Thank you my families for a really lovely day, we had breakfast with JA’s side and lunch with mine, and our first Easter egg hunt with Rafa was deliciously fun and adorable =D

Light and Space
In Britain we have the dubious honour of having the smallest average domestic room size of any European nation, which, in an effort to retain the largest living and bedroom spaces possible, often results in us having smaller bathrooms than we would ideally like. Any additional light sources will help to make the room feel larger, as will light coloured walls. Light pastel walls will help to enhance the sensation of light and space, without the somewhat sterile effect that white walls can sometimes have, especially in addition to an all-white bathroom suite. An illuminated mirror is a stylish and contemporary way to create not only a larger-feeling bathroom, but a glamorous vanity area as well.

Your Bathroom Suite
Replacing an entire bathroom suite can be an expensive and time consuming affair, so if your current suite is still performing to the standards you require it to, then replacing the taps, wastes and flushes is a cost-effective and easy way to give your suite a fresh new look. Modern chrome-finished hardware will look chic and contemporary, whilst ceramic disc technology in modern taps will give you greater control over water temperature and flow rate than ever before.

Storage We all tend to accumulate far more cosmetics, toiletries and cleaning supplies than we really need, and without sufficient storage space available, even the largest bathroom will begin to feel cluttered and cramped over time. Fortunately, bathroom furniture is the hot trend at the moment, and is more popular, and more affordable than ever before. To keep your bathroom neat and organised, with all your products discreetly stored out of sight, just to or three units will be sufficient to create a thought-out, designed bathroom aesthetic, as well as catering to all of your storage requirements.

Efficient Fixtures and Fittings
Around 60% of all domestic water usage takes place in the bathroom, so it’s vitally important to have efficient fixtures and fittings in place to help keep bills down over time. A dual flush toilet will greater control over the mount of water your toilet is using, and multi-purpose products, such as a chrome finished heated towel rail will help to warm your room whilst also being a strong style statement.

Style and Design
Chrome is the must-have material for bathroom hardware and smaller fittings, whilst natural wooden cabinets and natural stone tiles are to go-to products for those wishing to create a truly stylish, contemporary bathroom that is right on trend.
This list should help get started on planning your project, but take some time as well to have a click around and find best products for you. Good luck!

Helen Davies is a senior content writer for Better Bathrooms, who sell good looking contemporary and traditional bathroom furniture at realistic prices.

Well, I decided to build a small 1.2m sq in May of last year, to plant vegetables and fruits in time for the current summer.

After a few false starts (buying treated wood at first, then correcting the choice with hard wood pails) I built the structure all by myself (proud! ps, corded electric drills work WAY better than cordless ones whose battery never charges properly) and using the giant fat Kitchen Garden Companion by Stephanie Alexander, I prepared the soil and got the bed ready.

Annnnnnd 7 months later HOLY WOW! We have been rewarded with humungous zucchinis and the juiciest, best tasting tomatos ever.

People keep asking me what I’m doing to yield such good results, and the answer is “nothing”! So far, we’ve been lucky to avoid any caterpillars or birds or snails trying to eat anything, and all I do is give it a good water every few days if it hasn’t rained. Lucky or what?!

I planned spaghetti for dinner tonight, and forgot to check if we had any zucchinis before I went to the shops, so I got one just in case. I came home, and picked these two beauties right off the vine. Makes the shop bought zucchini look pathetic really!

This is my crop of tomatos from today:

I also made a quick bruschetta for an entree from the mini romas, on top of some store bought garlic bread, and oh. my. It was super delicious.

I’m definitely going to make a bigger garden for next summer!

I’ve watched my baby boy grow up so much, pass all the usual milestones and jump ahead in leaps and bounds, he’s such a clever little engineer (still yet to say a word though!). We are so lucky to have him and are amazed that we created him.

We were also devastated by the loss of JA’s dad Frank, in October. We continue to miss him every day, and all I can say is thank goodness for Rafael and his cousin Malia, putting smiles on our sad faces every day.

This is an extremely image heavy post, but it brings joy to my heart to see my little Rafa and remember all the great things we did this year.

(Images are in reverse order from December back to January)

 The welcome sign on the front door, I made using my Cameo cutting machine and different coloured textured scrapbook card.The photo wall as you came in the door, showing all Rafa’s monthly photos from 10 days to 12 months old.

I bought a plastic backdrop online for about $20 and put it up over our big front window, and it made the whole living room glow blue which was really cool. I hung up some netting (also bought online) and cut out some sea creatures on the Cameo to stick onto the backdrop.I had SO much fun making the cake. I started very early (a week or so in advance) on the topper, made entirely of fondant and did all the ruffles myself (I watched lots of YouTube videos and got some advice from SIL Katie to learn how to do it). The dessert table didn’t have any real structure to it, I just plonked stuff where I thought it looked balanced and moved it around from there.The pink jellyfish “baby” pinãta looked great I must say. I made it of papiêr maché and stuck cut circles of crepe paper to the outside, and hung lots of strands of curling ribbon from the bottom.I hand-painted all the shells on the cake topper, there’s a few dodgy bits but I’m really happy with how it turned out =) The only things I didn’t make myself were the white balls (Jila Mints), the one little orange starfish and seahorse, and the cake itself (Boston Mud from the cheesecake shop).I put together several of these table centrepieces which were so easy and fun to do, and relatively cheap if you already have some of the supplies.I can’t get enough of fondant ruffles now! Might have to make a Christmas cake just for fun ;)I picked up this cardboard cupcake stand from BigW for about $5, and made the cupcakes from a Betty Crocker packet mix, with added gel colouring. I made a simple cream cheese icing for them, and popped the little toppers on from The Style Emporium in Gold Creek. Super easy and really effective!  I didn’t really think about it but Katie pointed out it was probably a bit morbid to have Sushi to eat with an Under the Sea Theme =PI bought candy bags from Pack It In and filled them with blue and green m&m’s for the “sea” and yellow for the “sand”, to give as favours. Never mind that the dogs managed to eat 10 of them when I was in the middle of making them!  Little Heidi was a fan of the Jellyfish Pinãta, unfortunately it was a complete fail! I rigged it so the babies could grab a length of string and pull, and that would tear the bottom out of the Jellyfish and everything would come out, but the babies wouldn’t have a bar of it, they wouldn’t hold the string or tug it, so I ended up doing it for them (it would have worked great with 2 or 3 year olds I think!) and it ended in tears haha The lucky boy received lots of lovely and thoughtful gifts! And the dogs got way too many sneaky leftovers!

It was a wonderful day and I can’t wait until next year ♥

I went with an “Under the Sea” theme, and here is a sneak peek of the lead up to the big day.

Party post coming soon!

WHAT’S A HUMAN BROCHURE?

We think the best way for you to learn about Canberra is through the eyes of people who have been here.

So we invited 500 humans, just like you, to come and
experience our city first hand and spread the word online
about all the great things they got up to.

That’s how the Human Brochure was created. Here you will
find real travel experiences shared by humans for humans.
They prove that when you look closely, there are loads of attractions, experiences and fun you can have here.

Whether you’re a foodie, family, adventure seeker, lover of art and culture, or all of the above, you’ll find plenty of like-minded humans on this site whose journeys you can follow. Then you’ve got all the information you need to plan your own amazing getaway in our nation’s capital.

We hope to see you soon.

A free holiday to my own City, with free accommodation, free adventure activities and free range to post on instagram, twitter, facebook, flickr and tumblr about all the awesome stuff to do in Canberra?

YES PLEASE.

So I applied, and a few weeks later received an acceptance email, woop woop! I was coming to Canberra! From Canberra.

The best sort of holiday when you have a one year old is one where you can pack an hour before needing to be somewhere. Add to that the fact that I left home, drove the baby to his grandparents house, drove to our accommodation, checked in, got changed and was ready to leave the hotel for our “Welcome Event” in one hour. Just one of the perks of living in Canberra – no long commutes, hardly any traffic, easy transportation from one end to the other, in no time at all.

@Spifffmeister wants to make stupid faces in all the photos#humanbrochure #doingitwrong

Upon arrival at the hotel (The Mantra on Northbourne Ave) we were greeted with a Welcome Pack, and a nice mini cocktail, and a parking space (for those with a car). We dumped our stuff in our (massive) room, got changed, and went downstairs to meet our group and head off to the Australian War Memorial for the Welcome Event.

So happy at the thought of canapés #humanbrochure War Memorial here we come!

Ian Hill of Australian Capital Tourism (along with others from the War Memorial) welcomed us, and explained how Canberra was designed with a vision in mind of how the people here would be living their lives in this City (the design of Canberra is by Walter Burley Griffin). I love living in Canberra and raising my child(ren) here, and I appreciate it as a City more and more as I get a bit older and wiser. And I think old Walt was spot on, so good job on that one, buddy.

We were shown inside, and whilst the other participants were tweeting up a storm about the Pool of Reflection, the WWI fighter planes, the movie we were shown directed by Peter Jackson and the stories of the men and women who sacrificed everything for our Nation… I tweeted about the food.

Mini tandoori sliders, well played #humanbrochure organisers! I’d like some more please.

Mini burger number 2 = winning #humanbrochure

Once I realised there was enourmous mountains of food being brought around, I was happy to look at the exhibits more closely, and JA and I found this little gem:

Which was a set of playing cards, hand drawn and made from cigarette packets.

I also really appreciated the descriptions of the medals awarded to soldiers, these being my favourites:

For matchless leadership, bravery and skill
For courage, steadiness and utter disregard of danger
For courage, coolness, skill and dogged determination
For cold-blooded bravery in saving life at the cost of his own
For courage, endurance and fearlessness beyond praise
For contempt of danger

I’ve been to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra several times with school (my old highschool is directly across the road), so I think in some way the experience has become a little bit, um, boring for me. There is lots of cool stuff to look at, and endless interesting stories to read, and our hosts who were dressed up and explained things were amazing, and the actual building itself is very beautiful. But… if you’re seeking a bit of physical adventure in Canberra, you probably won’t find it here ;) History buffs and any one interested in War, planes, old machinery, architecture or photography will really love it.

It was then time to retire to our hotels for the evening, and though some people were keen to kick on, I knew we had to be up at 6.30am for our adventure to begin, so we were tucked up snug in bed by 11pm.

Stay tuned for day 2!