Saturday 27 April 2013

Real Estate Agent Photos

I never posted these shots of our house that the real estate agency took. They are fantastic and we really liked the write up they did. If you are in the Sydney Eastern Suburbs and looking for an agent to sell your place we highly recommend Belle Real Estate Potts Point!








xx Tess

Sunday 21 April 2013

Holiday time!

I apologize for the lack of posts and chit chat but we are in holiday mode and loving it!

Hubby is a surf boat rower and over the last three days he competed in the Surf Life Saving Australia National Titles up here on the Gold Coast. He and his crew did incredibly well making the final (beating more than 120 crews for a place) and came in 6th. I am one proud wifey at the moment!

This afternoon he is off with his club mates and crew mates celebrating. Me, I am kicking back, reading some blogs listening to the waves and looking out at this pretty gorgeous view...

Sunday 14 April 2013

Pottery Barn, PBK, West Elm & Williams-Sonoma coming to Bondi Junction in MAY!

Dear Australia, we have been missing out.

Big time. 

Our state-side friends have had homewares giant Pottery Barn all to themselves for years. Years I tell you!

Not for long! Come May the home design, food, interior specialist is opening it's very first international store right here in Sydney. More importantly, right here in the Eastern Suburbs. Less than 5km from my (current) doorstep.

I am beyond excited for this opening. Whilst there are fantastic, well reputed Australian furniture and homewares retailers (like Freedom and ... and...) we are seriously lacking in the element of mid-level, well made home retail giants. The small retailers are amazing and you can find the most exquisite pieces. But more often than not these pieces are not made for kidlets, they are pricey (i.e. way out of my budget) and just overall not a good fit. Pottery Barn and West Elm provide home fittings and furniture that are not only made really well, they mesh together with ease, they have a variety of styles and features and they provide the 'whole look' if that is so what you need. You can do a sectional, side table, rug, throw pillows, vases, books, plates, lamps and nibbles (from Williams-Sonoma) that work with perfect synchronicity.

With our impending finding and buying of our new home, Hubby and I have spent a great deal of time collaborating on the 'look' for our new home. Whilst the actual house we buy MAY impact a little on this style, we know what we like. We are not fussy people. We like comfort and sensible style. We are a little on the preppy style (taking the 'clean cut' element) and a lot on the beach side style. It may not make a huge amount of sense to read but our pinterest boards sum it up pretty well! 

Here are a few shots and items I simply love from this homewares giant - these are from West Elm.

Oh my goodness! How beautiful is this wall?



This is pretty much my IDEAL sectional. Space wise, colour wise, comfy-corner wise and arm style wise!



I have a rather enormous love for chevron patterns.



Immediately I love this lighting feature for above the dining table




This gorgeous rug is an outdoor feature rug - would have been perfect in the Little House!



Actually, I'll take the entire room thanks!



A cluster of these vases on my mantel please!



This gorgeous bedding..



My goodness these are just a few. I could seriously post pics all day!


Now, how to wrangle an invite to the opening night...

Check out these other posts about the opening of Pottery Barn, West Elm and Williams-Sonoma!



And here is the Pottery Barn Australia Facebook page



I. Am. So. EXCITED!

xx Tess


Wednesday 10 April 2013

Hello little lady!

I found this little lady by the side of the road this morning and picked her up and brought her home. An hour later a garbage truck came past and picked up the rest of the dumped furniture on the side of the road.

A small part of me regrets checking the remaining pieces properly. (yes, I know I am a scavenger)

A big part of me is pleased as punch this little lady came home with us.

She is almost immaculate (but we won't hold a little chip against her).

A simple shelf and beautifully detailed top with sweet little corners and lovely long legs. Made from solid, solid timber. They don't make em like this anymore!







Look at the corners! So beautiful!





Excuse the ikea basket from the baby's room and the minimal bits and pieces... I've packed most of the decor items in this house. Yes, we are a very naked house at the moment. No photos, no paintings, no vases, no ceramic animals...




Side table inspiration...

Should I paint her like this one?




I'd like a basket to fill the shelf, or perhaps a wire basket like this one?



I like this one from Shanty to Chic




I could paint it gold. Then again, maybe not but I quite like this one!



Boxes or basket on the floor then books and details on the shelf! Winner!



I don't think I can paint her just yet, but perhaps once we move home and have our new furniture she may just get a makeover!

xx T



Monday 8 April 2013

Prints for our new home

I've been scouting around looking for some new prints and paintings for our new home (no, we haven't bought yet but we have found something we love!). I found these prints through May Designs and the second set from Made By Girl and just love them. They'd look great framed in white or black and could really work in almost any room in the house!







These are by Jennifer Ramos of Made By Girl and she has an etsy shop here: Made By Girl Etsy

This first one is her classic, elegant LOVE print.





I quite like this grey colour way...




All bloggers and lovers of blogs and of course, the richness of life, coffee need one of these. It would be great on a gallery wall that incorporates a fabric covered 'mood' (pin) board.





Navy for me of course...




I think at least one of these will be right at home, in our new home!

xx T



Saturday 6 April 2013

PBB: In need of a dress

I am in need of a 'dress'. A versitile, everything dress. A little more formal than the dresses I picked out at Old Navy.

This dress must:

* Dress up and down for different occasions.
* Dark colour to be accessorised by silver and brights.
* Be baby friendly (i.e. not silk!).
* Enhance and hide.
* Be suitable for Club dinner at Aussies, two 30ths, two girls nights out and a 40th.
* Travel easily and not require crazy ironing! I am not an ironer!
* Work with flats, boots, high heels, sandals and also tights and winter heels.
* Fit my budget: Under $150

I really didn't think I would be able to find anything. Then I stopped in at Country Road the other day for a millisecond with a whingy kid and found this.


Country Road's Geometric Print Dress. A black dress, but not plain black.

It fits my criteria too!

* Dress up and down for different occasions - TICK!
* Dark colour to be accessorised by silver and brights - TICK!
* Be baby friendly (i.e. not silk!) - TICK!
* Enhance and hide - I think so? I'll pop in store on Monday to try it on..
* Be suitable for Club dinner at Aussies, two 30ths, two girls nights out and a 40th - TICK!
* Travel easily and not require crazy ironing! I am not an ironer - TICK!
* Work with flats, boots, high heels, sandals and also tights and winter heels- TICK!
* Fit my budget: Under $150 - TICK! It is $149.95 but they have their SPEND AND SAVE going at the moment. I'll add something small to the total price and save $50 (Spend $150 save $50).

Fingers crossed its a good fit and look and they have my size!



Old Navy Holiday Essentials

So techinically this is three days late, I'll blame it on the packing! We are getting there and soon our downstairs part of our house will be fully packed! Yipee!

Back to the goods, these are the things I snagged from Old Navy for our upcoming holidays! Yes I am aware I have a bit of a problem with stripes but who doesn't love stripes?

xx T



Thursday 4 April 2013

Rainy day packing.

Little Man and I spent today packing boxes. Boxes full of our lovely belongings. It seems a bit sad that we don't have a new home yet but the new owners of this house are moving in just after our trip to Queensland.

So a packing we are!

Until we find our new home, we will move in with my parents. I think Little Man will love having loads of time with his Grandparents and we are so thankful to have somewhere easy to go in between houses!

A few shots of Little Man during packing today. These shots are edited on my iPhone using the app PicTapGo! It is great!d






Wednesday 3 April 2013

PBB: Post Baby Body and a bit of a wardrobe update...

Pretty soon we will be jetting off to Tugan Beach on the Gold Coast for the Australian Surf Lifesaving Titles where Hubby will compete along with his Surfboat crew for GOLD! Go Hubby!

After the five days at the event we are heading to Noosa for a mini-getaway with Little Man. We love Noosa and have visited several times. It is a gorgeous, beach side town with great food, a beautiful beach and good shopping. We are looking forward to fully relaxing and taking some long walks along the beach.

Twelve months ago I gave birth to our gorgeous boy. Twenty-one months ago my body changed for good.


Oh so little.. oh such a spunk of a bub!


Things are so different with my body! I have worked my butt off (literally, it is shrinking!) to not only shift the baby weight that magically appeared whilst I was pregnant (trip to Europe prior to concieving bub probably didn't help either) but GET FIT! I had a great pregnancy and a complicated but good birth but my fitness after all that was about 1/10 of what it was BB (before bub).

So I worked hard, I kicked butt. I joined other mums at group training in the fight of the baby blubber, I pounded the pavement and I started Body Attack classes (and LOVE them) and I'm winning.

Now I train at least three times a week at the gym or walking and we are eating really 'clean'. These efforts are resulting in my shape changing back to what it used to resemble and I am really loving that part. I still have about 5kg to be where I would like that scale to be, but I'm pretty happy about the current number it is at.

However, there are significant parts of my body that seem to have changed for good.

#1 Widened pelvis - this one is not overly surprising and I probably should have guessed it would happen.

#2 Widened rib cage - this one is significantly surprising! Hello baby, stay out of Mama's rib cage!

#3 C-section scar 'crease' - I guess this one isn't really surprising but it's not very nice.

Believe me, I can live with these things. I have a healthy little boy who arrived in to this world and we love him more than anything. Plus Not there is not much I can do much about them and they honestly don't worry me. What worries me is the lack of clothing I have that I love and feel comfortable in.

So, some new clothes are/were needed.

I have purchased these AMAZING jeans




They are by DL1961 and are called 'Angel Jeans' in Mariner wash.

Yes they are Angel jeans! They claim to have 4 way stretch and I can attest to that! They are so super comfortable it is amazing. Great stretch, a little higher than I used to wear and one size bigger. All things I am happy with and in fact love.

Only one size bigger? That is great news.

People ask me all the time how I can buy clothes online without first trying them on. I took a punt initially in determining size because up until a few years ago there wasn't a lot of US branded jeans available here in little old Australia. Now you could go instore to David Jones or Myer and try on the jeans you want, then head online to search for the best price. Simple.

I love Old Navy. Their classic, basic style of clothing is generally well made and super baby/kid/work friendly. I'm going to see what I can find in the way of dresses and tops to do beach/day/night combinations with my new jeans, some coloured jeans and shorts and skirts I already have.

 Come back tomorrow to see what I snagged.

** All opinions are 100% my own, always. This post is NOT sponsored by Old Navy, Revolve Clothing, DL1961 or anyone else :) Thanks!


Monday 1 April 2013

Courtyard table makeover

How brilliant are four day public holiday weekends? I feel so rested and relaxed after having four luxurious days off with hubby and our little man.

We spent our Easter long weekend catching up with family and friends and also spending some quality time just as 'we three' relishing our little house and local area. In just three weeks we have to be packed and almost moved out! Eeek!

I have had this little project in my mind for a while now and felt inspired to tackle it yesterday afternoon whilst Little Man and Hubby played in our living room...

We have a gorgeous little courtyard (our only outdoor space in this small house) that gets little to no use over summer as it is simply too hot and extremely exposed to the sun and heat of Summer. If we were staying here longer I think we would have to look into covering the pergola beams with some sort of UV and shade material. However, now that we are heading in to Autumn we will get a bit more use out of it during the day and evening so I decided to pull together some table linen and decor for our outdoor arrangement.

Here is before...




I made a no-sew table cloth (using fabric I bought for this project three months ago!) using hemming table and folding the corners neatly and used pinking shears to edge-trim left over fabric from my Jewellery Pin-Board for napkins. The napkin rings are strips of large paint samples simply taped together at the back. For next time, I intend to make paint sample napkin rings using Courtney from A Thoughtful Place's mini-tutorial (ps. how gorgeous are her hanging eggs? Pinned!).



Here is my little courtyard table after!








These little bunnies are from Love to Celebrate in the Sydney suburb of Roseville. Gabby is the owner and has the most AMAZING taste and decorating skills. She will gladly help you out with any event you have coming up. Love to Celebrate




Thanks for stopping by!