Monday, October 31, 2011

LINKspired #001

Can't believe it's the last day of October! Ridiculous stuff. Nearly only one quarter of 2011 left!

Anyway, today I am launching another new blog branch which goes by the name of LINKspired. This particular branch will be to share all those cool web things that I have and am yet to come across that have inspired me or that I have found in some shape or form useful and then share and pass onto you to hopefully inspire or just put a smile on your dial! A lot of it is from other blogs that I read. So here it goes!


So if I had an iPhone this cover would be on my wish list.

This new campaign for Alzheimers Australia is pretty cool!

I'm always finding Nubby Twiglet's blog inspiring but this particular post about the Rock N Roll Bride magazine she has done some work with is particularly stunningly inspiringly beautiful!

Swiss Miss is another fabulous blog. This storage bag would be very handy in my household back home on the farm. 

I went to this Junior meet earlier this month and I possibly am in some of these photos!

If you enjoy a bit of black & white awesomeness you will most likely enjoy this place. Shirotokuro.

;) xo

Friday, October 28, 2011

Breaking Winter

October is so nearly over. And once again I'm wondering where those thirty-one days have gone?!

And as I write this blog I'm trying to work out how I'm not dead asleep right now! After a big night on Tuesday with the early start for work on Wednesday which I have not done in a very long long time... Somehow I'm not asleep. Somehow I wasn't drifting off in class today. And somehow I was still awake at even 11pm last night even though I was running 16 hours on only 3 hours of a recharge! And through all of that my mood has been quite good. So I have come to the conclusion that I need to get back into my habits from earlier in the year! And maybe I was just getting too much sleep. Over the last few months I've been a little bit down and I believe it's because of my lack of a social life that I kind of let take over. Having said that my aim of change is coming along, since my birthday I have definitely been a bit more social. The 2011SLASH2012 Summer mission is definitely to live it up and get out and about more. I feel I've been hibernating and it's been unhealthy. So it's time to fix that and shake the winter off once and for all.

My anticipation of the release of the Breaking Dawn soundtrack and film increases as Christina Perri's new song apparently written with Edward and Bella in mind, A Thousand Years has been released. Not as epic a ballad as Jar of Hearts, the song that has sent Christina Perri high into the charts, but still an enjoyable sweet track. I can definitely see it fitting into the film, and I am rather keen for it. Not long to wait now for both! Extremely keen!

xo

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Launching Inside Out

So I have a new branch on my blog tree. It's been trying to shoot off on it's own direction for a while now, and there are other on the verge of also spreading out soon, so stay tuned! But for now I will launch Inside Out. This blog branch will be specifically for the expression of the sometimes boring, often pointless and other times very odd little stories, poems and other bits and pieces of writing from inside of my head to outside onto a page, note or document and into this blog! So here we go! Inside Out #001...



Inside Out #001
The Darkness

The darkness, 
peaceful and reserved, 
but full of scary unknowns,
it has the best defence, 
you can never see what's coming, 
the power to blind your straining vision, 
to put you in a straightjacket of doubt, 
of paralysing fear, 
armless and helpless, 
and the only attack of worth is light.



Monday, October 24, 2011

Four

Finished watching Gossip Girl season four with my sisters this weekend. And I think we're all a little sad that we now have to wait another long while before season five will hit the digital disk! Cannot wait though! It's going to be a long wait. Season four did deliver and leave us with an exciting cliff hanger, though decidedly not as epic as past season finales. Especially that of season three. That was definitely an exciting season end. If you watch, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about, if you don't, perhaps just skip the rest of this paragraph. Chuck getting shot after being robbed was a dramatic season end to say the least. Season four has ended with Blair newly engaged to a prince and about to marry into royalty! What more could she possible want. It's everything she's ever dreamed of. But as usual, a one night mistake holds the possibility of a lifetime changing result! So that will be exciting to watch next season. I am rather disappointed with where Vanessa's character went this season. We are left to forever dislike her as her character slipped into the dark ways that sent Jenny into no fan land the season before. Which is a little frustrating as both Little J and V were characters I used love. Serena is also on the least favourite character list. But somehow Chuck and Nate just keep getting hotter. And Dan is never too hard to take either, though this season did see him make some frustrating decisions.... Anyone would think I was obsessed... haha!

Recently acquired Beyonce's new album, 4. Admittedly I was initially not that impressed with her single Run the World (Girls), but it has grown on me. I do have a slightly biased opinion of Beyonce's music. I do believe she is one of the most amazing singers of this time. B'day and I am... Sasha Fierce are both fantastic albums in my book. And 4 definitely continues to deliver this awesome music that she makes. My favourite tracks on the album would have to be Countdown, Love On Top and I Care. But I can see I'm going to have this album on repeat all spring!

I had my first macaroon on the weekend. My sister is quite into trying new things with her cooking and she decided that macaroons were it this week. They were kind of amazing! Extremely delectably dangerous! I actually consumed the ones in the picture as they were my sisters birthday present for me! How good do they look!? And yes there were some blue ones! Yum!

Just realised there is a theme to this blog that is entirely unintentional!  Have you already noticed it? Not only have I been talking about Gossip Girl season four, Beyonce's album 4 but there are even four macaroons in the picture!

Tata for now!

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Very Thankful

Well that's it. Teenager I am no more. My twentieth birthday has come and gone. (Except that I'm going to drag it out for the rest of the week until I see my family back home and celebrate with some more) But it's gone. If I blinked I might have missed it. But it was kind of awesome. I've already had two extremely tasty chocolate cakes and have had some lovely "happy birthday's" sung. It's all kind of a bit cute. Was very spoilt by the wonderful people around me. Very thankful. And looking forward to the celebrations of the rest of the week to come. Maybe birthdays aren't so bad after all...

xo

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Fresh Farewell

There we go, finally a banner to freshen up a bit. It's only temporary though. Bigger things to come!

So I have about 26 minutes left of nineteen! Farewell teenage me?

xoxo

One Nine Nearly No More

Sadly I am counting down the final hours of my teenage-dom. Teenagerness is almost a thing of the past. Tomorrow marks the day that I was born an entire twenty years ago. A whole two decades. Twenty years of life experience, though it doesn't feel it. And like some kind of early life crisis it's something that I find a bit depressing. I'm not ready to not be a teenager yet. I feel like I'm in a video game and there is something I've missed completing or forgotten to collect that gets me through to the next level. Missing some xp points. Level 20 is supposed to be pretty good, not as good as level 21 obviously but still promising. So what did I forget to collect along the way on level 19? Maybe it isn't that important if I can still progress to level 20 without it.

But why do I have this irrational fear of getting older? Is it something we all get in the later teen years before we burst into our twenties? Maybe it's just because when I was thirteen, you looked up to twenty year olds as much as you did a forty year old. Twenty is an adult and they must know everything, they know what they're doing, at peace with themselves and have a direction set. They seemed confident and all knowing. But as I have gotten closer to this 'adultness' it seems that is not the case at all. I guess either my thirteen year old eyes were innocently and easily deceived or there is something wrong with me. I guess it's just different, it doesn't feel how I thought it would feel to be almost twenty. I've been pondering about it a lot over the last week. But I know I need to embrace it. I must embrace my age, it is only a number after all. But I can't promise that this is the last of my contemplations of such things. I don't think my liking of having birthdays is going to improve any time soon.

Was watching a repeat of Glee, I believe it is Season 2, Episode 14, Blame it on the Alcohol,  and it's the episode where Rachel holds a party and they all get smashed off their faces and then continue to drink away the hangover for a few days until they perform in front of the entire school at an assembly about Alcohol awareness and drinking responsibly. Funnily enough they are all drunk and then two of them throw up mid performance, (Britney and Santana) but somehow they still manage to pull it all off, the principal praising them on their acting and effects used to emphasise the message. Anyway, still undecided about the messages in this episode being that sound but I was just admiring Britney and her amazing talent. She is my favourite character at the moment. Admittedly I haven't seen any of the latest episodes of series three, I'll marathon it when it's on DVD I think. But she is just so funny. So this led me to come across this video on YouTube of Britney moments. I'm sure fellow Glee fans will have a good giggle. 4:54 is possibly my favourite.

Bluejuice is a pretty cool band but I'm kind of stunned of the daring direction they took their latest clip, Act Yr Age. What do you think of it? I can't help but laugh at it but at the same time I struggle not to be a little bit grossed out! Kind of an ironic song title to be mentioning at this point in tim too.

So this is one of my last posts as my nineteen year old self. I feel like I'm supposed to be doing something kind of epic tonight. Perhaps It will be better to epically break out into my twenties rather than to epically close out the teens... stay tuned!

xo 

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Just Dance!

So I just finished watching a DVD I bought ages ago because it was on sale and kind of looked cool. Fish Tank. And now I'm kind of wishing I didn't buy it. Not my kind of movie at all. It is a highly recommended British film but they obviously have different taste over there. So not one that I would recommend folks. Not sure that I really want to rate it. I'll give it 3/10. Iy's just disappointing and frustrating watching this young girl and her actions and the actions of the people around her. But i've watched it now and I know not to watch it again!

Have just had a fantastic weekend at home with my family. We just bought the new Just Dance 3 which is the most awesome fun you can have with a Wii controller. For those that don't know, Just Dance is a dancing game(now way!) for game consoles where the have choreographed dances for a range of songs and he get to dance them, controller in hand to track your moves, and then it gives you a score as to how well you can do the dance moves. That's probably not the best explanation but if you check out the link  you will get a good idea. It's just fantastic fun and when you've got your sisters and brothers to compete with it's even funner. Would highly recommend it. One and two are also great fun but they have definitely gotten better with each one. And don't forget the exercise that you get from playing, and you don't even realise because you're having so much fun!

Also watched a lot of Gossip Girl Season Four, only two episodes to go now! And I also realised that the date I thought the Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Soundtrack would be released, mentioned in my Singing in the Rain post on the 29th of September was an entire month premature! So unfortunately I had thought it was out last week but it is in fact not released until the 8th of November. So I will continue to wait for it's release.

Tomorrow another week begins. But it's not just any week. It holds the last few days, the final hours of my teenage years. All about to come to an end. And I'm one of those people that finds birthdays rather depressing. I had kind of hoped I could just cancel the rest of my birthdays. I guess that's not really possible. Oh well. My birthday will come whether I like it or not, hopefully it won't ruin my week. Apparently there is no stopping time. Time that is only passing faster than anybody really wants it to.

xo

Friday, October 14, 2011

Tongue Tied

So I realised yesterday that when it comes to explain to people my life situation I always feel like I have to give them more of an explanation than is probably necasey. I probably do this because I guess there wouldn't be a whole lot of people commonly in a very similar situation to my own. But it's frustrating to explain because in the process of attempting to explain it in relation to whatever the story it is I'm telling I think I always end up confusing the listener and myself at the same time. It becomes very complicated! I'm yet to find a short and simple way to quickly explain to those who ask questions without creating a tongue tied round about answer. It's like I always begin like they know my background story and will know who I'm talking about.... and then they don't and I have to do this sort of round about backtracking to explain. Confused? That's ok.

Right now I am counting down the few minutes left until Big Day Out 2012 tickets go on sale. I'm a little keen to go, not just because it will feature Boy and Bear, Hilltop Hoods, The Living End, Kanye West, The Jezabels, Best Coast and plenty more cool bands, but I'm also just keen to go to A Big Day Out! Fingers crossed I can get tickets!

... WIN!

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Semi Fresh Start

So it's the second day of the new term. A semi fresh start. The beginning of the end. The fourth and final term of the year. The final set of weeks. This time last year I was madly stressing about year twelve exams and uni preferences and the results I may or may not obtain and the effect that this would then have on the year to follow. And here I am. A year later, though it feels a lot longer ago now. And I in no way envy the year twelves of 2011, though I wish them all the best of luck! Try your very best, but don't forget that this isn't the end, it's just the beginning!

So with the new term in mind I think it's about time I became a bit more active with this blogging business. Even if there is no one reading it. There is just something satisfying about blogging. So I am going to try and have a new one at least every three days. I'm telling you this because typing it is like saying it out loud, and saying it out loud gives motivation to follow through.

Over the weekend I ended up in Bendigo for a mystery tour in which we were taken to the Central Deborah Gold Mines where we did a tour and went looking for some gold. You even get to wear those cool head torches, making you feel just like an adventurer. Was definitely an interesting and educational experience in which I learnt I sure wouldn't want to be a miner! We also went to the Golden Dragon Museum which was also very interesting and gave us the opportunity to see some breathtaking craftsmanship. Just wow! The dragons and many other festive decorations and objects made for the Easter parade are so beautiful and festive. And then they have a lot of handcrafted artefacts that have the most amazing detail. Many wooden screens featured this handy work. The picture below is some of the carvings on one of these screens.

Lastly we visited The Zone which was absolutely fantastic fun. We did Go carting, laser-tag and mini golf. I don't think I've been go carting since I was about six. And the last time I remember playing mini golf was on a computer game that my brothers and i used to play obsessively. As for laser tag, that was my first experience of it, and I totally want to go back for another round! Fantastic fun with awesome people. Was a great day!

Last night I sat down to eat some dinner and as I was flicking through the television guide on foxtel I discovered that The Lizzie McGuire Movie had just started on one of the channels. I couldn't help but smile to myself as I made the selection and enjoyed the familiar openeing scene with Hilary Duff singing into a hairbrush in her bedroom mirror along to the Atomic Kitten cover of The Tide is High. This smile wasn't just a reaction to the almost silly-ness of the idea that I as my nineteen year old self would sit down and watch a movie like this all on my own when it is entirely aimed at my thirteen year old self. Nor was it because of this particular scene being funny. I couldn't help smiling because along with this movie comes a whole string of memories, like a portal to eight years ago, to my oh so innocent pre teen-dom. Back to watching Lizzie McGuire on TV and then them making the movie and thinking it was the best thing. I love that movie. I remember the frustrations of not being allowed to go and see it at the cinema. And then finally it was released on DVD. And it was not long after we had finally gotten with the times and bought a DVD player and this was one of the early additions to our library of DVDs. It even came in the special pack with a Kim Possible DVD, another Disney show that was popular at that time. Makes me think of Disney Girl and Total Girl magazines, which I definitely had quite a collection of around that time. I always had a thing for magazines and for some reason even though these two were practically the same thing I chose to spend my hard earned savings on buying both of them! A lot like Miley Cyrus is to the eleven year olds of today, Hilary Duff was an iconic and influential idol of my childhood. Though unlike Miley I don't recall Hilary having many scandalous and controversial stories constantly in the mainstream media. Back then the biggest drama was that Lindsay Lohan and Hilary were "fighting" over.... Aaron Carter? Who they both dated at some point. This slightly concerns me, to think that the eleven year olds of today are exposed to influences like Miley as the acceptable and desirable benchmark. Hilary never let me down as a bad influence. I certainly spent a lot of time with my hairbrush in the mirror singing along to her songs. Why Not was on repeat there for a while.

Anyway, I was just thinking of how funny it is how much of an influence celebrities and characters off of those favourite television shows can be when you're that young. But also the connection they can then have to that period of time in your life, as Hilary has on mine.

Just watched this trailer for Young Adult. I clicked on it because I think the cover picture slash poster looks really cool. Check it out! Looks like a bit of a quirky film. Shall be keen to see that one I think. Happy Feet Two is looking like a rather cute adventure too.

Anyway, I believe that is all for now.
Chow for now!
xoxo

Friday, October 7, 2011

myStyle/$pent #004

myStyle/$pent #004, August 2011

A Wedding Special for August, though very late!




This is kind of just a little showing of the gorgeous dresses my sisters and I wore to our cousins wedding in August. Any excuse is a good excuse to buy a pretty new dress and get all prettied up for a celebration of an occasion!

xo

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Wanted to Fall

So today I did one of those silly things that you only ever dread happening or have nightmares about. Something you laugh along with your friend about when they tell you how it happened to them but you make the mental note not to let it happen to yourself. Because when it does happen you are left with a slightly uncomfortable feeling with symptoms of uneasiness and the feeling of being cut off. This is all of course the typical result of leaving your phone behind.

It's ok, I didn't lose it somewhere random. I just accidentally left it at home this morning and then didn't actually notice I didn't have it until I was on my lunch break. So I din't actually suffer from any of the above described misfortunes. But I was faced with the dilemma of walking home without it which made me realise how I do depend on my phone for not only entertainment on my walk, whether it be using the radio, listening to music or calling someone but I also always make notes and lists to order the thoughts that swim around my head, I use my phone as a net to organise them as best I can. And it was definitely missed!

Watched The Time Travellers Wife on the weekend. Can't say I was overly satisfied with it either. Maybe I spent too long reading the book and then built it up to much in my head. I wanted to fall in love with the film but I can't help feeling like it just lacked something. I feel like if I hadn't read the book to fill in all the gaps of things that missed out on making the film that I would have struggled to like the characters. Though to be honest in the end of the book I'm not sure I was left liking the characters much anyway. I'll give it a 7/10. I guess I was just disappointed because the leads, Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana I like so much! and I just didn't really love them in this. Maybe I just watched it with a bit to much scrutiny. I will have to watch it again some time and see.

A film I did enjoy watching on the weekend was Burlesque! Christina Aguilera does an amazing job as Ali. I think she is just fantastic in this! Especially when she is generally a singer by trade. And boy does she put her voice on show in Burlesque! It's just so awesome. Cher is also good. And the addition of Eric Dane as friendly businessman Marcus and Cam Gigandet as always there best friend Jack, does not go astray! And I always enjoy characters played by Stanley Tucci, he's always good value. The soundtrack is amazing. I may just have to get my hands on that one I think! And the costumes! I'm in love! 9.5/10. This is definitely up there with one of my favourite films of the year!

After seeing the classes they did on Packed to the Rafters a few weeks ago and now this film, burlesque looks like fantastic fun!

Chow for now!