This month I...



...went a little bit mad over indoor plants. They're my favourite. Today I bought a string of pearls plant which I've been wanting forever!.



I sent out some zine orders and got a bit fancy with the lettering (the top one may have taken me several days to complete).


I finished my major work for my degree! Hooray! It is currently being exhibited at the Academy Gallery at my uni at the moment until the 7th of December and I'll have to take some better photos of it to do a post about it soon. I got my results back yesterday and am pleasantly surprised with how things turned out.


In the few weeks before submission I was doing 12 hour painting days and basically drove myself insane. This is Atticus saying to me "Are you alright? How about you stop painting for a while and eat/sleep/shower?".


I spotted this write-up in the local newspaper about the show, which mentions my work. I went to the grad show opening at the gallery last week and it was lovely to see all of the fruits of everybody's labours on show, such a diverse, wonderful range. There was a presentation ceremony and some awards (which I didn't even know they gave out) and I was lucky enough to snap up the Tasmanian Contemporary Art award and a $500 cheque. It was a very unexpected and a lovely surprise. I'm going to spend it renovating my studio. I'd love to do a small exhibition next year sometime.


I drew some chickens just for fun.


Theo and C spent the first part of the month in NSW visiting family and I went a bit stir crazy without them. C sent me LOTS of photos of Theo daily which helped.


My garden exploded with flowers (including these lovely irises which basically popped up over night).


On the day that C and Theo were returning home, I was running around the house frantically tidying and there was a knock at the door and this fantastic bouquet arrived from my lovely online friend Sophie who lives in WA. The note that accompanied them congratulated me on finishing my degree and I was so overwhelmed I had a little cry, sitting at my kitchen table (a happy cry). Such a ridiculously lovely gesture! And those proteas are just the most fantastic flowers I've ever seen. It was a lovely moment to finish my uni year on.


My boys returned home! I got stuck in traffic on the way to the airport and missed the plane landing, so the boys were waiting in the pick-up bay when I arrived. I was walking up the footpath toward them and Theo saw me and we walked to each other with arms outstretched and had the biggest hug in the world.

And now to overwhelm you with photos of my child...


We've been going to the park around the corner from our house most evenings after dinner to let Theo have a play before bed. We kick around a ball together and run around and often our two boy cats join us in the park which I love (you can see Tintin faintly in the above picture).


As it has been getting warmer around these parts we've been making a lot of icy poles and devouring them. They're Theo's current favourite thing.


This photo was taken when we went on a drive to Deloraine last week. Theo is looking especially cheeky because he has his eyes on a fountain he's interested in playing in (and that he later tried to jump into).


Sometimes we put Theo in the vintage dresses that I collect. I think he enjoys it.


Theo likes to walk everywhere now. It is so nice to let him walk with us rather than always strapping him into the pram. Today we went on a walk to Bunnings to ogle building and gardening supplies (for renovating my studio and starting a veggie garden). Theo likes to collect rocks to put down his overalls on the walks.

Listening | Serial, Ben Folds Five on vinyl and The Soviet Tape (jazzy Latvian pop rock spliced with Anti-Russian CIA documentary vocals - my favourite thing right now).
Reading | Uppercase magazine and Not That Kind Of Girl by Lena Dunham. I preordered a copy a few months before it was released but my copy didn't arrive for ages. I'm enjoying reading it little by little when I have a chance. She is very relatable and unrelentingly honest, which I appreciate.
Watching | Sherlock.
Making | Lots of different things for my new course, which I'm really enjoying.
Purchasing | A light pad, Ben Folds Five's debut album on vinyl (I saw it in my local record shop and couldn't resist), a whole bunch of goodies from my friend Holly's garage sale, a whole bunch of goodies from my friend Isis' garage sale, vintage baby dresses and a Fujifilm X-M1 (which I'll be reimbursed for by the company I'm doing my new course through, so good!).
Coveting | A new tube of Ruby Woo by Mac lipstick. It's the only lipstick I buy and I wear it everyday, so I use a lot of it!
Looking forward to | Taking Theo swimming over the Summer, doing one last Summer school uni subject in January, working on two zines over the Summer (one cat themed and one supermarket themed), my step sister coming to stay and going to see Ben Folds with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.

How's your month been?

+ when your garden has such nice flowers in it that you don't feel like you want to steal flowers from other people's gardens
+ a cat that is as committed to having a whole morning sleep-in as you are
+ blackwing pencils
+ people who let you in in traffic
+ old typographic signage
+ dancing toddlers
+ nail polish that stays unchipped for more than a day
+ interesting customers at work that make me feel like having unadulterated access to strangers is the best job ever
+ storage solutions
+ when your lipstick stills looks good at the end of the day
+ winning an award (especially when that award comes with a $500 cheque).
+ good advice
+ parking meters that still have an hour left in them when you arrive (conversely, i got my first parking ticket today, bummer!)
+ toblerone
+ gardening workouts
+ washi tape
+ putting together a care package for a friend who needs some tlc
+ vintage brooches
+ optimism
+ pesto

On Sundays I like to walk down to the Esk Market with Theo while C sleeps in (I sleep in most other days). There is a stall there run by an older woman who collects dolls and she always has lots of vintage baby dresses for $3 each (which I suppose she dressed her dolls in), so I grab them by the bundle for my collection. I really hope I do have a girl baby one day to wear all of these dresses! Sometimes when I bring them home, I put one on Theo and watch him swish around in it - he loves it!


I found this sweet old pink radio at the aforementioned markets a few weeks ago. Unfortunately it had been dropped at some point and has a crack in it and doesn't turn on anymore, so is purely ornamental. I also picked up the cute tiny little metal tins at an opshop recently and thought they'd be perfect for housing tiny succulents.



We took a drive to Deloraine last week and visited our favourite antique store, Sunny's. They had around a hundred of these maps of Tasmanian regions, which I thought were quite beautiful. I picked up four of them. I am resisting the urge to cut them up and use them in collages.


A sweet little pink pinny from the markets.


We always walked past this framed image at the markets and C would joke that it was he and I, so one day I decided to buy it and now it sits above his desk, ha.



I found this little floral travel diary at the markets recently and thought it was so sweet. The information at the beginning made me smile. Deck sports!





FOUR pink dresses!


I don't know what it is about these, but I seem to be starting another collection.


A sweet little vase from the opshop (with roses and gardenias from my garden).


C bought this lovely old map of Tasmania from Sunny's last week too.



Two sweet little floral numbers.


A hand illustrated guide to indoor gardening. How dreamy!


A sweet little cherry dress.


And finally, one solitary boy's vintage outfit.

What have you been thrifting lately?

My first assignment for my new course was just to go for an 'awareness walk' around my town and take photos of my observations. I do this all the time, so I thought it would be easy, but I walked around for about an hour without having taken a single photo. I really love the suburb I live in. I grew up in the middle of the bush, so I never thought that I would love living in houses side by side, but I do. I have the loveliest neighbours and there is a big park called Heritage Forest five minutes from my house that has a playground, outdoor gym equipment, trails, a picnic area and a dog park. It's a five minute bike ride into the city, 4 minutes to uni and 10 minutes ride to my work. The houses here are mostly lovely old federation cottages with sweet little gardens. People seem to care about living here and take care of their homes and gardens and say hello when you walk by.

I was hoping I'd get to photograph some of the (seemingly hundreds) of cats that live in Invermay sunbathing, but they mustn't have been feeling photogenic today. C has a hashtag on Instagram he uses to document all of the neighbourhood cats #catsofinvermay. Anyway, here are some photos I took on my walk.



I was taking photos of the bees in the lavender bush outside someone's house and they pulled up outside in their car and gave me an odd look and I was like "Uh, I'm just taking photos of the bees" and they were like "Mhmmm".




There are also two really great opshops a minutes walk from my house. A big plus.










I'd love to see some photos of your neighbourhood if you feel like doing an awareness walk too. Link me!