Francais

Bonjour!

I have decided to learn French.

Why when I live in New Zealand?

Well, I already know English.... I have a degree to prove it, but fluency is slipping daily :)

Maori won't be quite as useful in America when I one day move back....

Spanish would make the most sense but I already took years of Spanish... I forget most of it, but basically I want to be crazy and do something fun... That's why I'm learning French!

{Gack! I love Amelie! Love! LOVE! LoVE! lOVe!!!}

Who knows, maybe I will get sick of it and switch to Chinese next week, but right now I am seriously loving it! It's like I've tapped into some little wish from when I was a little girl and French sounded so pretty and I wanted to be the girl who spoke French... If that's all it gives me then it was worth it!

I am not taking classes though... I'm doing it audio style... Personally I think that classes work better for me, but this is a fun game at the moment. I think I might try and listen to some French podcasts while I'm at work because the amount of appropriate music I have is limited, and I don't want to get sick of my precious favorite artists!

{blah blah... Something something.... French}

So the plan is basically to force it into my brain and hope I make some French friends or plan a trip to France... Maybe I'll just be super cool at French restaurants? I'll be like those people who watch the Spanish channel and become fluent.

{Yes, if I learn French maybe this will happen to me too... Only I keep my head}

Seriously.... I forgot how much I LOVE!!!! Amelie and Audrey Tautou, and actually got more excited while writing this post.

{French Bulldog.... I love you}

Lunch

Look at the beautiful sushi I had today...

You know when you try and bite your sushi in half instead of shoveling the whole thing in at once? You think you are being graceful by taking a bite, but really you are ripping your sushi to shreds- all except the seaweed which remains in tact and annoyingly stuck to your lip... Do you know that feeling?

This is not that kind of sushi.

Every single bite melted away gracefully into my mouth. No tearing and no fingers. Just bites.

Midori Sushi here in Wellington is seriously awesome.

I had a voucher to go to the already cheap-o sushi place but turned around when I remembered Midori Sushi... I should have had a photo to compare, but just trust me: compared to this it looked like wet cat food rolled up in rice and some green stuff. This cost twice as much but I am 10 times as happy with it.

Home again home again... Jiggity jig.

Sigh... Back to my awesome home.... Le sigh...

{Hey there!}

Lets pretend I live here:

{Come in!}

{My bedroom}

{My kitchen}

Here's one corner of my back yard... I call this the rocking chair corner.

{One corner of the back yard}

Thanks for stopping by!

Brown Cat bad boy

So today the Brown Cat caught a bird... It was huge!

Of course it was a gift for Mike and I since he loves us so much.

{Brown Cat tough boy}

I'm the one who noticed him walking through the back yard with a massive creature in his mouth, but I don't have the stomach to look much closer. Mike is the one who locked him out of the cat door before he brought it in the house....

Mike thought for sure it was a King Fisher.... Hopefully not the native variety.... But seriously, that is a massive bird!

{King Fisher,,,, I'm so sorry}

Thanks Brown Cat, what a nice present.

Since Mike locked him out of the cat door, the Brown Cat dropped it, and we hope it flew away.... We don't really know though. Mike went outside looking for it, and found nothing, so "flew away" is a safe bet.

Thanks Brown Cat.... I know you love us.

House sitting

I have been looking forward to this week!

When you are renting the cheapest house possible so that you can save the most money possible, and when your land lady is more like a slum lord: you really appreciate a nice house!

Mike and I are house sitting at his sister's house, which means I have cats to cuddle with, a dishwasher, a heater, and a bath tub! (Yes, I said heater... Not all New Zealand houses have heat pumps. We have a space heater... Not good enough.)

Plus I can sit around all day watching Harry Potter because I don't drive and I don't feel like walking down to the bus stop!

Woo hoo! Nothin' to do!

Who wouldn't want to cuddle with him:

{Brown Cat}

Or him:

{Black Cat}

Let the relaxation and cuddles begin!

Too bad I forgot my Harry Potter movies at home.... and the cats are somewhere outside.

It's like one of those weekends where the opportunities are endless but you still sit around doing nothing but blogging.

By the way... The Brown Cat has his own blog. His name is Slim (and the black one's name is Spike), but they are only ever called Brown or Black. Be sure to check out Brown's blog because he is the coolest cat ever.

{Brown cat mad}

Vloggin Vednesday: Cheater cheater... Pumpkin eater...

So, I've got a massive cold sore (aka the devil lives on my lip this week) and thought I didn't want to miss out on Vloggin' Vednesday since I only just stopped being lazy! So, I'm being a cheater.... And yes I love pumpkin.

Actually, its just a great coincidence that the topic for the week is about morning rituals, and that my morning ritual has already been shared during a Vloggin' Vednesday!!!

What I do every single morning is: Meditate!!

{Gabrielle Bernstein: Add More Ing}

And that is exactly what I talked about in my "How to" vlog, so if you have already seen it... Sorry.... If you have not.... Great! Learn to meditate with me!

Besides, this is one of my more popular videos on youtube. People still check it out regularly...

The rest of the details of my morning are not super interesting, but if I skip a day of meditating then I feel like there is a hole in me the whole day. It throws me off. I wake up early enough to have 20 minutes of meditation, 10 minutes of journaling about my meditation (or just thoughts), and sometimes I try and do yoga or some exercise.... Exercise is hard at 6 am!

See that girl meditating in the middle of the street? She is a huge inspiration for me, and has really got me back into meditating. One of my friends introduced me to her book and I've never looked back. Check out her book if you are interested. Also, she does guided meditations, which are available on itunes. 

Anyway, here my morning ritual and a repeat on how to mediate.




Happy meditating!

Don't forget to link up over at Adeline's Daddy, and be sure to spread the love around. Visit my vloggin pals below.

        

        

Wow

Where did this week go?

I saw that my sister uploaded a new Vlogging Vednesday video, and I thought "what the heck? Already?" Then I realized that it is already Tuesday! Where did the time go? (She's super on top of her blog anyway)

So this is me saying "Hello world! I'm still here! I must be enjoying myself if I lost a week in there!"

{Gypsy Kitchen Wellington}

So, what have I been up to?

Between friends visiting from Queenstown, and randomly finding out another friend was in Wellington from the states; it has been a good week.

I found the best Japanese takeaway in town (Midori Sushi on Willis)... I skipped out on a concert to watch Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and drink whiskey (more fun than it sounds).

{Udon in a park}

I found a tree with a sweater and I ate a savory scone with mashed potatoes in it:

{Stay warm fella}

{Scone from the Gypsy Kitchen... Freak of nature}

Mike showed me a shop filled with vintage kimonos....

{That one there was like $300}

{Kimono heaven... I want I want}

And last night I hung out in a bar with about 80 Americans.... I was introduced to most of them (friend from the states was their boss on a business trip), and it made me want to go to New York and Boston so badly. (I've never been). It was like America came to me. It was awesome. 

What have you been up to?

Vloggin Vednesday: Photo share

Yes, I took a few weeks off of Vlogging Vednesday, but what can I say? I was lazy....

It was fun getting back into it though! There's nothing like talking about yourself to put a smile on your face...

{Cheese}

Actually, I love love love sharing my photos!

Of course I do! I have a blog.

At first I didn't know what I would talk about, so I just started pulling out some random photos that make me happy. Then as I got talking about them, I realized I had so many good memories and things to say about each one.

Don't forget to link up over at Adeline's Daddy, and be sure to spread the love around. Visit my vloggin pals below.

        

        

Beer

I love beer...

{Tuatara APA}

We went out to a cool bar near our house and of course I made Mike take photos of me for the blog.

{Mike+Beer}

Nothing exciting happened... I drew a picture of Mike in a tutu on the paper table cloth.

{Punch you!}

He was a pretty ballerina.

{I'm so tough}

We had chips for dinner... (french fries)...

{Smile?}

We are awesome.