Chrismukkah!

 Merry Christmas friends! I cannot believe another Christmas has just been and gone. It seems like this year has sped by at a pace, and boom it's suddenly December.





Must say it was a lovely, quiet Christmas with the family, rather different to last years fiesta. We had a beautiful turkey, which i stupidly forgot to photograph, delicious crispy potatoes, plenty of roasted vegetables, and all the marvelous sauces and gravies.

My Christmas continued the next day, with the (so far) 3 year tradition of Friend Christmas. Essentially my uni friends hate spending Christmas with their families and would much rather be spending it with each other, so we get together and celebrate with booze, barbecuing, and Kris Kringle. It was a really lovely day, despite the almost horrible weather.






Christmas didn't end there. On the 27th i joined Ellen's group of friends for their Group Christmas. Drinks and nibblies at Jan's place (OMG the homemade spinach dip was a.m.a.z.i.n.g.), and then onto Ice and Slice for pizza and gelato.





And then today was Ellen's birthday. So more celebrating, present giving and eating occurred. :)





Needless to say it's been a fun filled few days. How did you guys spend your Christmas/Hannukah/other holiday?





Petunia x

Films by the bucket full

I've been stuck in bed for almost a week now. And instead of succumbing to illness and sleeping the days away, i decided watching movies was a much better idea. I've plowed my way through some brilliant slasher films, but what i've really enjoyed are the films oozing with Christmassy joy. I know it's stupid, but around this time of year i do like to watch crappy Christmas movies about family and love and most importantly Santa! So here's my list of Christmas films to watch, and i'll throw in a few i am dying to watch myself.

This is such a stupid movie, and i love it. It's about a thieving Santa with a dwarf elf as a side kick. It's just a great movie. Watch it!



I can't help but want to watch this movie. A Christmas horror flick, hells yes. It appears to be a slasher film about a psychotic Santa killing sorority girls.



I love this version of Charles Dicken's Christmas Carol. It's just a sweet animated film that makes you feel all Christmassy inside.



Not quite as good as the 2001 version, but still a good take on such a well known story. I liked the somewhat darker take, and besides who can resist Jim Carey as Scrooge?



Ironic how true this movie is. People get so freakishly competitive with their Christmas decorations. I even heard a child telling they're mom "we need that Santa light mom because next door has more lights than us and it's not fair". Ridiculous, but true.

  

Two very over the top Hollywood romantic comedies that i am sure all of you have seen. I love them, in fact, i own them both on DVD. Hehe.



Childhood. Need i say more?



Such a nice refreshing take on Christmas. I can watch this film anytime of the year though, which is what i love about it most.



This actually gets me in the spirit of Christmas. It makes me want to buy presents and wrap them beautifully, and it even makes me want to believe in Santa Claus despite being 22 years old. Tom Hanks is great, the music is great, and really the idea of hopping on a ghost train in the middle of the night and visiting the north pole is just fantastic.



My all time favorite Christmas film ever. I have loved this movie since i was a little girl. It's bittersweet and heartwarming. A family is reunited, adults learn to put aside their stupidities, and love prevails, all because of a little angel girl. Just beautiful.

What are your favorite Christmas movies? I'd love some suggestions of news ones to watch.

Petunia
x

A little bit of Africa

I just got back from a wonderful trip to my birthplace, Johannesburg South Africa. I had the most amazing time seeing my family, and a few of my old friends. I didn't realize just how much i'd missed them until i was there.

Mom and i did some amazing things over. We played with monkeys, cheetah's and baby lions. We went on a game drive and saw lions (which were within touching distance), elephants, rhinos, giraffes, hares, zebra, and springbok. We took a trip to Sun City for a couple of days, and spent some time tanning and swimming at their fake beach. We spent a lot of time with grandpa, Michelle and Nick which was really wonderful. Nick is so much fun, he reminds me a lot of my brother. We got a chance to see my uncles. I even saw a couple of old school friends, so strange seeing people after 7 years.

Enough yammering about what i did. Here are some photos for you yo enjoy.

Mom and i at her 30 year arts high school reunion. 

About to gamble for the very first time with my step gran Michelle. She won a fortune at the roulette table. 

Mom and i getting out swim on at Sun City. Sun City is a resort type lace that has a fake beach, a wave pool, water slides, eating places, a safari etc. Loads of fun.

At the bottom of this picture you can see a grey line, that is the bottom of the vans window. That is how close this lion was to me. :o

A very large pack of elephants.

Aapie the monkey having fun with my curls at the Monkey Sanctuary. 

Grandpa's new kitten, currently named Tigger (but has had several names before this, so we'll see what sticks). 

We attended Jodi and Peter's engagement party while we were in Joburg. This is the part of the lovely family. Jodi is the gorgeous girl in the bottom right, and Peter is next to her. 

Here's my outfit at the engagement. I love my Max & Co. dress. Mom was in love with it too.

My very cute half uncle Nick giving mom lots of love. 

CHEETAH! I got to play with a cheetah named Mesai. He purred, he played, he listend when we told him to sit or to tap our hands. And his brother Felix meowed, just like a cat.

We also plated with lion cubs who are not as friendly as cheetahs, but still very cute. 

Petunia x

Thriller night....

So i've been a little slack as usual. I am a tragic little petunia, and an even more tragic little blogger. But i am here now with some photos of my Halloween outfit. This year i had every intention as going as a very scantily clad devil, but thought better of it and opted for Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz.

Isn't Dorothy just the most adorably dressed character? She's so stylishly vintage. I tried my best to dress as closely to her as possible, and thanks to Ellen i did rather well. 

Here i am all cute in Ellen's Dorothy style dress. I even have Toto as my loyal companion through Munchkin Land. And look at the pretty shoes, aren't they amazing? They are Ellen's sadly, and i love them. They worked perfectly as Ruby slippers. 

I spent Halloween with some of Ellen's lovely school friends. It wasn't a rowdy night, just relaxed and calm, lots of chit chat and girly giggling. Very fun. I hope you all had as enjoyable Halloween as i did. I promise i will update again soonish with pictures from the Love Vintage Fair. But you may have to give me a couple of weeks as tomorrow i leave for Johannesburg. I am so excited. I promise to put up some photo from the trip as well. :)

Petunia

x

Little brothers graduation

Today was my brothers graduation from high school. It was a long ceremony, many performances, and speeches, and 180 odd boys to send out into the wider world. I must say the performances were lovely, especially one in particular. An incredibly talented year 12 boy played a piano piece that he presumably transcribed himself from a number of pop songs. It was really wonderful. 

Not the greatest photos of the graduation, sadly my camera was being extremely uncooperative. But he still looks lovely.

I just adore this dress, i feel so sexy and comfortable in it. I eyed it and eyed it on etsy, and kept resisting it, and when i finally decided to buy it i realized it had sold. I was so sad, i moaned to Ellen about it a number of times, i regretted not snapping it up immediately. And then guess what? I looked into my cupboard one day, and there it was, in the blue dress section. And i smiled, a big grin, realizing that Ellen had sneakily bought it for me as a treat.

I finally wore it for the first time today, it was a perfect graduation dress, everyone loved it. :) Thanks Elle!!!

Petunia
x

A splash of colour

This weekend was absolutely delightful. Such amazing sunny, warm weather, 26 degree heat, clear skies, and a beautiful city to enjoy. I had lunch with my friend Sophie at Icebergs, the North Bondi swimming club. The view was stunning, wish i had taken my camera with, and the food was tasty. This is my super cute new dress which i've been unable to wear due to it's length. I finally hemmed it, and figured what a perfect dress to celebrate the new warm weather.

Dress: Dear Golden Vintage

Necklace: Vinnies

Shoes: Some strange shop in Hong Kong

Cat: my sweet 3 legged kitty Catastrophe

Petunia x

Pretty in pink

It seems our lovely little gardenia bush decided to bloom early this year. I think it got confused by the sudden spurt of hot weather we had a week or so ago. Anyway, i decided to take advantage of such a lovely backdrop.

Dress: Abercrombie and Fitch, bought on ebay

I really love this dress. I wore it to uni last week when it was really warm, and i got so many lovely compliments. 

Petunia

x

3 days of birthday!

Here's that birthday post i promised. I was spoiled absolutely rotten all weekend, it was a really lovely birthday. 

On Thursday i had a nice family dinner at Kam Fook. It's a birthday tradition in our family to pick a restaurant or a meal, and i was dying for Peking duck. It was a lovely dinner, plenty of silliness and giggling, especially over the fortunes in our fortune cookies. Ellen has a trick, you just add 'in bed' to the end of your fortune, and suddenly they become hilariously pornographic and strange. 

That's my gran, mom and dad, i guess that might be obvious. Can you see the family resemblance?

On the Friday night Ellen spoiled me entirely rotten. She took me to Opera Bar for dinner, we had a lovely share platter. They really know how to cook, the food was delicious, and surprisingly filling for a share platter. Then she took me to the opera to see La Boheme. Oh my goodness, what an amazing opera, especially for my first live opera experience. After the opera Ellie took me to possibly my favorite restaurant, Pony, for desert. I had an apple tart with vanilla ice-cream and caramel sauce. It was amazing. Ellen had a tasty chocolatey fondant type desert, also amazing. 

Last of the birthday spoils was a lovely lunch with my friends. Have to say Bondi Social may be painful to book with, but their food is really wonderful. They have a share plate menu, and really you just pick a bunch and tuck in, and everyone gets a taste of everything. 

The lovely Mel and Bianca.

Me and my bestie Ali.

The pretty Alex, Ellen and Elyse.

So there you have it, 3 days of celebration, 3 days of food, fun and friends and well presents, but they don't start with f.

Petunia
x