New Glasses New Outfit

Posted on May 30, 2010 by SdV

Last year I had to pick out a new pair of spectacles. I have been wearing glasses since I was about 8 and for good or bad it has become a big part of me. Admittedly sometimes I hide behind them and it’s only been a few years that I started thinking of them as fashionable than merely utilitarian!

I went with an Armani black rimmed frame with copper sides and it has been sitting in its neat little case until today. About time for a switch as my old pair has been getting rather battered and scratched. I do miss it however.

This new one is all clean and and scratch free and suddenly I can see well again without squinting. Yes that is a cell phone photo. It’s alright- I do not have to resort to the dslr all the time

I’m also wearing my awesome Christmas present sweater, first seen in Blue Summers. It is of an absolutely luscious cashmere with an open back= utter love. I paired it off with a loose cotton top and dark jeans. Can’t wait to wear it again!

Breathe

Posted on May 26, 2010 by SdV

There are days when I feel so excited, that it never seems enough, never quick enough, never enough time to do all the things I would like to do. I feel as if I’ve been swimming upstream, no matter how hard I swim, how fast, how eager, I’m still in one spot. Then I look back and take a moment, see how far I’ve come and am pleasantly surprised. But I want to do more, go further, be better.

Self

Sometimes a person just have to take a breathe. To smile and look at the sky, to appreciate colours and light and smells and taste and sensations. To say it’s ok. And to see how far they could go.

And it’s absolutely amazing, that one breathe, that one moment where you’re so still, it feels like you’re part of everything right.

I can’t imagine doing anything else.

Okra and Prawn Curry

Posted on May 17, 2010 by SdV

I was inspired by the Indian theme on Masterchef (for overseas readers, Masterchef is an Australian reality tv show where amateur cooks go through challenges of becoming a master chef…..) and so I cooked up my version of the okra and prawn curry! I rolled up my sleeves and get all my ingredients out.

Ingredients

Curry paste and spices, bowl of okra, bowl of prawns with shells and heads intact, a tomato, coconut milk and rice.

Okra is a bit of a weird vegetable but it does taste very nice. Back home we call them lady fingers, not quite sure why. They have a slight furry exterior and a rather slimy interior, takes a little getting used to if you haven’t grown up eating it! Pour some oil in a pot and put in the paste and spices to cook, and 2 cups of rice with equal parts water in the rice cooker. Be careful not to let the paste and spices burn, and pour in a cup of coconut milk to thicken, bring to boil and pour in diced tomato and the okra (chop off the hard heads of the okras and a slice in the body so that it’ll soak up the juices), stir and let simmer under a lid. Peel the legs and bodies off the prawns while retaining the tails and heads, throw the prawns into the curry and let simmer under lid. When it looks about ready, add salt and sugar to taste, serve on a bed of rice.

The curry happy in the pot.

Dish up!

Turned out pretty nice actually. I was sorta worried that it wasn’t a vibrant red that the curry was -suppose- to be and it tasted a little more coconutty than usual but overall the okra and prawns and rice was good together. I still prefer my grandmother’s curry but hey, living alone on a student budget, this is still rather cool.

I’ll leave you all with a picture taken of the Melbourne skyline during sunset a few nights ago. The colours are amazing, and today we had flashes of pink….how wonderful.

Ophelia

Posted on May 14, 2010 by SdV

The Hamlet play reminded me of this lovely little understated shoot with Courtenay we did earlier this year. We have worked together a fair few times now, she is the star of our Boy Meets Girl androgyny editorial (one of my favourite images came from there), and she bakes the most awesomenest cookies.

For this particular shoot we decided on her place for a series of geek chic looks and beauty editorial involving water in her bathtub. At the same time Courtenay purchased some adorable little goldfishes (we wouldn’t have guessed that this would be the start of our animals in shoots fascination ) So we shot our version of fair and tragic Ophelia:-

Courtenay bravely submerged herself and her white dress into the cold water, taking care to not accidentally squish the fishes. It was so terrible hard herding the little fishes to the right side, they insisted on staying near the end of the tub near her feet!

I used my Canon 100d with the (then new) 50mm1.8 lens and natural light. The downside was I couldn’t really take a full body shot at this length, at the time I was precariously perched on the edge of the tabletop trying not to fall in! Courtenay is a dream to shoot though, her skin is absolutely gorgeous in the light.