does anyone need help?

yesterday i saved a bad accident from happening at a busy intersection on lygon st.
it was extremely windy and a polystyrene box flew onto the road and was flying in front of cars and i road my bike out to a very dangerous position (as the lights had turned red) and picked up that box and took it out of the way... my heart was pumping so hard and a few cars beeped and waved their thank-yous.
it felt so good and i just wanted to help more people and right then a girl came up to me and asked directions... while i was in the middle of destroying the foam box and binning it. i felt an amazing rush as i kept riding. it was so windy but i felt like nothing could stop me and i could conquer the world! it just felt good to know i had helped when everyone else decided to sit back and wait for something to happen. it reminded me of my friend Hannah who stopped on the freeway to help a lost puppy once. i can now imagine the rush she must have also felt :)

the dirtiest designer habit of them all.

worse than spending ALL your rent money on a designer handbag is smoking.

smoking is just downright unhealthy. it smells bad and drains your money and makes you go outside alot (or just to rooftop bars).
but can i just say that (even though i will never take up this habit) when i see some one highly fashionable or european gracefully glide their hand and puff the most beautiful of clouds of smoke there is something about the style and look that makes me want to light up.

is smoking back in fashion?

i'm finding that all it takes is a packet of fads (candy shaped like cigarettes) and im pretending that my broken french is natural and that i own the world with my designer hand & mouth feature.

well i guess if i do a pack a day of fads i can always run it off around princes park...something i couldn't do if i'd stuffed up my lungs from actually smoking.

just a giant cupcake

big ol' fat rain

on thursday just past in melbourne, we had an absolute humdinger of a storm that brewed after a few very hot days... the rain was so imminent and almost looked like it wasn't going to come.... but then boy did it come!!!
it was the craziest downpour i had seen in a long time.. im talking about having to yell so someone can hear you talking!
anyway sitting on my computer and gazing out the widow at the H2O explosion outside i had an idea to draw a picture in watercolour penicls and put it outside so the colours would run and be cool although by the time i finished the picture the rain had slowed down to a drizzle :(
but i will upload the before's and after's anyway.. you can kind of see the difference.. didn't quite get the seeping colours effect i was after though.
ps the picture is of me in NY this coming christmas. pps. click to view enlarged image

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this is the before (below)


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and this is the after (below) the paper went a different texture and the colours brighter - not sure the scan show it up well though.

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was that a long black or a long mac?

so my housemates have decided (inspired by a project in the book below) that they want to make out back area of our backyard a bar/cafe one night a week a la the picture below. um wow ok guys this is pretty big.... i got a lot going on at the moment but as the little sister character ill just follow along... it actually would be pretty cool though cos we have a super cool laneway entrance and a sweet space for it and their idea is are to have a cover charge to cover costs and then give any profits to charity. oh im sorry i meant OUR idea. its really serious.... we even went on an excursion to section 8 to see how they did the crate thing.
anyway before you know it ill be getting up at the crack of dawn on a saturday morning serving poached eggs with dukkah and asking if you ordered a long mac or a long black.
see how this book is changing my life!!!!!!!!!!

im booked all week

my lovely friend recently bought me this lovely book full of how to make things out of household junk! it is so cool. it just arrived in the post.. i LOVE unexpected parcels too!

so many craft activities to do and so little time!

happy little vegemite

just continuing on the last of my posts on tasmaniac (as i like to refer to it as). i wanted to mention how happy i am to be an australian. i mean we live in a wild country and the people that settled here when it was first discovered must have been the most crazy adventurous people with amazing creativity and stamina. i imagine pulling up into the harbor at hobart and seeing the land in all it unique beauty and wondering what is out there. who lives there? how is it all going to work?
even though all my family migrated from Holland in the 40's and 50's i still think those migrants would have had a crazy adventurous personality and creative spirit to pack up and move to a huge island in the south pacific! quite frankly i am so happy to be part of a country with such exciting beginnings (and don't get me started on how adventurous the aboriginals were before English settlement).
even though i know australia is a bit far away from the world etc, i think we really do have something unique and very creative to offer the world :)

oh and whilst we are on the australianarama vibe, the other day i opened a fresh jar of vegemite (exciting i know) and it reminded me of when i was little, we used to fight over who got to open the lid of a new spread and who ever got to open it dug their knife deep into it making their initial in it. its crazy what kids will find to fight over. but i won this one. sorry tristan, this jar of vegemite is branded with an 'M'

typography i fell in love with

here are some lovely and well considered signs i saw when in hobart. the one that says ELIZABETH reminds me of my great friend elizabeth wilson who is just amazing you should see her stuff.

Van Diemans Land

the docks


I recently went on a trip to hobart, tasmania. it was so lovely to be on holidays. i was pleasantly suprised by how much i enjoyed the city itself. as i consider myself a bit of a city girl, visiting hobart i wasn't sure if i should be prepared for a backward little town or a capital city. what i instead found was the best part about hobart was the history and the buildings and knowing they were built by convicts.
this strip of arty cafe's and gallery which used to be a jam factory and its right near where the docks are.
the brown building on the far left as a little gallery with some amazing sculptures... my favourite was a giant wooden clothes peg, carved out of australian hardwood. brilliant.
there was another gallery behind and through the courtyard. it was awesome my dad and i got lost is the awesomeness. it had some very highbrow pieces in it. some early settler beauties... the prices were high but with good reason.
i nearly bought a renoir... yes thats right... for $450. it was just a simple sketch he did of a face. what an addition to my collection already though! but i couldn't spend my rent money on art. thats just silly.