Happy 2010 and New Year's Resolutions

Here are my resolutions for 2010

• Continue my quest to become a better vegetarian - sometimes in 2009 I had fish and prawns and shellfish so this year I will cut out the shellfish.  In 2009 I also stopped drinking milk in most things (I did have the occasional hot chocolate or milkshake though) so in 2010 I will try to up the soy milk factor in those things.

• I will go to church more.  Hopefully twice a month now.  One of these Sunday's I play the music at church but I would like to go another time.  However with our move this may be tricky so I will look for another Church when we move.

• The Beau and I have decided to sit down together once a day for a meal.  This has become really important now that he is doing shift work.

• Do exercise once a week (a walk or yoga counts).  Look to up this as I get better at the once a week.

• Not to let things I can't fix get me down.  For example, people parking where they shouldn't where we live.

• Blog at least twice a week.  One will be my menu plan and the other I will do a clothes or vintage related post.  I will also endeavor to proof-read my blogs so the spelling is not so atrocious.

• In relation to my menu planning I am going to try and be better with money.  This year we are getting married and buying our first home, so I need to track my spending and really stick to my budget (especially as at this stage I am unemployed!).  I would like to keep a ledger like 50s Girl speaks of in her blog but am unsure of I should try it on the computer first.  I will have to look into this a bit more.

Here are some pics from where I was on New Year's Eve - in Balmain in Sydney.

Menu Planning

Now that it is almost 2010 and New Year's Resolutions are being made I am getting in early and going to start getting back to my menu planning.

Week beginning 1/1/10

This week I am using two books:

Eat Me Now - Melanie Brown Waxman

Practically Macrobiotic Cookbook by Keith Michell

Both of these books are concerned with Macrobiotic principles which I try to follow but often without much success - not because of the food but because of my terrible lack of will power.

1/1/10

B: Bannock's with hummus and miso soup

L:Falafel in a pita with tahini, tomato, mint and carrot

D: Lamb cutlets (for the Beau), mash, broccolini

2/1/10

B: Fried mushrooms on bread and Bancha tea

L: Lentil Patty with Satay sauce and a miso soup

D: Home made Pesto with wholemeal pasta and a garden salad and steak for friends that are coming over.

3/1/10

Also on Sunday I will made bread in my breadmaker, a huge lot of brown rice and friands (for my Beau to take to his new job)

B: Bannock with tahini and marmalade.  Porridge with vanilla soy milk

L: Brown rice sushi and miso soup

D: Prawn Toast, Edamame, Lettuce and Pea Soup

4/1/10

B: Polenta with soy and pickled ginger

L: Vegetable Soup (or leftover soup) and brown rice

D: Chile with TVP mince

5/1/10

B: Scrambled tofu with mushrooms and broccolini

L: Miso Soup, Guacamole and corn chips, Millet Crush (with sweet potato)

D: At my Mum's - so something delicious.

6/1/10

B: Brown rice with umeboshi and gomashio

L: Millet crush, pickled cucumbers and leftover soup

D: At my grandma's so will probably be baked veggies and a veggie "chicken" schnitzel

7/1/10

B: Porridge with stewed fruit, Bancha tea

L: Brown rice salad (with corn and avocado)

D: Leftover's from the last few days.

Changes

I have not posted in ages as so much in my life is changing right now and it seems pointless to put any of it down in writing as it may change at any moment.

My Beau is about to finish his studies and we have been given our posting.  It is not in Sydney - which is nice as we want to move anyway but we don't know where to move to and we cannot decide on the same place.  We keep on tossing up between the Central Coast and the Hunter Valley.  

I have finished my university studies and so am now certified to teach secondary music.  I will start applying for a full-time job as soon as I know where I will be living.  

I have resigned from all of my current teaching posts as I do feel like I am ready to move on from all those schools and people.  I love them all and will miss them but I do feel like a change.  I am a bit scared as this will be the first time I am unemployed in about 7 years!  On the other hand I am looking forward to setting up a house and garden and being a good wife to be.

I wish that this was more interesting for everyone to read but I just had to write (or type) it out so I can not worry about it so much!

PS.  It is disgustingly hot here.

The Wedding - Part 2

So it was a battle between the Convent (Beau's choice) and Margan wineries (my choice).  We both lobbied hard for our choices but in the end the winner was Margan.

I am so excited to be having our wedding there as I feel it already has memories for us and has an amazing backdrop of the mountains where I would one day like to have a property.

We have decided to have a morning wedding.  We will be married at 11 am and then have a lunch - consisting of canapés and champagne, 2 courses and then our wedding cake for dessert.  We are inviting about 60 guests.  We invited 130 to our engagement party but just can't afford to have that many for our wedding.  Also a lot of those guests were far- flung family that we never see or have any contact with.  I felt bad inviting them to the engagement party knowing that they would not be coming to the wedding - but everyone else seemed to think it was ok.

We are getting away with just having who we want at the wedding because we are paying for it ourselves.  My father has remarried and had children with my step-mother so I don't expect him to offer anything (not that I want him too - I don't even know if I can ask him to walk me

 down the aisle).  Also my Mother wants to pay something toward the wedding but she has already bought my dress.  We want to feel like we don't have to do what other people want or invite them because of this or that.

I can envisage it will be difficult though.  

To make myself feel better here is a picture of my wedding gown.  Not very vintage - and not at all what I thought I would go for but I love that it's not white.  Which is making it hard to select wedding colours for flowers etc and the Beau is refusing to look at it (he is very traditional about things like that).  Any suggestions?

La Sposa, Pronovius "Paradiso" gown in Chardonnay

Holiday Slump

At the moment I am on school hoidays but not for much longer.

Due to my Beau being away with college still I have no one to go away with as everyone else who I would like to go away with (and those that could out up with me) are working.

I feel like I haven't really done anything at all these hols -  although I know I have.  I haven't just been doing "nothing".  So in the interest of making myself feel like they were worthwhile, here is a list of things  have done:

• Booked a wedding venue (more on this later)
• Spring cleaned the kitchen - although you can't tell anymore
• Spent a day driving around an area I may be moving to at the end of the year (depending on the placement that we get) to decide where we might like to buy our first home together (and the first house I will have ever lived in).
• Done my tax return for last year
• Eaten about a million pieces of nougat.
• Cooked some lovely food
•  Done a few days of thrift shopping with my Mum and Grandparents
• Designed a wedding website
• Gotten my car fixed (someone crashed into my while it was parked - in a car park -  and didn't leave a note).
• Done some Christmas shopping and made some present idea lists.
• Caught up with a few friends I haven't seen in ages.
• Had my hair "done"

To make this post a bit more interesting I thought I would do a list of all of things that I am in love with at the moment:

• Nougat as previously mentioned.  My favourite is Massam's honey and almond.

• Sleeping-in while everyone else is getting up.   I love my Tempur mattress.  My bedroom feels very calming in the morning.  This isn't my bed but kind of has the same colours and head board.

• The ocean temperature - it's about 20 which is the same as out.  I know because my brother made me go for a swim.

• Champagne - I'm averaging a bottle every two days!

• CD player in my hire car - my normal car doesn't have one - I can listen to jazz all day!

The Wedding - Part I

Here we go,

The planning has started in earnest.  We have a date: 27th August 2010.

Over this long weekend, the Beau and I went for a drive to the Hunter Valley to look at our short-listed venues for the wedding.

The places we looked at were:

• The Sebel Kirkton Park
  
• Margan Family Winery 
  
• Pepper Convent

The Beau likes the Convent and I like Margan.

The Beau turned into a gushing bride the moment we walked into the convent.  It's very shabby chic/French country.  I do like it - just not as much as Margan.  The convent does have an

 outdoor reception option - where we could sit under a trellis of Wisteria with long tables.  It also has a wet-weather option of a beautiful breakfast room with French doors looking onto gardens and said terrace.  We are going to be married in the morning and have a wedding brunch.

The ceremony can take place next to a lake, which has willows around it.   The Beau also think it could be nice that it may be haunted!

It kind of reminds me of school - where the was a convent - which I did sleep in once!  It smells the same, everyone whispers and you can hear everybody walking around.  I also think that the upkeep is not that wonderful - I saw beer bottles around the house and the verandah hadn't been swept.  Inside all looked ok.  

I forgot to the camera but here are some photos:

Here is one of the rooms - upstairs though - so for some of our guests.

This is the breakfast room which would be the wet-weather option.  I really don't like the chairs and their covers though.  I feel it's too "done". 

Margan winery is in Broke  - which is out of the centre of the commercial area for wineries.

Margan is also a bit unusual - it is quite new so it doesn't have all the history associsated with some of the other places we saw but all inside is modern and clean.  I thought that I would have like to go for something a bit older in style but I like the fact the the modern decoration and design means that it isn't "geared" towards weddings.

We are able to have an outside ceremony at Margan, with the mountain range behind us.  We can also have the reception on the verandah which is great because it is still a possibility when it's raining.  We actually had lunch on the verandah and it was raining but it was so quiet and beautiful.  The verandah overlooks their own chicken run and veggie garden at a distance.  On the lawn in between we could have croquet and boules set-up.  

The wedding planner was a dream and she didn't think that anything was too hard or impossible - she even said I could bring my antique linens to dress the tables!

 Here is view to the mountain ranges through the vineyards.

Here is one of the ceremony options - the courtyard.

  This is a picture of the verandah were we would have our tables for the reception.

This is the area that the verandah looks out onto.  It is not usually this yellow.  It is also an option for the ceremony.

Here is another picture of the courtyard but from the other side - the entrance.

7 Things

I have just finished reading Lobster and Swan blog and she had been forwarded on a 7 thing post.  I think that's how it works - anyway - she has asked everone reading to lost 7 things about themselves too.  I know I enjoy reading what people think about themselves so I thought I would give it a go:

1.  I have a terrible will power.  

No matter how hard I try or want something I am a shocker when it comes to keeping promises to myself.  I have no one else to blame but myself and it disgus

ts me that I cannot stick to things that should be easy like cleaning the kitchen.  Strang

e though - give me 6 years of university study and I'm your gal.

2. I used to be a flight attendant.

I only did it for 6 months while I was in my final year of university and it was a nightmare coordinating flight schedules and classes.  I flew for a Regional Australian airline on the Dash series - where you are sometimes the only flight attendant.  I found it similar to working in a  bar but with heels and and much less sleep.  The most glamourous part was having a pilot offer to put your suitcase in the hold for you or wheeling your suitcase around the terminal (for all of about 3 minutes!)

3.  I love musicals.

I don't know if this is such a surprise.  And it's not just any musical - give me Rodgers and Hammerstein and Gordon McRae any day.  Deep down all I want is a strong man to sort out money and a house and for me to feel looked after and then for him to burst into song and whisk me around the lounge room in some choreographed number.  Disgustingly anti-feminist I know.  It won't happen but I can dream about it.

4.  I have a linen problem.

This has a little to do with my will power but I cannot stop buying linen's.  Not just any linens but beautiful damask and embroidery.  I see them in the shop and think that some lovely person has spent hours working on it and it's so sad that it's now not treasured by anyone. 

5.  I love reading Patrick O'Brien

Naval books really do it for me.  I think I have a huge crush on Jack even though he is almost everything I despise in a man - cheating and ungrateful - he has this strange sense of loyalty and fairness that I find in myself. 

6.  Confrontation

I hat confrontation with anybody - people at the supermarket in my personal space, people who push in the queues, restaurant who mess up my order.  But the flip side is that a have a hot temper so most of the time I just make a horrible face and simmer away for the rest of the day - I have a hard time letting go.

7. Composing

I studied music composition at the Sydney Conservatoiurm for my undergraduate degree and have note so much as written a single note since I left.  I feel like I was a bit of an imposter while I was there, as writing for me was not because I had to but because I was good at it.  I want to write something but maybe I'm just afraid that what will come out is not "right" or "good" but I should get over myself and give it a go.

Now at the end of the post of Lobster and Swan everyone who read the post was asked to post 7 things about them so I will do the same.  Please link to your post in the comments section so I can find about more about you!

To make this post a bit more interesting I have included some random photographs of myself and various people.