Lingering

Last day of lovely Autumn. Many bare trees already, but a few touches of colour here and there still.

Supernatural

Another Scifi convention today - this one featuring the stars from the TV show "Supernatural". It was a really good day, although very long as these events always involve a lot of waiting around. As this was a more exclusive event (limited seating) the waiting was made much more pleasurable by very pleasant surroundings (the Park Hyatt Hotel ballroom), comfortable seating, luxurious amenities and episodes of "Supernatural" on large screens to watch while passing the time.
As always, all the stars were entertaining, friendly and very charismatic - especially this one:

Misha Collins (Castiel) was just gorgeous. E and her friend both had photos taken with him. C settled for an autographed photo.

 Afterwards, E and friend met other friends for dinner and C and I enjoyed a light meal ourselves before heading home.

I love Melbourne at night.

Crafty

Most of our family's favourite recipes are kept on cards in a recipe box. This box was always a plain old system card box which worked well enough but was not particularily attractive. About a year ago, I replaced the old plastic card box with the pretty retro one pictured below.

The new box, although nice to look at, has not worked out well.

It's too deep, the lid doesn't flip back all the way and it's impossible to flick through the cards to find the one required - I usually have to remove whole sections to find the card I want. Very frustrating.

So, it's back to the plain blue plastic one. Of course, I'd given away the old one so had to purchase a new one. Fortunately, it wasn't expensive.

Today, I decided to jazz up this new recipe box. I used scrapbooking paper to cover the panels on the box and the recipe dividers.

All I need to do now is label the dividers and sort out this massive pile of recipes.

Some of these will be discarded - as Z said to me "Do we really need six different recipes for chocolate cake?"

This will be a good opportunity to test a few recipes on the family and determine if they really are still favourites.

Sweet

For this evening's enjoyment, lollies to satisfy my current sugar craving and a very sweet book.

I first saw this book on this beautiful and inspiring blog and knew it belonged in my book collection. Although I ordered it ages ago, it was out of stock and didn't arrive until recently but it was certainly worth the wait. Inspiration on every page.

A quiet, cosy candlelit evening here.

On a cold night such as this, I long for an open fireplace...

Thursday

Routine slightly out of whack today as I'm doing the afternoon/evening shift at work. No motivation right now to do anything practical around the house so I think I'll just read until it's time to hop on the bus to work.
Making the most of the Autumn colours in this last week of the season.

Various weird fungi.

Morning rainbow.

A couple of months ago, we put a small birdbath in our little front garden. The other day I was thrilled to actually see it in use.

Slightly blurry through-the-window photos!



Casablanca

Although my classic movie rewatch was interrupted last week by the pleasant diversion that was "Downton Abbey", I have actually watched a few movies in the previous weeks.
Having reached the year 1943, I was very happy to watch a favourite of mine and undoubtedly, of many people.
"Casablanca" stars Humphrey Bogart as the charismatic owner of the nightclub "Rick's Cafe Americain" who inevitably must choose between giving in to his love for Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman)  or assisting Ilsa and her Czech resistance leader husband Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) to escape from Morocco so that Laszlo can continue to fight the Nazis.

Although I'm sure most people remember the love story in this film more than any other aspect, my personal favourite thing about it is the love/hate relationship between Rick and the crooked police captain Louis Renault (Claude Rains).
I'll always remember how much my Dad loved the very last line of the film:
"Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship". Great movie.

***

The only other movie I own from 1943 is "The Song of Bernadette".

Jennifer Jones won the Best Actress Oscar that year for her portrayal of the peasant girl, Bernadette, who has visions of the Virgin Mary at Lourdes in 1858.

Quite beautifully done and very moving.

***

On to 1944 and a complete change of pace:

"Meet Me In St Louis", a musical and in COLOUR.
 I'm surprised at how few and far between the colour movies are on this list so far.

Such a sweet movie with a delightful cast and extremely lavish sets and costumes. 

***

Last, but never least, one of my absolute all-time favourites

"Arsenic and Old Lace"

This is quite simply hilarious from beginning to end.

Cary Grant is perfect as Mortimer Brewster who, on his wedding day, discovers a surprising secret about his kindly old aunts.

Perfect casting, non-stop entertainment, all-round wonderful film. I will never tire of this one.

"Insanity runs in my family. It practically gallops"

 

Study

In between various domestic activities, I've been slowly decorating my study/spare room. A few bits and pieces have been added. It is, as they say, a work in progress.
 Still unsure about wall decorations. At the moment I think less is more, so I have only hung a couple of items. One is some framed Penguin Bookcover Postcards. The others are some small canvas panels which I covered with material scraps to match the cushions on the bed. None of this has cost a cent as I already had everything  I needed on hand.

Carefully not shown here:

• the computer and associated unattractive paraphernalia (is there any way to make this look good?)
• the built-in wardrobe, still unpainted one year after construction.
• the horrendous view of the overgrown garden.
• my overflowing sewing box.

Hopefully I will be able to display the room in its entirety one day!