DISASTER OF THE WEEK

HAY DAY

It was the packaging. It was the fact that I was in a gourmet grocers and I'd just had my haircut and I thought I'd pretend to have disposable income. This is my only excuse for paying $14.95 for a packet mix. I'm no Nigella, but I'm no slouch in the kitchen either and I've become quite renowned for my cupcake skills.

But there was something so seductive about the brown and pale blue papers, the elegant box and even the pithy message from Donna ('shhh, don't tell them they're not yours' - uh Donna your name is on EVERYTHING I think they'll guess)

They looked ok. They were a weird pasty colour when they came out of the oven, and there wasn't quite the fluffiness to the icing the photo promised. I have to tell you folks they tasted absolutely disgusting. really. the most synthetic, rubbery, and just plain odd flavour I've ever tasted. I would have been better buying a jam roll from the supermarket. I took them to the HML bbq just so everyone could sample a truly horrible cupcake.Needless to say no one did and they went straight in the bin.

 Maggie B on the other hand is working her way through Michel Roux's Pastry book. This lemon meringue pie browned a little in our insane oven but the pastry was flaky, the lemon was curdy and the meringue was deliciously crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside. Sigh, back to the kitchen for me.

Emo Fashion 2010

Emo Girls Fashion

Emo Hair

Emo Hair A long fringe (bangs) brushed to one side of the face or over one or both eyes, dyed black . Spikes are occasionally accentuated at certain angles of the hair, especially at the back. A common generalization for emo hair is short in the back and long in the front.

However, there are many emo-looking hair styles to choose from and it's important to think outside the box. Emo has its roots in the punk scene, and isn't just limited to black with a long fringe. Hair can be dark brown, black, blond, purple or any color you want - as long as the cut is expressive of a punk rock culture and has a little emo flare. Black hair, for example, may be highlighted with white accents, vibrant red streaks, orange tones, or any other shade the individual prefers. At the same time, any color that is bold and vibrant can be considered an emo look. Wear super girly hair bands, bandannas, ribbons. It's up to you!It is a misconception that emo styles aren't washed frequently.

While some teenagers may choose not to wash their hair regularly, this is not a necessary characteristic of emo styles.Emo hairstyles are a great way to play around with your look. They allow you to have fun, be creative and unique. An Emo hairstyle treats your hair like a canvas; you have artistic freedom to express who you are, to show off your personal style almost like an art form. The beauty of an Emo hairstyle is how un-uniformed it is; they are asymmetrical and rather choppy.As a result some emos prefer DIY hair or by cut by a friend at home shunning the processed, rubber-stamped appearance of mainstream hairstyles. A mistake in your cutting could actually turn into an advantage in your Emo look. Although sometimes it is best to visit a trained professional that you can clearly show what you want.

Emo Fashion Tips

Hoodies: hoodies are part of the emo fashion, but just not any regular hoodie. Hoodies with fun prints like skulls or cute prints and designs on the hoodie. The great thing about wearing a hoodie emo style, that they make hoodies for all seasons.

Extra Shirt: no not to carry around if you have a spill, but an extra plain white- t shirt or something with a solid print or designs to wear under your regular t-shirt, so you can create a layered look. Usually the emo layered look, consists of the under shirt being long sleeved while the top shirt is short sleeved.

Scarves: scarves are definitely a fashion statement for the emo look, to be worn any way they would like to. Scarves are usually long and knitted with solid colors, prints or stripes are always a nice touch.

Shoes: the shoes are quite simple in emo fashion, most emo trenders wear conversers or vans along with their hoodies and jeans or any other flat shoe without a sole would do the trick to complete the emo look.

Emo Hairstyles: Emo hairstyles are now again in fashion today.

Emo Fashion

Hair Tips

There is no need for concern when making your emo hairstyle, what you feel like doing goes! It's not a normal look so therefore people expect it to be all over the place and to be and over all crazy hair cut. Most emo girls and men guys to the jet black hair for their hair cut and they like the unnatural, uneven look it gives it more spunk. Even though the emo look is becoming more common, it is still an uncommon way for a hair cut. So have fun with it dye it black, chop it up and add some crazy highlights.

Emo hairstyles can be made by you, your best friend or your little brother. The style does not require a professional stylist or beautician. You can just cut the dyed hair all over in different shapes but the hair usually is always longer in the front hiding the face. You can also razor it in the back to have it spiky with the longer bangs for a weird looking hair cut. Both of these are considered an emo hairstyle. No matter what you do to your hair choppy, buzzed in the back as long as you have some uneven pieces framing the face your in the clear.

Emo hairstyles are usually spiky and shaggy a definition of how you felt at that time. It's an all over the place crazy style so use gel and hair glue to your advantage. Adding hair glue to the bangs in the front to make them straight and stiff is a must when trying to create the emo hairstyle. You can add gel to the back of your hair as well to make it stand straight out if you have the back shorter. If the back is long and shaggy just mix and match gel and hair glue to make it a crazy bold effect. Remember the more unusual and different your hair looks the better off you are.

Emo Hairstyles

Common hair styles
The emo haircut, not all but alot of emo's have black hair, probaly because it matches most of their clothes. The emo guy hair style thats is most common, wearing your hair not too long but past the ears and have it pulled over an eye. I know there are alot more ways for guys to wear thier hair but i think that is the most popular choice of hair style at the time.

Girls, girls, girls.... we all know that there are so many ways that we can do our hair and its great sometime but not always. One popular choice is to wear your hair down and over one eye. If you have short hair I see alot of girls wear it with clips pulling it back in all cute styles. Another hott look is to be two toned with one color on top and another on the bottom, and just wearing it down. There are too many ways that everyone wear thier hair to go over but these are some of the common choices.

Clothing
The emo clothing, alot of emo kids wear black, but don't mistake it as goth or skater cause its not even close. Alot of the shirts that emo kids wear have band names on them or some kind emo saying and yes they are tight. My favortie shirts are the ones with just a lil logo on them like a guitar or maybe cute teddy bear. The best thing to wear are pants best make sure they hug you close, closer the better and i dont think anyone is going to say diffrent. Jackets and hoodies, there are so many kinds of jackets that the emo guys can wear like a sute jacket, i dont think a emo chick has pulled that off yet but if you see a hott emo girl wearing a sute jacket and it dosent look bad let me know. Everyone wears pull over hoodies or jacket hoodies, if it dosent have the hood how are you supose to cover your face a little right? I see all kinds of hoodies and jackets tight and loose and lots of colors, some with band names and some without.

Dress's and skirts, yes emo girls do show of there legs even if they are pale guys this may or may not apply to you but there are alot of cute sexy emo dress's and skirts some with little designs on those are so cute. I like dress's that have a design on the shoulder like a skull or cherry. Hosery with the dress's and skirts fishnets or just black stockings i think girls should be able to be sexy no matter what it makes you feel good when you look good, you might not wear them all the time but showing some leg is always hott, no matter who you are or what you look like. And finally complete every outfit you have to have shoes, cute slip ons or just something super comfy, and there are girly shoes like a pair of mary janes, everygirl should have a pair beacuse they look so good with dress's or skirts while wearing a cute pair of hosery.

Emo Makeup
How to wear your makeup emo style, is eyeliner. Bring out your eyes with eyeliner black, blue, green, purple and so on. Everyone knows you can't ever wear too much eyeliner. Bring out your eyes with some eye shadow maybe two toned one color on top and another on bottom. Another cute way to wear eye shadow is to have three colors start from the inside with light color and go the the outer with darker colors. Alot of emo guys that wear eye shadow usealy do just a lil pink around the eyes but not too much. Mascara brings out your eyes alot to and makes your eye lashes look longer and fuller. If you want to bring out your cheek bones wear some blush if you dont know wear to put blush on at pinch your cheeks and just put it on wear the red shows. And to put a final touch on your beautiful face if lipgloss just a little shine is all that you need to make you lips look full and kissable.

CRAFT OF THE WEEK

nerd alert!

We make no bones about the fact that we are both gigantic nerds. So we love it when we discover others who like letting their geek flag fly just as high. However this mario brothers vest is clearly in a stratosphere of its own. We love it.

We love even more that the Happy Seamstress (who is also an officionado and lover of all things nerdy) has used her own geeky guy as the model for her photo shoot. Today she has an excellent round up of other nerd related craft which includes such gems as the Captain Sideburns Space Invaders chopping board

and this Instructables VHS toaster. Oh yeah. You can download the Mario Bros. vest pattern here. Guess what the truck drivin' historian and low ridin' architect are getting for their birthdays.

Backyard of the week

BARBIE!

Of course yesterday was orztraya/invasion/indian national day... so we made like thousands of other peeps nationwide and had ourselves a backyard barbeque. We'd planned on taking pics and writing recipies of all the good food stuffs on offer, but we were so busy in the morning preparing the feast, and so bloody hungry by the time the surf and turf combo was barbequed  we just tucked in. As Miss Penpen noted, sometimes the best evidence of a feast is a pile of empty plates... We will however give you a little taste of the menu -  from the barbie: butterflied lamb leg, scallops, prawns, haloumi and portabello mushrooms, on the side dish side we had bocconcini, tomato and basil salad, baby fennel and orange salad and roast peppers... YUM.

Of course if you have Miss P on the guest list you are guaranteed excellent cake as well as conversation and this gigantic plate of aussie as lamingtons were delicious.

And the architect was beside himself when he saw what Mym had brought to the collective table... as tasty as it was good looking. Of course no barbie afternoon is complete without some post luncheon activity. The masses got busy with an increasingly out of control game of Klop that included obstacles such as the lime tree and on site scoring inclusions of things like the 'wildcard pumpkin'. Here's the in-house DJ busting a move, being a teacher also meant he was pretty quick off the mark with the scoring as well - handy this many beers into the afternoon.

Shula on the other hand kept things crafty, putting her magic hands to work on this beautiful embroidery. Just gorgeous Shula, we can't wait to see this one finished.

SHOW OF THE WEEK

crunchy granola

The Jolie-Pitt 'Shilo Project' may be kaputski, but The Shilo Project. on at the Ian Potter at the moment (which features it's very own cavalcade of superstars) is still going strong. It's been concieved and curated by Chris McAulliffe, so yes everyone is in it. And it started with a couple of dodgy vinyl pickups from an op shop, which, it would appear is where Chris has picked up most of his large record collection (you and me both brother!)  The two records that spawned this exhibition were both copies of Neil Diamonds Shilo - one pristine, one filled in with blue felt tipped pen. In what Oprah would refer to as a 'light bulb moment' Christ thought "why not ask artists to respond to the blank shilo sleeve." Genius. Really there couldn't be a show closer to my heart. It's even got me eating granola again. Go see it. Then go home and listen to Hot August Night.

And no don't bullshit me people, I know you've all got a copy somewhere.

LIBRARY BOOKS OF THE WEEK

the borrower

If you are anything like me you spend some quality time every now and then with Amazon.com developing dreamlists of craft books to be delivered to your door. I dont often have the funds to actually follow through with this but I have discovered that my local library sometimes gets these books in. These two were ones on my list. To be honest with you I wasn't too attracted to the large projects (a corset? a crown? good grief) but there was a couple of scarves that have really taken my fancy

Its that time of year where my thoughts turn to knitting. It takes me so long to finish I have to start things in summer. I already have a baby jumper on the go for a friends newborn but its on tiny needles and is driving me a bit nuts. My beloved has come to expect a scarf each birthday in May and this year it will either be the colourful stripey above...

or this collegiate style double knitting number. I may have to consult him before I embark on the project. I've also picked one to make for mothers day (also in May here)...

you cant quite tell from the picture but it's actually a knitted tube with a piece of silk organza through the centre of it. Maggie B often finds herself out in the chillier months (film fest, comedy fest, jazz fest etc) and this will be perfect for the Melbourne autumn. This colour is even perfect for her. Wish me luck and I'll let you know how the projects go!

SHOW OF THE WEEK part deux

tester.

Has anyone checked out Handheld Gallery here in Melbourne Town yet? We are heading there today to see the new show by Chloe Vallance. We've always been a sucker for art that incorporates those paint chips you get from the hardware store. If you are anything like us you have piles of them around the place just waiting to have something happen to them - and its never about picking feature wall colours.