Memoirs with a glass of champagne: June 2013

27 June 2013

Book corner: James Patterson: 2nd Chance

I read the 5th book of this series without realizing it was a series, then went back looking for book one to four, they weren't available on Kindle at that stage so I continued with the series through book ten. Just before James Patterson launched book eleven, I checked back and book one to four was now available on Kindle. Book one in the series 1st to Die was fabulous, having finished 1st to Die I got moving with onto 2nd chance. I love this series, it is about four ladies who become friends during the first book and form a "women's murder club"

as the main character Lindsay a recently promoted Lieutenant (after solving the Bride & Groom murder case in 1st to Die) along with Cindy (lead crime reporter of the Chronicle), Claire (Chief Medical Examiner) & Jill (Assistant District Attorney). 2nd Chance reconvenes the four women, this time to solve the murders of two African Americans, a little girl and an old woman, bearing all the signs of a serial killer. Both victims were related to city cops. The rest of the book plays out as more victims are murdered and the four ladies work together to bring the case to an end. James Patterson's books are easy reading that move at a fast pace, all in all, a good chilling thrill. Now onto 3rd Degree

Till next time

xoxo

26 June 2013

Totes adore

Looking for totes to corral certain items in my home and came across these cuties from Thirty One Gifts, having beautiful containers to corral your things definitely makes organization far more fun
Till next time
xoxo

Project Organisation: Gift Wrap Station

As I mentioned in a previous post I am currently busy organising the "Bat Cave" and want the left hand side to hold all my crafts and projects (now that i will have time to actually work on them again) However, having become very frustrated with having gift wrap supplies in various places throughout the house, I decided to corral them all in one place and create a Gift Wrap station, as soon as Grant has moved my shelves around I will place this under the "Desk" Shelf on the left hand side.
I went off to Builders Warehouse this morning and purchased the Elfa Sliding Basket System. I bought the seven slider unit, with a Jumbo, Standard & 2 Slim drawers, it will fit exactly under the desk area and the drawers slide out easily for access.

Here is the completed unit, 4 drawers full of gift wrap essentials

This will be housed behind the drawer unit, I may tie a ribbon around them just to keep them upright

Bottom drawer has gift bags of assorted sizes

This drawer holds colored paper & extra cards

Colored twine, rafia, organza gift bags, tissue paper, gift boxes & ribbon

Top drawer holds various types of tape, glue dots, glitter glue & hot glue gun

Its great to see things coming together.

Till next time
xoxo

#nails of the week

A good old fashioned French manicure with Essie : pink a boo

Till next time

Xoxo

25 June 2013

Tuesday tea time

I am not a tea nor a coffee drinker, I really am just a water, wine or the now, very occasional Red Bull drinker. However since being at home and wanting to cut ~~down~~ out the Red Bull completely I went looking for a healthier alternative. I have now started a love affair with tea. I had quite an extensive collection of tea all given to me as presents, so i sorted through them all, sorted them into separate baggies then corralled them into tins and labeled them as Fruit teas, Chai Teas, Green Teas, Rooibos, Chinese Tea then placed my Stivia in the last tin, along with my bottle of Agave. I use the Stivia when I make iced tea with the fruit tea and I use the agave when I have hot tea

This is my absolute favorite fruit tea, how can you go wrong with champagne, strawberry & truffle, it is a loose leaf tea that I drink hot and use a tea ball to brew, I have this with just a spoonful of agave

This is Chai Vanilla tea with a spoonful of Agave and some almond milk, so delicious

This baby's on my absolute lust list but at a price of R 2650 for the Breville tea maker it will have to wait until Christmas time (hint hint family) with this baby, you select the tea type (green, oolong, black etc) place the tea in the magnetic basket, select the strength (mild, medium, strong), the water then boils to the exact temperature that is required for the tea selected, then the basket lowers into he water and stews for just the right amount of time, then raises again, and whats even better you can get it to hold the temperature for up to 60 minutes. I know it is very pricey but this just has to find its way to my kitchen and my new found love of tea.

till next time
xoxo

24 June 2013

Clean doggies

Doogie-Bug

Roxy

Once a month the four dogs are collected by the Doggy Parlour and taken away to get groomed. (Riley is still too small to go with, so he stays home with me) I just adore it when the dogs come back from the parlor, they also love being so clean and groomed beautifully.

Mishka

My gorgeous fur babies, very happy to be home

Bailey

Till next time
xoxo

Project Organisation: Revamping the bat cave

I have a room that is attached to my bedroom that Grant fondly refers to as my bat cave. I have my dressing table in there and use the other side to store crafts, magazines and my sewing stuff. It just isn't working for me right now so I will be revamping this to become a more functional area, my plan of attack, is to change the shelving area to work more as a desk (will mean Grant will have to move all three of the current shelves to different heights (which I am sure he will be absolutely thrilled about) moving the bottom shelf up above the top shelf for additional storage and then moving the middle shelf down to desk height, I then want to move all my crafting paraphernalia to here as it is currently housed in various places in the house, then use the new bottom shelf as a desk area that I can actually work on. I also want to make a gift wrap station that i will house on the side wall to the left of this photograph so that all my gift wrap essentials are all in one place, making it easier to wrap presents.

This area by the window is exceptionally bland so I have asked Grant to pick up some form of metal strip for me that I can hang above the window that I can then use magnets to display items that should perk this area up somewhat. I also have two additional pictures I want hung on the wall next to my dressing table.

This is my dressing table that is in some dire need of sorting out, along with the cubbies that partition off the bat cave to the rest of the bedroom, once the crafting side is sorted, this needs to be rearranged, it is functional but not very aesthetic right now. so this is the plan for this week. Revamp the Bat Cave
Will show updated pictures when I have completed this project
Till next time
xoxo

23 June 2013

#nails of the week

Essie : Thigh High and Top Shop : Jem Red

Till next time

Xoxo

22 June 2013

Project Organisation: Magazine Management

As part of "Spring Cleaning" my entire house one of the tasks I wanted to deal with was the overflow of magazines that I have accumulated. It is so very out of hand, I have monthly subscriptions of both actual magazines as well as e versions that are delivered to my i-pad. As life is so busy, they pile up and pile up and I don't get round to reading them.

Exhibit A (basket under my desk, full to the brim)

Exhibit B (three baskets in my Bat Cave)

Exhibit C (7 magazine folders)

So my plan of attack is as follows.
1. The first thing I did when one of my e version magazines came up for renewal, I opted out. No point in adding to the piles, I will not renew any further subscription until I have fully caught up.
2. I have also diarised 30 minutes a day to read through my magazines
3. I purchased another portfolio filer and labeled it for each room of my house as well as projects, recipes, holidays & Books so as I work through my magazines, if anything catches my fancy I just snip it out and file it under the relevant section.
4. At the end of each week I transfer relevant receipe's into my recipe book by either rewritting them or just pasting them in

I am systematically working my way through these magazines and will get on top of them and pair them down to a manageable number, then realistically look at which magazines I actually want going forward.

Heres to more happy organizing

Till next time

xoxo

20 June 2013

A new Fur Baby

We have a new fur baby, his name is Riley, when he came home with us he weighed 2kg and as small as he is, he has no fear, he took on the rest of the dogs and made it very clear that he may be small but they weren't to mess with him. He is such a feisty little one, but is settling down very nicely into our family and has crept into our hearts with much ease