Isn’t this necklace adorable? Perfect for Easter (or any time of year really). It’s from the studio of Me Me Me in London. Very clever ceramic artists they are! Also loving these cute bottle vases – I’d definitely get the lightning one!

(found via Mitchell & Dent)

This is all kinds of great.

“Turn your iPhone into a nesting box alarm clock » Hour chirp » Night mode and snooze function » Tap the screen anytime to see the nesting birds inside » 4 colourways » Charge your iPhone while you sleep and wake up with the birds!” – from LuckyBite.

I love this idea. I love my iPhone. There is a part of me that would adore waking up to the sound of birdies chirping (however the larger, grumpier part of me – the part that is known to throw alarm clocks clean across the room – probably wouldn’t be so keen).

I can’t help thinking that the more technologically evolved we become the more we’re going to want to revert back to a ‘simpler’ time when life wasn’t so reliant on gadgets for entertainment. Like the time of birdhouses, treehouses and outhouses.   Inventions like this straddle the here/now and the then and they make you stop and think about what you might be missing right outside your window.

(found via Mitchell & Dent)

I’m a diary keeper. I like the idea of being able to look back and read all the melancholy events of my past (I do melancholy well). I have some quasi-diaries from the early 90′s which are truly scary, filled with poems and drawings and song lyrics (how very 90′s). They are the perfect snapshots of a moment in time that feels like eons ago – even if they are a little embarrassing

Enter the My Life Story diary by Suck UK (available in Australia through Hart&Heim). This diary is a whopping 1080 pages and it looks so good! It’s perfect for recording all of life’s big moments and I think it would serve as a wonderful receptacle for family history etc. I think this is a wonderful idea and would love love love one for Christmas (hint, hint Santa!)

Things that are annoying me

1. Rent inspections. On the one hand they suck – I really don’t like having people wandering through “my” house, looking in my pantry and oven to make sure they are clean. It’s really aggravating to have to clean when I don’t really feel like it – which was especially true over the weekend being sick. On the other hand, having inspections every 3 months means the house is kept relatively clean I guess. But still, very annoying.

2. Writers who constantly brag on Twitter about how much work they’re getting done. Gee I’d love to be one of those writers who gets up at 5am each day and starts tapping away on the novel but I’m definitely not. I’ve written about 1500 words on my current project and I feel guilty for each day that goes by that I don’t add to it.

3. Channel 9 completely failed yesterday afternoon. I’d given myself 2 hours off cleaning so I could watch a favourite movie “On Moonlight Bay” and I’d watched about an hour of it and all of a sudden it switches to some damn footy show! No explanation just – gone! Really, really annoying.

4. No offense to anyone but all this conjecture about what killed Michael Jackson is also extremely annoying. No-one knows for sure as all the toxicology reports haven’t come back and even when an official cause of death is released what good will that do for anyone? Him dying is big news – I understand that. But this constant media barrage is not good. It’s like the coverage we received after 9/11 – constant and unrelenting (of course the two events are poles, poles apart). This is part of the reason why studying journalism just doesn’t appeal to me anymore. Parts of the profession seem so intrusive and unseemly.

5. Coughing in the supermarket. I was up at the shops this morning and I had the audacity to cough a few times while waiting in the checkout. If they could have, I’m sure the customers standing nearby would have wrestled me to the ground, stuck a hepa filter over my head and doused me in a mist of Glen-20. Coughing isn’t a crime people. H1N1 has got people jumpy that’s for sure. (Actually another interesting thing happened at the shops this morning. We were all waiting around at the checkouts, they had about 2 or 3 open and there were about 12 people waiting, carts full. Another checkout opened and a young couple made a move over to it with the man streaking ahead to beat anyone else. There was a woman in the checkout next door who moved across to the newly opened one – she got behind the man, but the man’s wife (who was wheeling the trolley) cut in front of the woman who in turn started a big ruckus about karma and what goes around comes around etc. Sometimes you have to just let it go – especially when the jilted woman could’ve just gone through the 12 items or less aisle.)

Things that are inspiring me

New nail polish. Love the bright pink colour. It’s by Sally Hansen – Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in Fuchsia Pink.

Being Human – a show about a vampire, werewolf and ghost all living in the same house. We watched the pilot last week and I loved it. Can’t wait to watch some more episodes this week.

*Sigh* If only I could knit! I could knit this crabby thing!

I seriously love this idea that I saw on Design Sponge a few weeks ago. As an anniversary present Grace of Poetic Home made her husband this great gift of typed up library-esque cards with important dates in their relationship. This appeals to me on many different levels – I love the typed cards – they remind me of my old typewriter. I also like the idea of chronicling important dates and things that happen. Would be great to look back on as time goes by.

A part of my routine for finding inspiration is trawling through images on Tumblr or Visualize. These images sometimes help if I’ve got a bit of writer’s block going on. I found the image above and it’s helped me to get some clarity for a new story idea. I find that I’m really responsive to visual cues – I tend to suck if someone gives me a verbal or written writer’s prompt but if you give me a photo – no problems. I’m no brain surgeon but I believe this may work in the same way that I’m more inclined to remember what a person looks like rather than their name. Something to ponder.

Have a good Monday!

If I were to show you the contents of the cupboard behind me you’d probably be shocked by the amount of journals and notebooks that I have stuffed in there. There are at least 25 – 30 of them in all different sizes and colours. I love notebooks, especially empty, untouched and pristine notebooks. Yes, I have a problem – I’m a stationery addict. Anyway I found another notebook that I would love to add to my collection of pretties.

You can get this and 9 other classic Penguin titles as blank notebooks from one of my favourite online stores – Notemaker.

My brother caught this shark on Saturday night while out fishing (from the beach). It’s probably just over a metre from nose to tip of the tail and I believe it’s a Grey Nurse but I’m no shark expert. My brother let it go, unharmed, and it swam off into the dark ocean. Kinda makes me wonder what else may have been lurking out there. There’s been so many reports of shark sightings and attacks over the last few weeks that the idea of swimming in the sea freaks me out.

This year I made a concerted effort to get our Christmas tree up and decorated early in December so we could enjoy it for the whole month. I really enjoy sitting down in the evening and seeing the twinkling lights and the pretty red ornaments and while I’m not feeling overly fa-la-la-la-la-like festive, I am more ho-ho than humbug. I thought you might like to see what the tree looks like so I very quickly semi-deep etched a photo (you can tell that it all got a little too hard as I got lower and lower – but you get the idea).

I love red on Christmas trees  so I decorated with primarily red and gold decorations. In fact my collection of decorations and baubles is pretty much solely red and gold – I’m pretty much a traditionalist – although I do love the tres trendy silver trees with gorgeous vintage baubles like this one though I don’t think I could pull it off. I love getting Christmas decorations from family too but some of the stuff I get given doesn’t match the scheme. I think I’ll need to invest in a little tree and decorate it with all the family given ones. I’ll put this on the list of things to do next year.

Speaking of family given decorations, each year (well for the last 3 or 4 I think) Mum has been making decorations for us to hang on our tree. This year it was a very cute beaded heart. I don’t know where she gets the ideas for each decoration from but they’re always flawless and the perfect addition to our tree.

Did you put a picture of your tree online? If you did, make sure you link to it in the comments so I can have a look!

Found a link to ultra-cool Gelaskins via Perez Hilton’s sidebar.
If I had an excess of money I’d definitely buy some of their art to stick on my laptop.

Check out how cool these are!

Monster – Playdead Cult

Rough Night Out – Bob Dob

Echoplex – Aaron Kranten

and my favourite of all…

My Pop – Colin Johnson

so frakkin’ cool, yes?

I got another thought provoking email from Daily Candy today. This time it was about a $22,000 cat called an Ashera which is like a mini leopard. As far as I can tell this pricey kitty is just like other kitties except it’s ‘exotic’. I seriously doubt that $22,000 poop is any different than $66 spayed, Cat Haven poop though. The only way I’d buy a leopard kitty is if it cleaned up after itself, got it’s own food and could do the laundry. Now, that would be $22,000 well spent.

This email got me thinking about what other kinds of exotic pets I might be able to acquire via the WWW. After a day spent wading through various nondescript online ‘pet stores’ I came up with the following list, complete with handy links in case you feel the urge to splurge.

Only $2000!!

I’m lots of fun!

Buy me today!

Isn’t he/she sweet with his little spikes!