And again, it's August!

Not a windy day like last year but sunny, fresh and full of the promise of summer. I walked under a long, shady stand of Moreton Bay Figs at lunchtime, enjoying the cool shade, while yesterday I was looking for as much sun as possible.

Here are some images I took last year in New York on a day that felt very similar to today ...

Wish I was there right now!

Today ...

The sky was blue ::: The sun so warm :::

I went for a walk at lunchtime and saw my first blossom tree ...


Spring is nudging it's way in.

Although, I've had a sneaky extra spring this year, in April, while away on our US trip. Whenever I wear the perfume I bought while in New York, it brings spring (and NY!) wafting back to me.

{all of these shots are from our last day in New York - we spent it wandering through Central Park. The very first image is of a local community garden near our hotel}

It seems like there has been a subtle shift in the seasons, even though it's sooo cold at the moment. Tonight while driving home I felt like I had a sense of us swinging out of winter. There was a different feel to the air somehow.

But sitting here tonight, my mouse hand feels icy, and the air in the house feels colder. Anyone who knows Sydney will know that we generally don't heat our houses with central heating, instead relying on space heaters. I have a lovely restored (fake) coal fire in the old cast iron hearth (my feet are toasty, even as I type)

Other rooms need a heater to take off the ever prevalent chill that creeps into these old semi's, especially when you have floorboards all the way through the house and no ceiling insulation. In summer the house generally stays nice and cool if you keep it closed up, unless we have a string of really hot days when it will then heat up and stay that way. We also don't have air con, relying on wonderful ceiling and floor fans and a breezeway effect down our long hall.

But summer seems such a long way away right now, although not so much when I catch up with all the summery posts out there in blogsville, from the northern hemisphere. I read a lovely one today, over at Fresh milk delivered daily. So simple and evocative.

Tomorrow, it's forecast to be 15 - that's pretty cold for us! But as long as it's sunny and blue like it was today, it's not too bad at all.

Small cakes in paper cups

OK, while I was writing that title it just dawned on me why they are called cupcakes. I guess that shows I am an Australian.

When it came to baking, my mum and nan and our very anglo predecessors always called them patty cakes - because they were cooked in a patty pan. Logical yes, but as a child I do recall wondering at one point, who's Patty?

I grant you it does make perfect sense to call them cupcakes. But I guess it's what you are most familiar with. And when it comes to something like cake - and small, iced delicacies at that - the whole comfort food/memories of happy childhood moments/fun parties/ kicks in, giving them a special quality that makes them very connected to you.
Well, that's how it is for me and these small cakes.

{sweet little red velvet cupcake I bought from the wonderful Amy's Bread in Hells Kitchen, NYC. And it was yummy!}

So, for the benefit of an international audience, cupcakes it is. And here is a truly amazing site, full of the most delectable cupcakes.

{Ming makes cupcakes, found via dalhaus, via hither and thither}

Mmm, I can almost smell the cloves, nutmeg and cinnamon scented cake topped with delicious old-fashioned caramel icing. Yum!

Have I mentioned how much I love them?

anthropologie

I finally got to visit anthropologie on our recent trip to New York. It was as good as I had imagined.
Here are a few of the lovely things I brought home with me :::


{details}


{details}



{details}

{details}

{this wonderful book was the perfect souvenir of our stay in NYC}


Here is a shot of the window on the day I dropped in :::

anthropologie really did live up to all the glowing reports. It's a remarkably mesmerizing shop. I wish one would open in Sydney. Really soon!

Hip hippocampus

Love love love this from Lou Lou & Oscar :::

Wish I was still in New York to see the Lost at Sea exhibition at Gallery Hanahou, where "daring fibre artists delve into the deep" {read a great review of it here}

::: I snapped the tiny one above near the dreamy indoor pool at Hearst Castle


::: Sweet seahorse tags from here - love the silvery bowl they rest in too.

Maybe it's because of all the gods and monsters spinning around in my head as I reach the conclusion of the mad, fun and fabulous children's series, Percy Jackson and the Olympians. As the son of Poseidon, Percy is often getting help from hippocampi and a black pegasus that calls him boss.
One more superb hippocampus ::: {from here}