CURRENTLY.

Linking in with the lovely Danielle from Sometimes Sweet for the first time, these prompts are really helpful to get the brain ticking over. Sometimes life moves at such a speed that I struggle to recall what is happening currently lol.

Watching: The Block All Stars and re-watching Sex and the City for the fifth time. Himself and I are hooked on this series of The Block so its fun to have that to share with one another. Also, I just super love renovation and design shows so that works haha.

Thinking about: Himself and his creative venture. We've been interested in vintage furniture, recycling, and salvaging items that would otherwise go to landfill for years. Up cycling items into new pieces, or just restoring those for our home. Anyhow, turns out that himself really loves it and he is great at it. It has begun to turn into something bigger (One Man's Trash) and I am the (self appointed) social media/marketing/retail manager haha. It is very fun, and I am so proud of him!

Also thinking about - sustainability. The way in which we eat, live, and our consumer habits. Sometimes I get horrid anxiety re:what we are doing to this poor Earth. I have been trying to get more locally, and making a conscious effort to reduce my impact.

Reading:  Animal , Vegetable, Miracle:A year of Food Life - by Barbara Kingsolver. I'm only a few chapters in so far and it is very interesting/informative regarding eating seasonally, and of just how far our food has travelled to be on our plate.  As a society we are so used to being able to get pretty much any fruit and vegetable at any time, mostly to the detriment of the Earth (fuel consumption etc) or the poor local farmers! Very eye opening indeed.

Looking forward to: Seeing Tegan and Sarah in April, regaining my fitness/health, and watching my love enjoy his work THAT much more.

Making me happy: Baby cuddles from my great niece, time spent nurturing my mind/body/and home, de-cluttering and a more organised home, my Ruby Clare and her loving, this blog and other lovelies out there - inspired :-D

Link in below so I can drop by and check out what is happening in your world.

Mel x

NY adventures Day One (image heavy)

My achiever trip to New York City. That I won (see here)

Oh my goodness. It was such a massive experience. So many firsts, massive amounts of places visited that I have dreamt of my whole life, the whole week was just so much.
If the people travelling with me had known how many times I thought "Its just like in the movies! SQUEEEEE!!" to myself they might just of disowned me lol. SQUEEEEE is my delightedexcitedhappydanceohmygawdimightdiefromexcitement sound. My trip was full of SQUEEEEE moments ;-)

The plane trip there was a really concentrated blend of excitement, fun, and wanting to pass out as I felt so horrid. This was my first visit to another country so the novelty of a larger plane was not lost on me. Having taken a fear of flying course and researched like a mofo it wasn't anywhere as an anxious experience as expected.
The Tv and movie options were plentiful, the crew friendly, and I was on my way to freaking NEW YORK CITY!
Via Los Angeles. In economy. Not a short or comfortable trip for me. My legs and feet melded into one swelled mess at around hour five or six. I found it impossible to sleep, all I wanted to do was lie down flat.
The food? Yummy as. They kept bringing it out. The food, Arj Barker live, and a gazillion episodes of hoarders kept me somewhat sane.
That and getting to stretch the legs at Los Angeles.

Arriving at JFK and the drive into the city as the sun went down was amazeballs. Seeing glimpses of the skyline as we drove in was beautiful. Even the traffic was okay. Since I was in America. In New York.

We stayed at the Park Central hotel. Having read plenty of reviews beforehand I knew I was in for an adventure at best. It was interesting. Black mould on walls. Filthy toilet that didn't flush. Glad wrap  over smoke detector.

Nice.

We asked for a new room. They didn't question why or even apologise. The new one smelt like wet feet and had some suss stains on the sheets. Yuck.

the classy view from our room

 Anyhow, we didn't spend much time in the room, we headed straight out for dinners. Mexican and the yummiest cocktail I ever did have. It was a prickly pear Margarita. Can't even remember the name of the restaurant but it was delicious and the service was incredible. Actually, everywhere we ate was about a gazillion times better than it is in Aus.

Walking up to Times Square after ward was super exciting, actually being in Times Square was pretty surreal. Lots of people trying to hustle for money though. 

At dinner we got told what we needed to wear for the next day but not what was happening. It was like that the whole time. In the weeks leading up to the trip I thought this might really bother me but I actually found it super exciting. Most times we wouldn't find out what we were doing until we arrived at that activity.
Anyhow, we got told to dress nicely as we were going somewhere fancy that afternoon.

Our first full day started with breakfast at some cute diner near the hotel (I will mention here how awful the coffee was I encountered pretty much everywhere in New York! Yuck! So watery and bitter) and walking about ten blocks to our first activity for the day...

so stoked to see a mounted policeman - those horses were obviously really well looked after/loved

Times Square sculptures

Times Square 

 ...a bus tour of downtown - super fun - I loved hearing about the landmarks, history of the buildings, and the stories of the city both new and old. 

me! on the bus, my roommate in the background - she was super gorgeous and really lovely