Photo Dump: Long Weekend Away

Just last weekend we took a trip up north to the hubs' hometown for an old school friend's wedding. It was cold here in Christchurch when we were leaving, so I packed 4 sweaters for our 4 day trip, but I ended up not using any of them! It was t-shirt weather the entire time we were there and I soaked in as much sun and sea breeze as I could. 

My in-laws live on the water so I was lucky enough to wake every morning to serene views of the bay. The small fart had a ball of a time; wandering around on their lawn, sloshing in the water in his new gumboots, pointing at all the strange birds that flew by...

It definitely went a lot better than our last trip just a couple of months ago - it seems being just a couple of months older make a world of a difference in toddlers. (Also helps that he wasn't sick this time!!!)

We were flat-out busy catching up with all the hubby's old friends and also the in-law's friends that were eager-beaver to meet the Master for the first time. The wedding was on the Saturday and my amazing mother-in-law managed to put the Master down to sleep by herself, no problems - that was the first time ever that someone other than myself had done this, with no qualms from the lil guy. He has come leaps and bounds, that fella. Sure helps that his routine nowadays is just bath, change, tuck in, give blankie and wave bye. I'm happy. 

Photo dump commencing.

Carry-on luggage: Mountainbuggy Nano, LittleLife Toddler Daysack and Marc Jacobs Eliz-a-baby bag

View from the deck

Small fart hangin' out with the grandparents' dog

Chillin' with grandma

Jetty

Early mornin' view from the living room

Checking out the birdies with granddad

Tide coming in

Glorious t-shirt weather

Tide fully out... and an awesome sunset <3

Wedding attire: vintage silk slip, Mango blazer

Walking down memory lane - hubby's old high school

Sick as playground... my old school wasn't half as cool as this

Wonderful nature

This place is just too cool

Mine... mine... mine...

Hanging out with daddy

This guy had so much fun running under the jetty, over and over again

... Yeah he got soaked (so worth it)

Can't wait to go back!

A.V.

Interior Decorating: A Parisian Touch

It's pretty safe to say, that the general populace, even if they haven't been there, love Paris (or at least, the idea of Paris). 

For me, when I think of Paris, the tune of 'La Vie en Rose' starts playing in my head and suddenly I'm remembering the beautiful architecture, the smell of the boulangeries on every street corner, the puddles on the cobblestone in the morning after the streets have been washed, the sight of men in suave suits on bicycles with a baguette in the front basket (yes, they actually do that). 

Paris is rightfully the quintessential stop for all things chic and inspiring. Just a major shame that it's quite literally on the other side of the globe to humble New Zealand. 30-something hours on a plane is just not something you do willy-nillly; for starters, it's super expensive and for those with kids... let's not even go there. ::shudder:: 

So fair enough that you try to inject a bit of that Parisian whimsy into your home, right?  

But the equation should never be:

• cheap, painted-white, faux French antique furniture
• gaudy 'I LOVE PARIS' prints
• pink or mint walls
• cheap black and white baroque print curtains
• chandelier wall decals

I could go on. I think you know what I'm talking about. It's a pet-peeve of mine, seeing a room-makeover TV show that throws all these things together and go, TA-DA!! A PARISIAN ROOM. 

Ew.

Let's look at some REAL Parisian interiors:

Air b'n'b

Elle Decor

Book-a-flat

French by Design

French by Design

Architectural Digest

Haven in Paris

Paris Property Group

Vogue

Vogue

And how 'bout some delightful exterior shots, just for fun?

Apartments for Sale Paris

Cities Reference

(My own photo)

(Own snap)

Altogether now, 

Swooooooooo~~~~~oooooooooo~~~~oooon. 

Doesn't it make you want to live there for a bit?? Your own Parisian apartment?? 

Unfortunately, that's a far cry from reality so if we were to take the next best thing and inject a bit of that Parisian-apartment feel into our homes, what to do? 

The above photos generally have these commonalities:

• Haussmann-era chevron hardwood floors and white walls with elaborate moldings
• fabulous drapes
• rug-goodness
• some painted-black wood furniture pieces to anchor the space
• mirrors to open up the space
• some modern furniture with clean lines
• texture for added interest
• decor items that look layered over time with an easy nonchalant feeling

I really like that a lot of Parisian interiors look like the property dwellers only keep pieces that mean something to them. Generally, the interior design is more function than form with a lot of technically mismatching pieces that still somehow work together as a whole. There's no unnecessary clutter, and generally the clutter they have is something more personal like a cluster of books with perhaps a notepad and mug of pens on top. 

I also appreciate the kind of laissez-faire approach to decorating that a lot of these interior pictures display; picture frames just sitting on the floor or shelf, as if to say, "I'm toootally going to get 'round to hanging this someday... (or maybe not)...meh..." 

I've seen a lot of other interior design pictures that look just too contrived and stuffy... sort of like they went out and bought everything all at once and messed around with it for hours till it looked P-E-R-F-E-C-T. Bleh. How tiring! But Parisian interiors are like the Kate Moss (circa early millennium) of interiors; thrown together without too much thought and yet still, in its entirety, perfection. 

Alice in Wardrobe Wonderland

Home Ideas

(Excuse the weird formatting - for some reason, I can't make the pictures the exact same size without one of them having a massive spaz and ending up in a completely different region of this entire post. Wtf. Get a grip Blogger.com)

Now, as for executing this Parisian-apartment-esque look, the chevron hardwood floors might be harder to achieve in New Zealand where carpet is usually underfoot. The elaborate moldings might be a bit difficult to come by also. But definitely painting your walls white is a way to go! 

Lovely, wallet-friendly, fabulous drapes are also difficult to source here... so my plan of action is that I just aim to slowly do one room at a time in our house (1 down, 6 to go...).

For furniture, skip the faux antique - if you can't afford the real deal or something super close to it, stick with simple lines and minimal detail. The plainer it is, the harder it is to tell whether it's $10 or $100. Also, if you go with black, it will anchor your light white airy space. 

Design You Trust

Add interesting textures together: faux fur throw and embroidered cushions, worn leather couch and a knit blanket, reclaimed wood bench and a recycled glass vase, hammered metal frames and an acrylic tray, agate coasters and linen placemats etc. You get my drift, non?

Vintage Revivals

Don't do flea-market everything. It should be roughly 2 parts minimalistic clean lines to 1 part rustic character piece. Too much flea-market turns your would-be-chic into old-man-wreak. 

But maybe it's more important to capture the attitude, rather than tangible things? Going back to the stuffy and contrived interior design photos (I know it's a requirement to spruce things up and stage things for the photos), it just makes it look like the home owner is slightly OCD, everything has to be in its place, and there's nary any tell-tale signs of a real-life person living in the home. I personally align myself with the more French notion of allowing things to just be... my sense of style isn't as innate as the French but I can 100% testify to the letting-things-be (read: lazy) part. No, that cup of coffee hasn't been sitting there for over a day what are you talking about. 

And on that note, here are my half-assed attempts to adding a bit of a Parisian flair in my own abode... 

French relaxed attitude of "I'll hang it one day..."

Substantially-sized black-lacquered dresser for a bit of anchorage - that oddly-angled wall is deceptively LARGE.
OH look! And I got round to hanging the art. Fail? ...? 

Mostly modern with some classic - sorry about the ancient iPhone 3G photo oh dear...

Un-staged photo that looks staged... that dress was hanging there cos I was packing for a wedding away from home 
Impeccable timing, your majesty! (Name that movie)

Old lines mixed with new, black bookcase to anchor the space,  plus a caramel leather desk chair - couldn't be bothered moving the bag or the dog's blanket, floor cushion or high chair though ^^;;

If you couldn't tell by my lacklustre attempts, my opinions are purely from an observational basis and not of experience nor practice. Hope you enjoyed the blabbering nevertheless. 

Here's to having a touch of Parisian chic in every corner of the globe! Santé!

A.V.

Maternity Wear: Old OOTDs & Baby Bump Progression

These are a bunch of super old OOTD shots from 2 years back when I was preggo (I'm not sure of exact dates till the last few shots sorry).

8 weeks roughly (almost 2 months)
Warehouse merino sweater, Jeans West jeans, Witchery necklace

13 weeks roughly (3 months, end of first trimester)
Country Road top, Cotton On belt, cheapo jeans from Korea, Michael Kors watch, Belle Noel bangle

19 weeks
Wish dress, Glassons cardigan, Cotton On belt, Belle Noel bangle

21 weeks (4.5 months-ish)
Kmart tank top, Jeans West jeans, Witchery jacket, Alexander McQueen scarf, MK watch, Belle Noel bangle

22 weeks roughly
Witchery silk shirt, Jeans West jeans, MK watch, Belle Noel bangle

24 weeks roughly (5 months-ish)
Country Road colour-block dress

30 weeks (6.5 months-ish, in the last trimester) - deceptive angle btw
Just Jeans sequin top, Cotton On (men's) chambray, Pumpkin Patch jeans

34 weeks
Temt top (XL), Esprit shorts

37 weeks (8 months-ish)
ASOS dress, plaited trim from Lincraft worn as belt lol

38 weeks
Supre tank top, Pumpkin Patch skirt, Witchery silk tank

39 weeks
Supre tank top, Zara tank layered on top, Pumpkin Patch skirt

40 weeks (9 months)
Mango cowl neck top, Pumpkin Patch

Hehe. My OOTDs weren't that inspiring back then (especially towards the end where it was the peak of summer and I could only bear to wear a skirt and some tank tops) but that aside, Memory Lane's sure a funny thing. It's funny thinking that the toddler that runs around right now, demanding my attention and squawking and doing all sorts of adorable things, was just a lil bun back then. Just a squishy lil nugget, growing in my belly.

Anyway. I remember when I got pregnant I was super excited about all the maternity clothes I could wear, but actually, most of the time, I just wore my normal clothes. My belly didn't grow as fast or as large as I expected it would... every woman is different, but I noticed as a whole, most first time mummies don't get a noticeable baby bump until at least 20 weeks. I remember trying to justify myself to people, "I'm not fat, I'm pregnant, I swear!!" Kind of annoying when it's not a 'proper' bump and just extra squishy-ness.

That top I'm wearing in that last shot, that's no maternity top; just an ordinary cowl neck top I got in Nice the year before. In fact, almost all the tops I'm wearing in the above photos are ordinary tops - bar the first photo with the black sweater and the white tank top where I'm 21 weeks (the navy striped Temt top was just a super large ruched t-shirt that looks like maternity wear). I just happen to own a lot of flowy, roomy, stretchy tops apparently. 

I like Kmart and The Warehouse for plain-coloured ruched maternity tank tops. Pumpkin Patch Maternity sometimes has some decent bottoms like jeans and skirts and tights - they also have frequent sales. Also, ASOS has a fantastic range of maternity wear. I particularly like the items from the brand New Look; chic and great price point.

No doubt, one day, when I'm preggo again, I'll be writing about new finds that are a tad more fashionable and chic. (NOT YET!)

A.V.