Thank Frock It's Friday! ♥

Starring none other than the most delicious aspects of the week that was, the most extraordinary! (Hint: oddly enough, washing the dishes DOESN'T ever appear on these lists. Unless of course you do love washing the dishes, in which case I'll stop, laugh awkwardly and try to pretend that this whole conversation never happened...) 

x Melbourne Propositions - One of my best friends sent me an e-mail earlier in the week which simply said ''I've decided that I need more fun and adventure in my life, more things to look FORWARD to!  Want to come on a weekend trip to Melbourne?!'' (Now is that a fantastic e-mail to receive or what?!) My fantasy answer: ''I'll book my flights now!'' My realistic answer: ''uh, let me just check my imaginary Lotto ticket to see if I've um, won. And if I have? GOOD NEWS! I'll not only be able to buy my tickets, but the entire country's, too! Yippee!'' In short? I am saving close to every single coin that I have at the moment, because in exactly four months' time, I'll be in PARIS! And in the interest of actually being able to stroll around and buy a croissant or a beret (or work another stereotype into that sentence!) while I'm there, I'm currently exercising some spending restraint of epic proportions. (But argh, the lure of Melbourne is so incredibly strong!) And on that note...

x Making Tiny Swaps - Like making homemade pizzas on a Friday night instead of ordering or buying them. Meeting friends for an afternoon coffee instead of a full-blown dinner and drinks fest. Buying the $1.80 pretzel from the German bakery across the road instead of one of their $4.80 cakes. (All hypothetically, of course! Ahem...) It's making these tiny swaps which are small enough to remind me that saving doesn't translate to ''all of the glee is being stripped from your life and you will never experience any form of retail-based joy ever again!'', but big enough to make a significant difference.

x This Photograph - Because it's not only taken by my mother (nice, huh?!), but also because it features my beautiful little sister and cousin, and reminds me of how completely exquisite New Zealand is:

x Other Little Things - Cherry blossom scented candles; Sunday morning cleaning sprees (you know the kind where you tackle the cupboards/drawers that you've been ignoring all year, but finally decide to because you can't actually open or close them any more? Yes!); Fudge's hair straightening products (shock! They actually work!); homemade chilli con carne; finally finalising our accommodation for London in October; and orange flavoured chocolate!

This Week -

x I Can't Stop Listening To -  As usual, it's been a completely mixed/this-is-why-I-could-never-leave-my-Ipod-on-shuffle-at-parties-or-any-kind-of-social-get-together-out-of-sheer-embarrassment kind of musical bag! Think The Beach Boys' Summer Dreams album on repeat, jingles from The Simpsons, classical music with horror themes, Led Zeppelin's The Rain Song while it's been pouring and Timbaland's Morning After Dark...

Suggestions For The Weekend Ahead -

x Reflect upon what your favourite age has been thus far: was it 15? 37? 58? 76? Why? For the longest time, I was utterly convinced that my 17th year was the most excellent, and that NOTHING would surpass it (how silly!) - I would find myself getting all nostalgic whenever I would talk about it and even PINING for it, until one day when I questioned why the heck I seemed to be so intent on relishing the past instead of trying to, as corny as it might sound, enjoy the present and look forward to the future. Were things so bad now that I wanted to keep re-living my apparent ''glory years''? And why WERE they even my ''glory years''?! If your twenty-fourth year rocked your socks off because you travelled constantly, vow to travel more. If being eighteen was momentous because you had no responsibilities, try to determine where you can eliminate some!

x Purchase a small plastic animal figurine to hide around your home for your parent/flatmate/partner to find. My boyfriend and I used to conceal a miniature dinosaur in the most unexpected locations for eachother (in the shower, in the cereal box, tucked underneath the ring-pull device on a can!) to discover until one day when it was hidden so well that we were um, never able to find it again! We have since moved onto a bespectacled green slug holding a microphone. He was in the cutlery drawer this morning.

♥

Melbourne dreams and miraculous straightening products; these are a few of my favourite things! What are a few of YOUR favourite things this week?

xoxo

P.S. I am attending a wedding as a bridesmaid tomorrow, nerves! (There's something about weddings that just make me feel so hyperventilating-into-a-brown-paper-bag!) Please feel free to wish me luck or send don't-trip-over-your-own-dress thoughts my way!