7 Years. 6 Months. 12 Kilos.

It's not that I haven't written anything in awhile its more that I just haven't been able to complete any of the posts I started writing. 

The last few months have been fucking insane!! Crazy!! Lot's of highs!

It's been nearly 5 years since I wore it and just as long since I last looked at it. Last night I whipped that bad boy out and threw it on. I couldn't zip it up myself which had me feeling a little disappointed but then BJ swooped in and saved the day. 

I haven't posted anything in the last 6 months, but SO MUCH HAS HAPPENED!!!


Since my last post, we went on our first family holiday. A week in Loch Sport, just the 3 of us and it was perfect. A chance to get away from it all and relax a little which is something I don't get to do often as I'm always working.

BJ quit his job of 7 years which he hated AND we started our own business! 

There have being some lows over the last 6 months too but I'm really trying to focus on the highs and keep a positive headspace.

2017 was a life changing year! We have taken a massive risk with BJ quitting his job and putting everything we have into starting a business and that's put a lot of added stress onto our lives. There has been lots of long hours, sleepless nights and very little family time but we are making it work. Doing everything we can to succeed and really build a better future for ourselves.

2017 was also the year and I decided to finally pull my finger out and be healthier. 

When I was pregnant with Audrey I was sooo sick that I lost an enormous amount of weight over the 9 months. I couldn't eat most things, I went to hospital at one point because I couldn't keep anything down and so after giving birth I went a little silly. After 9 months of not being able to enjoy all the foods I loved, I splurged a lot and that I managed to gain the weight back pretty damn quick. 

I got to a point that I was miserable. I hated looking in the mirror. Hating all my clothes and just wanting to hide all day in my hoodie and trackies. I kept going to kmart and just buy their $8 relaxed tees, a little bigger each time to hide my shame.

I finally made the decision to get healthy. I got on a strict meal plan, cut out 90% of my sugar intake and put a total ban on fast food. Apart from my clinical pilates class I didn't really commit to any exercise. I work two full time jobs and have a 2 1/2 year old so finding time to exercise is not easy and I didn't want to send my body into shock with too much change all at once. But in 12 months I've lost over 12kg!!

This week I had an urge to try on my wedding dress. Curious to see if it would fit.

It fit!! Perfectly!! It's a miracle!!

In the last 5 years soo much has changed. My body is completely different. I've had a kid! Things aren't where they used to be. But it still fits!

I was really excited that it fit and even more excited that when I had it on and I looked in the mirror I thought to myself 'If I was to get married right now, I would pick the same dress'. 

There are lots of things I'd change about my wedding day, but my dress definitely isn't one of them and that makes me really happy.

But the best part about trying my dress on, was seeing the look on BJ's face. I could see straight into his heart. I don't think he's ever looked at me like that. With THAT much love in his eyes.

I think I might try it on again in 5 years and see how it fits then.

This year I have some goals that I hope to achieve both personally and for the business.

I want to bake more - for myself and other people.

Continue working towards my weight goal.

Grow our business and really make it something amazing.

and make BJ and my relationship EVEN stronger.

We are 3 months into 2018 and things can only get better from here!!!

xx

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Four

What I like about our anniversary is that it's just for us. It's not a family event and it's not about Audrey... We can do whatever we want, or we can do nothing.

I had to count it out but this year is 12 years together, 4 years married. You'd think I'd be able to remember that off the top of my head but really it's not something that's important to us. We know we've been together for a long fucking time so the exact number of years really doesn't matter.

BJ and I aren't your typical couple. We don't buy Anniversary presents, spend lots of money or go away for the weekend. We might go out to dinner or have takeaway but that's about it. I wouldn't care if I was cooking dinner, as long as it was just us (and now Audrey) hanging out together.

This year our Anniversary was pre-celebrated days earlier. When I say 'pre-celebrated' I mean we went out to lunch while BJ was off work sick and while at lunch I said 'This can be for our Anniversary!'.

We went to The Smokery in Lilydale for some delicious smoked meat. I highly recommend it. It was fucking delicious!

Now as some of you know BJ and my wedding Anniversary shares the same date as the day we started going out. And since our wedding each year BJ has created a 'mixed tape' for our Anniversary and we take an annual photo for the cover.

This years one has fallen a bit between the cracks with soo much other stuff going on this year so I only got it yesterday but like all the others, I love it!

A 1000 Times - Hamilton Leithauser + Rostam
Upon A Hill - Foxygen
Wedding in Finistere - Jens Lekman
City Music - Kevin Morby
One More Lone Song - Mac DeMarco
Wild Once - Laura Marling
Kids In The Street - Justin Townes Earle

Love Is All - The Tallest Man On Earth
Mamah Borthwick (A Sketch) - Conor Oberst
Could Never Be Heaven - Brand New
Paradise - John Prine

If you want to check out our previous playlists you can find them here

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2013 Wrap Up

Wow! What a year!

2013 is coming to an end and I have to say it's been my most favourite year yet.

I was lucky enough to marry the love of my life and go adventuring around the USA for a glorious month.

I was able to see friends that I have been apart from for far too long and celebrate over and over again with everyone I love.

BJ and I had the wedding we truly wanted. We wanted to have a fun day with family and friends but didn't want to spend a lot of money as we wanted to honeymoon in America and continue a month's long celebration. We made a lot of the decorations and call in favours where ever we could. It was such a relaxing, joyful day and i would not change a thing.

The honeymoon was amazing! 

It had been years since we saw some of our friends overseas and we did not want to waste a second while we were over there. We kept ourselves very busy and had lots of adventures. (We finally saw Niagara Falls.... Wow!!)

We were both very much overworked this year. Saving every cent we could for our wedding/honeymoon. As well as working hard to save up our holiday hours. But it was worth it to have the honeymoon we both dreamed of.

This year we have also brought a new family car and finally got rid of BJ's egg mobile.

Tonight BJ, Cooper and I are going to hang out together with some homemade burgers (which I can hear BJ making right now) and celebrate the wonderful year we are saying goodbye to. We will bring in 2014 together. A NEW year which I plan to be just a good... If not better.

xx
Smorgy

PS: 2014 will include more blogging, more Fork This, as well as a lot of goals I am setting for myself and will work hard to achieve. I plan to have another VERY productive year.

PPS: Thank you to everyone who helped make this year soo amazing. Happy 2014 Everyone!


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Busy! Busy! Busy!

I can not begin to tell you how busy i have been this year.

On top of working full time running an office, i have also been trying to plan a DIY wedding... It's not as easy as it sounds.

I have had more then a few occasions where the tears have just started and could not be stopped because I've been soo overwhelmed with what's going on.

With exactly 5 weeks to the wedding I've come to realise that I cannot do it all myself. As much as I want to.

I have started to give jobs to others who are willing to help (as much as i don't want to) but still i have soo much to do.

This next month is going to be ridiculously busy.

This probably sounds horrible but I'm very much looking forward to the whole thing being over. I'll be happy to be rid of all this extra stress and be heading on our honeymoon to celebrate with friends overseas.

Today i had what i call my non hens party with family and close friends. I called it 'Goodbye Newman'. It is the only way i could force myself to take an afternoon off and just get excited about what the next month will bring.

My sisters went with the Seinfeld theme and we all had a lovely afternoon full of good food and laughter.

Thank you to everyone who came to celebrate with me.

Oh and here is this week's Fork This

xx

Smorgy

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Forgetful Blogger

I cannot believe how slack I've been this year with blogging. It's not that i don't have anything to say but i have been SUPER crazy busy with work and life.

BJ and I have been work hard planning our wedding/honeymoon/second wedding, saving our pennies and also trying to live a healthier lifestyle.

I WAS getting into a pretty good exercise routine until my back decided to go and I've spent the last month in a lot of pain. It has put me out of pocket quiet a bit with osteo appointments but it's finally starting to feel back to normal.

The wedding plans are coming along really well. We found out venue in February, invitations went out last week (which i designed and made myself - with help from BJ of course), photographer is booked, dress is ordered, honeymoon flights are booked. We have 4 months till the big day and I really feel like we are on top of things.

Fork This is still going strong. Out every Sunday. Get on it!!

This month BJ and I have done Meatless March. It really hasn't been as hard as i thought it would be to give up meat but i am looking forward to having meat options again soon.

I need to work on getting back into a blogging routine because i really miss putting things out on here.

I promise to be back soon but until then here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure.

xx
Smorgy

BJ and I being awesome

Mother Coopressa

Sooo long invitations

Meet Dale 'The Rock' Cooper

Meet my friends beautiful new bub

I got an iPad mini

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Goals for 2013

At the end of 2012 I was thinking about what goals i wanted to set for 2013.

I've decided I'm not going to make a list of massive goals that i might not achieve and then will feel miserable that i haven't. Right now I'm really happy with life and even though there are a few things i would like to change, if they didn't, I'd still be happy.

The obvious goal i have is still to lose weight and get fit... I'm doing this slowly but now with the wedding ahead of us i have motivation there to work harder to achieve this.


The other goals i have are: 

To manage our money even better then we have this first year in our house... We have a wedding and honeymoon to pay for and i want to make sure that we are still saving well and keeping our redraw account full.

To paint the rest of the house. We have all the paint but in the last 12 months have only completed a room and 1/2. I'd like to have completed the rest of the house by 2014.

To be more creative. Weather it's with food or craft i don't mind but i've slacked off a fair bit last year and was only creative when there was a birthday or occasion for it. Not this year. (At least with the wedding i know there will be plenty of creativity.)


BJ and I have set a couple of challenges for ourselves already this year:

We have decided that January, February and March are going to be take away free. We've added a clause that pizza isn't included because normally we'd be lucky to have pizza once in 3 months anyway. (And because one of our traditions we are starting is that on the anniversary of the day we moved into our house, we are going to reenact that night and walk up to get pizza and watch a movie together.

We've also decided to do 'Meat-less March' which i think will be an easy challenge for BJ but a difficult one for me.

And on top of these goals and challenges, we've both decided to re-do 365. After two years back I thought it would be a fun little challenge. A self portrait every day for 365 days. We are both members of the DnD 365 group on Flickr which is full of our friends from all over the world and we are excited that soo many of them have decided to do the 365 this year as well.

Usually it's BJ who pulls the faces

Let the awesomeness of 2013 commence.

xx
Smorgy

PS: I tried on a (dream) wedding dress this week and I was soo nerve racking and exciting.

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Wedding Outfit

This Saturday BJ and I went to our friend Bianca from Blush Loves Mint beautiful wedding in her Belgrave backyard.

The weather was surprisingly lovely considering how miserable it's been lately. 

I rushed out and bought a dress last minute and threw together a really cute outfit for the occasion.
BJ scrubbed up pretty nicely as well. I've tried this dress on 3 times, but this time it was on sale - Dress Win!! It was super flattering and comfortable as well. 

Megan: Dress from Dangerfield, Tights & Cardigan from Kmart, Ankle Boots from Spendless Shoes, and Sunnies from Rubi. Everything was also bought on sale :)

Bianca did an amazing job decorating. There was a delicious Candy Buffet (which included some of my favourite candies), beautiful cheeses and dips scattered around, flowered everywhere and these amazing turkish glasses laid out for guests to fill with her homemade soft drinks.

On top of all that, the marquee was covered in white and cream pom poms, giant white balloons and two amazing black chandlers which i just wanted to steal!!

Bianca was happy for me to share a few snap shots that BJ and I took of the decorations and tables. Look at how beautiful it looked.

Congratulations to Bianca and Patrick and a Happy 1st Birthday to their daughter Ruby. It was a lovely day and heres to many more. 

xx

Smorgy

PS: I ate waaay to much candy :)

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Fork This 49 - Our Idiot Brother

In this weeks episode of Fork This, BJ's younger brother Josh gets dared to eat items most people would not normally consume on their own.

The look on his face is very humorous!!

xx
Smorgy

PS: Congratulations to our friends Matt and Megan for getting married this weekend. Wishing them a lifetime of happiness together.

Here's a photo of BJ and I at the wedding

(Some real photos to come)

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Wedding Gift - Personalised Toasting Glasses

The work colleague that i made the Bridal Shower Gift for has almost reached her big day and I wanted to make something special for their wedding gift.

Personalized Toasting Glasses!

This wasn't a first time etching glass for me but it was an experimental way of doing it which I've not done before. It was quiet fiddly and sometimes frustrating.

Trying and get these two glasses to match was a painful task. There was a lot of tape involved and a lot of pauses were i would walk away for a little bit (so i didn't end up throwing the glasses).

I wanted to have them ready early enough to give to the bride and groom to be before the wedding day in the hope that they would like them enough to use on their wedding day to toast and celebrate with.

I'm soo happy with how they turned out. It was worth all the stress for the finished product.
Have another wedding coming up in October and thinking of doing the same thing... But obviously with their names hahaha.

If you want to see more photos go to my Facebook page.
Let me know what you think of my etched glasses.

xx
Smorgy

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Finally Being Creative - Bridal Shower Gift

This weekend I attended my work colleague Megan's bridal shower/kitchen tea. Traditionally for events like these you are ment to give the bride 'to be' a gift for her kitchen... These days most people already live out of home and have collect there household items and i didn't want to be the person who gave her ANOTHER set of tea towels.

I wanted to do something a bit different and creative. (FINALLY I've made something this year!!!)

So i made up a 'Hen's Night Kit'.

I made a set of badges for her and her friends to wear out to there night of girly fun. The set included a bunch of badges for all her friends to wear with informed everyone that they are apart of 'Megan's Buckette Party' and then Megan herself received three badges... A 'Bride To Be', 'Megan & Matt Forever' and '5th May 2012' (There wedding date) badge. The 'Bride To Be' badge was made a little more fancy with a cute ruffled ribbon around it AND i also made and extra 'Bride To Be' badge into a ring.

All the badges were designed to match the theme on her hen's party invitation and I think the whole kit came out looking pretty awesome.

I oragamied (I dont know if thats a real word) up some gift boxes and made a cute little card too. The ruffled badge was the decoration for the card and the rest of the goodies were tucked away inside.

It was something nice and different which i think showed the amount of time and thoughts i put into her gift. Plus i think she really liked it.

xx
Smorgy

I was wearing this hat which i created... It was bloody cold and BJ put on my head to warm me up. :)

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