Touchy feely types like me are suckers for a bit of one-on-one hugging action. Hell, I'll hug anyone given half a chance. Sometimes I'll go to hug a doctor, or my boss in work, just remembering in time that it's not really appropriate. Like when you put kisses on the end of texts to your plumber and press send before realising that it might be a little weird. Anyway, back to hugging, us human beings thrive on physical contact and the act of reaching out and enveloping someone in our arms, holding onto them closely for just a few moments is a beautiful and basic urge. You open your arms out wide and it's like saying, 'come here, let's cling on to each other manically for 3 seconds', a little weird when you think about it but also really, really lovely. Where would we be without someone to hug? 

I read this interesting study by psychologist Dr Emese Nagy who says that life is broken down by us into 'three second units of life', so that's how we experience the 'now', as a 3 second chunk. A hug, she suggests, is a way of sharing that 3 second chunk with another human being. I think that's beautiful, that we want to share a chunk of reality, of perception with someone else. I hug Edie all the time, I hug Lola lots too, even my husband gets lucky with a sneaky one several times a day. HUGS make the world a better place, that's for sure. Yay for hugs! Hug someone now, NOW! Go do it!
X

We're currently homeless! Well, we're living with my mum and dad whilst our new home is sorted. SO EXCITED! I love my little home-to-be. It's been complete chaos for the past two weeks and my poor old newly-operated-on bones have taken a bit of a battering. But it's all worth it. Bye-bye old house, we had fun but now it's time for pastures new. 
I had a birthday somewhere in-between beginning to pack and moving and was spoilt with lots of lush gifts that I had every intention of telling you guys about. My i-phone was my favourite. I'm gonna love taking pics and making little movies with it, can't wait to share them with you!

pose-y one of me...

not pose-y one of me and Edie!

We've got a busy couple of days ahead with parties galore so I'll be clicking (tapping?) away merrily. Have a BEAUTIFUL weekend!
X

Do something different

image found here

 These last few days I've been getting out and about again after my op. I've had fun. We went to the museum and when we got there we realised that it was the opening of the brand, sparkling new modern art wing. How lucky is that? Edie made a kick-ass paper hat (which she proudly wore for hours) 

and I sat in front of a Howard Hodgekin and fell in love with his work all over again. 

 We ate lemon and poppy-seed cake and drank hot chocolate in the museum cafe. Then we decided to drive to the beach for a walk along the pier and when we got there it was Carnival Day. How lucky is that? 

Edie bounced on a bouncy castle. We ate chips with lots of salt and vinegar and red sauce and watched the boats and the seagulls. There was a band playing. We held hands and laughed and the sun was warm on our faces. 

Some days fun comes so easily. Without even trying to catch it it just slips in and carries you away. You get in the flow. I think doing something different, going somewhere different increases your odds of having one of those days. Even in your own neighborhood. Be open to new experiences, new places, new people, no, make that seek out new experiences, new places, new people. Open your eyes, join a class, walk a different way to work, make a den in your living room and picnic in it, take your camera and your notebook to the park and fill it with nonsense, see a film at eleven in the morning, go visit a local tourist attraction you've never visited, go horse riding or surfing or take a meditation class, get out of your rut. And if you already do all of those things then do something else. Just now and again. Just to keep things fresh. Maybe whatever is least likely for you to do would be a good place to start.

 Tomorrow there's something you could do that'd open your eyes up and make you feel alive and aware and present. It's so easy to slip into a routine. We know what we like. Or at least we think we do. It was easy for me to do something different because I've been stuck indoors a lot recently so everything I do seems new and fun. But now I'll try to seek out new things to do, go and see. Because it's fun. 
XXX

The 3 A's of Awesome

Lots of you have no doubt watched this already but if you haven't then you gotta check it out. Neil Pasricha of 1000awesomethings.com tells us about Attitude, Awareness and Authenticity. Great stuff and such a sweet guy.
XXX 

Dark and delicious- Orla Kiely A/W11

Dark and Hitchcock-esque I love this Orla Kiely promo by Mercedes Helnwein. My favourite is the polka dot dress shown at the beginning, which is ironic after what I said about polka dots in my last post. I'm fickle.
AnnaXXX

A sunday visit to our nearly new house!

 It's been a gorgeous day, the sun hung out with us all day long. We went to measure up some rooms in the house that we're in the process of buying and I just didn't want to leave.

 I have sooo many plans for our *new house (the one that's not quite ours yet). I'm bursting with excitement to get in there and get going. Being content with where I am today… yes I can do that, but striving for great stuff in the future is what propels us humans into great things. I have energy that needs direction, I want to be choosing tiles, pondering over paint, blowing the budget on a rug that makes me orgasmic (god, I'm getting old, when did I ever think that a rug would make me orgasmic? Maybe tone that one down to plain old 'happy'.) We're doing it right this time, we learnt so many lessons on our first house, so this time there'll be no compromising, even when we're on a tight budget, if we can't have it the way we love then we'll wait till we find a way to make it happen. If it all goes to plan I'll be over the moon. We'll miss our first house though. So many good memories to take with us.

And it was lovely to have my outfit for today hanging ready this morning. And I'll have the same luxury awaiting me tomorrow! Stripes have a BIG presence in my wardrobe by the way. Polka dots are on trend for A/W 2011/12 but they'll never usurp my stripes, no way. 

XXX

Wake up

 I'm not a jump-out-of-bed-and-hit-the-day-running kind of girl. I'm an ignore-what-time-it-is-for-as-long-as-possible-until-I-have-to-heave-myself-out-of-bed-and-stagger-to-the-bathroom-with-bird's-nest-hair kind of girl. Thus, the first part of my day is spent in a kind of bewildered fog of lingering sleepiness. Obviously there's an upside to this which means I'm a wild party animal who's up raising hell all night (lie) but I sometimes like to imagine there's a cure for my allergy to mornings, maybe a routine of sorts to kick start my body and my brain.

The 10 o'clock rule

 This one isn't actually a morning routine, it's an evening routine. Basically you stop what ever you're doing at 10pm and get your shit together and laid out in anticipation of you dragging your ass out of bed at stupid o' clock the next day. Now, it's just coming up to 10pm right now and I'm watching Black Swan (freaky) and writing this at the same time, the rule is to stop whatever you're doing and sort out your breakfast, your clothes, your bag etc for tomorrow. Now, that just aint gonna happen, I want to to watch the film plus it would majorly annoy my husband - it clearly needs some tweaking.

 Which is why I sorted out a whole week's worth of outfits today when I had a spare twenty minutes. Here's a snippet of tomorrow's get-up all good to go and hanging smuggly on my dressing room door.

I like knowing that I have my week's clothes sorted. Of course, if there's a snow-storm or I get a last minute invite to a cocktail party I'll be all at sixes and sevens, but still. I'll try and post each evening with a pic of the next day's outfit. THIS IS GONNA REVOLUTIONISE MY MORNINGS! No more hunting for clean underwear and rooting through the laundry bin for yesterday's jeans! Well, for a week anyway.
XXX 

Hearts, hugs and rumpy pumpy, today is my (our) wedding anniversary! Thanks to my mum for the tip-off, I nearly forgot. I thank my lucky stars I met my man, he and I are so good together (well, I wouldn't have married him otherwise would I?) and he makes me HAPPY. Kisses to him. We like to mark our anniversary by buying something beautiful for our home. We're a little unorganised this year and have no idea what to buy, any ideas? Nothing too pricey, maybe something from etsy or a designer or artist you love? Well, we're off to watch a film and make out. Catch you later.
XXX