Thursday, February 21, 2013

Rouge Aerie Designs Update!


So I have good news and awesome news today. The good news is that I recently finished a new prototype dress for Rouge Aerie Designs.

 

 


The awesome news is that R.A.D. now has a manufacturer! The details of the arrangements and the secret print that will be used for this dress are currently under wraps.

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Sydney's Japan Matsuri 2012

Photo care of Cming! (@hehalana on Instagram)
Wes and I hit up the Japan Matsuri down in Darling Harbour this weekend for the second year in a row! This time, I convinced him to let me dress him up in a yukata for the outing. We met our friend Jon and a few of my lolita friends (including Cming, Jess, Sharon and Maia!) at the event to watch various shows on the stage, eat some great festival stall food and just hang out on the grass.

The highlight of the weekend was when Cming's friend Sam won the Hunky Yukata Contest! I had loaned him one of the spare obi I bought while trying to find Wes the perfect ensemble and the judges apparently really liked how it went with his outfit!

All in all, we had a really good time and I'm enjoying finding photos of us together almost as much (take THAT immigration officials! We've got even MORE photos).

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

La Perouse: Sailors and Pirates



Last weekend, Cming invited me out for a photoshoot with her friend Isaac Leung of Pireze Cosplay and Fashion Photography! We went to the La Perouse rock pools for the shoot, which was shockingly sunny. I also had to hold onto the hat I borrowed from Cming in nearly every shot because the wind kept blowing it off of my head. 
We had a good time, though! And Isaac got some great shots!

While we frolicked (slowly, gently) amongst the rock pools, Wes, Mike and Pete had fish and chips and played boardgames in the park. 

We've decided that we really want to go back, so we can take our time exploring and have a bit of fun. Maybe this weekend? Who knows!

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

The Power of Wishful Thinking

Recently, Wes' grandmother passed away, leaving us with the task of removing her possessions from her room at the aged care facility where she spent her final days. On the second to last trip over, we had movers take away all of the furniture that we intended to keep or donate to the Salvation Army, leaving only garbage behind for us to dispose of. Today, we borrowed Wes' dad's car to go haul the many boxes and bags away.

On the way to there, feeling drowsy from lunch and the heat of the car, I thought "it would be nice if someone else had already cleared everything out." Then, as we pulled up to the building, I asked Wes if we were parking around the side. When he said yes, I thought "it would be nice if someone else had left the side gate open already."

Eerily enough, when we got out of the car, we found that someone had indeed left the side gate open  (our bet was on the gardening crew, given that a ute and trailer were parked just outside). We used the swipe card to get into the building and headed toward her room. Since her passing, the door is always closed when we arrive. Today, it was standing open.

We went in.

And everything was gone.

From the look of the room, they had just cleared everything away this very afternoon. Surprised, indeed, we walked to the front office to hand in the pass key and go back to the car.

Irony is a funny thing.

Our Washing Machine is a Dimensional Vortex

Everybody I know has one, too. You lose socks in there quite frequently and sometimes your favourite pair of panties (if you're not careful enough to put them in a lingerie bag, anyway). Typically, you don't get them back. When you do, they often show up stuffed inside a pair of jeans or a sweater that you haven't worn in months. The key to the whole mysterious procedure is that you never see that dimensional vortex in action.

Yesterday, I did.


Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Well. That's funny...


Another sort of filler post.

I will never get over the fact that lemon-lime and bitters soft drinks are pink. Apparently, it's the bitters that does it. To be perfectly frank, I'm not sure if you can find it in the States as a non-alcoholic soda like it is here, or if you can find it at all. It's surprisingly good, though.

The funny part about it being pink is that I never knew until I had a Slurpee from 7-11 that was flavoured as lemon-lime and bitters soda. Until then, I'd never bothered to pour it into a glass, so I had simply assumed it was either pale yellow or transparent like Australian lemonade/Sprite.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

It's a New Year! A Month Too Late.

The last few months have been absolutely insane. I don't mean a little bit hectic, either.

I mean ... In. Sane.

I promise that there will be catch-up photos and posts soon (particularly pertaining to Christmas and all that that entailed this year) but for now, I'll leave you with a little sampling of Domestic Life in Australia, because I don't really know what else to post.


Polly want an apple?

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Cruisey Christmas

This year, Wes' office had a special party just for themselves. As a special treat, everyone got together and rented out a harbour cruiser for a two hour afternoon lunch party. We joined in for the festivities, since it was a good chance for him to introduce me to his coworkers and enjoy doing something a little bit touristy.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Happy Birthday Tori! (with a buttload of birds)

One of Wes' friends recently celebrated her birthday, so we headed down to her place to join in on the festivities. We brought booze and a camera and documented the resulting insanity and consequent joviality.

Apparently, mixing strange foods together is an Australian party tradition.

Though a lot of the guests passed in and out, we stayed through the afternoon and evening, enjoying drinks, stories, a sausage sizzle and a slew of silly antics. Since the photos really speak for themselves, there won't be a lot of commentary in today's post.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Another Wander Down Wollongong Way

As I keep bringing up, Wes is in the process of selling his townhouse down in Wollongong, which is why we've spent so much time down that way. We used to go there every week on garbage night, to clear things out. A couple of weeks back, we headed down again to meet up with the cleaning crew he'd hired (which turned out to be a woman and her son and was rather a bust).

While they set to the task of eliminating dirt and dust, we set to the task of eating lunch, taking a walk and generally being good for nothing tourists on the beach. As per usual, I got a lot of use out of Wes' camera on the occasion.

Friday, November 11, 2011

This is "Squirt" or Why Spiders Are Not Pets


This week, we had our first huntsman in the house. He wasn't very large at all, measuring less than 2cm with his legs all spread out, and was relatively docile. He hid when we entered the bathroom and panicked if we came anywhere near his clever hiding spot under the crown molding.

We weren't going to keep him and Wes was annoyed that I hadn't killed him on sight (for starters, I couldn't reach him on the ceiling and I also had no idea that we had spray in the house; plus, he was so TINY!). It was not I, however, who named him.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

No 'Ritas at Norita

About two, three weeks ago (yes, I am seriously behind on the blogging), Wes and I met Pete and Jon for dinner at Sushi Hotaru with plans to go after to Norita. As always, the sushi was great, but the highlight of the night was our trip to get dessert. I hadn't been to Norita yet and Wes had proclaimed that that night was The Night for Norita.

So away we went!

Norita is a cafe which specializes in desserts and board games. Unfortunately, these desserts are alcohol free, so there are no ritas at Norita. Harhar.

The idea is that you order one as you play the other. They have games you can "rent" for a small fee or, for those who play more than just now and again, you can bring your own. Because we'd been talking Apples to Apples up to Pete since the weekend, we brought it along to let him see it first hand.

(Plus, Norita's Scrabble sets are all missing letters.)

Adventures in the Greater North

A funny thing about really good weekends is that when you are having a great time, you forget to photograph it. Worse yet, you don't get around to writing about it for ages. Thankfully, I have a pretty good memory for these sorts of things.

For Mike Coyle's birthday last month, we headed up his way near Gosford for the weekend to celebrate.

Monday, October 31, 2011

Culinary Adventures, Another Installment

The funny thing about being the Crohn's party in the dynamic Foodie and Crohn's Girl duo is that a lot of the foods I'd really like to try are usually a big risk. Every time Wes says "let's have ______!" tonight, I have to weigh the pros against the cons and pray that the weight of the meal doesn't land me on a toilet for a few hours that night.

Crude, to be sure, but the truth.

All the same, we have had many adventures in trying new and exciting foods together, already. We've had yum cha, a family feed, dinner with friends, sushi train trials and a whole Japanese festival of goodies. Today, I get to tell you all about the awesome food we've had the last few weeks!

Saturday, October 22, 2011

Dinner Date with a Firefly

Eventually, we ran out of touristy things to do at the top of the Sydney Tower Eye , so we packed it in and headed back to the Galeries to have dinner. As he had predicted earlier in the day, Wes and I would indeed be eating at Hotaru one day.



We just didn't expect it to be so soon!

Friday, October 21, 2011

Meeting the Family -- Part Two

It recently came to my attention that Blogger ate half of the post I made about meeting Wes' family a couple of weeks ago, so I'm going to try and fix that here by retelling the tale that Blogger took.

Bird's Eye View

Eventually, we'd had our fill of food and festivities and Wes offered to show me the grandest views you can get while in the city, at the top of the Sydney Tower Eye!

In order to actually get to the Eye (the logo for which we agreed looks eerily like Sauron's Eye), we had to cross through part of the city, then through another shopping center, up about five floors and around a winding corridor. At last, we lined up to purchase tickets and yet again stood waiting.

On the way to the tower itself, we passed the Queen Victoria Building and several other landmarks. Sydney has a lot of really great architecture to admire!



Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Matsuri in Sydney or More Japanese Food Than You Should Cram into a Day

Darling Harbour hosts quite a few cultural and social events throughout the course of the year. It has a nice, centralized location which makes it easy to find and just as easy to stumble upon, which makes it ideal for these sorts of things.

On Saturday, there were two festivals going on at the same time. One of them, we had planned to see. The other was a complete surprise! I also got the chance to get a bird's eye view of the city and eat at a sushi train for the first time ever.

It was a very eventful and fulfilling day!

Which means that this is going to be yet another really long post.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 4


On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 3



On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!