This week at "Under the Shade of a Bonsai Tree"

Doing:

Went to the Grandmaster Flash concert last week which was part of the Mona Foma festival. The Mona Foma festival was on for it's 2nd year - featuring an eclectic mix of talented artists and musicians from all around the world. It is curated by Brian Ritchie who was the bassist for The Violent Femmes. Grandmaster Flash was the first person to use the turntable as an instrument and is famous for his epic hit "The Message". It was heaps of fun - he got the crowd absolutely pumped.


Having an old friend who lives in Melbourne and his girlfriend stay for 5 days. This pic was taken at the Raincheck Lounge which is where we went for hot chocolates after having dinner at The Alley Cat one night.
Australia Day BBQ at a friend's house

My Mum and stepdad have just bought a house (which my bro and his mates will live in) so they came up for settlement and helped moved stuff in. They came came over for yummo curries one night.

Icecreams at the Mt Nelson signal station.

Fun in our pool

Converting our 'junk room' into my 'me' room. It's hard to believe the transformation. It used to be a bit of an embarrassment but now it homes my craft table and I've prettied it up with a lot of my etsy and thrift shop buys. We also installed new lighting. I really quite love it.

Lots of jewellery making. I'm also looking into applying for a casual site at Salamanca but am hoping to do it with a little group of artists/crafters so that it wouldn't have to be so often as I haven't the time. If you're local and interested then get in touch!


Cooking: I like to make up big batches of a chai tea mix. I love this recipe and usually make it x10. Mmmm it really is bliss in a cup.
Reading: Jigs and Reels by Joanne Harris

Listening to: Fever Ray, Alexisonfire (but didn't like), Nick Cave, Cocoon, Sarah Blasko, Cyndi Lauper

Watching: While an old friend from Melbourne (film maker) was staying last week we watched an old video he'd made for me whilst I lived in Germany full of his old movies and funny bits and pieces.

Buying: This sweet little green teapot print from Ruby Victoria at a local market.
and I also bought this scrumptious disco bear bath bomb by The Bomb Squad at the market.
I've actually gone a bit crazy this week and have quite a lot of $$ on good stuff (including lots of pretty supplies) but there's some wonderful stuff on it's way which will brighten up my new 'me' room but I'll post an entry about them once received.

December Photo Shoot

Here are some more photos from the December photo shoot. All jewellery can be found in my shop.

Fever Ray

Oh how I love her. She's so quirky and cool and I find her music really quite spine-tingling. I think I've posted this video before which is a fave but thought I'd share a couple more plus a little clip from an award ceremony acceptance. Nonconformity can be so very cool!

[Like a Version - Wolfmother do Kate Bush]

[Like a Version - Wolfmother do Kate Bush]

'Parlez-Vous Francais?' clip - Art vs Science

Hitler finds out that the Tote is Closed

Buyster - Le Creuset review

A few weeks ago I was approached by a marketing representative from Buyster, asking whether I'd be interested in choosing one of their products to review on my blog. I had a quick squiz on their websites and was pretty impressed with the diverse range of products. Of course I had to agree that it'd be a fab idea. The lovely lady told me I could choose anything for around $60. I chose this Le Creuset baking dish - in this stunning royal blue colour. It arrived very promptly and am really happy with it. It looks fine indeed. Since we've been quite busy, had lots of guests and the weather has been so warm I haven't been doing a huge amount of cooking with the oven. I did bake up some potatoes the other day though and gave the dish a test run. It looks lovely and performs well; it's a decent size and also clean up quite easily.

Goooo BUYSTER!

This month at "Under the Shade of a Bonsai Tree"

Doing:
Spending a weekend at White Sands on the East Coast with family



Making more jewellery

The Great Moscow Circus


Bbqs, trips to the beach, swims in our pool, celebrating our wedding anniversary at the Revolving Restaurant, visits from my brothers and currently have friends from Melbourne staying with us.

Reading: Finished The Slap. Now reading Jigs and Reels by Joanne Harris

Looking forward to: Grandmaster Flash (on Thursday), Soundwave and Angus and Julia Stone.

Listening: Seasick Steve, Emiliana Torrini, Cocoon, Sarah Blasko

Watching: Fantastic Mr Fox, An American Werewolf in London, Sherlock Holmes, Where the Wild Things Are

Buying:
A 5 sample lot of perfumes from The Poison Apple Apothecary

and these sweet badges from Watersounds

Buyster

The good people at Buyster have offered me one of their products to review. It's perhaps not something I would have thought I'd do on this blog; I guess primarily because I didn't think anyone would ask me but hey! how could I resist. They have a huge choice of fab items from gorgeous lighting to bunk beds, kids stuff and rugs.
It took me a while to decide what to choose but I decided upon this lovely Le Creuset baking dish.
Just what we need actually and I love the colour. Looking forward to it :o)

Falls Festival

We've now had our first Falls Festival experience and what a raging success it was!
We took the boys for the first night and camped in our brand new 9 person tent.

They had a ball - all rather exciting; roaming around the festival grounds, eating yummy food, grooving to awesome music and getting a bit of attention from other festival goers (might have something to do with their cute Indian headdresses!)


My husband took them back to Hobart at around midday on NYE whilst I stayed to watch more bands and the Falls Fiesta parade. I was a bit sick actually (sun induced migraine - it was 38C) but recovered by the arvo. Huz returned in the evening so we saw in the new year whilst watching some super cool bands.


Highlights:
Sarah Blasko
Xavier Rudd
Seasick Steve
Emiliana Torrini
Lisa Mitchell
Kaki King
The Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Rodrigo y Gabriela
Midnight Juggernauts

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Christmas

I know it's a bit belated but I've not had much of a chance to sit and blog. Christmas was a lovely day spent at home with my family who came to visit. It involved a lot of gorging and drinking, opening some awesome presents and a bit of water pistol action.


A recipe I used for a delicious chilled mulled wine can be found here and delicious salads here and here.

I was so extremely spoilt. Sure I'd given my husbo a couple of hints but he's obviously checked my blog wishlists or my Etsy favourites because there were a couple of awesome surprises too!

A gorgeous amethyst ring

This funky cool cuckoo clock which I've been coveting for absolute ages.
This beautiful seagull scarf
These cute earrings by Polli

Frankie calendar

I know! Insanely spoilt. There was even more stuff too. Crikey!

Since then we've been enjoying a bit of free time and going to the beach and swimming in our pool. We also went to the Falls Festival but I'll do a separate blog for that.

More Christmassy pics can be found on my Flickr page.