collingwood

Busy little bee

| poppypeach

Checking out what has been happening in my life over the last couple of weeks and it has been full! It has been over a week since I posted what has been happening here and since I had an assignment due last week and then I had to start drafting an essay with my hubby out of town there was a lot going on!

I have been enjoying the volunteering at my daughters school and seeing the progress of the kids felt animals! They came out so well, with each animal having a personality of their own 😀

Our house has made some incredible progress with the carpenters adding on Level 2 which is the kids rooms. We are so happy to see that there is so much happening on the build and we can start to get a feel for the place now.

This artwork had the best pun by Tinky the artist:-
It was a filthy job, but the rubbish removalists thought it was their best work yet.
Barek artwork on found signage
Sea spirit

Today, which is Sunday Funday, we enjoyed some family time out, before it goes all crazy for the next 20 days when I start work full time on my prac. Today was a lovely 24 degree day and we went out into Collingwood to Off the Kerb gallery to see the Barek exhibition that is showing for a short time. We so wanted to buy another piece of his work but as we have not unpacked what we already have in our art boxes for the gallery space in our house we decided we will go visit him in the studio when we see what space we have to jazz up. We all love his work and especially the pieces on the found signage.

I reckon there will be sporadic times of posting over the next four weeks, as I start my teaching prac for Uni where I have be documenting my experience constantly plus I have an essay to write for another subject and I have this great media unit I am doing at the moment too. So up until Chrissy it will be full on. Gotta get to bed early for my big week this week!

Life balance

| poppypeach

Being on break I have taken the opportunity to finally go to the hairdresser and cut all my hair off and get a new hairdo! I found this fabulous stylist Chloe at Cherry Bomb hair in Collingwood. I said that I wanted to cut it all off as I have been eyeing off the lovely short styles on women around Melbourne. In my minds eye I saw a pixie cut but as I do have thick and curly hair, Chloe created this lovely hair style and incredible colour. I like to share the before and after pics as it was time for a change. I am loving it as it is so easy to style in the morning and on my travels to the gym and on my bike.

I have been studying for a maths test which is taking up most of my time and it is interesting the amount of stuff I do not use, that kids still learn in Year 9 maths! Lucky for me, the real world including financial maths and ratios is something I do not have to revise. My revision book is getting quite full with all my reminder notes of various formulas I have not used in forever but I will get there. When I am studying, I see how kids these days can call upon Google for all their knowledge and the greatest saviour for me with maths is Khan academy, as I love the videos and explanations to help me with my mathematical understanding.

Over the weekend I enjoyed this wonderful networking event at Swinburne University in Hawthorn which was an hour away by tram and train from home. It started at 10am so I was gone most of the day and the rest of the fam hung out at home and did errands. It was the first time the online contingent of my University got together and we got to meet fellow students and chat to industry professionals. The highlight was the inspiring keynote presentation by Emma Murray who made us all feel the energy to focus on what matters most in our lives and most of all, how to focus on our studies. I left the day with renewed optimism to study and get through my course and see the finish line!

On Sunday, we enjoyed an afternoon of family time and we went into the city to check out a Mexican festival at Flagstaff gardens. It turned out to be long lines for the food trucks and we were not drinking so we were not keen for the crazy margaritas. So we decided to check out the Queen Vic market and it was so good! We basically went there to scout out some food and I found this Sri Lankan street food vendor who made a Kotthu roti, right there in front of me with this incredible array of ingredients including curry leaves and egg, yummo. They added cheese on top which was probably a bit much for me but the yoghurt mint sauce was the absolute best. It was quite a feast, so I shared it with Ash and my hubby. Making the roti was very noisy indeed but well worth it for the food theatre. These guys are part of the restaurant Drums and are a franchise of 5 locations around Melbourne. They are also at the Preston market (just around the corner from our place by bus) where they are open on the weekend serving string hoppers and hoppers, so I have a date in the future to visit them there, yummo!

And the excitement in our house is that the steel has been fabricated and is getting in place. I visited over the weekend and found that a lot of action had happened including a brick wall. We are so happy it is moving along and today I chatted to a guy welding away and he told me there was some steel to be put in the front of the house as well. Its so good to see the structure taking shape as I have memorised the whole build 😀

Winter grooves

| poppypeach

Another whirlwind of a week with wrapping up the week after submitting my essays with some volunteer work. I helped out with an excursion for my daughters school to the local historical society. This was fascinating as I always like to find out the history of where I live. The above pic is of the prison in Pentridge and the clocktower is still there on Champ Street, Coburg.

After the excursion as I was out an about and the afternoon was sunny and beautiful I volunteered at the local community nursery to do some weeding and chatting to my fellow volunteers. Every time I go to Peppertree Place I find something cool, like this bamboo sculpture of a spider.

Over the weekend I had planned to catch up with friends for a picnic and bike ride off the Merri Trail. It was exciting as the four of us got on our bikes and rode towards the city on the trail. I am still in awe of the beauty of the trail and how much nature there is as you ride along. The bike trail leads off to some dirt tracks and killer hills where I had to push my bike uphill. I had the picnic goods on the back of my bike and the kids then stop half way up the hill so it was hard to work the momentum to get up the hill. Still the ride is just stunning with Ceres Joes Market Garden where we get our veggies on the trail and just down the road from our house was a super cool find. I noticed they had volunteer spots but I have to watch my time now that Uni is out and there is a lot to catch up on for this month!

Monday was a day off – yay here’s to long weekends!! My friend and I went out to lunch with the kids and afterwards took them wall climbing. It was so exciting to see the kids get up so high and then slowly come back down in their harness. I reckon it would be fun to try one day and get over my fear of heights.

Tuesday was the day for me to go out and enjoy some mama time. So I made a booking at my hairdresser who I love, with their flamingos on the ceiling. I decided to do a brilliant red I have been coveting for a while now. As I walked along Smith Street the changes are intense with Vegan Wares – a super cool shoe shop, leaving the hood. Lots of little cafes and other stores have come up in the time we were away but still tucked behind the main drag on Oxford Street I found Proud Mary Coffee. I had been wanting to visit the Melbourne shop after I went to the Portland cafe with my Aussie friend! I loved the Melbourne cafe with the wonderful staff, kick arse lunch with local pine mushrooms and delicious coffee with a local almond milk. The coffee is the biz and I knew I shouldn’t have coffee after 12pm but I had to try it and it was amazing in a perfect flat white! The building above is an apartment complex I imagine as Oxford Street is lined with the beautiful red brick buildings.

Finally with some time to go through my wardrobe and boxes from California, I am ready to pass on some goodies to the world. These are some pieces that need new homes and can be found on Etsy and Ebay – all links are here => https://linktr.ee/poppypeach_goodness

Grab some goodness to jazz up your winter if you are in the Southern hemisphere.