Le Journal de +Louise

Bonjour à tout!

Greetings from Paris!

As a super early birthday present, I’ve had the chance once again to traipse the cobble stoned streets of Paris =)

Despite the long almost 24 hour plane ride, the biblical hives breakout from my what seemed to be an allergic reaction to anti-biotics, and spots of rainy patches, the city welcomed us back with open arms.

The past few days we have laughed, shopped, eaten, wandered and left footprints all over Paris.

More photos to follow!

The.best.chocolate.fudge. Ever.

Flourless, 100% dark chocolate. Perfect.

Leo’s home made chocolate fudge has been road tested by the fussy palettes of family and friends. And, of course, a big stamp of approval from me! I have finally kicked my Nutella addiction, but this, this is really something else.

I giggle everytime I look at this picture. Leo refused to give in to sore right arm muscles from all the batter whisking, and so he came up with this:

Our very own industrial mixer!

For those who are puzzled, it’s actually a metal whisker attached to a power drill. Brilliant, yes?

I’m thinking of secretly sneaking a line into his wedding vow that reads, ” And I will promise you, a life time of home made flourless chocolate fudge ahead…”

Whirlwind months of April and May have finally come and (almost) gone. Finally, some breathing space and time for myself.

In these past weeks of my absence, in random order I have:

~ Played hostess to parents and good friends

~ Realised that no matter how hard I try, heck, some people can’t/won’t change!

~ Run my first marathon

~ Hung up my yoga mat

~ Graduated from mon classe française

~ Been experiencing a second bout of adolescence, heaps of bumpy zits but not a slight chest increment in sight :(

~ Baked my first cake

~ Nearly finalised wedding dinner arrangements, it’s almost there, I can smell it!

~ Popped my GHD cherry

~ Received the most incredible early birthday present!

Stories to follow…

Found this on postsecret and absolutely could not resist!

Parents have come and gone. The house is quiet again, no more home cooked dinners and hectic weekends. Time to settle back into the familiar.

This wintery autumn is wreaking havoc on my yoga routine. Cold nights, warm couch, hearty soups, snugly bed…

Oh, if only I have sufficient willpower to ramp things up again. Perhaps another challenge is in order?

Sovereign Hill, Ballarat is about a 40 minute drive from Tuki. An open air museum that is located on a site linked to the richest alluvial gold rush in the world.

It has over 60 historically recreated buildings, with costumed volunteers and is complete with antiques, artwork, books, machinery, livestock and animals, carriages and devices all appropriate to the 1850′s era.

This old man wouldn’t stop talking about how her daughter bought him this accordian from Shanghai. Then he started spouting out Cantonese, Mom went to sit by his side and he said, “Oh come come! Come sit next to this ham sap lou…”

We had a spot of lunch at the New York Bakery =)

At the goldsmith, Dad attempted to lift a gold bar…

Retro print house. Bought some prints and posters for the house…

Dad marched into the millinery shop, put on this cowboy hat and demanded a picture…

This is how candles were made. Coincidentally the shop sold various kinds of vegetable oil soaps as well, at just $2.95 each, Mom and I bought up a storm, of course!

Outside the sundry shop…

We raced back to Tuki from Ballarat, hoping to catch some trout for dinner. After all, why stay on a trout farm if you don’t try your hand at trout fishing, right? We hung around for about 45 minutes, all the while watching (enviably) this 2 girls in mini skirts and 3 inch heels, catching trout after trout and squealing away; our fishing rods in the mean time, refused to budge.

That explains why Leo looked like this…

In the end, we gave up, went into the restaurant and bought 4 fresh trouts to cook for dinner (much easier!)

The next morning, we woke up to a herd of stallions right in front of our cottages; bade Tuki goodbye and headed back to Melbourne.

Leo and I woke up bright and early the second day to the wonderful smell of homemade lamb sausages, bacon and toast.

First stop of the day was Daylesford’s Maker’s Market. We went in for a twirl and came out with some handmade rings and vintage prints for the house =)

Chocolate Mill

At around mid day, Dad started to look a little restless, so in order to keep everything tightly under control, Leo and I took them to the Chocolate Mill, “for serious chocoholics”.

Hmm… choices, choices, choices! No one should have to choose between chocolates…

Dark? Milk? White?
Frangelicos? Rum?
Caramel? Mousse?
Ginger? Chilli?

Dad took a dare and ordered ice cream topped with hot chili chocolate. Initially he declared that the chilli factor was pure hoax, until the fiery aftertaste got to him and I swear I saw faint smoke streaming out of his ears!

We came out with bags and bags of cocoa goodness, and that even includes a couple boxes of after-dinner sweets!

Lavandula

Lavandula is a Swiss Italian farm, 10 minutes from Daylesford.

They converted an old barn into a small retail shop that sells homewares and lavender potions.
Mom, with her newfound love for lavender, went crazy. She can now build a tiny house out of the many bars of lavender soaps that she bought.

Against a backdrop of lavender crop art.

There isn’t another person who loves lavender as much as Mom does… You should have seen her butchering the lavender bushes grown outside of our neighbour’s Tuki cottages. She went out at night with a torch light and came back with a million stalks of these purple beauties.

Mom rolling (almost) in a field of lavender…

Had a nice lunch at La Trattoria before heading back to our cottages.

We spent the rest of the evening photographing Tuki’s breathtaking landscapes.

Mom and I walked away from the retreat, hoping to be able to get a closeup of the grazing sheep. Until sheepdog Lily overtook us and chased away all the sheep!

Mom, the ranger, gathering wood for the fireplace…

We had another cosy night in with home cooked noodles, sausages, salad and tea =)

Since I have some time on my hands this weekend, I thought I might as well post an update complete with pictures of Easter long weekend before I had to do another embarrassingly late travel entry.

Parents landed in Melbourne for their 3 week holiday last Thursday. Having visited Melbourne almost 7 years ago on a whirlwind of a trip, I decided to bring them to the idyllic Daylesford for the long Easter weekend.

We were given 2 side by side stone cottages overlooking a lake.

Having consulted Dad on the type of holiday he was after, Tuki Retreat seemed to tick all the boxes. Fresh produce. Countryside setting. Stone cottages. Crackling fireplace. 30 minutes from Daylesford, Australia’s spa country.

The cottages are equipped with old fashion fireplaces (boy, did Leo and Mom have a great time building roaring fires!) and small kitchenettes.

We checked in a little after 2pm and headed straight to the small in-house restaurant for a quick bite.

Tuki is known for its fresh trout as well as its lamb produce. We had a hearty lunch before heading into town.

The main pulse of Daylesford seemed to have flatlined as most retail shops were closed for Good Friday.

Eateries were buzzing with tourists, we had a walkabout and went into Frangos Frangos for coffees and cake.

We later drove into Hepburn Springs and stopped by the cluster of mineral springs in the springs reserve.

Several springs exist in the main reserve – Soda, Sulphur, Pavilion, Locarno and Wyuna. They ALL tasted like old, rusty metal. Although the Soda Spring ranked slightly higher on the likeable-o-meter, (but only due to its carbonated nature), I still could not have spat the foul tasting liquid out of my mouth fast enough.

Here’s one for the album… With me working hard at the pump, dad looking disinterested, and mom, with her crass pose (which was entirely her insistence, btw)

I should have heeded advice on making advanced dinner reservations as every single place we went into was fully booked. We rushed into the local IGA (5 minutes before shop closure), stocked up on packets upon packets of instant noodles and had a cozy homecooked dinner in our cottages.

{Trip Report 09 Nov 08 & 10 Nov 08}

We awoke bright and early, had a hearty breakfast wheeled and trolleyed right into our room by Christian =)

We decided to take it slow and strolled leisurely into the town centre and towards the river.

A “human sculpture” outside the Uffizi Gallery…

Ponte Vecchio

Ponte Vecchio is the medieval bridge over the Arno River and is occupied by jewellers, souvenir sellers and art dealers.

I went hunting for vintage brooches, haggled and went home with 3 authentic shell cameos =)

We stopped by for some delectable gelati…

We went across the bridge and stumbled upon Papier Arti E Mestieri, a lovely quaint papier shop in Piazza di Santa Maria Soprano. The entire shop is filled with gorgeous leather bound journals, handmade marbled paper, tooled bookmarks and handstamped cards.

Before dinner, we caught a cab to Piazza Michaelangelo to bask in Florence’s golden skyline…

We celebrated my birthday at Golden View Open Bar, by the Ponte Vecchio, where we had the best seafood dinner, still unrivaled till today.

We were meant to only spend 3 days in Florence, having booked an early morning train heading towards Venice. However, we encountered a train strike (again) but this time, trains were cancelled for the ENTIRE day. We had to ring our hotel in Venice to hopefully be able to cancel the first night stay and thankfully, the owners were kind enough to not charge us a penalty. I rang Christian and he was able to put us up in one of the smaller rooms, so we dragged our sorry selves back to the BnB; to recover from the ordeal, we stopped by Santa Maria Novella Perfumeria, an opulent baroque gallery that houses fragrances, tonics, rose water and soaps. A bit pricey but I bought a bottle of ‘Angels of Florence’ as a souvenir =)