Anyone for some concrete?

You may have noticed after a long weekend of blogging I was a little quiet the weekend just gone. Well my mind (and body) were not in the best place. I injured myself in a bike crash last week (more on that to come) and was limping around in pain for three days at work, add an extra stressful working week and I wasn't the nicest girl to be around. I figured I wouldn't force my nasty mood onto anyone who didn't have to listen to me, hence I refrained from blogging. Sitting at the computer desk was also not the most comfortable either. 

me grumpy after a very wet ride home a few months back!

Is my mind much better a week later? No, not really. To be honest, I need to swallow a cup of concrete and harden up. Limping around for week is really nothing to be upset about compared to what others have to deal with. Alex told me yesterday that I need to stop feeling sorry for myself. But in my defence, I am getting extremely frustrated with the amount of time it takes to do the most simple things and my muscles are aching and begging for a stretch because I am walking differently and carrying my weight differently. If I could just sink into some amazing yoga stretches for the hamstrings and hips I would feel so much better but with a knee that barely bends or straightens this is kind of impossible, sometimes I am so agitated I just want to chop my leg off. 

a very fat and ugly knee of mine

I am off to the doctor tomorrow to get the final verdict on this knee of mine, is it just a simple sprain or have I done something more serious? After throwing a heap of money at the doctor and a machine I might just find out it is merely a sprain in which case I will feel rather silly and embarrassed, and all sympathy from Alex will be out the window from that point forward. But of course that would be the best outcome. Having never had a sprained knee before I am not sure how long it should take to recover and regain the movement of my leg. Having sprained my ankles numerous times they usually heel up to normal walking point within 3-4 days with pain continuing for specific movements for a few weeks depending on the severity of the sprain. Well I currently cannot straighten my leg or bend it at more than a right angle and twisting is out of the question. I have been limping for a week and my calf muscle is pinching and aching, I think from walking differently. 

Anyway I will find out tomorrow and maybe then my mood might get better, at least then I will know what I am dealing with. 

Talk soon,

P.S. we should get our wedding photos very soon, plus our printed coffee table book which I am really excited about! It is the book that is holding it everything up but I am sure it will be worth the wait.

Marge, Marge, the rains aren't here!

Yes you read that correctly, the rains AREN'T here and boy does poor little Tassie need some rain. Our little island state of Tasmania has been battling bushfires on and off across the last two months. Our weather conditions have been hot and windy and with plenty of dry vegetation to burn, once a fire has started it has been difficult to stop. With Hobart reaching its highest temperature ever recorded on 4 January conditions were bound to get worse. Fire fighters from far and wide have pulled together and defended the homes and lives of the locals, and they really have done a fantastic job but unfortunately it doesn't seem to be behind us yet. 

A bushfire rages through the Lake Repulse / Meadowbank area, as seen from the village of Hamilton, Tasmania, 4 January 2013

I am shocked every time I turn on the news to hear that another fire has sparked up somewhere across the state, although they don't all turn out to be as bad as the worst it is still devastating to here. To think that some of these fires are deliberately lit absolutely disgusts me and sometimes those who light these fires never get caught. Why someone would do such a terrible thing astounds me, I just can't understand it. What I wish would come to such people is not appropriate for me to say but no doubt they will never get the wake up call they truly deserve.

Yesterday I found myself complaining that my washing on the line would smell like smoke, then I gave myself a virtual slap in the face for being so selfish and ungrateful. My problem was pathetic compared to the people who were worrying about their own homes or the fire fighters putting themselves in harms ways defending these homes. I can't imagine how hot and physically and emotionally difficult it must be to fight a fire. 

A bushfire smoke plume is visible from Park Beach in Forcett, south-east of Hobart, the state's capital

So please take this time to spare a thought for those under threat by these fires, or who have already suffered from the fires last month, or those whose family members continue to go and fight the fires day after day, or those even making sandwiches for the fire fighters, anyone involved in fighting these fires deserves our thoughts and our thanks. In the meantime all we can do is pray to mother nature for less wind and more rain. Lucky for me in my inner suburban home I have nothing to worry about but not everyone is that lucky. 

Talk soon,

Happy 1st Birthday

That's right about a week ago my little corner of the world wide web turned 1! Hakuna Matata has (barely) managed to stay up and running during its first year. My first year blogging was almost a failure, not enough postings from me, not enough replying to the comments of my lovely readers, not enough photos and not enough references to everything wonderful, but I survived. 

Year one for my little blog was nothing like I had planned, with inspiration and encouragement from others, this time one year ago I decided to start my blog. Hoping to do many updates, share details of my wedding planning and to share my experience with depression, I was excited and nervous to finally publish my first post after spending months thinking about. Looking back I didn't share nearly as much as I had hoped. Why?? Well life got in the way I guess! I still have a long list of blog post subjects I can't wait to post about and I rarely lose the inspiration to do so, just the time and sometimes my ability to write. Sometimes I know what I want to write but putting sentences together to get the feelings I have across can sometimes be very challenging. Luckily though I am still as motivated, passionate and inspired as I was on day one.

So lets try this all again in year two! Lets hope for more posts, updates and more honesty from me. Thank you to my readers for standing by me this past year, thank you for your love and support and please keep reading during year two. 

Happy Birthday to my blog, thanks for being my outlet for all of my thoughts and emotions this past year. Here's to a second year of more posts, photos and readers as well as a brand new blog header to come very soon!

Talk soon, 

Crazy little thing called....Sleep??

Sleep, there are so many articles out there about it, how much should you be getting, how important it is for the body, how to get to sleep, the best way to sleep...the list goes on. When you're a infant your parents are begging you to sleep more, then as a teenager you can somehow sleep all day, work comes along and you find yourself losing the ability to sleep-in on the weekends, then maybe as a parent you become the one begging for your babies to sleep more, before you know it you're getting older and wake up at the crack of dawn everyday!

I think I am currently at the teen stage of sleep (even though I am 25!), I can usually sleep at any time of the day, on the couch in broad day light, in the car, on a plane - easy peasy. Unlike Alex I need at least 7 hours of sleep to function properly, left to my own devices I can easily sleep 10-12 hours a night, not something I am proud of but I have come to accept it. I am also an intense over thinker and like to be insanely organised and in the lead up to the wedding I found myself tossing and turning trying but failing to get to sleep until the early hours of the morning. There were still months to go until the big day and I knew I wasn't going to make it alive if this continued. I still had to manage to get through the work days and try to eat healthy, all easier to do when you aren't sleep deprived. That's when I found this app for the iPhone. 

Relax and Sleep Well is a hypnosis recording by the UK’s best selling self-help audio author Glenn Harrold. It wasn't recommended to me, I simply searched for sleep apps and selected this one from the list. There are probably many out there, some maybe even better than this one but this one has been an absolute life saver for me. I used it in the months leading up to the wedding and even the night before the wedding with mum listening too, we both fell asleep like cats (I had babies here but then realised babies don't fall asleep that easily)! I have even been using it post wedding too, I hope I don't become reliant on it but it hasn't failed me yet. Seriously every time I play it I fall asleep, without fail! Some nights I have tossed and turned for hours and then I have finally played the recording and fallen asleep within thirty minutes. If you have trouble getting to sleep I highly recommend you give this a try, what have you got to lose? Certainly not a good nights sleep!

I have my phone by my bedside when I am asleep, as well as a really bright alarm clock and a TV and DVD player in my bedroom, all things that aren't recommended by the experts but I just don't want to give these up. I also look at my phone (facebook, instagram etc) before I go to sleep and as soon as I wake up, bad I know! I sleep on my stomach even though I wish I didn't (I have tried everything to combat this one). I would love some help to continue getting good quality sleep. What are your tricks for getting a good nights sleep? Do you have a bedtime routine to support your sleep? 

Talk soon,

Where did the time go...

The 12th of January 2013 has been and gone, that's right my wedding has happened!! My honeymoon has happened! Where did the time go? Life is slowly getting back to 'normal'. In theory now that the wedding is over I should have plenty of time to blog but lets not make any promises just yet!

My wedding day was truly brilliant, the best day of my life so far. Once I receive my professional photos (which should be soon) I will post more about the day but, in short, it really was a perfect day which couldn't have been any better. Plenty of guests left saying it was the best wedding they had ever been too. There were tears and laughter, dancing and singing and plenty of love. 

The honeymoon in Thailand was also very awesome, I am in love with Thailand and can't wait to go back there someday. Thai people are so giving and their food is amazing plus they live in a very beautiful country.

Lately I find myself wasting hours re-reading our wedding cards, re-reading our guest book and going over the same photos on facebook. I just want to relive our wedding day, I am sad it's over and that I never get to do it again but it's also very awesome being married and being able to call Alex my husband.

We both went back to work this week which was a bit of a challenge and our body clocks are taking sometime to get used to the working hours after five weeks away. My body is also begging me to eat a little healthier and get moving a little more. Back riding the bike to work was also a little challenging after not riding for a month but that should get easier and quicker over the coming weeks. 

So now the weddings over what do I plan on doing with all my free time?? Well lots of blogging of course, I think now I will post more about the wedding then I did leading up to it. A little backward I know. Some travel posts are also in the works. I would also like to focus on doing some more exercise and riding on the weekends, spending time with family and getting my house organised. I really need to clean out cupboards, de-clutter and spring clean (in summer?). 

Talk soon,

Our Wedding - so far

I thought it was about time that I did a wedding post. I realised I still haven't outlined everything that has been planned so far and what I imagine our special day to be like, so here goes.

We are getting married on Saturday 12 January 2013 (a little under 2 months away!!!). 

The gorgeous staircase - Villa Howden

Venue: Our venue is the beautiful Villa Howden which is a luxurious boutique hotel located on Tassie's North West Bay. I am very confident in the venue and know that I can rely on the natural beauty of this place to make our day perfect and our photos amazing. The ceremony and reception will both be held at the hotel, I will be staying there the night before with my mum and Alex and I along with 19 of our guests will be staying there the night of our wedding. I love that there will be no mucking around with travelling or checking into hotels and that I can spend my entire weekend at the venue. They also have a conference room that will be our back up ceremony room in case of rain. The make-up artist and hairdresser will travel to the hotel to prettify us girls in one of the lovely suites, awesome!! Brian from Villa is brilliant and so accommodating and the food is something pretty special as well. The entrée and main will be served alternate drop, with the cake served as dessert. Canapes will be enjoyed in the grounds of the hotel prior to dinner. 

Bridal Gown: Obviously I can't say much at all about the gown! It is from Rayanne Bridal, who since I purchased has relocated to Launceston. I have heard mixed reports about Anne from Rayanne but I have to say she was a great help and gave sound honest advice. She even threw in my veil for free! She is the kind of person who is straight up and honest but so am I, so maybe that's why we hit it off. There was no hassle with her moving to Launceston, the dress came in around August, I paid for it and picked it up and spoke to the alterations person she employs who is located in Brighton. Around December I will give her a call and she will come to mum and dad's house (also in Brighton) to fit the dress! Easy peasy. I also got my bracelet (which I love to bits) from Rayanne Bridal.
Bridesmaid Dresses: The girls dresses are from Bridal Boutique in Hobart. The colour is a gorgeous champagne/latte colour. I love their dresses, they look beautiful in them. 
Groom and Groomsmen Suits: The boys suits are from Les Lees, which was perfect as some have decided to hire whilst others have purchased theirs.

One of Robyn's buttercream cakes

Cake: The cake is being made by Robyn from Heavenly Cakes of Indulgence. The cake took some thought as we are rather picky. We wanted a great tasting cake more than we wanted a traditional looking gorgeous wedding cakes. As our cake is getting served as dessert we really wanted it to be a tasty dessert cake. We did consider cupcakes but it seems silly when our cake is getting individually served on plates anyway. We both aren't fans of fondant icing (the traditional white icing) whilst it looks great, it doesn't taste very nice. It could have just been cut off before serving but I don't want to pay for something I am not going to eat. So instead we are having delicious buttercream which will be as smooth as Robyn can do. Under the buttercream will be chocolate ganache encasing a three tier raspberry and chocolate mud cake Mmm yum. There will be no flowers or ribbons as I like the idea of the entire thing being edible but there are some yummy edible decorations that Robyn is making! I can't wait to see it.
Music: We are having a string quartet for the ceremony only, Strings on Fire. A band will start after dinner around 8.30pm, the band, Ebeneza Good, took forever to find. I think we watched every band in Hobart and I am so happy with our final pick. The lead singer is confident and charismatic. I know now that everyone will be up on that dance floor dancing to a mixture of old and new tunes, just the way we want it. I have linked to a video of them their song list excites me I can't wait to dance the night away will my husband and family and friends!! 
Flowers: The gorgeous Ange from Harmony Flowers in Lauderdale will be doing our bouquets. We are having white lilies with baby's breath. I know at least two other brides who had their flowers done by Ange so I am really confident in her plus she is just so damn lovely and helpful. We are doing the boys bouttonneirs, the ceremony arch and isle and table centrepieces ourselves! 
Photographer: Our photographer is Al of Alastair Bett Photography. Again he was recommended to us by three different people and he is easy going and fun plus his photos are amazing! He will photograph us girls getting ready plus the boys (we will all be getting ready at the hotel) and he will stay well after dinner - perfect!

Celebrant: Our celebrant is Tom Payne. I really wanted a male celebrant (it just seemed more fitting to me) and Tom was celebrant to my brother's wedding so we have seen him first hand. This was a no brainer for me!

Hair: Jo from Shear Delite Hair & Beauty will be doing my hair, the bridesmaid's and mum's hair. 
Make-up: Karla from Sharkra Medispa will be doing our make-up as well as mum's. Karla has done my make-up already on two other occasions and I have been seeing her for 5 years for my facials every 8 weeks so she is just like a friend. She will doing our spray tans as well. Plus any other maintenance I may need *wink wink*. Karla and Sharkra were another no brainer for me.

Rings: Our rings are from Michael Hill which is where my engagement ring was purchased. We have these already and I just need to get my engagement ring rhodium plated in a few weeks.

Invitations: We made the invitations ourselves with cases and card purchased from Christina Re. 

The Prime Pool Villa at The Vijitt Resort!

Honeymoon: Sarah from Flight Centre, Liverpool Street organised our honeymoon with plenty of input from us. This was another plan that took us forever to reach a decision, we procrastinated for months. We really wanted somewhere tropical and relaxing but not too expensive. Sarah was really helpful and had plenty of experience and advice. We are spending five nights on Phuket at The Vijitt Resort in a prime pool villa with our own private pool and five nights on Phi Phi Island at the Phi Phi Island Village Beach Resort and Spa. I cannot wait for this but we did totally go over budget...oh well I am positive it will be worth it!! 

So I am pretty organised. I am so glad I documented this, it makes me realise how much I have done. Now we just have the final crafty stuff and embellishments to organise! 

Happy Birthday

OMG what an incredibly busy few weeks I have had.  I measure my life by my weekends (sad I know) and the last three weekends have been jam packed with my own birthday celebrations, my bridal shower and a hens night plus lots more! 

Me on the Pancake Train!  

My birthday is on 4 November and this year I turned 25.  My celebrations started with dinner with Alex and my parents-in-law at Dede Indonesian and Thai Restaurant in North Hobart.  I love Thai food mmm yum. The following day both Alex and I took the day off work and when to the pancake place at the Margate Train, we sat for a few hours eating pancakes and reading the paper, it was really nice and relaxing. Alex had pancakes with bacon and maple syrup whilst I had chicken with pancakes, we then shared the scrumptious chocolate and banana pancakes for dessert! We spent the rest of the day shopping and he bought me three beautiful dresses for my birthday, he says one is sexy, one is cute and the other is beautiful, I think they are all great!

Amazing Chocolate and Banana Pancakes

Out to lunch with friends

The following day we had lunch with our friends at Barcelona in Salamanca and then wandered through the Salamanca Market absorbing all of the wonderful stalls but I was a good girl and didn't buy anything.  I must go to the Market more, they have some great stuff especially for unique gifts and the atmosphere is infectious.

Birthday cake!

Presents!

My man making me pancakes xx

I told you he is gorgeous!

On Sunday (my actual birthday) I had to beg Alex to get up out of bed and make me breakfast, pancakes (again).  I love pancakes. Then we visited mum and dad for a relaxing afternoon in the sun.  My brother, sister-in-law and nephew joined us all for a lovely dinner.  Mum made me an amazing half white chocolate, half dark chocolate mud cake, it was delicious.  Well done mum.  My gorgeous nephew kindly decorated it for me.  It really was the best cake ever. 

As far as presents go,  I was utterly spoilt.  Mum gave me an awesome shellac nail polish kit and light, I love being able to do my shellac nails myself!  I received flowers from my boss, dessert plates from my parents-in-law, dresses and nick-nacks from Alex plus lots more from friends.  I was a lucky girl!  

Thanks to everyone for my birthday well wishes and for helping my have a fantastic birthday!