the amphitheatre neighbourhood

I'm lucky to be able to see my home through fresh eyes; I still have my tourist glasses on. The harsh light; too full of contrasts, making everything look too dark, then too white. There's a hodge podge of buildings along the waterfront, all angular, all different styles, different materials, nothing much to unify the skyline. The space. The big gaps between people on the street. The casual dress, as if everyone's just thrown anything on to buy milk from a corner store. Here, even our bars have outdoor sports, volleyball, tetherball, ping pong. People can't sit still. And the wind. My god, the wind. A friend of ours called it "limiting". Sometimes, I want to scream into it. It's a love/hate thing, this being home. 

changing your spots

Sometimes twentysevennames gets a bit twee for me. 

There's something ridiculous about walking into a serious meeting full of old men in suits, trying to look like you know what you're doing and that people should listen to your advice, when you're wearing a dress with cats or strawberries or apples, hearts and stars with boot-wearing legs.

This animal print top was a great mix of "grown woman" with a pinch of a ruffled hem that shouts, PSYCH! I'm still a CHILD.  

doggy in a domino scarf

Hey, this silk scarf from Country Road is on sale and you should think about buying it. I did. And now, I'm always late to social engagements because I'm too busy taking selfies of me wearing it. 

LIES. 

I don't have any social engagements unless you count staying home in my socks, with my dog, reading $3.75 Kindle romance novels (try this one, yo!) a SOCIAL. ENGAGEMENT. Which I totally do.

OH! And it's winter here in the Southern Hemisphere. This scarf is silk. Which means it's not warm. It's more....fancy scarf-tying techniques and pretending you're Audrey Hepburn out for a strong espresso on a lovely spring-time morning in Rome. Okay? If you want warm, check out this bobbly scarf on sale from Kate Sylvester. Fancy! Can someone please buy it and mail it to me? Thank you!

Chester Le Pew

your momma's jeans

Hey, so my friend and I brunched at Loretta's. I had green eggs and bacon, a rhubarb and rose soda, chocolate lava cookies, and a flat white (stahhpp!). She had some vegan smoothie thing and some sandwich bite thing with broccoli, feta, pumpkin, and sunflower seeds, and a banana cake with blueberry cream cheese icing. My friend was warned that the sandwich bite was small which I liked because there's nothing more annoying than going to a restaurant, really hungry, and accidentally landing yourself with the dreaded big plate + small stacked food in the centre combo. That -ish makes me hangry.  

Loretta's was pretty basic. Don't get me wrong - it was delish. It carried on Floridita's signature of classic foods done with quality ingredients presented in a no-fuss way. The interior was also right on-trend if you think Scandi-modern, handmade ceramics, and artfully stacked gourds on a windowsill is on-trend. Which I do. I love that stuff. 

But the trouble is my friend and I like to think we're bosses. And basic doesn't usually mix well with bosses. You know what I'm saying? Probably not. Don't worry. Read this. Anyway, we managed to get around this issue by eating double what people were eating, cackling really loudly in the corner and talking about really nasty, yuck stuff that people shouldn't normally talk about when they're eating. If you like the sound of that, you should come join us for brunch.

where everyone knows your name

A couple of years ago, this restaurant opened up in the city and I took my family there for my brother's birthday. Now, my mother's there almost every week and when she walks in, the manager gives her vouchers and free plates of chorizo. Imagine that! Imagine spending so much money at a place that when you walk in, they give you money! Crazy times.

I recommend Ombra deeply and sincerely. I used to think tapas was a joke 'cause I thought it was a secret society intent on forcing me to eat small portions infrequently. I take it all back. Go for dinner. Go for lunch. Order the polenta chips and the serving of meatballs and leave room for the chocolate salame.

But don't go for breakfast because Wellington is one of the brunch capitals of the world (fact) and if you wanted to eat a continental breakfast, you'd stay at home or GO TO EUROPE where no one knows how to do brunch. Okay?

Campari. Glorious campari. And Edison bulbs everywhere.

My mother asked the manager for ten of these empty bottles for her flowers. They got it for her. 'Cause they're great.

This hot chocolate was more bitter and rich than sweet and rich. I know which one I'd prefer. In a hot chocolate and in a person!

My brother just had this chocolate croissant 'cause an hour later he was having all-you-can-eat firecracker chicken

Full disclosure - I live a blink away from two NZ designer stores. One of them is literally my downstairs neighbour. Also, I have a classic champagne-taste-on-a-Spumante-budget. Sound familiar?

So sometimes, I find myself in these stores, on the way home from work or from walking the dog, and suddenly, I'm in the changing room on my banking app transferring money from my runaway fund into my checking and thinking This is an illness. It's really not. Unless poor self-discipline and money management are illnesses.

A bracelet that tells you to run when you know you can't. Depressing much?

I like to wear the bracelet to remind myself that I'm about to turn thirty and therefore RUN is exactly what I want to do but also the very thing I can't do. Physically due to fitness but also metaphorically as in I want to RUN from work and responsibilities and paying a mortgage and walking my dog every day and unloading the dishes BUT guys, I can't. 'Cause I'm allegedly an adult. So the bracelet helps with this quandary. You can get one too from Karen Walker.

The dress? I just like the dress 'cause I like Zoey Deschanel and I like Orla Kiely and it reminds me of both and it's pretty. Damn you, Kate Sylvester!

My dog has no idea what's coming to get him.

hashtag talk in a lurid pink jersey

Got told off for running in an art gallery today. Nearly thirty. Still being an idiot in public. I feel like talking in hashtags so here it is: #poorimpulsecontrol.

That's the long weekend done and over with, people. Hope you're having a lovely start to the week wherever you are.

And for pete's sakes - don't run in the art gallery. Walk. Slowly. Like a lady.

Thanks City Gallery!

The most colourful person in the room. As per usual.

This was a dark room with this CRT tv playing a black and white subtitled documentary about African tribal masks.

Hey, can we talk about fash-yon for a sec? I bought this Mean-Girls pink waffly jersey from Asos on Soph's lukewarm recommendation ("okay quality, a bit scratchy. Mainly bought it for the colour"). I gotta say, it fits my winter jumper requirements perfectly. Roomy, slouchy, suitably 90s. 

However, it's so sneakily normcore that I had to dial it back up a notch and pair it with this bewildering piece of hardware from Glassons around my neck. My husband laughed when he saw me wearing it. But that's okay 'cause that sometimes happens. I was really attracted to it because it felt like a necklace that couldn't make up it's mind about what it was (am I Aztec? Or punk? Or sort of teen witchy Pagan?) so it decided to be everything all at once! I like that approach to life. 

Most of all, I felt like this was what my Vault Dweller character would wear after she'd spent some time in the Wasteland running with the raiders in Fallout 3. I know that game was, like, six years ago, but I still love it. Right? Right? Right.          

Looking sheepishly into the distance.

other people's dogs

I always thought I'd end up with a cat (independent, suitably snarky, loves dairy). Yet, here I am with a black and white ball of fluff named Chester (or depending on mood - Chesty, Fluffball, the Molester, or Fatso). 

The first three months was TERRIBLE. The poor kid was barely 4 months, he didn't trust us, we didn't trust him, he didn't know what to expect, and neither did we. 

There was poo and piss everywhere except where it was supposed to be, the barking was so loud when you left him in a room by himself that your ears were ringing and you understood why, in comics, dads threw slippers at dogs. The classic activity of "walking the dog" wasn't the peaceful, happy idyll I'd imagined, but a battle of wills between me, the dog, the leash, and terror whenever realised I was outside without a plastic bag.

So every single day, he came close to being dropped off at the SPCA or being foisted onto a friend. Only our pride kept him with us. Raising a puppy would not break us. We were two intelligent people. This dog would not beat us. We would raise him and raise him well, or else...

My friend with a thirteen year old dog she'd raised from when she was barely out of university was reassuring. "Once they're trained, a dog is easy," she said. 

And I'm happy to confirm, she's right. Just like with anything worth having in your life, hard work resulted in a totally awesome seven-month old puppy who can high-five, sit, settle, come, shake, beg, up, down and everything in between. 

You know, falling in love is like owning a dog.... 

{Photos by Rob and yours truly} {Jersey from S'wonderful, Jacket from Kate Sylvester, Scarf is secondhand from Recycle Boutique} {Acacia branches & blooms, early cheers, and wild onion pilfered from the banks of the Upper Hutt river}

saves me

I figured out the trick to saving. Without a goal, stashing your money is nonsensical. The concept alone is about a long look forward into the future. Not knowing what looms in your horizon or even bothering to look means not caring very much about getting there at all. 

I was doing so well. But one look at this twentysevennames dress and I was lost. It took five minutes to say, Yes. A round trip of ten minutes to jog back to my apartment to fetch my credit card and to jog back to the store. Slightly puffing, I waved my magic plastic around and it was mine. Knowing the trick to saving is plenty different from actually doing it successfully. 

{dress by twentysevennames, shoes by mi piaci, clutch from glassons }

{ for summer, we're at the wellington waterfront }

oh so quiet

I was talking with someone this week about the importance of having hobbies; something to do outside of work, family and friends; something all to yourself. His mother painted every day. This was a lifeline for her, particularly as she got older and her life became more and more contained. Contained? I asked for more explanation. Her friends were dying off one by one, she'd been a widow for a few years, her mobility was limited, and her hearing was deteriorating. Putting a brush to a canvas every day kept her sane, reminded her of life's pleasures, chased loneliness away, and made her forget the limits of her physical self.

I have this image of a woman in my head, outlined against the milky white light coming from a window. She's painting a watercolour. Her hand trembles slightly as she dabs her brush against the paper. Her skin is stretched so thin over her knuckles and bones. The colours on the page bleed and blotch. There's only her, the room, and the dab of a brush against paper. That sound alone fights off the silence. 

~ Pictures by Rob and me on digital and 35mm film ~

shrieking spring

My darling girl, when are you going to realise that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage.

Alice Hoffman

 ♥ Pictures by Rob D and me on 35mm and 120mm film ♥ Zara top, Dotti skirt, She's A Lady shoes, Glassons clutch, Amethyst bracelet from Dubrovnik ♥

delayed gratification

I read once that some writers only have one novel in them; Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. Perhaps its nothing more than opportunity. Margaret Mitchell might have written and published more than Gone with the Wind if she hadn't been killed crossing a road when she was 48. I was a bit afraid that at 36 Zadie Smith had stopped at three. So this year I was relieved to find out NW would be released.

I don't read more than a handful of pages every couple of weeks. I know that once finished, it'll be a long time before I get another chance to luxuriate in a Zadie Smith novel. This is one of the very few times where I'm happy to delay gratification. 

You know what I like about her books? She writes like a true observer. Her writing is a product of someone who is in but also out. She's that chameleon girlfriend of yours who gets invited to all the parties by all types of people. She blends seamlessly but is still interesting; well-read, of course and up on current events and pop culture. She never dominates conversations but instead she has a knack for listening and listening hard; for seeing and seeing everything that you can't and don't want to. 

♥  Photos by Rob D on 35mm film ♥  Dress from Valley Girl ♥ 

♥  Photos by Rob D on 35mm and 120mm film  ♥ Dress from Sylvester ♥  Cardigan from Glassons ♥  Ring from Karen Walker Jewellery ♥