the morning) sleeping in the car, away from the guitars in the main house, and were awoken by the young neighbours riding the new Christmas bicycles about. We chatted and then grabbed some fish and chips before heading home.

It was a lovely time :) And a happy celebration of what was 2011 and the 2 year anniversary of the Boy and I <3

Merry Christmas

A merry Christmas to you all!

How is everyone recovering from the food comas and family overload?

I've enjoyed sniffing the real Christmas tree and introducing the Boy to my dad's extended family for the first time (bit naughty after two years together!). Ended up feeling sick after all the Christmas yummies I stuffed in my tummy, despite my attempts to control myself. That's always the way though! hahaha

And, ah, I had my first white Christmas. I can't say I'm a huge fan. All that white stuff is hail. I now have plenty of hail dints in my beautiful new car :( There is nothing we could have done about it though, and plenty of others have had it a lot worse. One white Christmas is definitely enough for me though!

Now I'm just hanging out to watch the Downton Abbey Christmas Special :)

Beach squeals

I've just been down the beach! Only for a day or so, but it was so magnificent! I'll do a post about it soon. First, I have to write 7000 words for my thesis this week! Eek! Wish me luck!

A Grand Day Out.

Last Monday my grandmother and I had the most wonderful day out. We visited the Vienna exhibition at the NGV International, had a delicious dessert lunch and went up the Eureka Tower. It was so wonderful!

On our walk up from Flinders Street train station to the art gallery, we went past this Kombi coffee machine. The opportunity to have a kombi coffee was too good to pass up! The man serving was very nice and his little daughter who was with him had the most beautiful gold hair. Very jealous indeed!

Next, was our visit to the Vienna exhibition. It was absolutely fantastic! I haven't been to such a wonderful exhibition in such a long while. We went to the Art Deco exhibit a few years back and I found it a bit underwhelming. This exhibit had a wonderful mixed collection of all sorts of things from all sorts of artists. Plus, I love Klimt's work. Although not a Klimt work, the above painting was one of my favourites. Gran and I stood in front of it for a while nitpicking all the dresses on display. Such vibrant colours in the painting, even today!

Grandma insisted she wanted a dessert lunch and so there was only one place I could take her, really. The same place were Lover Boy took me for my birthday celebrations, Meat & Wine Co. Our order: The Grande Finale. Gran was amazed and delighted! (Also, please note how stunning and fashionable my gran is in the picture above! I hope to be a stunner like her one day)

The Eureka Tower tour was the next. I have never seen the view from Eureka so clear and crisp. It was magnificent. Here's a picture of Fed Square, St. Pauls Cathedral and Flinders Street Station. Melbourne truly is a beautiful city :) I'll have to do a separate post for all the pictures I have from the Eureka tower.

I can't wait for my next grand day out with my grandma! <3

Birthday desserts

I had the most wonderful, sugar-filled birthday last week.

The Boy and I had lunch at Miss Marple's Tea Room in Sassafras. I'd heard much praise for it from friends, so it was time to give it a whirl. Especially when their website held images of desserts that looked like this:

While we didn't have the sundae pictured above, we saw plenty being delivered to the tables and they looked exactly as pictured. Delicious!

Instead we went for Belgian waffles and 'Vicar's Folly'. You'll have to wait a little for pictures, but for now this description of the Vicar's Folly from their menu should wet your appetite.

A delicious congregation of butterscotch ice-cream, honeycomb pieces, chocolate, whipped cream and caramel fudge. A sundae that is definitely "heaven sent!"

Following such a wallowing, we snooped about a wonderful store called 'Tea Leaves', right next to Miss Marples. Miss Marples has a lovely collection of teapots which excited me, but the teapots in Tea Leaves was even more magnificent! Plus a million and one different types of teas to sniff!

We left with a Strawberry and Champagne flavoured tea and a minute teapot that reminds me of Miss Marples Tea House. A nice little souvenir :) We haven't tried it yet, but it smells delicious and can only mean good things!

After heading home and having a short food nap, the eating continued with a family roast pork and an oversized ice cream cake:

Deliciously deadly.

Bows and birthdays!

It's my birthday! Happy Birthday to me! :D

I've finished my literature review and I'm ready to celebrate. Blog posts coming, I promise! Including many delicious desserts, cute kitties, exploring the Dandenongs and maybe a few recipes!

For now though, feast your eyes on my beautiful Boyfriend's wrapping skills. He understands my love for bows :)

Hope you all have a lovely day and I'll be back soon! :)

Easter leftovers

Did you know you can get Kinder Mini Eggs?

"Milk chocolate mini eggs with a milky and crushed hazelnuts filling" says the packet. Delicious says me.

And did you know you can get big boxes of Creme Eggs?

Yep. $14 too. Too damn good.

If any other Melbourne people are interested, you can find these boxes down at Box Hill, in a shop called 'Sweet As'. This is how the Creme Egg ice cream was possible.

Now I'm off to go grab myself a big Kinder Surprise egg! Yum yum yum!

Easter

I've previously mentioned my love for Easter. And so my love continues.

Easter this year was not marked by a huge Easter egg hunt and family gatherings, as it had been in the past. Instead, this year we relaxed with family, had a puppy play date and rolled about in delicious chocolate.

I concocted Easter bunny poo for my boyfriend (roasted almonds coated in dark chocolate - his obsession of late).

While he created Creme Egg Ice Cream. Have I ever mentioned before my boyfriend is a genius? The boy makes the most delicious ice cream! This one was chocolate ice cream with pockets of the creme-y bit from inside Creme Eggs throughout and hunks of the chocolate shells. Perfect!

Hope you all enjoyed your long weekends and all the sweet chocolatey goodness! :)

We love Mali and Ongaht

On Saturday we had a trip to the zoo! We had some tourists in toe, so we made sure to visit the Australian animals bit (which we usually skip) and made sure to visit everyone's favourites.

My favourite? The baby elephants, of course! I've been very lucky that my boyfriend has been very understanding of my love for the baby elephants and has taken me a couple of times to see the cuties :) He's even written about it in poetry! So I know he secretly enjoys it too, but the minions (i.e. little children) running around like maniacs wear thin pretty quickly.

Lucky for us, baby Mali put on quite a show! Mali was quick to jump in the pool, ducking and diving. That was cute enough, but then Mumma got in and Mali truly started her fun!

Mali kept trying to jump up on her mum's back!

And was surprisingly successful!

Ongaht was curious, but a bit too shy to join in.

He was a cutie in his own right; protecting the herd by chasing away a manky looking peacock (that later followed us everywhere!!).

If you're interested about the baby elephants at Melbourne Zoo, check out this link.

Chinese New Year

Image source: ccyhan

Happy Chinese New Year!

Over the weekend, my boyfriend and I went to the Chinese New Year festival held at Box Hill. It was very hot and packed full of people. We had a very yummy dumplings lunch and later brought some BBQ chilli pork from a stall holder. Soo yum! We left pretty quickly though. It was just too hot and too many people. I wish we had seen the lion dances. They are always amazing :)

We returned home (very happily) with these:

His and hers slippers. Yoshi for the boy, Kirby for me. I love them so much <3

Melbourne Symphony Orchestra @ Sidney Myer Music Bowl

February has arrived! And that means the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. Free of charge. All you have to do is bring a picnic rug!

Image source

I have intended to go every year for the last five years. And every year I have either a) forgotten, b) been too busy, or c) lacking company and/or energy to go.

I am determined it will be different this year.

The schedule is as follows:

Wednesday 9 February - Mozart and Mahler

Saturday 12 February - Beethoven's Fifth

Wednesday 16 February - Romeo and Juliet

Saturday 19 February - Made in Australia

For more information, check out this website.