This is not a spray paint tutorial.

In preparation of the bathroom renovation, I was cleaning out my accumulated junk. Among this junk was an old chrome style trolley. It was looking a little worse for wear and was about to meet it's fate in the bin.
I had a very random, sudden idea to paint it a bright colour.

Being a complete novice in the spray painting trade, I trotted off to Mitre 10 Mega in my stilettos after work one night and tried to explain my project to a very nice man in terribly unflattering overalls. I'm talking overalls supporting a protruding belly unflattering. But nevertheless he was very helpful.

I came away from the shop $30 poorer, but armed with a can of primer which he said would "bond to anything"and a bright yellow top coat.

I didn't read up online for any tips on spray painting or priming or surface preparation... so unlike me. But this project was spontaneous and not well thought through.

Let me walk you through as best I can so you don't make the same mistakes.

1. I lined the floor of the garage with newspaper as it was raining outside. (mistake one, now a yellow patch of paint on garage floor and newspaper permanently bonded onto my trolley...)
2. I sprayed the BLACK primer onto the trolley in what I thought were thin coats (mistake two, covering black with yellow?)
3. I sprayed a second coat of primer (actually ok this time)
4. I flipped the trolley pieces over to prime the other side (mistake three, the moment the paper began bonding with my trolley)
5. I waited for the primer to dry
6. Sprayed a thin coat of yellow onto the trolley trying to cover the black primer, meanwhile asking myself why the man in the unflattering overalls didn't sell me a WHITE primer. 
7. Sprayed a second coat... but not so pleased with the coverage, so I went a bit heavy handed with the paint (mistake four). 
8. Waited for it all to dry 
9. Turned it over and sprayed the other side yellow
10. Ran out of spray paint

This is NOT a tutorial on how to spray paint a trolley. As you can probably tell, I am not the person to give advice. I liked my brother's suggestion. "why did you not spray paint on cardboard, everyone knows not to use newspaper" Obviously I'm not one of those people...

Now the moment you've been waiting for... the big reveal... The yellow trolley with black primer peeping through and newspaper stuck to it in places (*ahem) and taking pride of place in the guest room.

I splashed some white paint on the old dark brown mirror above the trolley to lighten the area as well. Apart from my thumb prints from where I became impatient and wanted to hang it, the mirror was pretty successful for a quick fix.  I just threw some stuff on there for the photo to make my terrible spray painting less obvious. I'll let you decide if it has worked. 

It's all about the hands and feet...

I'm so lucky to have this precious little goddaughter to photograph whenever I feel the need to capture some sweet babyness.

At 5 months she's all about her hands and feet. Isn't she delicious...

Winter Wonderland

Last week it was my turn to host the dinner club. I say it was my turn, but really it's whoever can bring themselves to find enough chairs and set up a dinner for around 15 people on a weeknight.

The weather has been so stormy recently, we decided a winter theme would work best. Stews, casseroles, sticky date puddings and roast vegetables were among the mix of dishes people created. YUM!

As always, I don't tend to take too many pictures as I'm always busy eating and chatting away, but you get the idea of the setup. It was pretty close to Mr D's birthday, so the dinner become a little bit of a birthday celebration. I wish I had a photo of the scrummy birthday cake Laura made. We ate it all... before I thought to get the camera. Woops.

Hosting dinner club is always worth it, to have all of your local friends gather around and eat, laugh, eat, laugh and make a mess.

I'm still yet to post the dinner previous to this one... Man Vs. Wild. Stay tuned... 

Japanese Night

Last year some time a group of us decided it would be nice to get together one night during the week, every fortnight, and share a meal. We decided the dinners would be loosely themed, meaning all of the dishes people created would work together and make a great spread. 
We always have too much food, too much wine and stay up way too late for a school night, but it's worth it. 
Dinner club has grown somewhat to include several more friends from the area. The more the merrier in my opinion! This week we have around 18 guests...
Here is a snapshot of the Japanese night put on by my closest, funniest,  friend and amazing hostess, Hanna. Just before we left home I decided to tear up some calico and make Japanese inspired headwear for the guests...just 'cos. 

 

 

Hayley, come home! dinner club misses you!

 

Even the dog couldn't escape the Japanese headwear...

  

Where does the time go?

Little Lincoln, first photographed at around 2-3 weeks old. Now she is a few weeks away from turning 1! 

To refresh your memory...

 

And now...