fuchsia fragments

Busted my ass off at work yesterday in prep for the long weekend and being the only one in my team actually at work. So I stayed back pretty late and had 2 cakes due that night for the weekend.

Things were actually going really well. I got home, had a bit of dinner and started baking. Was done with my Ombre cake and the dirty ice for my big Saturday order and had these on the drying bench. Called it a night just after midnight.

What could go wrong?

So Maxxie was making a shitload of noise randomly in the middle of the night. And he was let in while mum quickly went to shower. In the 10 or 15 minutes of doing so, my cake was destroyed. He had taken a massive chunk out of it.

I'm pretty fortunate to have such an awesome family and to be able to spend time with them. Sit with them in a car ride for 8 hours and come out at the end alive!!

We took a few days over Easter this year to go to South Australia and wine country. Two wine regions: the Barossa Valley and Coonawarra.

So worth it.

We took the first flight out of Sydney and my goodness, I have never seen the domestic airport so packed and buzzing so early in the morning in my life. So lucky to have a very nice Jetstar lady help us with our tickets and pretty much get them straight away. And luckily, the line through security moved fast. Although, we were still pretty much the last ones to board the plane... AGAIN!

We got to Adelaide just after 8 and picked up our car. It was a Kia Cerato. Can't say I liked it much.

Drove to Hanhdorf and Beerengburg farm for freshly picked strawberries, jam, the best smoked salmon and German food!!!



 

What a Saturday... it was the annual pilgrimage to the hills for the one and only ms D's birthday. it was epic. it was cold. it was amazing. and it had all the elements of a adult kid's party down to the old school candy, party bags and screaming. Thrown in with a healthy dose of delicious food cooked by donna's mum, scones (made by me of course), meringue clouds (cherry's efforts), the DIY photo booth with very carefully crafted props and 2 rounds of epic epic Scattergories.

Just wanted to say THANK YOU for the effort, don't think I'd ever do something like it. But its good to get the Stgghs peeps together to chat (as usual, we boycotted the movie and sat in the kitchen). It brought out our competitiveness. And it meant we all ate way too much... again. The wine was amazing though :P


Had to run around in the morning dropping Ari off at tutoring and then going to the cake décor shop to pick up essentials since I won't be here next weekend. To drive down to the south and then stop by home and then all the way north feels like a mini roadtrip. The traffic was uncool yesterday: one breakdown on the m4 and an accident as well. Made for slow driving.

I think sometimes I'm not that great a driver... cue: I drive like an Asian, young female...? But I only notice this when I'm transporting cake because I'm always terrified something will happen like the cake will fall or collapse or something. Just remember breaking hard a few times and holding my breath to make sure the bunch of balloons sticking out of the cake didn't fall. It didn't... p h e w. Oh yeah, and I should probs be looking more at the road, not the cake.

Lingered a bit last night, dropped Anita off at her place but its always a quick drive in the middle of the night. Felt a little bit intimidated / out of place / spooked when driving through Punchbowl though. Was driving down this one street and it was almost 1 a.m. and there were guys hanging around their cars outside... like what the? :\

Caking, working, social drinking, tutoring, shopping... can't do it all. Feeling like I am living in a little bit of a dream and it all seems a little surreal.

I think its finally caught up with me. That there are only so many hours in a day. The need to sleep, to exercise, to work, to relax... its been a tough couple of weeks but I wouldn't have it any other way. Except maybe wish for a couple more sleep ins and shorter work days (dreaming!).

I can't wait to be fully on board with my new role. I'm not use to depending on others to do something that I would consider easy. But I will diligently and obediently follow all the rules and processes until such time as I am free to do it on my own. Even if it does drive me mad a little by little...

my toughest quarter-end yet. Staying back till 9 p.m. on a Monday night completely and utterly kills you for the rest of the week. So tired, so wired and sleep deprived for the rest of the week... work lunches and wine wasn't quite enough to make us feel better.

Makes it that much harder to bake but that much more satisfying. Midnight baking and 5 a.m. decorating!

Need to perfect my latest gluten-free cake. Coincidentally dairy-free as well so finally something that I can share with Vivian :) And it actually tastes delicious.

Extra hour of sleep tonight... exciting!

And finally finally a day at home. Feels SO good. And accomplished. Even if it was just sleeping in, taking Nessie to the vet, cleaning the fish tank, bathing the dogs and picking up Ari from tutoring!