Our weekend away

We went away for an over night stay in Woodend this weekend. It was Aaron's Christmas present, a weekend getaway to a brewery hotel with complimentary dinner, tasting paddles and breakfast the following day. We were going to catch the regional train which takes us through the country side but because of electrical repairs, we were taken to Woodend by bus, not as magical but alas.

The Holgate brewery is a two storey early 20th century building with beautiful stained glass, even if the rooms themselves are a bit tired. The dinner was normal pub food with the exception that the cooks must be heavy smokers without many tastebuds because our entree, main and dessert were WAY too salty and sugary, respectively. The beer, however, was really good. I fully enjoyed the IPA and summer ale. It was delicious.

Holgate brewery:

Woodend itself, is a cute quaint little town. It has the corner bakery, butcher, cafe, boutique clothing stores and a very cute book store.

We wandered into the New Leaves , and spent quite a while looking through the lovingly curated books. I saw and got very excited about the Happy Home made book. I bought it and I can't wait to make the following:

Wedding shoes

I've a good friend's wedding in June and am sick of boring black dress shoes. Here's a website that sells quite colourful and fun shoes for special events:

Scintillation heels

Bow topped slingbacks

Scalloped platforms

Boutique weekend

You'd think that by the photos on this post, we spent our weekend eating. Alas, you're wrong. We spent the weekend researching different developments and builders, concreting our decision to build with Boutique in Mernda. Yup, that's right. It's all very exciting. We have our meeting with the Boutique sales person tonight to go through finer details and another meeting with a mortgage broker. We spent Saturday driving around, talking to sales, looking at land lots etc which was all very tiring in its own right. Sunday was spent at home, looking through the two floor plans we're torn about, add ons, hidden costs, blogs made by couples who built with Metricon to get an idea of what the process is like and what obstacles they had. Knowledge is power and when you've never built before, that's very important.

Mernda is 30km north east of Melbourne CBD and of all the developments we've visited, this is the one we both liked the best. Aaron has worked on site here so he knows more about the layouts and what not, which really helped. We arrived a bit too early for the displays home so Aaron took me to this cute quaint bakery in Mernda:

and we had a very filling breakfast before our busy day ahead:

We got home around 6pm or so and had some snacks before heading over to a friend's place:

Best blue cheese, ever...

Whitestone

from Oamaru, New Zealand

And to fuel our Sunday research,I made us this breakfast that kept us going:

Rosemary pan fried potatoes with guacamole and scrambled eggs with gravalex.

This week, where did it go?

This week has just whizzed by. It ended with a stressful few hours. Yesterday, we found out that the airline we booked for Hawaii had just gone bust. (Leaving 4000 travellers immediately stranded and the rest of us to deal with our own alternative routes... they didn't have enough credit to refuel in phuket!) People who paid for their ticket with cash could not get their refund back but thankfully, I charged it (charge it!) and my bank says the full amount will be refunded in two days. So I had to fork over another 2000 dollars for a Qantas flight to Hawaii. Ouch.

I did, on the same day however, received my Bario Neal ring:

It came in a glass corked bottle

small and subtle

The rest of Friday went more smoothly with some new creations

and a simple pan seared salmon and oyster mushroom with udon noodles dinner

plus, I've been loving the floral designs everywhere. Here are my current favourites:

Nine West flats

Gorgeous wall hanging

Bluebellgray tote

Hope you have a lovely weekend!

Coci la elle umbrellas

It rains quite a bit here in Melbourne. Everyone has drabby black umbrellas, the golf umbrellas, the small wind reversed umbrellas and everything boring in between! How awesome would it be to have one of these Coci la elle umbrellas! Look at the colours and patterns, so so gorgeous.

my favourite

Wandering around town

Wouldn't this outfit be great for wandering around town?

Jackson Johnson and Roe Dress

Clare Vivire Tote

Meadowlark Serpent bow earrings

And now that waking up to the darker mornings are harder, this print should help

Beautiful Cheong Sam

I grew up with a very tacky impression of Cheong Sams. Cheong Sams, a staple figure hugging Chinese dress prior to the 60s (as far back as the 17th, brought in by the Manchus), were only regularly seen in the 80's on waitresses in blaring red at Yum Cha restaurants. My grandma has an array of Cheong Sam that were tailored made for her, they always looked gorgeous on her but I never fancied the idea of having a Cheong Sam of my own. Not until I saw the Cantonese movie, In the mood for love (which was a total bore but the cinematic was gorgeous) did I was in awe of the beautiful Cheong Sam. It was flattering and the pattern of the material was endlessly beautiful. Cheong Sam are still wore now in Chinese festivities, such as weddings and in modern interpretations:

Cheong Sams in Lust, Caution:

Of course, Shanghai Tang has always been infamous for their exquisite Cheong Sams which comes with a hefty price tag. Their beautiful interpretation of the Cheong Sams with modern colours and pattern has captured the attention of exclusive clients. (And poor little old me!) I've wandered into a Shanghai Tang in HK before and wished so much that I could have one.

And this version by Vivienne Tam, the Imperial Slash dress is truly breath taking:

Floral print Dr Marten

Have I been living underneath a rock? How is it that I've just stumbled upon these awesome shoes from Dr Marten?! The print collection has me swooning! I still remember when I saved up all my Chinese New Year red packet money to buy my first pair of black Dr Marten boots. It was part of our school uniform back then, so my purchase was legit. Legit. 12 years down the track, I bought myself a pair of black Ellen Dr Marten flats which I wore for a few years.

Perhaps these will usher in my third Dr Marten purchase..... Oh, did I tell you guys? I'm banning myself from internet shopping till August. (Minus shopping for a bridesmaid dress and shoes) We are saving more for a house now....