into the rain

Well, I'm not sure where to start.. Since I've last posted much has occured in the otherwise typical life of Annie. Christmas was what to be expected; plenty of delicious food, awkward relative conversations la de la de la. Probably the nicest part of Christmas for me was the evening when were went to my Nan and Pop's house up North, because I got to spend time with my cousins baby son who is probably the god dam cutest little human being to walk the planet! Jack and I basically spent the entire night with Nate in our arms or in the plastic wheel barrel which we had to push him in non-stop. After Christmas was done and dusted we got up at sunrise to set off for Woodford, where all the fun began. Woodford was incredible, as it is every single year. It was pretty wet this year, maybe 4 days of non stop rain and 3 of mostly sunshine. The gum boots certainly got a work out and a half. My favourite live acts I saw this year were Tinpan Orange (now my most listened to band within a 4 day period), Cat Empire (of course), Felix and The Phoenix (felix cat empire felix in case you are unaware of his new band.. oh and I got to chat to felix after the show.. just casually..grjaegieahgb) and a bunch of local artists I listened to at Fretfest each morning with a croissant. I spent a lot of the week lazing around in the Chai Temt, meeting new people and dancing ridiculously hard to Wild Marmalade. Overall Woodford, if I had to squeeze the experience into one sentence.. It was a week of fantastic food, hilarious sometimes awkward but always worthwhile situations, plenty of cheap wine and incredible people all packed onto a few hills covered in mud.

One day when I was sitting on the Village Green people watching (in a non-stalker kinda fashion) I just had this overwhelming sense of belonging roll over me. It felt like every person in the whole god dam festival was exactly where they were meant to be, doing exactly what they were meant to be doing. Whether it was the little kids skipping stones by the waterfall or the doped up hippies gazing into the trees and seeing much more than just leaves and barks and especially the musicians who all looked like they were ridiculously content with their venues and audiences (and who can blame them.. might I add). It was like Woodford was one giant puzzle and we were all just little pieces fitting in to create this image. Anyway, on the topic of images and away from the topic of my never-ending rants.. here are some of my favourite stills from this year:

Mummsy and I

Rits and Kyrill our friends all the way from Amsterdam!

Oh Jerusalem.. you brought us many laughs

Breakfast with George and Vin

Ellie and her consistently wet hair

Nic.. being Nic

Seb showing some love to Elle, which was clearly reciprocated

Beattie embracing the mud

Sitting on the hill at the amphitheatre

Holly, Briar and Finn's mud wars

Writing on the Village Green

Some kiddies playing in the lake

Village Green

That time when Vin and George carried me around on a chair

George and me

Blue King Brown

Lior

TIM!

Boats on a lake

Tim and Fin

Georgie looking ridiculously good for a muddy festival

Maybe my favourite stall in the festival!

In Action!

I'll finish with some music by Tinpan Orange:

Tinpan Orange by gaga-digi

woah pools!

I wasn't going to do another post but then I started to look up photos of pools and well.. there's some seriously GREAT pools out there! I especially like the contrast between the incredibly mind blowingly awesome pools and the shitty inflatables haha :)

merry merry christmas bloggers!

I haven't posted at all these holidays as I've been so busy enjoying the pure freedom provided by umemployment and 2 months of no school. My holidays so far have basically consisted of hot days lazing by the public pool with friends, spending hundreds of dollars on christmas gifts (fucking season of giving!), dieing my hair various shades of pink, contionous sleepovers and lots of time spent on trains and buses. Tonight it is Christmas Eve and although this is exciting in a "fuck yeah presents tomorrow and a shitload of good food" kinda way but really tomorrow is far more smile evoking. Obviously.. you may say because tomorrow IS christmas but also tomorrow is Woodford Eve which is considerably more exciting and definitely worth noting. In a mere two days I will be at Woodford probably in the festival at this point munching on satays, filos, pancakes, noodles, gourmet pizza and other various foreign delicacies that keep my stomach rumblin' at night. I will be gearing up for a week of music, laughs and memories that can only be described as 'once in a life time'. What happens in Woodford, stays in Woodford as within all those crowds of dope smelling hippies and amongst hill after hill of secret spots and shadows cast by big gum trees, there is plenty of space and opportunities for secrets to happen and be kept. But before all this I must put back at least half of the clothes I want to pack and bake some cookies for the fam. So my fellow readers (if any are still out and about after my lack of blog-appearance) I would like to wish you a very Merry Christmas and I hope you all have as awesome of a new years as I will be having! Hohohooho

Brothers On A Hotel Bed by revolemina

cobra snake

I fell in love with this editorial I found on the cobra snake (here). The photographs for me show a mix of innocence, secrets and maturity. I'd love to do a shoot like this; taking fashion, photography and writing to create a series of photographs that tells a fashionably aesthetic story! Click photos for larger images

Do you ever feel sometimes like, you need to have something you are really good at. Something that strangers and friends and family can remember you for being great at. Do you ever feel like you don't have that 'something'? That maybe you won't find it.

geh

So next year our formal is in April.. which is good and bad. Good: It'll be warmer so unnecessarily ugly shawls aren't needed. Bad: It's in APRIL which is only 4 months away, 4 months seems a long time but the next 2 months will fly, being holidays and then it's only 8 weeks. I want to buy a vintage dress which will most likely involve buying something online from an overseas buyer which is great and all but frustrating because you can't try it on obviously.. Not to mention I have no clue who to even take. geh I'm just going to forget about it for another month or so.

christmas and mountains etcetera etcetera

Holidays have started off slowly but pleasantly enough. I spent the weekend up at my Nan and Pop's house which conveniently is placed a casual half hour drive from the mountains of the "Sunshine" Coast (please note I put sunshine in inverted commas because there was a considerable lack of sunshine for the entire weekend). All in all it was a lovely little getaway; drinking tea and eating nan's home made cookies whilst watching modern family into the wee hours of the morning and driving through small mountain towns, shopping in markets and devouring scones and pies, was most enjoyable. I could find myself easily living up there amongst all the giant green trees and lakes filled with secrets.

On a different note, all this Christmas hype is certainly keeping me jolly, holly and ready for mass amounts of food at family gatherings. I decorated the tree a week or so ago and even bought a USB CONNECTED Christmas tree for my computer! Yeah! So basically I eat all that shit up and if everything happened the way I dream I would be in a big ol' American style home having a white Christmas with ugly sweaters, turkey, carols, mistletoe kisses, ice skating and marshmallows by the fire place. Yet again- around this time of the year I resent to live in the Southern Hemisphere.

All I Want For Christmas Is You (by Mariah Carey) by XmasSongs

YES!