William + Laura

So...

2012-03-13T08:26:00.000+10:00

Somebody impulse-bought a juicer.

In my defense, I'd like to argue that there are many worse things one could impulse buy. And also, how good does fresh juice taste?

Alien foods

2012-03-11T08:21:00.000+10:00

I'm going to blame it on the fact we are both tall, and bending right over to peer into the bottom shelf of the pantry just doesn't happen regularly enough.

Great Uncle Victor's 80th birthday

2012-03-08T09:02:00.000+10:00

Poor Uncle Victor didn't get much of a look in when it came to the camera. How can you compete with a horse that beautiful, a little nephew so cute and that handsome husband of mine?

We spent a warm Saturday afternoon eating cheese, meeting and getting reacquainted with extended family, singing Happy Birthday and enjoying sweet baby cuddles with our new niece.

Au revoir February...

2012-03-06T08:14:00.000+10:00

...and there flies by another month. How is it March 6 already?

We did our usual thing - eat, drink, work and play. It's so nice to be establishing 'usual things' as a couple, making time for good food (it's all I ever seem to take photos of!), good conversations and good old fashioned quality time together.

February brought with it many unexpected moments - some bad, but mostly good. We're so grateful for this life we get to live and are doing our best to soak it all up.

A breakfast date at Brio, a spontaneous walk through South Bank, a scenic route of the city, Max Brenners, figs and croissants, jelly hearts and a cheeky little Queenslander fighting for it's space amidst the big concrete city.

Campos with friends

2012-03-05T20:13:00.000+10:00

We spent Sunday afternoon with dear friends for lunch and coffees at Campos, Fortitude Valley. After a long wait in the heat, our little posse were treated to our own private room, complete with soft chairs and a buzzer to buzz wait staff! Feasting on breakfast foods, and downing a good amount of coffee (I even managed a flat white), we chatted and chatted and chatted away.

Will loved a black coffee + soda water concoction, we all loved the coffee bag wall and Bec and I managed to convince everyone into taking a not-too-awkward family photo. How sweet are moments with friends?

Nous parlons francais!

2012-03-02T10:30:00.000+10:00

Well, a little bit at least!

Our French Summer School finished last night. It was intense but so worthwhile, and we're so surprised / proud of how much we picked up. We can say the essentials - 'Je ne sais pas' (I don't know), 'Je ne comprendre pas' (I don't understand) and 'J'oublie' (I forget!). We can also make silly sentences like 'Nous aimons manger le chat bleu' (We like to eat the blue cat), and do much more useful things like introducing ourselves and talking about food, travel and our home.

Crossing the Schonell Bridge into UQ

Reading 'The Little Mermaid' in class

The student concentrating..

Will also pulled out 'Ma femme, elle s'appelle Laura. Elle est tres jolie' (My wife, her name is Laura. She is very pretty!) in our speaking exam, which made the rest of the class smile and left me blushing :)

And if we suddenly throw our arms up in the air, exasperated, and let out a couple of strong French words, we're probably practicing our newly-acquired French swear words. I never swear in English, but what is it about saying something, anything, in French, that feels so sexy? Je ne sais pas!

The Wedding Files: Husband and Wife

2012-02-18T10:30:00.000+10:00

We had the best day together as husband and wife.

I can't look through these photos without getting a little teary. Will and I agreed that come our wedding day, we wouldn't worry about how things looked, how it turned out, if we got tongue-tied on stage or anything, we just wanted to be really present and spend the whole together. Once I walked down the aisle and tightly gripped Will's hands, that's just what we did. When I remember this day, I will always remember the way Will looked at me, the little jokes and laughter, all the hugs and smiles and delight we had spending our first day together as husband and wife.

Thank you for taking a (long, extended, over the top ;) peek at our wedding photos!

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

The Wedding Files: Friends and family

2012-02-17T14:15:00.000+10:00

Our family and friends made our wedding day so wonderful. From dragging two huge trees through the auditorium, to packing up the herbs, we were incredibly blessed to share the day with so many friends. We don't have much more to say except a huge thank you and we love you! Now to some more photos...

My brother Jeremy is in the army and was unable to join us in person, but was most certainly there in spirit.

Our beautiful families.

Our best friends.

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

Next post (and the last one) - Husband and Wife

The Wedding Files: The little details

2012-02-16T10:00:00.000+10:00

Here are some more little details from our day…

I wore my dream shoes to the ceremony, wedges that felt like sneakers for photos and the dinner, and my earrings were a gift from Will from our first Christmas together. I chose a veil for the day, and then swapped it for a gorgeous flower pin from Grace Designs for the evening. Unfortunately it didn't make the photos, but it was gorgeous - something similar to this.

The men wore grey suits, yellow Billy Button corsages and baby blue ties that we hunted all over Brisbane for. Aren't they all so handsome?!

The girls chose their own dresses, from Cue, Ultra Suite and JJ's House. I love bright beautiful flowers and I love how our florist pulled them together. Oh and those ultra high heels were from Zu.

We used potted herbs, flower posies, candles and a hessian table runner to decorate the tables. Our herbs (from Bunnings) have now grown up, reside on our front deck and regularly make an appearance in our meals. We also incorporated wedding photos of our parents and grandparents and little lego people into the decor.

We used a patchwork quilt hand made by Liz (Will's mum) for a post-ceremony picnic, and Will borrowed his grandfather’s old camera as a prop. I also picked up some animal face kid’s party plates from Spotlight and turned them into masks for something fun.

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

Next up: Friends and family

The Wedding Files: The Dinner Party

2012-02-15T18:00:00.000+10:00

I had imagined our wedding reception to feel less like a formal reception and more like a feast with friends and family. We were so happy to have long tables, to sit in the middle and to be surrounded by everyone we love. How great that wedding celebrations end with food!? Will and I love food, so it suited us to a tee.

We served Bundaberg drinks with stripey straws and canapés while we mingled, and our menu included duck and crab, lamb and salmon, berries and chocolate. Our lovely friends and the evening's hosts, Matt and Rach, got the night started, we said a quick hello to everyone and then Will’s mum Liz said grace. Dinner time!

The absolute highlight moments were the speeches. I am a sucker for a good speech, and we loved hearing every word from our fathers, our best man and our maid of honour. Kind, encouraging, humorous, special words that had everyone laughing, and a few of us (i.e. me) getting teary. There was so much love in the room and it really meant so much to both of us to share the night with everyone.

Another favourite moment was watching everyone find their seat and little gift from us. We wanted something happy and fun to spoil our guests. Inspired by the lovely Cup of Jo, everyone got a pair of Happy Eyes and saw hearts all evening. I made felt flower brooches and hair clips for our lovely ladies, using the Rose Tutorial from How Joyful. And for the gentlemen, a snazzy pin-on bow tie. We included the menu, a little hand written note, and our William + Laura stamp.

We chatted, we danced, we stole more than a few sneaky kisses, and then we said goodbye. It was all hugs and kisses before we raced down the stairs and across the Parklands. I’ll never forgot hearing all the cheers and clapping as we made our getaway. A perfect night with beautiful, beautiful people.

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

Next up: The little details

The Wedding Files: The ceremony

2012-02-14T14:45:00.000+10:00

I still remember the feeling I had walking down the aisle towards Will. I was so excited and overwhelmed that I could barely hold his gaze – it was such an unreal feeling. My parents walked me down the aisle to Dream by Priscilla Ahn. I love the tradition of a father walking his daughter down the aisle, but I love that my mum could share that special moment as well.

The church looked incredible, better even than we had hoped it would. A lot of people congratulated me on turning such a corporate-y building into a beautiful wedding setting, but I really couldn’t take the praise. Will was 90% of the brains behind it, and his groomsmen provided the muscle (yes, those 4m trees were very very heavy).

Our dear friend Jess read a beautiful scripture for us – Colossians 3:12-17, in the Message version. My favourite line was ‘… and regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It’s your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it.’ It is such a meaningful, challenging and practical passage that means a lot to us. You can read the entire thing here.

Before we said our vows, we shared a few things we loved about each other. Those few moments were so incredibly special. We said our vows, we exchanged rings, and then, hurrah!! We were husband and wife.

Will is pretty sure he jumped the gun and kissed me before Ps Murray had finished saying he could, but it was such a blur and we haven’t seen the video yet, so who knows?

Another special moment was having our families join us on stage, to pray over us and give us big hugs. With family overseas, it really is a once-in-a-life-time moment having our parents and grandparents all there with us.

Hooray! Mr and Mrs Swanson. We left the building to Alexander Fairchild’s Very First Time and then came a mega-hug fest with so many people we love.

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

Next up: The dinner party

The Wedding Files: Getting ready

2012-02-13T19:00:00.000+10:00

We have so many happy memories from November 19. In the weeks after the wedding, I filled many pages of a new journal with all the little moments I could recall. I have a feeling we'll enjoy looking back on them in years to come.

But it's true, a picture speaks a thousand words, so here they are (with a few words here and there).

First up, getting ready with my family and my girlfriends...

I don't think I stopped smiling the whole day!

My girlfriends all have great style, so I asked them to find a navy knee length dress and let them go from there. We hadn’t seen the dresses all together until the morning of the wedding, but they were perfect. And it really is special to spend the morning of your wedding with your closest friends.

Aren't they beautiful?

I chose a one-shouldered lace wedding dress and I was so excited to finally wear it. I had to use every ounce of self-control not to try it on each day before the wedding. The girls got me into it, 42 buttons and all.

Yes, I was rather excited!

We had a lovely relaxed morning getting ready, took lots of photos and filled our faces with croissants and egg sandwiches (thanks mum!). I showed my dad my dress, put on my shoes and my parents and the girls prayed for me just before we left for the church. I was pretty eager to see Will and had to hang outside the church for a few minutes because we were so on time.

Photos by Hailey and Andrew of You Can't Be Serious

Next up: The ceremony

The Wedding Files: Wedding week

2012-02-13T10:00:00.000+10:00

Being married is lots of work. There's all the paperwork to change my (Laura's) name, meals to be cooked, French classes to attend together, cuddles to be cuddled and animated 'discussions' over which drawer is more appropriate to keep the gladwrap and alfoil in.

Which has meant we've been a little slack sharing wedding photos. But our laziness ends today, as we have painstakingly sorted, resized and uploaded some of our favourite photos to the blog. Trying to choose just a handful of photos to share was harder than finding my soulmate, falling and love and throwing the wedding in the first place, so I've chosen all the photos I love the most and spread them out over the coming week.

Our photos were taken by the wildly creative and absolutely lovely Hailey and Andrew Bartholomew, of You Can't Be Serious. We are very, very, very happy with the memories they have captured and would recommend them to anyone!

Pop in later today for more!

j + a + Smurfette Haus

2012-02-11T18:45:00.001+10:00

We're counting down the days until Jeremy and Aneela tie the knot and we get a new sister. 63 days to be exact. (Aneela told me today, so don't be weirded out that I knew that ;) J + A are one of our favourite couples, and given we'll soon all be family, I have a feeling they'll still be favourites 50 years from now. I love that about family.

And family are turning into neighbours as these guys have a house not too far from us. Jeremy moved in today and we popped in for a visit. Their pad is very, very cool*, with an awesome back yard, and yes, it's blue. So of course, we've named it Smurfette Haus and are so excited that Smurf Haus has a new sister. Or girlfriend. Or whatever the relationship was between Smurfette and all those blue boys :)

*Yes. An awkward family photo and a bath tub in the backyard. We just can't compete with that kind of cool.

the honeymoon - part four

2012-02-11T16:36:00.000+10:00

It's the final instalment of our epic New Zealand oddessy! After a road trip from Christchurch to Queenstown, kayaking the dart river and a whole week of lazing about Lake Ohau we moved onto the final stop on our honeymoon itinerary - Mount Cook. Laura is waiting to blog the photos from our wedding, so I'd better get a move on and spill the beans about the last leg of our adventure.

If you missed it, here is part one, part two and part three for your viewing pleasure.

Mount Cook and the Hermitage Hotel

The Hermitage is New Zealand's oldest hotel and probably it's most burned down (twice!) accomodation. It has hosted a swathe of great climbers (including Edmund Hilary who practiced on Mt Cook before he took on Everest and won!), so the decor is very mountainey, filled with mahoganey funiture and has lots of books. The Hermitage is just great for newly weds and nearly deads and we'll definitely be back there one day, as long as it doesn't burn down again.

We stayed in a chalet at the Hermitage because the rest of the hotel was fully booked, but the receptionist gave us the chalet with the best views over the mountains, and there was even a grassy knoll outside - perfect for a W&L style picnic. So we spent the early afternoon snoozing, eating cheese, the last of our delicious smoked salmon and sipping a new favourite - Monkey Bay.

After snoozing away the early afternoon, we took off down one of the trails up towards the mountains. We crossed rivers swollen with melted ice, climbed rocky hills, scaled across rickety cliffs - and Mount Cook didn't feel an inch closer after a few hours of hard walking. Good thing summer daylight savings meant we weren't going to get stuck in the open and die of exposure on our impossible quest to reach the summit.

Ok, so the risk of dying from exposure was a bit of an overstatement, we actually had to hurry back to the hotel as we had a booking for the buffet at 7pm. Life on honeymoon can be pretty intense sometimes. The good news is we made it back in time enough for a cold ale in the hotel bar and now the tales could flow freely about our journeys through the great wilderness.

After dinner we raced out to watch the sun set spectaularly over the tip of Mount Cook, it was a beautiful end to a classically perfect day.

Postscript

The next morning we checked out of our little chalet and drove back to Christchurch. We said goodbye to our trusty rental car (which really didn't feature enough in this blog - I know) and had dinner at a local cafe nearby the airport. The next morning we boarded our flight and headed home. Our honeymoon was over...

Actually, we were so excited to get back and truly start our new life together. For the first time in our lives we now get to say 'goodnight' rather than 'goodbye' at the end of each day. And there are great things we'll take from our honeymoon like doing picnics, random star jumps, snapping photos of everything, being adventurous and doing everything together.

I think the real honeymoon is just getting started :)

** If you're heading to South Island NZ, have any questions or want any information about the places we visited, leave a comment below and we'll be happy to help you!**

oh hello february...

2012-02-09T18:17:00.000+10:00

... when did you arrive? We're now in our third month of marriage - 2012 is flying!

Here are some little memories I'm shall we'll treasure down the track.

coffee, hot chocolates and dreaming about adventures..

our puppy, lucy, who now lives on our lounge room wall..

exploring the neighbourhood where Will grew up. stealing starfruit like he did as a kid..

cleaning, clearing, mowing and sorting..

new lunchboxes, packed lunches, and unusual additions in our salad..

the only takeaway indian worth eating (masala art) and grape fanta. so purple it'll probably kill me..

February, we like you.

the honeymoon - part three

2012-02-04T23:06:00.002+10:00

Well, that was weird. We got halfway through our honeymoon blog posts and then *poof!* followed by a *sizzle* as water crept through my keyboard and fried the motherboard of my laptop. Such is life, so let's get straight back into the NZ honeymoon trip!

If you missed it, here is part one and part two.

Lake Ohau

Wow, what an incredibly special place. We would love to keep it a secret for ourselves, but that's not the way the world works because of the internet nowadays. We stayed in the seriously chic mountain hideout 'Ohau House' for 7 nights, the longest stay of our trip, and it was so good to know we could unpack and make ourselves at home.

Perched over Ohau Lake, this designer bach quickly became home. The incredible cooks' kitchen, relaxing lounge, the jade speckled floors of the enormous bathroom and the stunning views across the lake left us somewhat bewildered and entranced with our new digs. The lake is quite remote and in the middle of nowhere - just what we wanted.

The weather can change in a tickle in this place. When we arrived it was blustery and moody with squalls moving at speed over the lake, yet the following day it was all blue skies and sunshine. One night it was so windy we thought the house would get carried away, and the next day it felt as if one could walk across the lake and visit the neighbours on the other side it was so calm. The changing weather would make great conversation if you had nothing else to talk about.

(Not) Around Town

Unlike Queenstown, there aren't any places to go out in Ohau. In fact there isn't even a convenience store. This place is defintely remote. Good thing there was a great kitchen to cook up a storm in (lamb shanks, roasts, salmon steaks etc), and the nearest shop was actually a local salmon farm. As well as getting provisions from local Twizel town 20 minutes away, we stocked up on delicious fresh and smoked salmon which kept us going throughout the week.

The Great Elsewhere

So other than laying about the house we took some trips along the lake and up into the mountains, generally exploring without any maps or watches. There was also plenty of competitive stone skimming in the lake (which seemed to be about as sporty as we got on this leg of our honeymoon).

We came across well marked trails and made sure we did at least two or three short hikes (or 'tramps') up in the hills behind the lake. In true W&L style we always took a car load of cheeses, wine and smoked salmon to keep us going. Life can be too perfect sometimes.

On one of our adventures (we pointed down a gravel road and said "let's see where this goes!") we stumbled across a great area in the middle of nowhere called Temple Valley. Criss-crossed with tracks that meandered in and out of dense forest and up into the hills, it was such a great way to burn off all the calories after sitting around reading, eating and watching the lake.

Hanging out and just doing nothing was one of the best aspects of our honeymoon. We'd highly recommend choosing the most laid back itinerary possible. Don't plan too much and give yourselves plenty of time to find things to do rather than booking your days up. We really needed some solid down time after the craziness of such a big event (the wedding, remember?!), and Ohau helped us slow down and get our heads around what had just happened.

In fact I think there came a point I even put my camera down and stopped taking photos. It was so wonderful just to follow along a mountain road with my beautiful new wife by my side.

In our final honeymoon post we head to New Zealand's most famous hotel and climb up New Zealand's tallest mountain (well we got close anyway!).

Hanging with our besties

2012-01-31T23:15:00.002+10:00

Yay for Nandoes dates with our best man and maid of honour. Last time the four of us shared a meal, Will was in a suit, I was in a white dress, Kate was sharing the pros and cons of us getting married and PC was drumming up the best best man's speech.

We love these two.

The Food Files: Mid-week roast

2012-01-25T20:40:00.005+10:00

We started our four day weekend with pork-crackling. Is there any better way?

We use a Nigella-inspired recipe for pork that involves rosemary, salt and a bottle of dark ale poured into the baking dish. Tonight I added roast veggies and whipped up a pea puree (two cups of peas, a dollop of mint jelly and a few squirts of mayonnaise, all blended).

I don't mean to make ya'll jealous, but oh was it good.

West End Coffee House

2012-01-23T22:20:00.002+10:00

Our epic quest to eat our way around West End was progressing very nicely until we tried this place, West End Coffee House. They serve food (Thai Isaan) and coffee (Campos) so good we don't dare go anywhere else anymore. If you're ever in the 'hood, let us know and we'll most definitely take you there.

Will was dreaming about sticky rice all evening, and I was up all night after my yearly coffee.

If you're new to Isaan cuisine, we recommend the thai beef salad or the larb. If you want to try something a little new, go the som tam. Seriously.

The honeymoon - to be continued...

2012-01-16T23:09:00.002+10:00

So Part Three and Part Four of our honeymoon adventure have been temporarily delayed due to an incident involving Will's laptop and a cheeky glass of water. There was a horrible 24 hours waiting to see if the honeymoon photos made it out alive, but alas, all's well with the hard drive and Will's new laptop should arrive this week. Here's Part One and Part Two again.

In the meantime, here are a couple of photos from Lake Ohau (Part 3) and Mt Cook (Part 4). Let's call it 'The Honeymoon, Part 2.5'.

The first three photos are essentially taken from the same spot - the first, looking into our holiday house, the second, looking out to the left, and the third, turning 180 degrees to the beautiful mountains down yonder. It was absolutely spectacular and I spent a lot of time on that couch, taking in the view.

And this below is the official photographer in action. We spent our second last afternoon tramping (Kiwi for hiking/walking) through Hooker Valley. There were suspension bridges and rushing rivers and bunny rabbits - something for everyone!

Just around the corner from where Will is standing, is the glorious Mt Cook. Again, it was spectacular - just wait until you see my husband's* photos!

*Wowee! I have a husband!!

Bribie beach trip

2012-01-11T10:41:00.000+10:00

Our long-awaited beach trip nearly didn't happen after a series of unfortunate car-related events that ended with Will sitting in the BiLo carpark waiting for RACQ. But we got there in the end, and oh it was good.

Ocean breeze, fresh prawns, a new picnic rug (thanks Paul + Lauren!) and lots of puppy-stalking. The best way to spend a summer's holiday.

We did our usual star-jump session...

...and finished the day with pirouettes and high kicks.

Blessed

2012-01-10T22:02:00.003+10:00

And now to take a moment to pause and count our blessings.

After the breakdown of our gifted second-hand washing machine, and a call out on Facebook to friends who might be selling one, we are now the proud custodians of a beautiful brand new washing machine, kindly lent to us for free from a very lovely and generous couple.

We did two loads the first night we got it and spent the whole time saying 'It's a real washing machine!' I think we both had visions of months of either hand-washing or carting our clothes basket to our parents every couple of days. Thank you very lovely and generous couple!

And on the topic of things around the house, I wanted to make a joke about ‘How long does it take two intelligent newlyweds with four university degrees between them to clip the toilet freshener in the toilet bowl?’ but we spent waaaaaaay too long trying to figure it out the other night that I had no energy left for being witty.

first day of school

2012-01-08T22:21:00.002+10:00

We are off to French school tomorrow! We've signed up for a summer intensive at IML, two nights per week for the next seven weeks, and we're looking forward to the challenge. I've been practicing all the French words I know, things like 'baugette' and 'ooh la la' and 'pas de chat' (which means 'step of the cat' - an old ballet term I'm sure will be absolutely no use in class).

We'd both love to speak a second language and there are handful of French-speaking countries we'd like to work in sometime in the future. And secretly, I'm hoping the more French I speak, the more likely Will will take me to Paris. A girl can dream, no?

Byebye holidays

2012-01-06T22:28:00.002+10:00

After a marvelous honeymoon adventure in New Zealand, we enjoyed our summer holiday at home in Smurf Haus. We spent a lot of time sleeping, eating and lounging around, with the odd burst of energy to hang out with some of our favourite people.
Being married and on holidays? Bliss.

- smurf haus sketch on our new blackboard -
- byebye christmas tree / car selfies / pot plants -
- brunch at peter's / new years with friends / flat tyres -
- supermarket sunflowers / thank you cards / more dahlia love -
- dinner and movie with kate / the double rainbow -
- yellow love / billy buttons from the wedding -

2011: Best year yet!

2012-01-02T21:38:00.010+10:00

it's true, 2011 was amazing. twelve months of big events and incredible little moments.

january.

will was home for the summer, we picnicked at the beach, we played tourists in our own town, we made big plans and then watched them and our city get washed away in the floods. we helped clean up, we played lots of scrabble and we endure our final departures lounge.

february.

we spent a lot of time on skype. laura finished one job and started looking for another, while will got ready to break up with sudan.

march.

more skype time. we started this blog together, laura celebrated her last day of unemployment and will made the break up official.

april.

will came home from sudan for good on april 3. on april 9, he took laura on a picnic, got down on one knee and put a ring on laura's finger. we celebrated with boiled eggs. the rest of the month included an Easter picnic double-date, a family birthday, and brainstorming all the random shops we wished had a wedding gift registry.

may.

we celebrated one year together with a dinner date at citron and decided that life is so much better together. will made the most of his time off before accepting a job 200m down the road from laura. despite all the planning, we had to postpone our engagement party to june, but laura found her wedding dress with the mums, so at least something big could be ticked off the to-do list!

june.

with the help of our very good looking bridal party, our friends and our families, we celebrated our engagement with a picnic party (of course!). it was the most beautiful day, the park looked amazing and we all stuffed our faces with a cake made of cheese. will hung out with his nephew, we hit the beach,we played putt-putt and someone was proposed to for a second time.

july.

birthday month! we celebrated both of our birthdays with a new (and very wonderful) tradition - 'the 13 days of birthday'. it involved a lot of food, horse riding, gifts and a personality test. a busy, busy month with more birthdays, a trip to adelaide and lots of running around west end.

august.

we finished our house hunting, signed a lease on Smurf Haus and Will and PC moved in! laura and the bridesmaids did some serious wedding prep, will took out the winner's trophy at our staff go-kart day and we spent some more time picnicking.

september.

a month of love! we celebrated the marriage of michael and val and then blaine and tegan. it made us all the more excited to be getting married in november!

october.

in the midst of all the pre-wedding chaos, we did our best to keep some 'us' time. we headed out to moreton bay to watch the whales and relax, we hit up max brenner for our chocolate fix and we finally made it to guzman y gomez. we celebrated friends and funny moments and counted down the days til we would be husband and wife.

november.

we finished all the little details, we visited roma st parklands one last time and we had the bridal party and our families over for a pre-wedding mexican fiesta celebration. and then, hurrah, we got married! we had an incredible day with our family and friends and were so happy to share the first day of our marriage with them all. the next day we flew out to new zealand for the best holiday ever.

(here's a sneaky peek of our professional wedding photos from you can't be serious. we've seen the rest, they are amazing and we can't wait to share!)

december.

we returned home, jumped back into work for a week or two, then celebrated our first christmas eve, christmas day and summer holiday together as a married couple.

wow. 2011 really was the best. we are so grateful to God for his goodness, for being so faithful to us, and for blessing us with incredible friends, amazing families and so many wonderful things.

2012 is here already and we know it's going to be a big and adventurous year. we are ready to have our socks rocked!

The honeymoon - part two

2011-12-27T12:34:00.002+10:00

Thanks for all the nice comments on our first honeymoon post, we had so much fun taking these photos. We are loving on all the friends, family and welcome strangers who are dropping by our little blog. Our epic newlywed's adventure is spread over four posts (because we seriously took too many photos!), so without further delay let's keep moving along our road trip. After our night at Lake Tekapo, we jumped in the car and headed further south for three nights in cute Queenstown and to visit the beautiful Mt Aspiring National Park.

You can read up on part one here if you missed it.

(P.s. Laura also blogged about Mrs Robinson's vintage fabric store over at laura and friends!)

The Lakeside Maisonette

We spent most of our honeymoon staying in self contained holiday houses that kiwis call a 'bach'. Giving up the convenience of a hotel we had the opportunity to stay in ridiculously beautiful places with incredible views, and received wonderful hospitality from their proud owners who lease them out as a small business. We had such a blast staying in baches as opposed to hotels and would highly recommend it to anyone taking a vacation in New Zealand. Though be prepared to cook your own meals or eat out, as there is no room service!

The first bach we stayed at was the lakeside maisonette and it's owned by a very nice couple called Christine and Marc. We had been dreaming about this place since we first spotted it while on our long distance relationship (LDR). I can't tell you the amount of times I clicked through their website daydreaming about our honeymoon here and in real life it didn't disappoint!

The bach is about 7 km outside of Queenstown and off the main road down a gravel track through some pine trees. Our little hideaway was split over two levels and even had a loft in the ceiling for reading and hanging out. it's around the bend from a swanky hotel charging $700+ a night and is completely secluded and private.

Our floor to ceiling windows gave us the most zen lookout over Lake Wakatipu and the Remarkables ranges. The only interruption was the local steamship making it's twice daily crossing far out on the lake.You can watch the TSS Earnslaw sail by from the lounge, the bedroom or even the shower if you want.

Queenstown

With Queenstown being the gateway to European adrenaline sports nirvana, I felt a bit out of place without my polar fleece, multi-zip pants and bandana. Nevertheless we had a great time wandering around town, discovering funky design shops and I stumbled into cider and ale heaven. As the picture below attests, this tiny island has an industry large enough to stock all it's shelves with local products. Too many ciders and not enough time - and we needed to eat first!

We stopped by an obvious tourist trap called Pier 19, and conveniently for the menu we felt like salmon and lamb (coincidently the same items on our reception menu at the wedding). This mahogany style restaurant on the water in Queenstown had beautiful fare, cheery wait staff, a solid local wine list (we tried a Cloudy Bay vintage which was pretty great) and decent prices. What a cool little place! It was packed with newlyweds and nearly-deads rather than those hip mountain bikers, so we blended in easily sipping our drinks at our table for two.

After dinner we caught the most spectacular sunshower over the lake and mozied home to prepare for our only serious activity we had planned for our trip.

Dart river & Mt Aspiring National Park

New Zealand is wild and rugged, and people to go great extremes of physical activity to experience this amazing environment. Being in the aforementioned newlyweds division, we steered away from the 5 day hikes, extreme adventure experiences and did a really great one day jet boating and kayaking (or funyaks as they call then) experience up the Dart river in Mt Aspiring national park. We jet boated up the river flooded with snow melt and paddled back downstream in our mighty inflatable funyaks.

We did our trip with the Dart River Jet Safari group. The company is owned by the local Maori community who have traditional ownership of the land. There was a jade rush in which they settled and mined the area for the deep green stones a long time ago. Now we were able to enjoy it flying by the seat of our pants in a jet boat.

At the top of the river (as far as we were allowed to go in a jet boat) we pulled into a crystal clear mountain stream and they told us all the safety instructions about how to paddle the boats. I didn't hear a word because I was too busy taking photos and staring at those mountains.

After a while we pulled off the main river and dragged our kayaks up another stream, at the end was a cave which we paddled through (now expertly after learning the hard way about kayaks - maybe I should've listened a bit better!). The newlyweds had become Will Grylls and Laura the Explorer.

We finally stopped and had lunch in a grassy clearing, Laura froze to death and I stalked some local critters in survival mode (but settled for the cold meats buffet instead). We then jumped in our boats and paddled back down the river to the waiting bus that took us across Paradise Station, the farm where they filmed the LOTR, the Hobbit and a few other flicks. We were happy and tired and had a very aspirational day in the National Park.

The Road to Ohau

After three great days and nights we said goodbye to our little maisonette and all the cool kids in Queenstown and headed back the way we came to our next holiday bach. On the road to Ohau we stopped off by one of the countless mountain creeks to throw stones and stretch our legs.

Thanks for reading along for part two of our honeymoon adventure in New Zealand, we had such a blast the whole time! In the next post we turn off the tourist track and between reading and eating we spend time exploring the back roads of a little known but spectacular area of the South Island.

Our first Christmas Eve

2011-12-26T20:56:00.005+10:00

I went a little snap happy on Christmas Eve, but it was our first as husband and wife and I'm so glad I captured a few of the special moments.

We ate pancakes on our front deck, listened to the rain come down, spent about an hour in a very cool kid's store, did our supermarket shopping, moved some furniture around, ate corn chips and discussed a fun business idea with PC, finished painting our DIY chalkboard, returned to the front deck to eat cheese, watched thousands of bats fly over, lit candles and exchanged Christmas gifts, listened to Christmas carols, cooked Tom Yum, chilled out to Modern Family and baked some special red velvet Santa Hat cupcakes.

It really was the best Christmas Eve ever.

Last Friday night at Ikea

2011-12-23T16:39:00.002+10:00

Have you discovered the joy of shopping at Ikea at night time? It has revolutionised our world. We parked in the closest non-disabled/parents carpark to the main entrance, we strolled leisurely through the top floor without the crowds and the screaming children, we got dinner for free AND we came home with lots of goodies.

A word of warning though - night time shopping at Ikea will diminish your bank account. Everything looks more pretty / useful / needed / stylish / functional when you don't have to peep at it from behind a crowd of people!

The honeymoon - part one

2011-12-22T10:46:00.002+10:00

Where better to take my new wife on our honeymoon than the land of elves, orcs, trolls and wraiths. Yes, that's right, we went to New Zealand! We have a lot of photos and some stories to share, so without further adieu, here is part one of four of our honeymoon adventure.

(And just an FYI these posts will be about as epic as a Peter Jackson production.)

Kia Ora Mr & Mrs Swanson!

We flew from Brisbane to Christchurch on a late night flight that turned red eye when our plane was delayed, instead of arriving in Christchurch at midnight, we arrived at 3:00 am. Never fear, honeymooners are a cheery lot and we soon emerged the next day with our rental car, a GPS and a a long scenic meander to our first stop and Laura's favourite place in the world - Lake Tekapo.

Lake Tekapo

We stayed at Pepper's Bluewater Resort which was a pretty sweet little hotel with faded cedar buildings and views over the lake and mountains. Best of all the manager left a congratulatory cheese platter in our room for us on arrival - our first free honeymoon loot! Everything was starting to feel quite magical.

After a late night flight and a long drive, we took a nap and when we woke up it was snowing. Awesome! The weather had been wet and overcast since we arrived (hey, who cares about the weather?!) and after those few wonderful moments of snow the clouds cleared and it was sunshine and blue skies for the rest of our holiday.

The next morning we visited the infamous old chapel on the lake, I fought with Japanese tourists stumbling into the frame while Laura took her time admiring the lupines by the lake. So incredibly beautiful! And the scenery was pretty epic as well hey!

Tarras Village & the road to Queenstown

A typical conversation of ours on the road was as follows:

Will: Woah!

Laura: Woaaah!

Will: Look at that!

Laura: Woah!

Every hill we drove over, every valley we drove through and every creek and river crossing was spectacular on our way to Queenstown. Every scene was framed by mountains and lined with turqoise alpine lakes. Coming from sub tropical Brisbane in a dry heat wave we were in awe of all the good looking nature around us.

Even kiwis themselves are pretty cool, and hip. Boy are they hip. We stopped through a little town called Tarras Village which looked like etsy.com if the online kitschy craft store ever occupied a postcode. Vintage chic lovers can see more of Mrs Robinson's vintage fabrics and knick-knacks shop over on Laura's blog soon.

Next door was a well equipped local store with most of the items coming from local producers in the area, and it also made a good pit stop for more practical reasons. Though the kitchen had closed by the time we arrived at the local cafe (and delicious cuisine items like wild game, NZ beef, salmon, rabbit and other tasty things were now off the menu), the toasted bacon, camembert and pesto rolls called torpedoes were still intensely delicious! Foodies take note, New Zealand has good fare.

If you've lasted this long into our epic post you're probably family or a stalker, so stay tuned for part two in Queenstown with our incredible designer built house with million-dollar views, our kayak adventure into the unkempt wilderness and I battle a mighty dragon called Smaug for a pile of golden treasure.

Milk Cafe

2011-12-12T19:16:00.001+10:00

Three cheers for lazy Saturday mornings. Absolute bliss. We only roused ourselves out of the house with the promise of breakfast/brunch/lunch at our 'local' - Milk Cafe. This old-time style milk bar does delicious coconut milkshakes, serves a mean BLT and burgers and is so darn charming you almost expect the waiters to serve you on rollerblades.

Here's to Saturday morning dates, a good milkshake and hanging out with my husband!

We're back!

2011-12-11T20:32:00.004+10:00

In case you missed it, we got married! And then had the time of our lives in glorious New Zealand. Now we are husband and wife, and that is the best thing ever.

2011-11-20T14:31:00.002+10:00

- - - -

Following an incredible event in the lives of william+laura, the newlyweds will...

B E

B A C K

S O O N!

- - - -

The Wedding Files: Two sleeps!

2011-11-17T10:49:00.003+10:00

We're on holidays!

It's two sleeps until we get married!

We're off to lunch for Will to meet my NZ grandparents!

It's all happening!!

Friday night fiesta!

2011-11-13T00:36:00.003+10:00

A sneaky photo steal from here. More photos to come.

We treated our families, bridal party, partners and MCs to a Mexican Fiesta at Smurf Haus on Friday night. It was a little thank you for all their love and support and kicked off 'Wedding Week' celebrations. There were pinatas and everything!

7 sleeps baby!

The Wedding Files: Behind the scenes

2011-11-10T00:24:00.011+10:00

It's very late at night and I should be asleep, but who can sleep when they are getting married so soon?!

We've been working hard getting the final details of our wedding sorted. We've taken over our dining room table with lots of paper and fabric and string, and my bedroom and the spare room, (and my brother's room!!) are housing important items like my wedding dress and wedding shoes. It's all systems GO!

Here's a sneak peek behind the scenes - without giving too much away ;)

Left to right, top to bottom:
1. Confetti from our invitations, 2. Cheesy cauliflower I couldn't eat because the excited little butterflies in my stomach were doing aerobatics!
3. + 4. Edible blooms from Will, with a cute note attached.
5. Practicing my new name, 6. One of many trips to Bunnings.
7. Kitchen tea gifts! 8. Scouting photography locations.
9. The day I picked up my wedding dress, 10. Sushi at Chermside while running wedding errands.
11. The final countdown! 12. My TD&H future husband.

By the roadside

2011-11-05T12:30:00.001+10:00

#WeLoveWestEnd

The Wedding Files: Scouting out photo locations

2011-11-04T23:52:00.005+10:00

Ah! So much happening, so little time to record it all!

Last weekend we went exploring. 'Finalise photography locations' was the next item on our shrinking to-do list, and it was a beautiful afternoon to get scouting. We've found some gorgeous (secret) spots and can't wait to get photos taken as husband and wife.

Will whipped out my iPhone and I twirled in the sunshine.

It was all fun and games until I got attacked by a bug. Will caught me part way through the classic Fraser-eye-lid-flutter...

Classy, right?

Sometimes he brings me flowers...

2011-10-26T18:27:00.003+10:00

... sometimes he brings me vegetables carved into animal shapes!

And by sometimes, I mean it's only happened once, on Sunday, when this little fella showed up in a cardboard box. What a cutie!

Our house is haunted...

2011-10-20T23:49:00.005+10:00

...by the ghost of a very tall smurf.

Recently, we have spent a lot of time turning the Smurf House into a home (for ~~Smurfs~~ humans). Trips to Lifeline, trips to Ikea and me going on and on and on about a bedspread I've ordered from the States. If my current obsession is anything to go by, Will has a lifetime of linen conversations to ~~endure~~ look forward to. Lucky man.

It is such a wonderful little house though, with a lot of personality. I guess no house with blue walls throughout the inside and the outside could ever be called dull.

There are blooming rose bushes in the backyard that provide fresh flowers every day, and if the breeze on the front deck is anything to go by, it will be a glorious summer house. 28 days until I move in, and it can't happen fast enough!

{dinner date}

2011-10-18T22:56:00.003+10:00

Our latest effort in our attempt to eat our way around Brisbane - Guzman y Gomez. It's where all the cool kids go!

The Wedding Files: Wise words

2011-10-11T22:18:00.004+10:00

"The grass is always greener where you water it."

This little quote was kindly shared with us by our wedding photographer a few months ago. From memory, she had heard it from an older gentleman while working on a photography project about relationships and commitment.

I think it's a wonderful thought to consider for marriage.

Photo from my 365 day project.

saturday-to-saturday

2011-10-09T09:48:00.003+10:00

It's been a wonderful week of little moments that I don't ever want to forget.

Birthday picnic for Steffany.
New yellow shoes, newly weds, and an endless supply of chips.

Enjoying the river and the sunshine after work. Others ran, we took it slow.

Hilarious, snort-laughter-inducing moments.
The tarago-driving poodle and a City Cat and rubber ducky stand off.

Taking on Ikea very late one night... and winning!
Hand-picked flowers from our garden and having coffee on the new kitchen trolley the next morning.

Being in the office, and also being out.

There are so many little moments in each week that deserve to be remembered. If I don't have my camera out, I often find myself taking a mental photograph and storing it away in the back of my mind. The last seven days have been drenched in amazing, full, rich moments with people I love. Here are a few of the mental photographs I don't want to forget:

The ocean spray and coming around the top end of Moreton Island
Holding hands in traffic and animatedly discussing our work day
Being overwhelmed by wedding prep, having a good sob on Will's shoulder, and feeling like all was well with the world again after
Watching 'Into the Wild' on the very noisy bean bags
Eating copious amounts of sticky rice at Thai Wi Rat
Making our living room look amazing with new lamps and cushions
Riding a golf buggy through aisles of trees
A very sleepy Will making very silly jokes about BoBo and Lola
Finding a $600 tie while looking for groomsmen's attire
Counting down days until we are married - 40 sleeps left

Life is so very wonderful.

A day on the bay

2011-10-06T14:00:00.000+10:00

There's nothing like spending a day on the water, whether it's at the beach or scooting across the bay as we did on Sunday - especially when the sun is shining and the clouds are fighting a losing battle for a spot in the sky! Despite some pretty stiff onshore winds we boarded the MS Eye-Spy and crossed Moreton bay to visit pods of humpback whales on their annual migration down the East coast.

It was such a great lazy day, and the whales were also certainly lazy. They were content to spend most of the time rolling on their backs and working on their blubber. We saw six or eight whales along the coast of Moreton Island and a few pesky dolphins for good measure. I borrowed a zoom lens for the day (thanks Ming!) but the whales were content to mostly lurk rather than breach, so no National Geographic images this time, but going on dates with Laura and you always have a supermodel on hand - wow!

detour

2011-10-03T19:32:00.003+10:00

A couple of weeks ago, we made a spontaneous detour on our way home from work - a detour that including a trip to Max Brenner, dress shopping, and a movie date at Southbank.

I gotta be honest, those kind of detours are my favourite.

And we can now wholeheartedly recommend the White Shake (lychee and coconut) and the Yellow Granita (fresh mint and lemon). Seriously yummo.

little moments

2011-09-24T22:03:00.003+10:00

On Friday after work, we had picnic in our backyard. There's nothing like lying on the grass under a big blue sky. We listened to Angus and Julia Stone's 'Mango Tree', ate an entire packet of corn chips and laughed the afternoon away.

The Wedding Files: 66 days

2011-09-13T21:12:00.002+10:00

66 days, or 9 weeks and 3 days, or 2 months and 5 days, or 1584 hours until we are getting married.

Here's my new favourite photo of my future husband and I, to celebrate the countdown!

Photo credit: Jess Greenwood

Ending August

2011-09-05T18:07:00.005+10:00

We've just finished a very busy, very crazy month. Our little blog has been kinda quiet, but not because life has been dull. There's been lots of work meetings, a bit of travel, countless training presentations, pre-marriage counselling sessions, a wedding, birthday parties, decking out Casa del Smurf, family dinners, wedding ring shopping, coffee dates, gift registry set up and waay too much time spent in traffic. Life has been FULL.

But we managed to sneak in a lunch date last week and finally visited Jam Jar. Yay!

The outdoor courtyard is hidden from view on the street, and decked out with cool artwork from local artists. It feels a little bit like a Melbourne alleyway cafe! I had a yummy chicken and chorizo gumbo and Will enjoyed potato pancakes. The servings were a little on the small side, and neither of us really liked the music choice, but aside from that, it's a pretty cool little West End cafe.

And here's to a *fingers crossed* quieter, calmer September!

The Wedding Files: Blacker and Val

2011-09-05T17:25:00.004+10:00

We were so honoured to witness and celebrate our dear friends' marriage on Saturday. Blacker and Val are one of our favourite couples and it was so special to stand under those big old fig trees and hear them say their vows. Val was absolutely radiant and hearing Blacker share why he wanted to marry her made me cry. And Groomsman #4, what a handsome man.

And that renegade chicken? I will be asking Val where she hired him from and seeing if we can sneak some feathered friends into the church come Nov 19.

I'm joking, of course. Apparently llamas, not chickens, are where it's at. Oh world of weddings, you are a crazy, crazy place.

A little bit of last week.

2011-08-27T00:03:00.003+10:00

These things make me happy:

Friday nights at the Smurf House. Freshly picked flowers from our garden and lemon tarts. Artwork from our engagement party. Honeymoon planning.

Picniking

2011-08-18T22:01:00.010+10:00

We made the most of our Ekka Show Day with yet another picnic (seriously, we're getting good at these!) at Cedar Creek. What can beat the great outdoors, a hunk of brie and the love of your life?

We were merrily enjoying the tranquility, guzzling down our Honest Quenchers, when all of a sudden, a greedy kookaburra landed in our picnic fare and tried his luck at stealing our food. The cheeky birdy left his beak-print in the brie, but otherwise left empty-handed (empty-beaked?).

Of course, we weren't going to give up any of our yummy treats, so we set up a tripod to protect the goods. Low and behold, Mr Kookaburra tried again. I squealed and covered my eyes, only to open them seconds later and see Will with a large kookaburra in his hands!! The bottom centre photo shows Will re-enacting the catch - I was too slow to capture it the first time round. Needless to say, the tripod turned into a picnic-protecting tee-pee and after waiting in the trees for ages, Mr Kookaburra finally gave up.

After lunch, Will smashed up wood and I did some wedding-related stitching. We explored the creek bed, reminisced about the proposal and made the most of my new Camera+ app.

The day finished with Thai takeaway back at the Blue House. We began our pre-marriage counselling DVDs, which took our minds off all the wedding planning and set our focus on what's most important - our marriage. And when the clock struck 8 o'clock, Will pulled me off the couch, raced up the street and we watched red and green and pink and gold explosions fill the sky and illuminate the city.

A perfect day.

97 days..

2011-08-14T15:16:00.000+10:00

... until I'll be coming home to this house and this man - yippee!!

A day at the Raceway

2011-08-13T14:23:00.004+10:00

The only thing better than a Work Social Event, is a Work Social Event with your favourite colleague, who also happens to be your fiance. We spent most of Friday at Kingston Park Raceway with our work mates, racing around the track and enjoying a day away from the desk.

But don't let the smile below fool you - apparently I am not such a fan of stuffy helmets and smelly petrol cars. I quit early on in the day and may have gone home later with a mild case of sunstroke. Will, however, went on to do a gazillion laps around the course and went home with the Winner's Trophy (and his trophy fiance!).

Yay Will!

Yesterday

2011-08-08T21:12:00.003+10:00

Yesterday, we headed straight to the blue house on the hill after church. We walked 4 minutes up a small hill to our new local cafe. We ate ham and cheese croissants and took in the quirky decor. Then we walked back down the hill, checking out the neighbourhood and watching the birds eat ants.

Yesterday, we drove in the opposite direction, to one of three local supermarkets. We wandered around the aisles, picking up all the important things. Fresh fruit and veggies. Good-quality olive oil. Mersey Valley cheese and Vita-Weat crackers. I made smiley faces at the most adorable little girl, who made lots of lovely faces back at me. We made bets on how much the groceries would cost, and I won.

Yesterday, we organised the fridge and we organised the pantry. We curled up on the couch and watched the rain catch the sunlight, and dribble down the paw-paw tree that stands just outside our window. I had a Sunday snooze. Will tickled my back and read his book. He said I didn't snore, and I hope he was telling the truth.

Yesterday, we did something we used to do last year. We each picked our three favourite things from the last couple of months, and took turns sharing them. There have been so many good things, things to reflect upon and remember. We also talked about some of the challenges, and some of the not-so-good things. We talked and talked and talked, and it was good.

Yesterday, after sunset, we got off the couch and took a stroll to the end of the street. We stood on the street corner and marveled at the perfect view of the city and it's lights. Will let me wear his fishing jacket and we tried to spot cranes on the top of buildings. We got very thankful and felt very content.

Yesterday, we ate steak and salad off the white dinner set from my grandma. We sat on cushions on the floor and put our plates on the coffee table. We talked about how very blue the house was, and how wonderful it will be to spend the first year of our marriage there.

Yesterday was a very good day.

The Wedding Files: The Bridesmaids

2011-08-04T09:40:00.003+10:00

After Saturday's adventures house-hunting, came Sunday's just-as-important adventure to find the perfect bridesmaid shoes. After being sick, interstate and up the coast over the last few weekends, I felt like I hadn't seen these lovelies in ages and was more than a little happy to spend my Sunday afternoon wandering around the shopping centre with them.

After sushi and salads and hazelnut milkshakes, we ventured off to find new high-heeled friends. We narrowed down what we were looking for and made chatty shop assistants find us 'one of this and one of that, in a size 7, 8, 9 and 10'. A couple of serious contenders later, and we'd found 'the ones'. And while there was no 'bridesmaid' discount, they were marked at a lower price than what they should have been, so the girls got a little bit off - it was a Christmas miracle! (that's for you Steffy)

These girls are my bridesmaids and I am so happy and blessed to call them my dearest friends.

Kate is my favourite sister and brings lots of laughter, creativity and silliness into my life. We're already getting sad about 'the breakup' - namely the end of the very friendly relationship between my wardrobe and hers. Who will I share clothes with when I live with a boy? Luckily, she bought us matching onsies, so that's one thing we can both keep wearing.

As well has having the hottest blunt fringe ever, Steffany is also full of bridesmaid expertise. She has been a bridesmaid before, and is in another wedding in September, which makes her full of clever thoughts and ideas and advice on pulling this event together. I'm really thankful! What's more, she's witty, she stunning and she has very nice taste - all great bridesmaid attributes!

And now Emily. I have a bunch of things I'll get these girls to help with over the coming months, but so far I've mainly been getting ideas together and getting my head around everything to do. So they haven't been roped into much just yet - that is, everyone but Emily. Emily has been working her (rather cute) butt off designing an amazing wedding invitation. She is incredibly creative and talented, hardworking and very gracious when we're slow with information or deciding on the perfect font.

And my lovely Brie - the only bridesmaid who does not blog! Brie had a gorgeous wedding of her own at the end of 2009 and has a great wealth of bridal expertise. She is thoughtful, caring and kind, and I know come November 19, Brie (and the others!) will take very good care of me. And I really love her new haircut - stunner!

And here's a little peek back to earlier this year, when I official asked the girls. I felt like I was proposing :) There were cupcakes and candles and little letters and lots of girly squeals. And thankfully, they all said YES.

House hunting with W+L

2011-08-03T01:12:00.002+10:00

Much to the chagrine of my employers I've been spending plenty of my time hunting for our first house. I'm not sure if it's just some caveman desire, but I really feel responsible for making sure the first place Laura lives in outside of her own family's home is decent. It'll be crazy enough living with a boy for the first time let alone living in a hovel, I wanted somewhere that even on the bad days of smelly socks and tonka trucks she could be comfortable!

Most work days I send her a 'rental of the day' by email. And we actually quickly decided we quite liked the same ideas: house - yes, apartment - no, polished wooden floors - yes, shagpile carpet - no. And so on and so on.

On Saturday we had a mammoth house hunting adventure together. We were going to inspect four houses in the space of one hour... So here's what we found:

House #1

I'd been eyeing this fellow for a while, great location, nice verandah, and a sudden drop in price on the rental market. But my tenant sensors were up - a drop in price? no internal photos?! Sure enough the pleasant faux-villa style reno finished at the leadlight window in the front door. As we moved through the house with only another edgey couple along for the inspection, we noticed cracked windows, a run down kitchen and a 'open plan' lounge/dining that would treat our furniture like the X2 impossible puzzle. The backyard was a grassless slope, and coming back inside we passed through the kitchen, as quickly as possible. I guess it was authentically Spanish after all.

I realized we wanted a place that we could not only live in, but also enjoy the mundane activities such as cooking dinner together without thinking we were in a lifeline warehouse. This place would be a great reno job, but that's not what we're after so we quickly moved on...

House #2

When the landlord rocked up in their beat up 4x4 packed with whining toddlers my guard was up. We walked through the back entrance to this place with beautiful city views - if you could actually find your way into the house! Its state of disrepair was pretty apparent, but Laura was seriously checking it out! I was ready to move on and get away from the damp air but she was adamant - we really needed to open our minds. I wouldn't be suprised if the previous tenant had a hydroponic farm and opened their minds in certain ways as well.

Sure there was a fireplace, and sure there were city views. But it was old and dingey and run down, and who wants a place where it looks like the landlord hadn't lifted a finger to fix it for the last 20 years? If he couldn't install a front door, I doubt he'd look at some dodgey wiring either.

The hippy couple who joined us for the inspection got into detailed discussions with the landlord - we made our exit swiftly as another poor soul arrived and tried in vain to find the invisible front door.

House #3

This house was kind of an inbetweeny - cheaper than inner city, but still conveniently close to town. This house however was blue. So blue. In fact, I really was unsure about it from the outside because it stuck out of the hill like a smurf villa. We also had another inspection booked at the same time 10 minutes away, so we really had to fly through this one.

Laura on the other hand had decided that it was her house. She even gave me a star jump of approval before we got inside. I paused for a photo of the street number on the front deck, and a few seconds later I met smurfette bounding out of the living room... "Let's put an application in!"

The next thing I realized was that the inside of the house was also blue - so very blue. But it was pretty cool too. It had big, well sized rooms, new fittings, new kitchen and bathroom, a freshly painted interior and great floors. Oh and it was blue, but also cool - it was growing on me!

So we ended up going over the house in detail, finding pros and cons and more pros and more cons. We decided to put an application in there and then. Unfortunately we had missed the other house inspection by this point, but really - this place was pretty cool.

House #4

We drove to our fourth house not really caring what was at the end of the road. We talked and thought about Casa Del Smurfo (the blue house) and how great it was. This last house was ok, it wasn't as blue but then it was also on a corner block and had some funny little quirks from what we saw outside. I suppose I'm just suspicious with upside down street numbers like the number 8 on the letter box. We drove off after a quick walk around.

...

I shall leave you in anticipation of whether we even found a house that weekend, and the next step of actually getting our application approved... But you can wait a little for that :)

The Wedding Files: Half way there..

2011-07-29T09:30:00.003+10:00

I've been thinking about the process of planning a wedding as more of a journey than just a destination. Many people have mentioned how the actual wedding day flies by, so I am savouring the lead up and want to remember all the little moments.

There was the sneaky secret planning before we were officially engaged, which involved vague conversations with Ps Murray about his availability for a 'big event in our lives', lots of emails to a special photographer and an amazing Will contacting event hire places in Brisbane from the other side of the planet...

Then there was the little 'coincidences' of being at another couple's engagement party, and taking up a friend's offer for a lift, and me happening to look up from my phone and out the window as we happened to drive past a lovely little cafe - a lovely little cafe that looked perfect for a dinner party, and happened to host weddings, and just happened to be available for a wedding on November 19. Perfect!
Of course, then came the big events - Will coming home, and proposing, and celebrating with boiled eggs.

And then there was asking the bridesmaids, and finding the dress, and the suit, and designing the invites, and booking the hair dresser, and makeup and making a billion to do lists - but more on all of that another time, because today's big news is that...

We are halfway there!

Today Will and I have been engaged for 3 months and 20 days, and today also marks 3 months and 20 days until we marry. It's all so exciting!

Happy Birthday Mama Liz

2011-07-28T21:01:00.003+10:00

While I will always be a Fraser deep down inside, I am getting so excited about officially becoming a Swanson. I love this family and it was so nice to start the week with a family dinner for Liz's birthday. Happy birthday Liz!! And luckily for me, the night was personality-test-free.

In the midst of planning a wedding, we've been talking a lot about the future and what we want for our marriage. Family and friends and faith are priorities, along with food and fun and fresh air. And yes, the inner-alliterationist in me loves that they all start with the letter F.

But we both feel so blessed to have such wonderful families, and really value the time we spend with them.

Will in West End

2011-07-22T10:49:00.000+10:00

Star jumping our way around West End.

The 13 Days of Birthday...

2011-07-21T22:32:00.000+10:00

The 13 Days of Birthday are like the 12 Days of Christmas. Except, instead of starting with a partridge and ending with twelve drummers drumming, the 13 Days of Birthday start on my birthday (July 6) and finish on Will's (July 18).

We weren't smart enough to realise our birthdays book-ended a 13 day period last year (it was the year we thought living on two separate continents was an okay idea, we were delusional, obviously!) but this year we really smartened up and realised we could turn two individual birthdays into almost a fortnight of celebration. And celebrate we have!

Here are some of the highlights:

Day One: My birthday! Will gave me a cute succulent plant named Albert, we had International Food Day at work, and we had the entire Salon Lounge to ourselves on the account of it being State of Origin Night. We drank cocktails and ate yummy food and Will didn't even gloat when Qld beat NSW.

Day Four: Will spoilt me with a romantic morning horseriding through the beautiful Mooloolah Valley. We made new friends in Alabama and Grizzly Adams, rode through an abandoned train tunnel and I only rode into a tree once. In my defense, it was Alabama's efforts to avoid walking through mud that landed us in such a predicament - who knew horses didn't like dirt?

Day Six: We had a gorgeous picnic in the park and finished the day with a Fraser family dinner - for my birthday and Jeremy's last night in Brisbane before he moved down south. Things got a little crazy when Father Fraser pulled out a personality test for us all to complete, but Will passed with flying colours and, thankfully, still wants to marry me. Cue some Meet the Parents jokes now.

Day Seven: Unrelated to Birthday week, but a big day in both families. Jeremy flew out early in the morning, and Paul and Lauren announced Baby No. 2 early in the afternoon. Bye bye brother and hello new nephew or niece!

Day Eight, Nine and Ten: I wound up in bed for three days with a nasty fever/cough combination. Will brought all my favourite things - a punnet of strawberries, a packet of pork crackle and an interior design book. He's a keeper.

Day Twelve: We had Swanson family lunch to celebrate 28 years of William. The food was delicious and the company was lovely! Will joked with facebook that he felt awkward with all the birthday kisses I gave him, but I know he secretly loved them.

Day Thirteen: Will received birthday balloons, birthday chocolates, a birthday card with a special birthday voucher, and more birthday kisses after work. We had Pizza Capers, snuggled up on the couch and watched a movie. A very fitting end to a wonderful 13 days.

Only, it wasn't the end! As Brisbane seems to shut down on Monday nights, we postponed Will's birthday dinner to Wednesday and treated ourselves to a delicious feed at Blue Smoke BBQ and a selection of sorbets at Freestyle Tout. We turned 13 days into 15, adding a little extra birthday cheer to a very happy fortnight.

Happy Birthday us!

A long distance 'Hey! I love you'!

2011-07-19T21:12:00.000+10:00

Last year, Laura and I spent a large part of our relationship in other countries and on other continents. There are only so many flowers you can send while in a long distance relationship and I couldn't help but feel there was something so unromantic about punching in my credit card details over the internet to do so.

So, on days when there was no emergency unfolding or gantt chart needing populating, I did things like this instead - make a movie with George Clooney in it...

Celebrity Stalking in Sudan from willswanson on Vimeo.

Happy Birthday Handsome

2011-07-18T11:07:00.002+10:00

Today marks 28 years of William, and I think that deserves celebrating! So here's another list of reasons why Will is one-of-a-kind and worth so much to me...

1. Will has been diligently managing a growing list of potential rental properties - finding suitable houses, contacting agents, organising inspections and generally working his butt off to find a home we can call our own. He works hard!

2. He's smart and super intelligent, but completely down to earth. We have great deep conversations about faith and life and politics and science.

3. His amazing smile. See evidence above.

4. Seeing him pull faces with his gorgeous nephew Christian. Will makes everyone smile and always lights up a room.

5. He's just as adorable when he's playing with beautiful Labrador pups.

6. After spending three days in bed, Will visited me every night, bringing gifts and funny stories and back rubs. He looks after me so well.

7. He's such a talented photographer. I love looking back through his blog and seeing the world through his eyes.

8. He makes a delicious Tom Yum. And he goes out of his way to buy all the ingredients when one sick little Laura requests it for lunch.

9. Will is willing to let me run a gazillion wedding thoughts past him without getting fazed. He has great taste in fonts, diplomatic when sorting out guest lists and always brings me back to the bigger picture.

10. He is loyal, strong, handsome, generous and wise. He's just the best.

22 in review

2011-07-05T10:11:00.000+10:00

Last year I was inspired by one of my favourite bloggers (Elsie) and wrote a birthday list - 22 Things to Do Before I Turn 23. I posted it to my Laura and Friends blog and started working my way through a bunch of things I had 'always wanted to do' but had never really made happen.

Given that my birthday is tomorrow and I will officially be 23, I thought I'd see how I went. So here goes:

DONE

#3 - Start a new blog and post regularly.
One of the big 'moments' of our relationship, along with the first 'I love you' and the 'Will you marry me?' was the first conversation we had about starting a blog together. I guess it's the unsexy, unmarried Christian equivalent of 'let's move in together', but a natural progression for two people who have been blogging for a very long time (anyone remember the good ole' days of Will's Red Hero blog?). We have so many memories to keep track of and don't want to forget a single one.

#5 - Go away for a weekend with girlfriends.

One of the best weekends of 2010 - full re-cap here.

#6 - Memorise a chapter of the Bible
So I cheated and found the shortest chapter of Bible - Psalm 117 - but then discovered it is a beautiful, albeit brief, passage about God's love and faithfulness, so I am happily keeping it close to my heart.

#9 - Learn to cook something clever

I can now cook a curry, Thai Larb, Potato Rosti, make sushi, meringues and macaroons.

#10 - Send 50 hand written letters or postcards (okay, maybe not 50, but at least 20!)

#11 - Sew a summer dress
Rocking out my aqua + lime creation. I'd bought the fabric a few years ago in Ghana.

#12 - Make the most amazing care package for William
A special 'First Day of Work' survival pack that included a massage voucher. I think that counts as pretty amazing!

#14 - Read my first ever Jane Austen book

#16 - Graduate university

#17 - Go vegetarian for a month.
Yep, definitely the hardest thing on the list! Though this tofu burger was seriously amazing.

#19 - See ten ‘classic’ films I’ve never seen before
I counted anything that was really old or had one a lot of awards or was one of those films that everybody has seen - Anne of Avonlea, The Queen, Forrest Gump, The Piano (DON'T see it), Revolutionary Road (okay, caught out, only saw five).

#20 - Finish my 365 Days Grateful project

I wrote a reflection here last week - I was so happy to started this, and a little proud to have made it the full 365 days through!

#21 - Give away $500 just because

#22 - Donate blood
There were cheese and biscuits to munch on after and I found out that, though 1 in 3 people need blood, only 1 in 30 donate. I saved three lives, and you can too.

------

ALMOST DONE:

#2 - Fly an aeroplane.
I'd give it another month or two and I'll be able to cross this off the list - excited!

#13 - Work up to being able to run 5km at once.
Will and I are making progress on this one, running along the Brisbane River a few nights a week.

#15 - Visit my Grandma in NSW.
We were all set to go back in early January when Grandma wisely suggested we postpone due to the possibility of flooding. Just a day later, most of Queensland was declared a natural disaster zone and northern NSW was just a inundated. Grandmas are wise women. New trip has been rescheduled for later this month.

------

Any items missing (of which there are a couple) may end up on my 23 Things to Do Before I Turn 24 list. Others, like #4 - Watch the sunrise and the sun set on the same day - have been tossed into the 'Probably too ambitious in the first place' basket.

Yay for Birthday lists - I have loved this last one and am already dreaming up lots of fun things to the next one!

RADelaide

2011-07-02T09:36:00.000+10:00

Last weekend, Mum and I got up at 4am on Saturday morning, to be greeted at our front door at 5am by Will, to get to the airport by 5:30am for a 6:30am flight to ADELAIDE!

We were off on a mother-daughter trip to visit family friends. Their eldest daughter, Grace (8), is my goddaughter, and last weekend was her First Communion. Given I'm not Anglican, I had to read up a bit on what that even meant, but it was really special to spend some time with Grace and her little sister Emma.

We went to the park, saw the ducks, drank lots of hot chocolates, played hide-and-seek in the rose bushes, made electrical circuits, visited the most incredible State Library, wandered through the Museum, hurried through Art Gallery, cuddled with Henri the Cat, enjoyed a fancy dinner party, picked mandarins from the garden, played with the most amazing dolls house, and of course, headed off to church on Sunday morning.

Needless to say, I'm glad to be a 'grown up' - life as a little human is BUSY, and tagging along made me sleepy. I've spent this past week taking naps in an effort to recuperate. But there's nothing like a little interstate interlude to mix things up!

And can I please have a house just like this one?

A perfect Sunday in June

2011-06-30T21:25:00.000+10:00

On a perfectly crisp and sunshiney day in June a group of people gathered in a clearing in a forest to celebrate something really cool... our engagement!

After downpours of rain and the decision to delay it a month ago, it was more magnificent than we could have hoped for. Thank you mums and dads, friends and family for all pitching in, and thanks to everyone who came along to make this day not just fun, but incredibly special!

And since that Sunday in the park the best thing I've discovered is that the party might be over... but we're still engaged! Woohoo!

........

Break Even Day

2011-06-23T21:36:00.000+10:00

Will and I have been together for 415 days. We've spent 207 of them on separate continents. Today marked Day 208 of being together in the same country. Break even day baby!

We took a lunch time stroll through the back streets of West End and had a little picnic on the front lawn of a friend's house. There is nothing like winter sunshine, pretty flowers, and a certain handsome someone to brighten up a day in the office.

And tonight included dinner at Sings, house-stalking in Bardon, budget writing and a quick trip to Chermside for a preview viewing of Steff's Nov 19 dress.

Today was a VERY GOOD DAY.

Engagement Party Eve

2011-06-18T19:36:00.000+10:00

It's the night before our engagement party and I am a bundle of excitement. We spent the day getting all the last minute jobs done - picking up paper cups and printing photos and organising furniture.

We have gorgeous red cake stands waiting for cupcakes in the kitchen and a pile of pretty blankets sitting in our lounge room. And after the boys spent the afternoon moving furniture, I got a text with the caption 'Brid@l bo¥z' and the photo below.

After postponing the party from May to June, we got caught up in the rest of day to day life and kinda forgot the party was coming up. It's only been the past few days that we've realised this is actually happening.

Yes, we're already engaged, but celebrating with family and friends makes it feel all the more real. We've spent all day saying "We're getting 'engagement-partied' tomorrow!" and I just can't wait.

Mum & bub

2011-06-16T20:30:00.000+10:00

My nephew Christian is now 8 months old and pretty much the most adorable character in the <100cm size range. I visited Christian and his mum Lauren for coffee while I was still in robe and slipper mode recently and we went to the park for a hang out in some crisp winter sunshine.

Warning - these photos are disgustingly cute!

You can see more images from this day over at Lauren's Pink Absence

Date Night

2011-06-12T13:15:00.000+10:00

We are big lovers of food, but tend to stick to the Asian / Thai side of things. But we may just have found our new favourite restaurant on Friday night - Ortiga.

We ate our way through various parts of the pig (with some beef and squid on the side) and marveled at the waitstaff's ability to not only pronounce all the Spanish names, but also get through the lengthy explanation of what everything was.

And of course, any restaurant that serves complimentary pork crackle to munch on while perusing the menu will instantly win my heart.

But the most important part of date night is the date. I always end up sitting across from the funniest, thoughtful and most handsome guy.

He's a hottie and I will happily eat 'jamones' with him for the rest of my life.

at sunset...

2011-06-10T19:38:00.000+10:00

Sunset Picnic, May 29, 2011

About five minutes later, Will pretended (loudly) to propose. We got some polite smiles from the tourists and celebrated the moment by eating an entire chunk of Mersey Valley cheese.

In fact, Will has proposed a number of times since the real thing. He's tried it loudly in a restaurant before, seeing if they give us a special engagement discount. They didn't, but I think my endless giggles and 'but we're already engaged!' protests may have given that one away.

And now, we're just about to race out the door to try a spanish tapas place in the Valley and I wouldn't be surprised if the night ends with someone down on one knee. Luckily, I have not changed my mind and will keep saying yes, again and again and again.

The beach

2011-06-09T01:07:00.000+10:00

May 29, 2011

Dear Saturday, you rocked.

2011-06-05T13:06:00.000+10:00

Two hours in the sunshine. Brightly coloured golf balls. Lots of hilarious swings.. and misses. A few hole-in-ones. Cute little families enjoying a day out. Finding tilt-shift in Instagram. Blue skies. Yummy lunch. Beautiful friends. High fives.

Sunday Sunshine

2011-06-04T00:25:00.000+10:00

Sometimes when I need some head space, or some heart/soul space, there's nothing like getting some real space - big wide outdoors kinda space, with an ocean that goes on forever and a blue sky that reaches to the heavens. And when that's the case, nothing beats getting away for the day and taking a mini-holiday with the one that you love.

First stop - Organika. Will made a big deal about my great menu selection - the Thai Chicken Burger - and I gotta admit, the Thai Chicken Burger was kind of a big deal. Chicken, noodles, chilli, avocado, coconut - it was amazing.

And then, Noosa Heads. This place is so good. The weather was amazing, the views were spectacular and we even spotted a dolphin gliding through the water. I could stare at the ocean all day, and that's basically what we did.

I re-read some of my favourite chapters from A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. I was reading a bit about making 'memorable scenes' in life when Will came over with two love-heart shaped rocks for me. My man made a memorable scene right there.

It was just a single day at the beach, but it made all the difference to my week. I glided through this week feeling so rested, so relaxed and so ready, and rather convinced that mini-holidays should be a very regular part of our lives.

Friday Night Hangs

2011-05-31T21:13:00.000+10:00

“What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured.”

- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. quotes (American Writer, b.1922)

Just a handful of the people who make life wonderfully unlonely.

the mamas

2011-05-28T17:10:00.000+10:00

We love our mums.

gotta remember this date...

2011-05-26T22:20:00.000+10:00

May 24, 2011.

The day we discovered the all-you-can-eat buffet at Sushi Station in West End.

It is also the day before Will accepted a job... in West End... down the street from my work... and approximately 20 metres from our new favourite Japanese place.

Life is throwing so many good things our way.

Sunshine & beach boxes

2011-05-25T15:27:00.000+10:00

Last year we took a holiday down to Victoria to visit friends and family before I took off to Africa. After a few misty days in vineyard territory we decided to visit the famous beach boxes and the weather kindly put on a fantastic show of blue skies and sunshiney goodness. Apparently you can purchase one of these tiny timber sheds for $200 000. At that price I'd probably install high speed internet and call it home-sweet-home.

You can also check out Laura's grateful #28 from the same day!

'Very lemony' lemon slice

2011-05-20T15:14:00.000+10:00

So what do you do when life gives you lemons and buckets down rain before your outdoor engagement party? You make lemon slice! I practiced my house-hubby skills and used this random recipe (I have no idea how I found it) for lemon slice. As you know - the girl loves anything with lemons it!

First I made the base, which was the scariest part creaming the butter and sugar that wasn't quite room temperature. Thank goodness the 'artisan' was in fine form!

Then plonked it in the tray and into the oven to cook and go light brown for 15 minutes
While the base was baking I made the super lemony filler with lemon juice and zest - from five freakin lemons. that's a lot of elbow grease...
I poured the filler over the base, and two became one. Then put it back in the oven for 30 minutes.
I had so much filler I put the left overs in some ramekins and added crushed peanuts as a base in the bottom (that's all I could find!).
Turned out pretty great for my first ever attempt at baking sweeties!

(Babe they're ready when you get home from work :)

happiness is...

2011-05-18T22:19:00.000+10:00

1. Finding king-sized Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and eating them right up.

2. The perfect dilemma - three beautiful wedding dresses to choose from.

3. Will+Laura+Steff dates.

4. Having the heater on at work. On and set to 28 degrees.

5. A beautiful, special patchwork quilt.

6. Visiting the cutest little cafe. It even came with knitted knee rugs!

7. Watching Miss Em walk across stage and graduate. Well not technically, as we were running late and missed that part. But we got to drool over her portfolio after. Not technically on the drool part either, leaving our saliva everywhere would not be classy.

8. Phone conversations with my Nana in NZ.

9. A day in the park playing with helium balloons. These things are fun!

10. Knowing I will marry this handsome fella in six months and one day.

He knows me too well. I do love lists.

Why she can't live without lists

2011-05-16T23:14:00.000+10:00

Whether we've been planning a holiday, a month of close-distance relationship activities, or an engagement party and wedding, I've been discovering that Laura just cannot live without lists. I might start a conversation talking about shoulder massages, Laura often opens the conversation with 'I think we need to write a list...'

Here's a list of reasons why I suspect Laura couldn't live without lists:

1. She's a logical and analytical thinker, which is awesome, because I'm often off on a tangent somewhere

2. She likes to get things done and done well, as she's a sucker for excellence

3. Lists are something two people can share and work towards, which is great as we pretty much do everything together nowadays!

4. She's visual and needs something to stare at while conjuring up a storm of ideas

5. Being artistic slash creative demands the need for a pencil in her hand and something to draw on, having a list is a great excuse!

6. She doesn't just do extra-curricular, she actually does 'ultra-curricular' activities. Lists help her spread as much Laura love around as effectively as possible to her tutoring family, her fiance, her friends , family and passions!

7. It's symptomatic of her 'notebook obsession disorder' :)

So yeah, her list obsession might very well be weird but there once was a time that I actually couldn't live without whiteboards and marker pens...

Street photography in Melbourne

2011-05-14T17:23:00.000+10:00

More images of our Victoria trip are in the Sunshine & beach boxes post!

365 days.

2011-05-12T21:29:00.000+10:00

Dinner celebrations at Citron - the best modern Asian restaurant around.

May 4, 2011.

One whole entire year together.

Together, but actually mostly apart. In fact, I just did the maths. Of our first 365 days together, we spent 207 of them on different continents.

Being the self-confessed nerd that I am, I took the numbers a little further. June 23 is our official break-even day.

After that, we will have spent more days in the same country than not.

And that makes me a very happy girl.

Macaroons: a love affair...

2011-05-09T17:39:00.000+10:00

Why would we post about macaroons on our blog? Well, at some point last year Laura discovered an incredible knack for creating these sugary marvels at exactly the same time that I discovered a peculiar culinary addiction to them. Some would call it all just a coincidence, but true macaroon connoisseurs know that 'macaroon' and 'coincidence' are antonyms!

Coincidentally, around that same time we flew to Melbourne and in the course of our adventures we discovered an entire restaurant specializing in macaroons....

They didn't last very long at all... Oh, and more blog posts about our Melbourne trip are on the way :)

Better together

2011-05-02T21:34:00.000+10:00

Because a couple that irons together, stays together.

When Will was overseas, one of the things I was most looking forward to on his return was being able to do things together. The basic things, like sharing a meal, or taking a walk.

Separated by thousands of kilometres, and with a seven hour time difference between us, our 'dating' relationship did not consist of movie dates and weekend picnics. Rather we talked. And talked and talked and talked.

We talked about the weather. We talked about our work. We talked about life and love and other mysteries. Sometimes we spoke until the Sudanese sun had set and the Australian sun was about to rise.

We talked until we had nothing left to say, and then we sat in silence. Or we had a video chat dance party to Will's ringtone, depending on the mood.

The thing about long distance relationships is you have to rely on conversation. Conversation without activity. Conversation without interaction with other friends and family. Conversation without body language, if the internet or power was out. Bare, basic conversation with out all the extras that really are so important.

How we both learnt to listen to the tone of each other's voice, to gauge sentences and sighs.

Once when I was feeling particularly disheartened, a dear friend wisely advised me to talk and ask about everything - including, and especially, the trivial and mundane. She too had endured a long distance relationship, and knew the importance of staying connected when distance, time and internet providers seemed intent of making connection impossible.

I can't tell you how many times I asked Will what he had for breakfast, or he asked for a blow-by-blow description of my very ordinary work day.

So there was great anticipation for his return and the opportunity to do things together - to share in something together, rather than just report back at the end of the day. I am so grateful now to head to the supermarket, to go to a friend's birthday party, to spend an evening dining out with friends, with his hand in mine and a smile on my face.

This engagement season has brought so many projects and activities our way, and there is nothing better than working on something together. The phrase 'better together' rings so true.

And while I never want to do long distance ever again, there is a real gratefulness for that season too. I know Will so well because of the hours upon hours upon hours of conversation we have had. We know the value of communication, because we've been in a place where we've had to put so much value on it.

But how I love that a hug and a hand squeeze are now back in the vocabulary.

Dear Anaconda...

2011-04-26T00:05:00.000+10:00

Do you have a wedding gift registry?

We'd like a couple of bicycles and a two-person kayak.

Love William and Laura.

An Easter picnic

2011-04-24T16:45:00.000+10:00

We took my brother Jeremy and his girlfriend Aneela on a picnic to our new favourite picnic place to celebrate Good Friday. We drove to Cedar Creek in Aneela's hilariously cute Polo hatchback. The roof slid all the way back so we were getting a tan in the backseat along the way!

I'm beginning to think that we are serious picnickers as I've lost track of how many times we've sat on a rug under a tree or by a stream and had lunch. I still haven't found a restaurant or cafe that comes close to the incredible ambience of this place!

Happy Easter!