Pinkerton Manor

Back in Brisbane and loving it.  Still adjusting to the humidity after so much dry weather in Canberra, but it’s great to have good coffee and sushi places in more than two locations.  And multiple Nando’s, all of which include drinks in the meal deals!  Plus I love Brisbane.  It’s home.

I’ve really missed that view.  I’ve been walking a lot lately, taking everything in and making an effort to take different routes and occasionally deviate from my destination.  I want to get to know the city better and hopefully get some good photos along the way too.

Second hand or hand made is going well(ish).  I bought swimmers from a store the other day, but I justified it to myself with the fact that I’m incredibly fussy about swimmers and these were only $17.  And I needed them asap since my previous bikini disintegrated in Melbourne and I need to start swimming as exercise for my knees (I’ve even been looking into aquarobics).

Speaking of aqua, Matt gave me one of the best gifts I have ever received for Christmas.  A fish tank!  And once we have it set up, he’s taking me to buy a couple of fantails.  I’m so excited.  We went and had a look at some fish last week, they’re so cute with their swimming around and looking pretty.  We also looked at seahorses and although I could keep them in my tank without any problems, Matt thinks they’re weird (and I would probably spend all my time watching them with quiet awe).

And now I leave you with what was meant to be an outfit photo.  I didn’t realise how great being able to use Mum’s tripod was until trying to take these photos.  I think I will have to invest in my own.

Hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas and New Years!

EDIT:  Reading By Hillary just now and was reminded that I forgot to include what I’m wearing in the above photo.  So, here it is.

Awesome t-shirt – thrifted, very comfortable purple pants – Tree of Life, amethyst earrings – gift from Matt, necklace with pendant watch – eBay, garnet bracelet – made by me.

Holy crap, it’s nearly next year already!  Tomorrow will be the last day of 2009 and I’ll be jetting back to Brisbane.  I meant to post a phone sock tutorial before the year ended, but my camera batteries died so it will have to wait.  For now though, let’s talk about new years resolutions.  I’ve never really liked new years resolutions since every time I make them I inevitably don’t stick to them or they become irrelevant or I forget what they were.  So, for 2010 I am calling them goals.  And here they are.

• Get my learner driver licence
• Go back to uni or study of some kind
• Look after myself better, eat healthier and relax more
• ‘Second hand or hand made’

I’d better explain the last one.  I buy a lot of clothes and fashion related things and this year a lot of those purchases have been from shitty chain stores or discount outlets.  Sure they’re cheap and fun and sometimes I get some excellent stuff, but I’ve decided that in 2010 it has to be ’second hand or hand made’.  I’m also going to shop local as much as I can.  From buying my fruit and veg from the local farmers market to supporting local designers and craftspeople.  And I’ll be blogging about it all the way; featuring Australian designers, artists, craftspeople and purveyors of fine wares and calling for suggestions too.  I’ve yet to decide what I will do if I slip and buy something from K-mart, but I’m open to suggestions for that as well.

See you next year!

I’ve been a little quiet lately.  Mostly because I’ve been busy.  I went to Melbourne a few weeks ago for a holiday and it was hands down the best week of my life so far.  Hands down!  I’d never been there before, but people had always told me that I would like it.  They weren’t wrong.  I want to live there.  I met up with my ex boyfriend from Brisbane and we shared a hotel room for the week.  We’ve kept in contact a lot since I left Brisbane and we’re very good friends.  Even though we’d been a couple for nearly three years, Melbourne was our first real holiday together.  Anyway, here are some photos before I explain more.

Matt in front of Flinders Street Station

Lord of the Fries

I think that’s a theatre or something

Bikes we hired for the day

Church we stopped to look at on our ride

Matt with his bike

Cupcakes from my new favourite place, Little Cupcakes

Matt at Little Cupcakes

The cupcakes were delicious

I didn’t get nearly as many photos as I would have liked since I kept leaving my camera in the hotel room.  Sometimes because I had the dumb and others because I was achey and couldn’t be bothered carrying it.  We ate so much amazing food, my favourites being Little Cupcakes and Soul Mama.  We went to Soul Mama for a date.  It was the greatest date ever.  After we ate what was easily one of the best meals ever we headed over to Luna Park.  We went on the Scenic Railway and laughed so hard it hurt, then Matt played a sideshow game and won me a purple snake softie which I wore around my neck afterwards when we went for cake in Acland Street.

The other highlight for me was riding a bike.  I hadn’t ridden a bike since I was a kid and I was a little worried that between the arthritis in my back and the problems I have with my knees I might have a bit of trouble.  But I desperately wanted to do it and Matt was incredibly supportive.  We rode along the river for a while, but my knees started to hurt so we decided to cut through some suburbs in order to get to Abbotsford Convent.  We walked our bikes for a bit and then when we came to a slight downhill run Matt convinced me to get back on.  I had the time of my life!  We rode the rest of the way with no problems at all.  On the way back to the city I even rode in a bike lane on the road.  On the road!  I really want to buy a bike now.

In the weeks since I’ve been back I’ve done a lot of thinking and Matt and I have done a lot of talking.  I’m moving back to Brisbane on the 31st of December.  Moving back in with Matt, but we’re taking things slowly and seeing what happens.  I’m planning on going back to uni to finish my creative writing degree mid year and I’m going to put a lot more effort into the blog and my various creative endeavours.  I’m so happy and enthusiastic about life at the moment.  It’s fantastic.  I’m glad I moved to Canberra even though it hasn’t lasted that long.  I’ve spent lots of time with Mum and Louie and Matt and I have both grown and learned to communicate with one another much better.  Plus I’ve saved some money while I’ve been here so I can afford to go for my learners licence next year and get driving lessons.  I’d still rather a bicycle though, but I can probably afford that too.  Yay!

Apparently the Wild Things are in Canberra. Or at least they were. I spotted this awesome graffiti every day walking to work in the mornings and it always made me smile. Until this morning when I discovered that some jerk had covered Max’s head with an ugly poster. So glad I got a photo of it now.

The last few days I’ve been trying to decide whether to do outfit photos for the days I go to work. I love getting dressed on the weekends and always put effort into what I wear, but when I go to work it’s more a question of ‘what clothes do I have that look good, but I won’t be upset if I ruin’. So I kind of wear a lot of the same.

Right now I’m wearing black pants, a maroon cowboy check shirt with a grey knit vest over the top. It’s actually a pretty neat outfit, but I’ve worn it once a week since I started this job. Plus I’m usually too rushed in the mornings to be taking photos and too tired in the afternoons. Perhaps for now at least I’ll skip the work-day outfit photos. Unless I’m feeling particularly spectacular anyway.

So, I neglected the blog a little. Sorry, blog.

What have I been up to? Well, I’m currently knitting a scarf, getting back into drawing and painting, looking for a new job, plucking up the courage to post outfits over at wardrobe_remix, putting the finishing touches on a goldfish plushie for a friend, falling in love with a few newly discovered blogs (bread & honey, The Uniform Project, mimilove), redesigning the blog and drinking Lady Grey tea.

So, now that I’ve made the blog a bit prettier I’ll try real hard to update semi-regularly. Promise.

I organised my fabric stash!

Pinkerton Manor recieved its first spam comments recently.  Go team!  Long story short, I’ve turned the captcha back on and will be investigating ‘better’ captchas.  On the plus side, at least it reminded me that I haven’t posted in a while.  I’ll be remedying that shortly.  Right now I’m slow cooking curry.  Yum!

ETA:  I’m going to stick with my current captcha, reCAPTCHA.  It was featured in this months New Scientist.  So, nerrrrrr!

Big news!  I obtained new emoticons.

You like?

I’m still ironing out the bugs on a few other elements of the blog.  For example, I’ve been told that the captcha for the comments sucks.  I actually didn’t think it was that bad, but I’ll look into what else is available.  And tomorrow I’m planning on taking a few photos to make a fancy new header image.

Also to come, photos of buttons.  Everyone loves buttons.  Don’t they?

ETA:  The comment captcha has been turned off.

I had intended to post a number of things before now, alas life got in the way. My boyfriend, henceforth known as Lord Adlington (his choice), and I moved house rather unexpectedly. Long story short, circumstances led us to realise that we weren’t happy in our old flat and fate led us to our new one. Our new flat is the front corner of an old Queenslander. It is utterly delightful and I look forward to posting photos as soon as we have finally finished unpacking.

In other news, my good friend Darren at RapidHosting kindly helped me out with some hosting. I now reside at PinkertonManor.com (which currently redirects here). I’ll be roadtesting Wordpress in my secret blogging labrotory in the next few weeks and hope to officially launch Pinkerton Manor soon.