Some of My Inspiration

Good Morning The Internet.

So, you know I've shared some of my inspiration before, in the shape of Daniel over at manhattan-nest, well, the guy's up for an Apartment Therapy Homie Award!  Huzzahs all round!  Please vote for him, he's so funny and true it makes my little heart leap.  OK, I'll share the pics of his that inspired me, and you go vote, K?  Simples.

And of course, the bed.  Without this post, my bed would STILL be awful.

Go! Vote! Now!

Ta and thanks and such.

Planning a new bathroom

Good afternoon all,

I'm in the midst of planning a bit of a bathroom update.  I recently re-did the main bathroom, but I'm after something a bit edgier.  It's currently powder pink, with white and pale pink towels, an ornate white mirror and a frosted glass medicine cabinet.  As a renter, this is pretty much the only thing I can change.  It's a pretty small room, but I want to go DARK in there.  My thoughts are near black walls and ceiling, and hot pink pops.  Think 'goth flamingo' and you're there.

Over half the bathroom is tiled in plain white square tile, so that should balance it out, and the floor is a 'lovely' black faux marble texture lino affair.

So, here is my current thought process...

I LOVE the octopus figure.  Mr E hates it.  Something tells me I'll win this one.
I'd show you a before picture, but currently the bath is absolutely filled with balloons from my birthday festivities a few days ago.  What?  That's normal, right?

EDIT:  Here are the before pictures.  Who cares that the bath is full of balloons?  I'm not normal so I shan't pretend to be.  So this is pretty much the view from the door (Why are bathrooms impossible to photograph?)

Notice the ledge above the toilet and sink.

 This wall is entirely white tile, so nothing can be changed there, although I guess a medicine cabinet could probably be screwed into the grout.  Probably.

The wall on the left there, and the reflected wall opposite show that it's a pretty, sweet pink at the mo.

I've never liked the light, but I hadn't (until now) had a better idea.  There was a horrid wire cage thing over an incandescent bulb when we moved in.  At least this was an improvement.

And here's the last wall.  That medicine cabinet is WAAAY too small, even though we don't use this as the main bathroom.  You can see the grey floor here too.

So there you have it, watch this space!

Chocolate Ruffle Cake

What day is today? It's Mickey's Birthday! What a day for a birthday, let's all have some cake!

I made a lovely ruffle cake, thanks to Pinterest (Did someone say 'addiction'?)  It's Hummingbird Bakery Brooklyn Blackout chocolate cake-my go to chocolate cake.  There's three layers of that with chocolate ganache both inside and out.  This is a chocoholics dream.

My house is in full on birthday mode today, with balloons strewn across the floor...

 And my homemade birthday chandelier.  It's just balloons, ribbons, pom poms and a homemade crepe paper fan hanging from wire.  It makes me happy.

 And of course the epic cake.  This also makes me happy.

Well, the tea party is on Saturday, and I'll be making cake pops, rice krispie treats, cupcakes, macarons for the first time, and some savoury bits and bobs.  Expect more pics! :-)

Seedlings are a-growing...

Hi Everyone,

After three weeks on a sunny windowsill above a radiator, my seedlings have started to flourish.  I've got two types of tomatoes and a couple of pepper types.  Soon it will be time to pot these babies on...

See you soon!

Cooking for a New Mum...

Good Morning All.

My sister has just given birth to a beautiful baby girl (cue 'ahhhhs')...

I know absolutely nothing about kiddos, and when I held her in the hospital I was straight up petrified.  I know it's nice to offer to help out at home when someone has a new baby, y'know, so that mum can nap and get clean and rest, but I have NO CLUE.

I figured the most helpful thing I could do would be to batch cook a few meals for them.  (There's mum, dad, and two boys already...)  Oh, I also made cupcakes with pink satin flags.

Welcome to the world, little'un!

Allotted time!

Good Morning!

After sitting on a waiting list for three years, I have finally become the proud owner of an allotment.  It's a half size plot, and in pretty good shape, but there's still plenty of work to be done.  I'll keep you all updated as things grow, and will probably end up posting recipes for my produce too!

Watch this space!

Pantone Colour of 2012: Tangerine Tango

Good Evening all,

It appears I have been snared by Pantone's colour of 2012 already.  Needing a new stovetop espresso maker I found myself in TK Maxx, and came across a tangerine coloured example.  This is what I'm talking about...

 I usually try to avoid anything this trendy, but as with all areas of my life I apply the simple principle of 'if I like it, I'll do/have/eat it'.  It's seemed to work so far.

Cupboard Shame

Good Evening all,

I've finally been shamed into sorting out the cupboard which serves as a loft in my apartment.  Now, it's important that you know that I am married to a hoarder, and we pulled about 8 boxes of CABLES, myriad broken laptops, access points, projectors and whatnot out of the cupboard.  In all fairness, not a great deal of the 'stuff' in there was mine, but there is a pretty hefty pile heading to charity shops tomorrow.  We also shifted 4 binbags of junk and 3 of recycling.  Yep, there was a place in our house dedicated to storing out of date pizza menus...

Without further ado, I present some pretty shameful before pictures...

It was, as I believe the kids say, a hot mess.

So, after about 8 hours and a trip to the local Staples, it started to look a bit more like this...

Finally, once everything was out and I could hoover, we had the fun of fitting it all back in.  I'd been 'editing' as it all came out, so I was faced with a  MUCH reduced amount of stuff to cram back in.  There were a few 'Tetris' moments, but on the whole it is SO much better!

Hurrah!

2011 Revisited

Good Afternoon everyone!

(Cards from Etsy shop dodelinedesign)

I apologise for the lack of posts lately, but y'know, life was happening.  Nothing exciting, just life.  So, I figured it was about time to take a look back at 2011, and especially my first post of the year-Things for 2011.
The first thing to note is that I made no 'New Years Resolutions' and I broke none. (It is also worth noting that I celebrate New Years properly on the 1st November, anyway).

There were quite a few changes around here last year.  we finished the Living Room, we painted the bedroom, we upholstered the bed (and I discovered Daniel over at Manhattan Nest...), I finished the bathroom, repainted the dining room aaaaaaand painted the hall, stairs and landing.  Actually, we painted EVERY SINGLE ROOM in our apartment this year.  I've finally started to be able to put together finishing touches without worrying that the actual paintwork wasn't finished...

I needed to get more organised.  I still need to get more organised.  The Great Wardrobe Experiment was a great start, and to be fair, that wardrobe is still looking pristine, so it seems that the experiment worked.  The 'Junk Cupboard/Loft' is quite another story though.  In 2012 I think I'll kickstart the year with a picture of just how bad this baby is.  The Mr is a hoarder, and I'm a minimalist/hider-The ultimate combination.

The second part of 'Things' was the intention to be more mindful of the stuff that comes into the apartment in the first place.  I think we've done a pretty darn good job of this actually.  By we, I mean me.  I think I've done pretty well here.  I reckon that this is the first year of my adult life in which I haven't bought a cushion or a lamp or a duvet set or some inane kitchen item.  I have bought a few things though, like the 1960's Hi Fi turntable, a Typhoon storage jar, a cake stand or two...  Okay, so it may not have been perfect but there's been such a vast improvement.  Honestly.

After the festive season is over and things start to die down and settle back into routine, we'll attack that cupboard.  If there's something in there that I haven't laid hands on in the last year it's going.  I still have a spare wedding dress in there. (Yes, Spare.)

Anyway,  I hope that you've enjoyed this year's journey, and hopefully we'll have another rollercoaster ride next year too.  For now though,

Happy Whichever Holiday You Celebrate.

Furoshiki!

Good Afternoon all,

I'd like to share with you my latest obsession:  The Japanese art of Furoshiki, or cloth folding.  This is usually used to wrap gifts or carry things such as books or even watermelons!

I've been using a (homemade) furoshiki wrap for my lunch this week, and I think it's super cute!  I made the furoshiki wrap by cutting up a square of fabric (that I made from the same fabric as my ironing board cover) and hemmed a simple edge onto it.  Then the fun started...

 Lay the cloth out in a diamond in front of you...

Pop your lunch in the centre of the cloth- I use a small clippy box for fruit and a medium clippy box for soup or leftovers or whatever.  There's usually a banana or a cereal bar balanced in there too...

 Take the left and right corners and bring them up over the lunch and tie in a double knot...

 Turn the whole thing round so the loose sides are on the left and right again and bring these up, a bit like wrapping a present.

 Both sides up...

 ...And tied in a double knot.  I tend to do this quite loosely, and not tie the knot too close to the lunch inside, so it acts like a carrying handle.

You can even slip your chopsticks through the 'under-knot'.  I really like the way this looks, and the way it holds your lunch together, especially if you're like me and end up with all sorts of random or loose items in your lunch!  The good thing about this is that it doesn't matter if your lunch is an awkward shape either, because you're not forcing your food into a square box! :)