a Beer, a Whine and The Spirit

Hubs and I left Brisbane 8 (???) hours ago and we are currently on stopover in Singapore, using their FREE internet!! Did I mention it was FREE????? Singapore Air have my 2 thumbs up so far! We had a few glasses of wine (and G&T and Baileys) which I've never really done before (drank much on flights) so I'm feeling ready for a little nap now but there are too many good movies and TV shows to watch on the next leg!! Which leaves in 6 hours :-(

Singapore airport is also really easy to get around (FREE shuttles between terminals that are run by robots!! Okay. So it's all automatic, but that's PRACTICALLY a robot, right??)

Not much more to say other than I had such a great Christmas and it was awesome seeing all the family again. I miss you all already!! And we made a few new special friends who really touched our hearts - you know who you are! Can't wait to see you again!

Until we get FREE internet again, adios!

Posted by Renae at 11:52 PM Comments

We're due to leave on our road trip in about 3 hours time and we're almost packed. Sort of. Mostly. Oh well! It'll happen! I'll be trying to blog a bit while on holidays, but I haven't prepared or scheduled any posts for while we're away, but I'll have plenty to talk about when we get back.

I hope you all have a really wonderful Christmas and thanks for reading!

See you in 2010!

Posted by Renae at 1:57 PM Comments

Myself, Hubs and Nate will be starting our road trip back to Brisbane tomorrow night and we're excited!! This is where we'll be for the next few days:


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Once we hit Brisbane, we'll be pretty busy leading up to Christmas, and then of course we'll be heading to South Africa and doing something like this:


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So as you can see, we have a LOT of fun to get through the next few weeks! Then it's my 30th birthday! YAY!!! And then we'll be attending Hubs' brother's wedding (double YAY!) and then flying back to Melbs for our last 5 months here before we head to Wangaratta (or to the locals, Wang!) which is here:


View Larger Map

Looking forward to seeing so many of you soon! And some of you not soon enough!
(You can drag and zoom in and out on the maps! Go nuts!)

Posted by Renae at 4:52 PM Comments

In fact, no one is like "other people". I guess that's what makes us all special and individual and all that stuff. But I'm a slow learner, and I can be particularly dense sometimes. I'm just now learning (in almost my 31st year of life) that I don't think the same way as "other people", and other people don't think the same way as me. And that's okay.

I have these ginormously high expectations of myself that I'm constantly not living up to. But no one cares about this but me. Instead of just being "me" I want to be the perfect Wifey, the perfect employee, the perfect friend, the perfect body shape, the perfect daughter, the perfect granddaughter, the perfect sister etc etc. No pressure or anything!! And when I fall short of this, it really gets me down.

I know that this is making me sound like a perfectionist, and I'm really not, as I just give up when I'm not perfect! :-) I just try and do too much all the time and then when I don't succeed I fall in a heap. So even though I don't like to make New Years resolutions, my goal for next year is to give myself a break; to let myself be me, however imperfect.

It's going to be tough :-)

Posted by Renae at 11:43 AM Comments

No, I'm not talking about this type of Mary Jane. I'm talking about THESE.

Oh, and these:

I have bought all 3 pairs since we've been in Melbourne, for a grand total of.... hang on, how about I play another game!? How much you think I pay for each pair? They are all leather (wouldn't buy anything else when it comes to Mary Janes!), super comfy, and totally sexy! Again, I'll put the price down the bottom, but I can assure you, you WON'T BELIEVE ME!!!

Another angle? Sure thing!

Posted by Renae at 10:16 AM Comments

Posted by Renae at 10:29 AM Comments

Friday the 4th of December it was cool
Sunday the 6th my back got sunburnt from sitting out on our patio for a few hours, cutting Hubs' hair (calm down, it was just a trim)
Tuesday the 8th it was freezing again so I had to wear layers (and on sunburnt skin, this is NOT COOL)
Sat/Sun the 12th/13th was cold then hot then cold again
Yesterday (14th) was freeeeeeezing!
Today it's getting up to 30
and Tomorrow it will APPARENTLY be 39.

Stupid. Melbourne. Weather.

Posted by Renae at 9:31 AM Comments

We have been fortunate enough to have access to a car the last few weeks (thanks to Lsl buying herself a Ute from down here, so we have to road trip it back to Brisbane starting this Friday!) so we decided to take it for a spin down to Torquay a few Saturdays ago. The weather was so lovely in the morning, that I insisted we get out of Newman for the day. The thing about Melbourne weather though, is that it seems to incorporate the surrounds as well. On our way down the sun vanished, but we were determined! (Well, I was determined. Hubs was in a making-Wifey-happy mood which suited me just fine!)

We arrived and went for a walk down the beach. It wasn't actually as cold as I expected, and the bay water was pretty nice too.

And now for a game of "how much you think I pay?"

(Back story: My Grandpa is a bargain shopper and becomes very pleased with himself when he saves lots of money, and he likes to pose the question "how much you think I pay?" and is chuffed when we name a price WAY higher than what he paid! It's good fun!)

So I bought this purpley-pink top from a Kathmandu sale

and I pose the question: How much you think I pay? Now, I SHOULD leave it at that and tell you the price after you guess, but I'm not that patient, so I'll put the price right at the end of my post and you can tell me how WRONG you were in your guesses :-)

After our walk on the beach we went and checked out the Rivers clothing store and got a few bargains there as well! (A post for another day.) While we were inside it started pouring down so we shopped until it eased off. We left and dropped our stuff off into the car and as we were doing so it started to pour down again so we ran to the cafe we had decided to eat at, but not before we got quite soaked :-(







Full price $74.95 (who would PAY that???)
What Wifey paid: $6.95 (yes, I'm a bargain shopper too!!)

Posted by Renae at 11:11 AM Comments

I'm a cereal girl (living in a cereal world?) and I had toast for brekky this morning and there are so many things I don't like about toast for breakfast:

1. it takes too long
2. it doesn't fill me up for more than half an hour
3. too many decisions to be made about what to put on it in the morning (jam? peanut butter? honey?? I'M STILL HALF ASLEEP!)
4. I get distracted very easily so there's only a 50% chance that I won't forget about the toast being cooked and burn it beyond recognition
5. I'm hungry now (see 2nd point)

I have a whole week of this!! (we are leaving on Friday and ran out of cereal last Friday and there's no point in buying a whole new packet just for a week...)

Posted by Renae at 10:12 AM Comments

When choosing a movie, to watch, one question always has to be asked:

"Is this a Wifey movie?"

A lot of the time, Hubs has to think about it. Most of the time he gets it right, but sometimes not. Here's an example of Wifey movies:

Cool Runnings (I can't believe that's the first one that popped into my head)
Moulin Rouge
Lethal Weapon1-4
Chocolat (I think I had a bigger crush on Juliette Binoche than I did on Johnny Depp!)
Die Hard 1-4
You've Got Mail
Love Actually
Robin Hood, Men in Tights
Shrek
to sum up: rom-coms, comedies, kids movies, action with a medium level of violence

An example of non-Wifey movies:
A Nightmare on Elm St (thanks for letting me watch that when I was 9 years old, big bro)
Twilight movies
The Exorcist
The Ring
Hostage (learnt that the hard way too)
Anything scary
to sum up: horror, creepy, extreme violence

This rule also applies to TV shows. Some shows that Hubs and I have enjoyed together are Scrubs, Battlestar Gallactica, and more recently, Boston Legal.

And then there's Dexter.

Dexter is not, never has been, and may never be, Wifey-safe. Hubs started watching a few episodes last year when we first moved down here, and he said it was really awesome, and that I should give it a go, and that he would tell me when to close my eyes (or at least put my hands over my face and peep through my fingers.) So I gave it a go. I think the first episode we watched together was on the weekend I was sick with rubella and it was daytime, which reduces the scary-factor somewhat. It was like a train wreck. I couldn't look away! I loved it but hated it all at the same time. But not wanting to be narrow minded, I stuck at it, but we were only allowed to watch it in daylight.

So we made our way through season one with a few bad dreams, but I did really enjoy it. So then we moved on to season two, with the same daytime rule. We took a bit of a break from it after that (season two was emotionally exhausting!) but then Hubs acquired season three, so we started watching that a few weeks ago. And we punched it! We were watching an episode most evenings (it's still light until 9pm!) followed by an ep of Boston Legal. But the other night we watched Dexter, BL, and then ANOTHER Dexter cos it was so good.

Bad idea.

I had the most horrible dreams. There was stabbing and shooting and strangulation, dumping of bodies in the lounge room ("we" killed Dexter then tried to hide his body under the couch) and police cars and stake-outs. It was all there! And I had one of the worst night's sleep I've had for a LONG time. We MUST comply with the daylight rule. It's not a rule to be broken.

So we are watching the last episode of the season after work today, and the suspense is KILLING ME! I trust it will be as good as they've built it up to be. No spoilers thanks!

Posted by Renae at 11:21 AM Comments

spaghetti and bolognaise - good
bolognaise on toast - good
cheese on toast - good
jam and cheese on toast - good
vegemite and cheese on toast - bad
vegemite and anything - bad
banana and honey - good
banana and tuna on toast - bad (yes, I know someone who tried it)
mango on toast - bad
mango - bad
mango flavoured frozen yoghurt - good
natural yoghurt and bran with some honey - good
vegemite and honey - see above
milo - good
peppermint tea and milo - bad

And you?

Posted by Renae at 3:06 PM Comments

... I was blogging about how lovely and quiet the college is without all those pesky students around
... I was amazed that we had been in Melbourne for 6 months already
... I was struggling to find an identity for myself down here
... We had just celebrated our 1st wedding anniversary
... I was annoyed that I was sick AGAIN!!
... I was looking forward to going to Brisbane for Christmas

And now I'm
... blogging about what I was doing a year ago
... blown away we've been in Melbourne for 18 months
... finding my groove down here as a wife, a Marriage Celebrant, a friend and someone who has had a job for over a year and is happy in it
... excited to have just celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary
... excited that I haven't been sick for months and months (touch wood)
... looking forward to going to Brisbane for Christmas, and all the adventures to follow

The countdown is on! 2 weeks and 1.5 days of work left and we're hitting the road! YEAH!!!

Posted by Renae at 11:17 AM Comments

It's my job to order to the key lanyards at the end of the year, so if students (or staff!) lose their keys, the person who finds them can call the number on the lanyard and tell us where the keys are. In a perfect world anyway. Most of the students discard the lanyard as soon as they are given their keys. Anyway. I get to choose the colour and last year I ordered a lovely orange, to contrast with the previous year's blue. This year I chose purple. Hooray! My favourite colour! The colour of the lanyards have nothing to do with this story, but I like purple so I thought I'd mention it. (And from the looks of my blog, I like the combo!)

They arrived today and look stunning. I gave the first one to my boss (well, one of my bosses - when you're this low in the pecking order, you have many) and she put it on her key chain. A minute or so later she came out holding the lanyard, looked at me, and said "The phone number is wrong."

In the 3 seconds before she cracked a smile and said "only joking", my brain had processed the following:

"Crap crap crap. Hang on, they used the template from last year so that means LAST year's number must have been wrong, but I know for a fact that it wasn't wrong. Someone at their end must have stuffed up. It's not my fault! Hooray!"

Am I the only one here impressed by the speed of my thoughts right there? Maybe it's the thought of getting into trouble (yes, I'm a scaredy-cat) that makes me think so fast. But seriously! Never mind how gullible I am, LOOK AT MY BRAIN POWER!!! At this rate I'll be able to take over the world sooner than I thought.... Mwah ha ha ha ha haaaaaa....

Posted by Renae at 3:00 PM Comments

I consider myself to be a very lucky person, growing up in a loving family in a beautiful home and never going without everything I needed, and many things I wanted. With Dad being a geologist, we got to do a lot of travelling around for the first 7 or so years of my life. We would spend the winter months up in Dimbulah (I can't believe it has it's own Wiki page! Woo hoo!) just outside of the township, where my bro and I would go to kindergarten, pre-school or school. We lived at a Queensland Government base camp, where up to 30 male geologists and maybe 1 or 2 female geologists or field hands were based for 6 months at a time. There were a number of tents set up as accommodation, and some outhouses and outdoor showers to share.

We were lucky though. We had "the shed". As a kid, it was like living in a big adventure land. Our "back yard" was a mountain of boulders that we would climb up and explore; "The Shed" seemed perfectly adequate and large to a 4 or 5 or 6-year-old; and because we were usually the only kids on site, we were given a lot of treats, usually in the form of soft drinks or cardboard-on-a-rope rides, or piggy-back rides. Mum was the camp cook, often cooking for the whole camp of 30 men, with my brother and I, and our dog Cuddles, running around under her feet.

I re-visited our old home when I was 22 and boy that shed was small. Mum, how did you do it?? Living there with Dad and us 2 ratbags, I have nothing but admiration for you!

Even writing this now, at the age of 20...something... I have a smile on my face. Those times up there for our family are some of the happiest memories of my childhood, and certainly at my youngest, some of the only memories I have. Yes, my life is awesome.

Posted by Renae at 9:20 AM Comments

I think I just had one of the nicest coffee's I've EVER HAD. The Deputy Rector pops down to The Potter coffee shop from time to time and picks us up a coffee, and today's brew was just amazing! I mean, I haven't had a bad coffee in Melbourne (bad service, yes, but not bad coffee!), but this one was just exceptional. It was the perfect temperature, the perfect strength and the flavour was fantastic!

And now I want another one...

Posted by Renae at 9:32 AM Comments

She Bop was a very confusing song for me, as previously mentioned. I didn't even know what the song was about - I just assumed that it was about dancing - bopping - you know what I mean? But no, it's not. It's about..... um..... I'll let you read about it yourself :-) (Pay particular attention to the second paragraph under "song information." Classic!)

So the second lot of lyrics I misheard were:
"Do I wanna go out with a lion's roar?"
which I always sang as
"Do I wanna go out with a lying slob?"

Well no, I don't! And I certainly don't want to dance with one!

Posted by Renae at 10:05 AM Comments

One of the enormous ANZAC bikkies I made a few months ago.

Posted by Renae at 3:00 PM Comments

I've been having a little bit of fun with all the new gizmos and gadgets available on blogger (I accidentally typed blooger! Tee hee!) .com. I am particularly LOVING the new search tool (see left sidebar at the bottom) so I can check and make sure I haven't already blogged about stuff before I start a new post. (Bad memory). Turns out the search window in the Navbar is fairly useless. Oh well. I do love my new look blog!

Plus, you can see what I'm up to with my TO DO list! Riveting, I know!

I do realise that many of my readers use Google Reader to read blogs (as I often do) but feel free to come over here and visit from time to time to check it all out. Who knows? You might want to know what I'm up to this Friday night in Brisbane!

Posted by Renae at 8:40 PM Comments

"Often the things that annoy you in others, are things you see in yourself."

I have NO idea where I first read that, but I totally related to it then, and I have ever since.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. For some reason, my patience has been a bit light-on for a while now, and I've been finding myself getting annoyed at things that wouldn't normally annoy me, and then getting annoyed at myself, for being annoyed. And that is really annoying!!

To try and combat this, I've been trying to work out exactly what is annoying me in a situation, and reasoning with myself: Is this worth getting frustrated over? Is the issue, in fact, my own? Am I getting annoyed at this person, or the behaviour? Would I act the same way if I were in their shoes?

This line of reasoning sometimes helps (if, in fact, I remember to do it and not just get carried away with my feelings and thoughts and get upset and annoyed and frustrated and.... where was I?...) and I feel I am reconnecting with my patient self. Then today I stumbled across this quote:

"Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves." (Carl Jung)

And I like this idea a LOT more. It takes away the feeling of frustration, at both the person for being annoying, and at myself for feeling like I have the same character trait that is annoying me in the first place. Instead, it gives me the suggestion to get to know myself better, and to understand who Wifey really is. And she's not such a bad gal.

I told you! This journey of self-discovery is going to be a lonnnnnnnnnnnng one.

Posted by Renae at 3:34 PM Comments

So, remember how I told you about the chilblains? The doctor told me to make sure I kept my feet nice and warm all the time, and that would help the healing process. So that's what I did! I wore shoes and socks EVERY DAY and slippers or thick, woolly socks at night. Then a couple of months ago I start getting these spots on my feet. They weren't painful as such, but they were all between my toes and annoying me. So I FINALLY went back to the doctor about them this week (I'm sure he's sick of the sight of me) and you won't BELIEVE what he told me.

"They are heat blisters. Your feet have been kept too warm."

Excuse me? Can you please repeat that?? First you tell me to keep my feet warm ALL THE TIME, and now you say I've kept them too warm?

And the treatment?
"Don't sweat. Ha ha."

Do I LOOK like I'm laughing buddy?

Posted by Renae at 9:36 AM Comments

I'm such a dork*. No, really. I sometimes look at myself (either in the mirror or in my head) and just think "Gee I'm a dork." I'm one of those people you see at the shopping centre, dragging along her little granny trolley while tying to hold a shopping basket as well, wearing pants that are a little too big, bending down to get the yoghurt, dropping half of the stuff in her basket, and trying to pull her pants up. All while giggling to herself. (Yes. This actually happened to me.)

I'm one of those people who will glam up for an occasion, hoping people will notice how hot I'm looking, but then turn up to dinner the next night in a Muumuu and thongs with my hair sticking out at crazy angles, and not give a crap what anyone thinks. (Yes, I do this regularly.)

I'm one of those people who sings 80s songs out loud, anytime, anywhere and think that everyone is laughing WITH me, not at me. Oh, and I also used to LOVE going shopping with my 2 besties in high school, and start singing along to music that was being played in shops. It used to drive them nuts, which made me want to do it even more! (I was a really annoying teenager.) Of course, I would only do it in the shops I didn't like, and wanted to get out of. (You know who you are! It was all part of my genius plan! Mwah ha ha ha ha.)

There are just too many other examples to speak of. I think one of the things that really enhances and compliments my dorkiness is my clumsiness. Seriously. I'm one of the clumsiest people I know. I was clanging about in the kitchen the other day and I dropped the water bottle twice - once when getting it out of the fridge, and again when putting it back. Hubs didn't even flinch.

So I asked "How come you don't even flinch when I drop or smash stuff?"
His response? "Because it happens all the time. Whenever you're in the kitchen, I hear *crash* "sh*t" at least once or twice." I thought about it and then laughed a lot. It's funny cos it's true! (And I need to stop swearing!!)

So Hubs might be King of the Nerds, but I'm definitely Queen of the Dorks. And a very proud Queen at that.


* the general definition, not the USA definition. I hadn't even HEARD of that being a potential meaning of the word. I had already written this post before looking up the definition, and you know... I don't care!

Posted by Renae at 12:00 PM Comments

I was watching our friend learn how to rollerblade the other day, and I was enjoying watching the learning process. I've tried so many sports in my life, and find it exciting to continue to try new things. Here are a few I've given a go:

Swimming - started young cos I had asthma and was pretty handy at the school swimming carnivals
Gymnastics - started when I was fairly young and learned at the PCYC
Judo - did this at the PCYC as well, with my bro
Ballet - started when I was 4 years old, finished when I was 13. I got to the stage where I actually had to be good to continue!
Tap dancing - Did this for about 4 years as a teenager and LOVED IT!
Jazz dancing - I think I did this for 2 years (as well as tap and ballet) and liked it but wasn't that good
Athletics - at primary school. I was good at sprinting, long jump and high jump. Until puberty hit...
Hockey - played hockey (goal keeper) from 10-years-old til 16, then again when I was 21/22 years old.
Soccer - played in high school and then again when I was 26/27 y/o (in goals again)
Basketball - was on the inter-school team (mandatory sport on a Wednesday)
Netball (indoor) - first played when I was 17/18 or so, then on and off in my 20s
Skiing - first learnt when I was 10 years old, then again for year 11 ski trip. Can't wait to go again some time and try my hand at snow boarding
Indoor hockey - played for a few years in my late teens and again in my 20s I think
Wind surfing and catamaraning - both just for fun with family
Touch footy - Played when I was 23/24 but didn't like it that much, then played down here in Melbourne last year and LOVED IT!
Ultimate disc - played 1 season last year with Hubs and enjoyed it, but the game times weren't that convenient and it's TOO COLD in Melbourne to play sports at night!
Going to the gym - well........
Rollerblading - just for fun
Personal training - did that in my mid 20s with a friend, then just before our wedding with Hubs(we were totally buff!), being trained by one of my bridesmaids who's a personal trainer and who LOVED kicking our butts.

Stuff I've tried once or twice: Tennis, Rebound volleyball, squash, badminton, backyard cricket (more than once or twice, clearly), karate, ju-jitsu, indoor rock climbing, sky diving (once is enough), lawn bowls.

So it kind of looks like I play sport the same way I work, but I did actually participate in a lot of these sports for a long time, so it's totally different. :-) That's all that I can think of at the moment, though, there could very well be more! (And there's probably a really obvious one that I've missed!)

The moral of the story? I'll try anything once!

Posted by Renae at 1:00 PM Comments

Wifey: "whatcha doing?"

Hubs: "Ummmmm.... buying something off ebay?"

Wifey: "Oh? What are you buying?"

Hubs: "Well I could tell you, but then you'd have to kill me."

Nothing further Your Honour.

Posted by Renae at 9:59 AM Comments

I decided I needed a kick-start to my exercise regime (that is, I had no exercise regime and needed one) so I've signed up for a 1 month membership to all the classes at the uni gym. I'm no stranger to joining a gym, but I'm not so familiar with actually going regularly. I've probably joined half a dozen gyms in my life, but the novelty wears off in about the 2nd month and the rest of the year is wasted. I've sometimes gotten some of my money back, but more often than not, it's been money down the drain.

I know that part of the reason that I didn't go regularly was because I was always so busy and I didn't put it as a priority. After the initial surge of motivation, I would put it at around 8th on my list of priorities so it never really got "done". I have quite a bit of time on my hands at the moment, and I wanted to do something for myself and for my health. So this time, instead of committing myself to a whole year, I decided to just go for the month. Kind of a build-up before Christmas. And I went for the classes-only pass as that's what I'm most interested in. Plus it includes use of the pool and I don't mind doing laps from time to time.

So my month started last Thursday and I think I've already gotten my money's worth, going 10 times in 8 days. Most of my muscles are screaming at me on a daily basis, but I'm already noticing an increase in my energy, plus I'm going to sleep easier at night. My dreams are a lot more crazy (as is per usual when I sleep heavier) but it's worth it.

So I'm not saying I'm going to keep up this "10 trips in a week" thing, but I'm certainly going to give it a crack!

Posted by Renae at 1:37 PM Comments

When I look at my feet, I see my Dad. I have his feet. Our feet seriously look SO alike. I'll take a photo some time and show you. It got me thinking about what features I inherited from which parent, or side of the family, and here's what I've come up with, going from the bottom (my feet!) to the top!

Feet - Dad
Calf muscles - my Nanny (Dad's side)
Body shape (short legs, long body) - Dad
Child-bearing hips - Mum :-)
Chin - Mum
Mouth - Mum
Nose - Dad
Eyes - Mum
Hair - Mum
Voice - Mum
Hands and fingers - Dad

And a few other things:
Stubbornness - Dad
Practicality - Mum
Sentimentality - Dad
Organisational skills - Mum
Sexy legs - Mum :-)
Use of hand gestures when telling a story - Dad
Karaoke skills - Mum and her side of the family (R-E-S-P-E-C-T!!)
Squeemishness - Dad (you know it's true!)
My social nature - Mum and Dad

And of course here are some comparison pictures. In case you can't tell, these were taken at our wedding and I LOVE our wedding photos so I like to take every opportunity I can to show them off!

Can you see the resemblance?? Looking at these photos I reckon Mum and I have a similar posture and Dad and I have a similar cheeky grin! I'm sure I could come up with many more things my parents gave me, in appearance, personality, and the values and morals they instilled in me. I think I've turned out all right :-)

(And you know, a photo of Hubs too, at our wedding, which has nothing to do with the post, really. Did I mention I love our wedding photos???)

Posted by Renae at 4:49 PM Comments

We were at our friend's place for dinner a few weeks ago, and Hubs was having a great time playing with their eldest son (who's 3 years old), building fun things out of Duplo. Hubs finished his project and showed me:

I was convinced he had heard us talking but he was adament that he was mearly stating the obvious. Yeah. Real obvious. Who the hell has heard of a ziggurat!!??

Posted by Renae at 2:18 PM Comments

What we've been up to lately:

I've been sewing, making Christmas cards, baking, socialising, trying to find motivation to exercise, working, being a wonderful Wifey (in my opinion!)

Hubs has been studying, putting together a rockin' media pc (guest blog post to come, right Hubs?), tinkering with various projects, being a wonderful Hubsband.

We attended my cousin's wedding a couple weekends ago and had an absolute ball! I'm planning on a separate post about that soon. Life is just kind of cruising along at the moment, but this could be the calm before the storm as Hubs starts exams in 11 days and has a LOT of them. Plus, I have committed myself to a few projects and bits and pieces that aren't pressing yet, but I know how time has a tendency to fly so I need to keep an eye on the calendar. (What do you MEAN Monday is the first day of November???)

We are looking forward to coming up to Brisbane over Christmas, as well as travelling to South Africa early January, celebrating my 20tenth birthday mid-January and attending Hubs' brother's wedding at the end of Jan. Then it's back to business in Melbourne on the 1st of Feb 2010. 2010???? Wha????

So this is just a heads-up to let you know we'll be up in sunny Queensland soon and would love to see as many people as possible. Well, I would love to see as many people as possible - Hubs would be happy with a few small gatherings over a few beers, in between working on his boats (a couple of Hobie cats he's been fibreglassing for a little while.) We'll see how it all pans out.

The weather down here has been just beautiful since Saturday. It's currently 28 degrees and I can't WAIT to finish work and get out amongst it. The weekend is looking gorgeous too, and I'm really hoping this is going to continue, seeing as how it IS currently Spring time. Chances are though, (and I don't mean to tempt fate) it will plummet back down to 10 degrees some time next week. WHAT? It's TRUE!

Watch this space for posts about a duplo "pyramid", a giant cookie, a fairytale wedding, a game of "how much you think I pay?" and, as promised, a guest post from Hubs. It's going to be WILD!

Posted by Renae at 3:56 PM Comments

I've contemplated writing this post for the last year or so, but have never quite gotten around to it. The views expressed in this post are of myself and many people I know. By "we" I refer to many many people in general, but I realise that not everyone feels this way.

Firstly I want to talk about life. New life in fact. Babies, if you will. What is it that "we" find so fascinating about babies? What makes "us" go ga-ga over them? They're everywhere! I see babies almost every day being pushed or carried around by their Mum or Dad (or their nanny in New York!) and every time I see one, I go all gooey inside. Now before you blame my biological clock (tick tock tick tock), I have to point out 2 things:

1. I've ALWAYS been like this
2. I'm not the only one who starts pulling funny faces whenever there's a baby around


4.3 new babies are born every second!! Babies are common. And I don't mean in the chav sense of the word, I just mean they are a dime a dozen, yet every baby is a miracle and something to be in awe of. "We" will never get over the wonder that is the warm bundle of goodness wrapped up in a blanket. *sigh*

And then there's the other end of a life. Death. Again, death is so common. Around 2 people die every second of every day. As my Dad says, "Death is a part of life." People go through stages of grief that are often unbearable. I can't imagine this level of grief, but I know that sooner or later, I'll have to deal with it. I have known people who have died and I have bawled my eyes out at their funeral. I know a lot of these tears have been for their families - a lot of my grief in these instances has been out of empathy for their loved ones left behind. But I also believe in a life after this one, which brings comfort in the midst of the heartache.

I feel I am categorically ill-equipped and unqualified to speak with any level of authority, on such life-changing experiences, even though I have witnessed a birth (the second most amazing thing I've ever experienced. The first being the commitment I made to Hubs on our wedding day) and have grieved over death. It's just one of those things I find fascinating. We are mesmerised by birth and can be broken by death. We are captivated by the face of a newborn, and can be scarred for life by the death of a loved one.

We rejoice in the start of a new life, and I like to think we can rejoice in a celebration of a life that has ended.

Posted by Renae at 1:20 PM Comments

Do they have spines?? Or bones at ALL?? I actually really like the music (and I like potato salad!) but the real fun starts about a minute in! Watch til the end. It's pretty amazing.



 (And yes, this is a cop-out post. I have lots of photos and posts in the slow-cooker, I've just been too lazy I just haven't gotten around to finishing them!!)

Posted by Renae at 9:08 AM Comments

For some people, it's cigarettes (yeuch), for others it's exercise (I wish), or it might be chocolate (guilty!). But my main addiction is being organised. I love it. I get a thrill out of it when everything falls into place and my handy work pays off. I pretty much single-handedly organised our trip to the USA and it was brilliant. Because I'd done all the work before we left, and we were flexible once we got there to change our plans (somewhat) if we wanted to, we had a stress-free travel experience. I can't help it! It's the way I was brought up. (Have you MET my Mum??) Nor do I WANT to help it. (Why on earth would I??) Organising our wedding was like heaven for me...

Hubs, on the other hand, is a fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants kinda guy. And this is certainly one of the things I find endearing about him. He is relaxed and chilled out most of the time and I know this rubs off on me which is a good thing. I also know that we disagree on certain things when it comes to organising or "over-organising" things as he might say. But it's a learning curve.

The weekend that we just had, however, proved that no matter how much you organise something, if you keep leaving your suit and dress for the wedding you're attending behind (first at College and then at Hubs' Mother's place), things aren't going to run so smoothly! Ha ha. Oh, and I haven't even MENTIONED the fact that I left my purse in Melbourne as well. It was a hilarious comedy of errors by someone who is usually on the ball. I think my memory is failing (yes! Already!) so I might have to start writing more lists.

Our weekend was delightful (apart from the forgetfulness) and the wedding we attended was fabulous. But more about that later. It's time for me to get .....

(everybody all together!!!!!)

"ORGANISED!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Posted by Renae at 11:44 AM Comments

Happy-1-year-at-my-job-anniversary-birthday to meeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Yes, it's official. I have held a permanent, full-time job for 1 whole year. Hallelujah! Today marks 1 year at my job here at Newman College, full-time, and I'm pretty excited about this milestone. Well, actually, I only just remembered about it now!

Interesting things about my job:

• I haven't taken a sick day since I started (I've been late in twice with a bad neck though)
• I have had about 7 weeks of holidays (some taken leave without pay)
• I have another 6 weeks off over Christmas
• We have coffee every morning together at 10:30am
• We have morning tea all together (including other non-office staff) every Wednesday and the kitchen provides tasty treats such as toasted bacon and egg sandwiches or scones or biscuits (I'm trying to cut back though!!)
• We celebrate everyone's birthday with an extra morning tea
• We go out to lunch a few times a year all together and enjoy a lovely 3 course meal
• I really like working here. The people, the location, the flexibility and generosity I experience every day reminds me of how blessed I am to have this job.

And I plan to be here until we leave college next June/July, so let the morning teas continue!

Posted by Renae at 4:55 PM Comments

The weather has been so appalling here lately, with cold winds and rain and temperatures barely hitting the mid-teens, that us Queenslanders are finding it difficult to cope. Hubs in particular has NOT been impressed that we are living through winter again.

Having said this, I DO love it when it rains at night when we're all snuggled up in bed and drifting off to sleep. I always find I go to sleep much quicker when it rains. I think this stems from when I was growing up and I was always so paranoid about burglars. There was no good reason for this, other than me being a big scaredy-cat about... well... pretty much everything! But I knew that a burglar wouldn't be so stupid as to rob a house when it's raining, (how did I know this???) so I always slept soundly on those nights. The heavier the rain, the better.

These days it just brings a nice feeling of comfort. A feeling of home, wherever I am.

Posted by Renae at 4:18 PM Comments

I had a flashback the other day about being at pre-school as Christmas approached. We were, as usual, putting on a nativity play, and as the parts were being selected, I was hoping to be Mary. The angels got cast first (Billy Bob's Mum was one of them) and I was selected, but I turned it down. I was hanging out for the big one. Once the angels were all selected, they went on to the animals and "extras". They must have chosen Mary and Joseph next, and I was overlooked. I have no idea how disappointed I was about this, but I can tell you, I was even more disappointed to find out that the only parts left were the 3 wise men. So I got stuck with being a man. I remember this was a little upsetting, but Mum made me feel better somehow and I ended up having a blast. I can't remember what gift I was carrying for Baby Jesus, but I like to think I held the gold...

Posted by Renae at 12:11 PM Comments

Today is not only my Mum's birthday (Happy Birthday Mum!!!) but it's also the 60th Anniversary of when my grandparents landed in Australia. They were refugees from WWII and had a choice to come to either Canada or Australia, and luckily for me, they chose Australia! (Lucky, cos, you know, otherwise I wouldn't exist. So maybe it's lucky for ALL OF YOU!!! Ha!)

Mum and Dad wanted to commemorate this milestone by throwing Nanny and Grandpa a party, and Mum took it upon herself to make the coolest cake EVER!

Mum hired the cake tin from a cake shop and bought the accessories to put this creation together. When she first emailed it to me, I thought it was a picture from a magazine that she wanted to copy, but no! It was the real deal! I showed all the ladies here at work and they went berserk over it as I did!

Mum has made many of our cakes over the years, mainly from the Woman's Day Birthday Cake Book. You know the one. I had the doll cake, the bunny, the monster, the piano (it was purple cos purple is my favourite colour and Mum would do anything for me), the sewing basket, a few numbers (like ONE - 3 cakes spelling it out!), the cricket bat (yes, I had the cricket bat) and a few more I'm sure. This is a bit of a hobby of Mums, but I reckon she could turn professional!

I hope you have a lovely birthday Mum! And I trust the Anniversary celebrations were a blast! :-)

Updated: And here's Nanny and Grandpa enjoying themselves on their special day:

Posted by Renae at 12:38 PM Comments

I love a good P.S. That is, I USED to love a good P.S. but they seem to have become obsolete since email became the favoured form of correspondence. In my younger years, I had many pen-pals and I LOVED writing them letters with pretty paper and glittery pens and funky stickers, almost as much as I loved receiving letters from them. I used to have about 4 or 5 pen-pals all at once, but only a few went the distance. They were all people I had met through primary school or through friends and kept in touch with them by putting pen to paper. I had one in Japan, a couple in the US, one in Gladstone, one in Cairns, and one in PNG.

The girl from Papua New Guinea I met in year 4 and we were pen pals up until I was about 22. We lost contact after that, but on a visit to Australia earlier this year, she popped in to see if my parents were still living at the same address, which they were, and asked after me. Unfortunately I was already living in Melbourne and Dad didn't think to get her number or email address (that's okay Dad. That's a "Mum" thing to do!) so I never did get to catch up with her. I still have all of her letters though, and unlike my crazy scrawl, I always marvelled at her perfectly neat writing that didn't change from start to finish, nor from 9-year-old to 22-year-old.

I used to experiment with different writing styles too - at one stage I was dotting all my "i"s with circles, or giving "g"s and "y"s straight tails. I went through a big loopy letter-writing phase, but mostly you could tell it was my writing because I started off with neat and normal-sized words and finished with a big, uneven mess!

But that's not what I'm here to talk about! While writing my letters to various pen pals all around Australia and all around the world, usually 3 or 4 pages long, I would start thinking about what to write in my P.S. Not that I HAD to include a P.S. but I always did love to.

A typical ending to a letter may have looked like this: (pretend it's almost legible:)

P.S. I miss you! I really wish we could just hang out!
P.P.S. Say hi to your family for me!
P.P.P.S. My family says hi too!

After the 3 Ps it would just get silly. But don't think for a second I didn't get silly!! Ha ha.

I guess the main reason for writing a P.S. is that you want to include something that you had left out of the letter, and it would be too messy to try and write it in the body, so you add it at the end, hence the name Post Script. Now, call me crazy, but if you're typing a business email, and you'd forgotten to put something in the email, wouldn't you just go back and add it? Is there an etiquette for this? Am I missing something?

I think in personal emails, it's nice to put a P.S. I miss you or P.S. I love you, but not such a great idea, in a business email, to put something like P.S. Please reply to this email to acknowledge receipt of information. Shouldn't that be in the body?

I just think it's weird.

P.S. I miss you!

Posted by Renae at 9:15 AM Comments

A few weeks ago, our friend Ian came down for a visit. He's been threatening to come down for a year and phoned us on a Wednesday to tell us he'd be here Friday night til Sunday! So we booked him in for Saturday afternoon and evening and looked forward to it with great anticipation.

About a year ago, Hubs and I went on a winery tour with our friend Nate, and one of the bottles we bought was a Verdhelo from Sticks Winery. We had been saving it for Ian's visit as we knew that was one of his favourite varieties of wine so of course, we had to buy some cheese and bikkies to go with it!

We headed out to Hardware Lane, as Ian is our jazz buddy and there's live jazz at Hardware Lane most nights. There are also LOTS of restaurants and way too many spruikers. Business is obviously slow EVERYWHERE as we were offered free bottles of wine, Cosmopolitans, beers and bourbon to try and convince us to dine at a number of places. We opted for a place called Pop.

It had no Pop.

The free bottle of wine was actually really nice, and about $40 on the menu, but we were right in the middle of the 2 groups playing jazz so we couldn't really hear either of them which was disappointing. The food and service weren't really up to scratch so we decided to look for somewhere else for dessert.

We went down to Block Place which is a neat little lane way in between the Collins Streets (little and big) and went to Caffe e Biscotti for a night cap. Hubs wanted "something different" to drink so the bartender took full advantage and made him a Frangelico, Kahlua and lime. I won't disclose the cost, but it was a delicious drink! Ian had a liquer coffee with Cointreau and I had a port.


The drinks really were lovely but not something we could afford regularly!! We also ordered a stack of pancakes to share which were delicious, but the best thing about this place was the little jazz band outside! They were great and really added to the atmosphere of the place. The service was good and it's somewhere I'd like to go back to try the meals. But definitely only for a special occasion.

A great night out in Melbourne!

Posted by Renae at 10:02 AM Comments

Hubs and I try to have a designated "date night" every week or 2 and it usually occurs on a Wednesday night. A few weeks ago, life was hectic and the only day we could do was the Tuesday, so we put it aside. Hubs planned to cook up his famous pumpkin and mushroom rissoto, so before he got home from uni, I got a few things ready for him. I had frozen some leftover stock from the last time we'd made rissoto, so that was all thawed out and ready to go. I chopped up all the mushrooms and put them in the steamer part of our saucepan set to rinse before setting them aside. Then I chopped up the pumpkin and got the rice out ready for Hubs to come home and make some magic.

So Hubs comes home, tired after a long day of studying and slowly gets to work. First of all, he grabs the "saucepan" of mushrooms, puts it on the bench and proceeds to pour the defrosted stock "into" the saucepan, all in one go, before I realise what he's doing. You can guess what happened to the stock....

Chicken stock - 1
Hubs - 0

Somehow this was my fault for putting the mushrooms in a saucepan with holes in the bottom and not telling him. I wasn't so convinced and started to get a bit cranky, but tried to see the funny side.

Not a happy Hubs. So I helped him clean that up while he continued preparing. Now it was time for the rice. As we had some leftover, again, from the last rissoto he'd made, I had rolled up the packet and put it in a re-sealable glad bag, but as he went to take it out, he grabbed the "wrong" end.

And you can guess what happened to the rice...


Rice - 1
Hubs - 0

It went all over the counter, on the floor, beside the oven, EVERYWHERE! And that was my fault too. I was laughing quite hard at this stage, but Hubs wasn't ready to see the funny side, so I decided it would be best to leave him to it and go and read my new favourite comic book.

We had a couple of glasses of wine over dinner and a DVD and started to relax a little and try not to take it all too seriously. Dinner was absolutely delicious and looking at these photos now (and having the sense to take them at the time) I can't help but laugh. A lot. It really was a hilarious date night, and we have learnt that Tuesday nights are NO GOOD for date nights any more, and we should stick to Wednesdays from now on!

Maybe I should have learnt from last time, although, this might be another one of his ploys to do things "enthusiastically and badly" in the hope of not being asked to do it again!!

Posted by Renae at 1:25 PM Comments

Posted by Renae at 4:21 PM Comments

NOTE: If you haven't watched the movie SERENITY, and you don't want to know the ending, this post isn't for you.

As previously mentioned, Hubs and I have been watching Firefly and we finished the last episode on Tuesday night. It was a bit darker than previous episodes, and not one of my favourites, but it got me excited about watching the movie Serenity. We were going to have a movie night Friday night, but last night rolled around and it was lovely and warm and we had nothing planned so we decided to watch it then. Serenity is considered as somewhat of a sequel to the TV series and it had all the same characters that we had grown to love, so I was super excited.

The movie was also pretty dark and a bit scary (I had to close my eyes at times) but it was a pretty cool story line and was fun to watch. Actually, it was just like watching a double episode of Firefly! It was all going along nicely - I was nervous and the suspense was great! And then it happened. Wash got harpooned by Reavers and they left him on the ship cos "he was dead". And I was like "naaaaaaaaah. There's no WAY they would kill off Wash after they'd already killed off Shepherd and Mr Universe. No WAY."

Yes way. I was gutted. Devastated. I cried. Like, SERIOUSLY cried. Why would they do that? If there are any fans out there (I know there are), TELL ME WHY THEY WOULD DO THAT!!!!!????? Hasn't Zoe been through enough in her life??? Even if they DID think it was a good idea to kill him off, they needed to get Zoe to completely lose her nut. They needed her to break down and cry and not be able to focus cos she's just lost the love of her life. Instead, she continues in her usual no-nonsense manner and kicks some Reavers butt.

I was not happy. I'm STILL not happy about it.

I need answers people!!

Posted by Renae at 2:42 PM Comments

No, I'm not telling him to chill out. I'm talking about chilblains. (I looked up the Wiki article link, but it had a gross picture on it. Now, how many of you are going to look it up?...) I was talking to a friend down here a few months ago and she was telling us that she gets chilblains and she explained what they were. It's where your extremities - usually fingers and toes - are sensitive to the cold and blood vessels get inflamed and cause numbness, itchiness and pain.  For the few weeks before that, I had a really sore toe (the one next to the big toe) and it was really sensitive to touch, and sure enough, that's what it was. My doctor said that it could take up to 6 months to get better, but it might also get worse, and sure enough, the next toe down is sore now.

It's HORRIBLE!!

I thought it might get better after a month in the US summer, but they've gotten worse since being back home. Stupid cold Melbourne weather.

Now my toe can't go to the market...

Posted by Renae at 9:25 AM Comments

Even though we didn't stay in all of these states, we did cross the borders (and got photos of most!)

Posted by Renae at 9:09 AM Comments

Friday 24th July, 2009 until Sunday 26th July, 2009

San Diego to Los Angeles by train - 120 miles
Los Angeles to Brisbane by plane - 7183 miles

I LOVE the lines in this song that say
Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes
I'm afraid it's time for goodbye again

I remember feeling this way when I was travelling around the UK and Europe. I was constantly meeting people, only to have to say goodbye indefinitely. That's how I felt about America. I loved it SO MUCH and I really would have loved another month over there (or 2 or 3) but I know we'll get back there some day.

Anyway, back to our last day! The adventures aren't finished yet!

Charlene took us down to the "drug store" as we had decided to buy our duty free booze there. We got a 1.75L bottle of Bombay Sapphire Gin for $30USD!!! BARGAIN!!! And we got 750ml bottles of Bacardi, Lemon Smirnoff and Raspberry Smirnoff for $10USD each. Crazy! We headed back for some brekky and a final pack to fit in the booze, and a final weigh-in. 1 bag was 50lb (22.6kg) and the other was 60lb (27.2kg) so we were luckily under the 30kg each weight limit.

Charlene was keen to show us around a bit in the morning and we were lucky enough to be able to push our train trip back to 3pm instead of 1pm. This was great as it meant we didn't have to wait around at the other end (LA) and amuse ourselve. Charlene took us to the Cabrillo National Monument lookout and there was a beautiful view of the bay, the ocean, and the city.

There is a US Navy port as well as a Marine Corps in San Diego, so it is a very military city. And we were in for a real treat, seeing:

Posted by Renae at 8:10 AM Comments