My children will live just to grow old

but if I sit here and weep I'll be blown over by the slightest of breeze.

Rambling Man, Laura Marling

I am visiting the lovely city of Melbourne again. I have been here for only half of my time and I am already down to my last $25. But I have a weekly transport ticket and many snacks from home that I can take with me. I think random public transport and home snacks are the way to go. I also have my shiny new Canon 500D to explore with.

Can anyone recommend some nice places to sit and read or take photographs? I have a few places but I'm wondering if I can find a few more. Melbourne is a vast place afterall.

I had my first proper sleep in in about 3 months today. It was simply fantastic. It's hard to sleep in with a 3 year old brother running around the house in the early hours of the morning when your house has paper thin walls. I am not sure what to do with the rest of my day though.

Here is a new dress I bought a couple of days ago. I am completely in love with it.

 

x

We never meant to be this bad,

we never meant to be this sad. We never meant to be a lot of things that were lurking in the dark

-Whitley, Facades II

Such a shame that the lovely Australian band that is Whitley decided to split up. I managed to see one of their last gigs and it was truly one of the best gigs I have ever been to. Only very small and held in the back of a pub but quite marvellous all the same. But I suppose in the end not all bands can stay together.

I am amassing a collection of vintage white/cream dresses it seems. I think I would like this one to be just a tiny bit longer though. Maybe I will attach a lace layer to the bottom. And it needs a sash or ribbon around the middle.

I have a party coming up which is themed 'Evil Doers.' I am going to go as a vampire I think. I was going to go as a DALEK but a) I decided it might be overkill for a backyard bbq and b) it would be hard to sit down with styrofoam balls stuck to your skirt and c) the host of the party didn't know what they are. So keeping in mind the fact that I already have a set of vampire caps I shall go as a vampire. Don't fret though, there will be absolutely no glitter involved. In fact I am thinking of dressing more like a child vampire rather than a gothy adult one like I might normally do. I'm thinking more Claudia from Interview with the Vampire or Drusilla from Buffy (though yes, I know she isn't a child).

 

   

I applaud the facade of every broken heart...

I've been so busy with uni lately that all I really have time to do is throw on some clothes and run out the door. Printmaking is absorbing all of my time and I've been sleeping at friends places a lot too and forgetting to take my camera. Hopefully in the next couple of weeks I will have my SLR though. And as this is the last week of uni I should certainly have more time, though perhaps not more outfits. I am horribly broke and trying to save for shopping in Melbourne in 2 weeks.

I might also have some crafty things to upload soon as I have been a busy girl. Once holidays roll around I am looking forward to cleaning up my shed and unpacking the boxes I still have left from packing. Then I shall have my art shed ready for use. Well, ready for use for a couple of weeks before mid summer hits and it turns into an oven =P

Here's what I wore to uni the other day and managed to photograph in a rare moment of earliness. There's really only two options for places to take photos at my new house haha. I am sure you will get bored with the scenery soon enough...

I have an odd attraction to blurry and out of focus images...

I ate the red berries, the ones you told to leave alone

My process of getting dressed is probably remarkably similar to that of a 5 yr old playing dress ups. I never choose an outfit the night before or even an hour before unless I have a new item I simply must wear or I have a special occasion that limits my wardrobe. Otherwise about half an hour before I go out I start selecting clothes. I give a brief thought to what I will be doing in those clothes but most thought goes into how I am feeling. 90% of the time at this stage in my life it is something vintage or maybe slightly Indie.

However in the past 21years of my life I have visited the more bohemian hippie side of styling and the more gothic/punk side as well. Both I would say are an influence from my mother. As a child she dressed me in mostly Tree Of Life style clothing (if you don't know this shop read hippie style flowing dresses and hippie tops and long skirts), then when I hit high school I started to borrow from her wardrobe a bit, which led to the more gothic/punk trend. I tended to mix hippie and punk, I'm sure the results were...interesting. I can't really remember haha.

I still love Tree Of Life clothing and many of my highschool years were spent in the company of a decidely gothy friend. As such I find it hard to kick the punk look completely and I think I will always have a love for a proper steel boned corset. A properly fitted one feels like a permanent hug, I swear. And who can resist borrowing things from your mum's wardrobe when she was a punk/goth in the 80's and was pretty much the same size as you.

So, I switch between styles depending on mood.

Today is Tuesday. I love Tuesdays. Tuesdays are my self appointed day off and I can never do work on them. That would spoil them. So today I went for a walk to my favourite escape point. I like it because it is within walking distance and hardly anybody goes there. It is a lookout point at the end of a mangrove boardwalk. I like to put my feet over the end and lie there in the sun and cloud watch. It's a good place to go if I am upset or have some thinking to do.

Fishermen pants are possibly the most comfortable pants ever. I only own 3 pairs of pants. One pair of charcoal jeans. One pair of men's tweed slacks. And these. Oh and pyjama pants, but not tracksuit pants.

hanging out in my sister's room

On a side note the mulberries are out! As a child I used to walk to the one around the corner and come home with purple hands. The lady who owned the tree once gave me a white mulberry from in her garden. It tasted strangely like apricots. I think this summer I will make jam. Probably not mulberry jam though, I think that would be ridiculously messy.

Spent time making trouble, what's the sum of everything

"You haven't blogged in ages" you say, well here is an epic blog...

It was my birthday on Friday. It was a great day with breakfast out, paid for by my lovely friend, and then to the movies to see Inception (which is quite frankly a masterpiece in film), then to family dinner, and then to town where I actually for once consumed some alcohol (I never drink.) Arrived home at the bright and cheery time of 3.30 am, just in time to get up at 8 for my sister's Birthday. Talk about feeling dead! Haha. My sister mum and I had lunch, which I don't think we have done since my brother was born 3 years ago so that was quite nice. Unfortunately I have a horrendous cold, which I woke up with on the morning of my Birthday and just seems to be getting even more fabulous.

Sunday was spent in Sydney with my Aunt, Uncle and cousins shopping for my sister, and planning overseas possibilities for me before driving back home. I came very near to having a panic attack at one stage on the way there, seems my fears are continuing to get worse.

I didn't get many presents, in lieu of money for my planned trip overseas so it is kind of disappointing to be told that I am probably not going. By disappointing I actually mean completely devestating, but oh well. I am now faced with the rather large decision of whether or not to continue on and go on my own. To be honest I am not sure that I can, but to have wasted a whole year of working, and saving, and hoping and then to be given nothing but money for overseas for my Birthday, it seems like a monumental waste. There isn't really any point in postponing it because everyone I know is already there, has already been or won't be able to afford it any time in the near future. I could postpone it to the middle of the year, but I hate summer, I really loathe it and the idea of 2 summers in a year and a summer overseas where it's hot and you are carrying luggage and it's busy just doesn't do it for me. Also I would only be able to go for about 3 weeks. I am of the perhaps impractical opinion that if you are going to waste 2 days and a lot of money on flying all the way to Europe anything less than a month is probably wasteful.

I could go at the end of next year, but that is so very far away, especially when you were expecting to go in about 3 months time. Also I will have teaching prac until mid December. If I go this year I can at least start in November and have a couple weeks before full winter hits. Ideally I would go in Spring and visit tulip fields and gardens and those kind of things I enjoy. But to do that I would have to defer uni for a course that is already a 4 and a half year course and face the fact that I will no longer be doing my course with anyone I know for the next 2 years.

So I've concluded time is not the issue but whether or not I can face doing a foreign country on my own for about a month. I should give you the heads up that I am an incredible home body. I like being on my own but in practice I've probably been properly alone for all of 3 days this year. I have never travelled out of the state without family. In fact I have only ever gone to Tasmania on a family holiday or to Melbourne to see dad. The furthest I have travelled on my own is a 4 hour train to Tamworth to stay with my best friend for a week or two.

So the idea of going on my own is probably beyond ridiculous. But the idea of NOT going makes me want to cry...or actually cry as the case actually is.

*Sigh*

My aunt loves travelling and she went over and worked/backpacked in Europe on her own when she was my age. She has been looking into safe ways that I could do it on my own and well...survive. She is better than a travel agent. But I am still not sure, and I am running out of time...

In other news I have a bunch of outfit shots that I have not posted in my recent running-around-like-a-headless-chicken.

If you are looking for a pair of really solid opaque tights in great popping colours, that are thick and durable and feel really nice, I recommend We Love Colors.

A bit of Birthday fun through tights. I love looking at my legs in these :P

red means red. a bit blurry sorry but that doesn't effect the colour!

x

Put your face on a contact lens, only I have been to all the places we've seen

The lovely Eleanor departed to lands afar this evening. Seems to be a trend among my nearest and dearest haha. I will have my turn one day. So to say goodbye I bussed/walked over to her house at a ridiculously early hour that required being awake before 7pm. Uuurgh. But walks in the freezing cold are surprisingly invigorating, if not so great for extremities like noses.

I hung around and talked to her mother about my vague overseas plans while she went through her own awakening routines and then we went to the movies. I was the mildly awkward 7th wheel to a 3 couple set but oh well. We went to see Toy Story 3. Quite the epic movie! I am not sure if I prefer that one or the 2nd one, probably the 2nd but give it time. I think it lived up to the hype.

Finished said beanie last night. It looks somewhat like a gum nut. It was a good learning experience. Now I know what to adjust and such so that the next one is better. As everyone has departed for sunny Europe I should have quiiite a bit of time on my hands.

Although this beanie was the 'learning curve' beanie I quite like it. I don't like beanies that cover my forehead...in fact I like beanies that I can forget I am wearing. Ones that keep me warm without bothering me, which this one does as I have worn it all day haha. Still, I will make the next one longer before I start decreasing so it sits on my head more. Or on the head of whoever I give it to.

I actually bought the skirt I am wearing to match my fox beanie. It has little red riding printed all over it. But it worked with this hat as well.

stegapurplesaurus

frustrations with phones

Bon voyage 'Noracle x

A bow for all occassions

Just taking a moment to share some of my favourite summer clothes/outfits. I found the polka dot ress in a hidden away stall at Bondi Markets last month. The skirt on the other hand is from a shop on my favourite street. It is a prefect mix of sideshow and whimsy with merry go round animals printed along the front in grey. Grey is by the way one of my favourite shades to wear. The singlet looks a little bit bogan, usually I layer it over a lace top and tuck it in loosely but it was too hot today.

I also clearly have a penchant for tying bows in my hair to jazz it up a bit. Long, dead straight hair can look very....flat.