!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!BLANKET FORT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey wassup wassup! Well, I dunno about you all, but I have been a busy bee lately, and I'd like to share with you a cool thing I was involved in: The unforgettable Blanket Fort Party! The night of nights for many, myself included, was a great achievement by all those involved and will go down in history as one of my favourite birthdays everrrrrrrr!

As my 25th Birthday approached, I realised that to some this is a big year. It's half-way to 50, and I tend to believe that quarter-life crises are very real indeed. So I had the choice of going two ways: adopting a fear of ageing and locking myself away in my bedroom, rummaging through baby photos and brushing my hair until i go bald (much like my infantile self), or...accepting it. I went for the latter...sort of.

I often reflect upon my childhood, and how blissful my youthful ignorance really was. I mean, kids shouldn't have to deal with all the scary realities of life and they are often protected. Well, i was anyway, and many kids in a similar socio-economic-developmental-middle-class. Those were the days, when nothing concerned you, and you could lay around all day because there was nothing else pressing to do. I decided that at this point in my life, an injection of childlike delight was just what the doctor ordered so I decided to have a Blanket fort party!!!!!!!!!!!

On Community they did a few episodes about building a Blanket Fort, and the idea resonated well with my inner child. Blankets, sheets and pillows, crawling, PJs... how could anyone be unhappy in a blanket fort?! Then one day I heard on the radio that a guy was decorating his apartment for a Blanket Fort Party so i was determined to make one myself. I did a little research on other people's success or FAILS online, and decided it could be achieved pretty easily.

My supplies: A few rolls of fishing line, tacks or small nails, LOTS of safety pins, sheets, blankets, rugs, pillows, beanbags, fairy lights, and of course, plenty of this junk:

Josh and my housemate Maki decided they would be the engineers for my fort dreams. A bit like Inception but not. I wanted people to still be able to walk around - not 100% crawling, so to create the roof of the fort, Josh put little tacks into the top of the door and window frames and then ran a netting of fishing wire from one point to the other. We also ran it along the walls so we could hang sheets straight down.

Once that was all rigged up, we started draping sheets, curtains, blankets and whatever we could find over the netting, then joining them together/hoding them in place with many, many, many safety pins.

We ended up borrowing sheets from friends and family, then buying most from op-shops, I got some great designs like Batman, E.T, BMX rally... oh they were awesome. I gathered up all my romantic lighting and fairy lights, made some paper snowflakes, some mulled wine, fairy bread, ordered some awesome anime costumes from ebay, and then, got ready to parttyyyyyyy:

We had a giant Pass the Parcel early in the night too - a great gift from some mates. This is me in my dinosaur costume opening one of the layers!

And the fun wasn't contained to one room either.. the hallway was decorated like a tunnel and there was a table in there that you had to crawl under/climb over - it really forced people against their will to tap into their inner child. It sucked on Sunday though cos nobody could be bothered moving it yet it killed us to keep going over or under. There was also a Nintendo / cuddle room in the spare bedroom! As you can see, it got very cuddwy! See my green leg poking out? I'm in there somewhere...

We also paid homage to both Community and Workaholics (<3) at the party. The blanket fort and human being were Community:

And Maki dressed as The Ders. So good! My skinny-boy friends and boyfriend found it challenging to fill out the caboose of their costumes so they stuffed it with balloons....

Oh what a night! I recommend everyone do a blanket fort PJ party, it's so fun!! The next day was nice too as we all lay about in PJs and blankets watching TV all day, ate Fish 'n' Chips for lunch, then a roast chicken/veg for dinner. It was just like old times where we had no commitments or cares, just hanging out doing sweet f.a. I talk like I'm about 100 remeniscing back on my happy youth but if you don't excercise your inner child and chill out it will run away. I've got mine on one of those kiddie leashes so it wont get away, and sometimes it goes hyperactive and tries to bolt off, and i clutch on and get dragged along for the ride. It's a fun ride. 

what's been goin' on!

Ahoy Noahssss! Well, lately I have been a bit all over the place (what else is new?) and haven't given you news on a massive achievement! MY PERGOLA IS FINISHED! Woo-hooo! My Dad put the roofing on last week. He slaved away with Maki in the heat and wind trying to screw down the colorbond and laserlite sheets. Crazy! But yes, it is done!! So now, I can focus on the yard. The massive yard. And those horribly low fences!

I need to get some crushed rock and mulch and make a nice garden so it doesn't look so desolate out there. So looks like I can tick this pergola item off my list. I did help about 1%... BUT i did financially back it, and it ended up costing DOUBLE what I was told it would cost, so that has pushed all my other plans back :S So I think i helped it get built in a way haha... oh dear. I suck. Watch this space and hopefully i can make my backyard beautiful for you to enjoy! Anyway in other news, Josh bought me some lovely roses...

Lovely roses, bad photo! Sorry, I compressed it heaps for a forum, and cbf uploading it again! haha. Also... in other JOSH NEWS.. He gave Missy a haircut last night, and she is like Patchy McBaldy now. She had heaps of grass seeds and burs and knots. It is bonkers....

Aaaw little missy :) Yeah so TONIGHT I am trying out a new Vego restaurant - as part of my list :) I have to try 5 new ones. Luckily at World Vegan Day I got handed a business card for a BRAND NEW vegan cafe. I lost it though.. that's the bad news!! I'm sure it will work out :) Life always does... life... finds a way...

ZOMG OKONOMIYAKI

Why hello everyone!! I am very excited to show you these pictures of my new recipe off the list! Okonomiyaki is one of my favourite Japanese dishes EVAAAAAA! Okonomi means 'whatever you like' and yaki is 'grill or cook'. Shiho came over on Sunday to offer her Japanese cuisine expertise, and here is a picture-heavy post detailing almost every step of the way :P 



cabbage (i used wombok)



spring onion

 

Shiho mixing the batter. We made it with 1 cup flour, about 1 cup Dashi (or you could use water), and 1 egg. You can also buy a batter mix at an Asian Grocer but we couldn't find it *frown*

 

heating up the teppan. Josh bought me this - what a sick dude :D

Cooking the yakisoba noodles. We found a $2.16 packet of yakisoba complete with yakisoba sauce at Safeway - enough to make 2 hiroshimayaki! crafty consumers!

the batter was a little thick the first time - needed more dashi!!

amazing photos by Corey - you can see the steam!!

On goes the cabbage!

In Japan they have super super thinly sliced bacon and pork but we couldn't find any so we chopped up some normal bacon cuts :S I jokingly called this Australia-yaki because of how improv it is.

bacon goes on too! i was looking for kim chi but the asian grocer was SOLD OUT!!! wtf

crack the egg

scramble it

now comes the tricky part. Watch me fuck this up....

scooping the filling back in. God i hope no okonomiyaki chefs are seeing this... how embarrassing...

on goes the infamous brown sauce. Okonomi sauce

then the kewpie mayo

then the spring onions or "negi"

then the fishy flakes. I call them bonito flakes but Shiho calls them Katsuobushi. We are both right in a way because bonito is the name of the fish (Skipjack tuna) which is dried and smoked and then turned into flakes called katsuobushi :) 

oh... yes... then we taught shiho some swears. She spelt this out on the fridge - cho kawaii!! I then corrected her and she won't stop saying it.. haha! Also she found out a worse one.. starts with 'c'... oh dear!

With the left over batter we made an osaka style one because we had no more noodles. This only has cabbage and spring onions in it but you can put anything!

oh yeah, then we went on the roof!

What a fun day :) Next I want to make sukiyaki - another of my favourite Japanese dishes :D mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

piece of art for the house

Well, although it is not your traditional piece of artwork ie. painting on canvas, i think it still constitutes as art - cruddy as it is. I selected pictures and frames, then Josh and I arranged them in an order we thought looked best. There are some road-trip memories in there, a picture from Nagano in Japan, one of Chester, one of my Grandpa, one of Josh and I in McLarenvale wine region in SA, and some other nice ones.

I drew this a while ago, and i got the frame from an op-shop. Love it!



Got this from an op-shop too. So cute, and it makes me want to escape there sometimes!

 So what do you think? Does this act as a TICK off my list??

boudoir bonanza

Hi there :) The other night I got a bit restless and decided to give my bedroom another mini-makeover. Since buying a house I have been struggling with how slow life moves financially. I live week to week and have to wait for so long for anything I want. I have an eternal list of wishes and things to do... but I love it really. It feels so much more like an accomplishment when you plan and work and fiiiiiinally achieve. Growing up I was used to watching my parents decide to do something and fully achieve their goal in a single afternoon. Sometimes I would come home from school and my mum would have totally re-lanscaped the garden, or re-arranged the furiture in the whole house, including my bedroom- don't worry I put a stop to this once I reached high-school fo real. Anyway I guess mum's "go-get 'em" attitude rubbed off on me and as a result, in my adult life, I usually can't sit still at nights. Woop.

So here are some shots of the slow progress of my bedroom makeover taken over the last 4-5 months. Unfortunately they are all of the same wall and the bed... the rest of the room is not as visually striking... yet... haha. The lamps and bedside tables in the first photo were my first purchase to help create my new look bedroom haven...

Basically when I moved into this house I was going for "WHITE! EVERYTHING WHITE OR CREAM!!!" I chucked out my burgundy and gold everything and decided for a brighter feel...

Then I painted the walls to give the white furniture more attention...

Behind the scenes, I also got my new tv, and re-arranged the furniture and cleaned out my walk in robe. Then I put my new IKEA $20 bedspread on...

Then I had this idea:

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!! I love my room!! There is still more to go, but by blogging about the process it will push me to do more :) woop woop!

Project Update

Wow, what a busy weekend!! My dad came back from Sydney and began work on the pergola again. It's pretty tall, and it was scary being up that wobbly ladder :S but it will be totally worth it when it's done :)

This is still very rough, and as i had to go out in the afternoon I didn't get a picture of where he got up to. He got all the top beams in place so now he just needs to tidy it all up and attach the roofing!

The fences are so low, if i stand on tip-toe I can see 4 backyards over. What is this, the 50's? Fuck man. I want to get extenders on the fence or put up some lattice for a bit of summer party privacy. Hoorah! Oh also, another thing I'm working on is the rabbit hutch in preparation for getting a wee rabbit! Once the pergola is done hopefully that will be the end of loud noises and i can safely get my bunny! So Josh's sister donated me this hutch, and as you can see, it needs a little bit of TLC...

Josh tells me that he made this years ago for the rabbit :) Even more reason to hold onto it and give it new life. I don't have big plans for it as yet because I have to focus on making a chicken coop BUT i plan to sand it back and tack down the chicken wire and give it a fresh coat of outdoor paint. I bought a similar colour because it looks so bright and happy! Will get onto that ASAP :)