Nail Polish or Nail Lacquer

According to Harpers Bazaar (my favorite mag) it is fashionable this spring to not be matchy matchy with your nail polish but rather have two colors that compliment making sure the pedi is a darker color than the mani.




All over Brisbane the electrical boxes were painted fabulously:

Also saw the coolest trees in Brissy

And the coolest flowers!

Master Calum

South Bank

Introducing Master Blaster, a.k.a. Calum James Glass-Swaim

age 10 months

His birthday is Christmas Eve!

We are just chillin at South Bank, enjoying the day.

I brought my swim suit just in case! This picture is taken at Streets Beach. It is a man made beach in South Bank along the Brisbane River. The esplanade that follows along the river is just past the "beach".

All along South Bank is a windy sidewalk that has this fabulous Arbour "made up of 443 curling, tendril-like columns of steel, each covered with a train of vibrant magenta bougainvillea plants"(http://www.visitsouthbank.com.au/attractions/arbour).

Confucius



South Bank has several parks for playing, swinging, climbing or sliding. Grassy areas for picnics or playing ball and you can ride bikes, roller blade, and skateboard so that's pretty cool and they have free barbecues anyone can use.



After swimming at the beach and walking around a bit we grabbed some lunch at The Plough Inn. We had a yummy dip entree with delicious bread, some hot chips, and Hoegarden. Yum. Then when we were leaving it started pissing down rain so we went back for another Hoegarden.



Nepalese Pagoda
"The Nepal Peace Pagoda was entirely handcrafted in Nepal of cut and felled Terai Forest timber from the southern jungles of Nepal - over two years of meticulous work by over 160 Nepalese village families - and was shipped to Brisbane for Expo"
in 1988 for the World Expo - UN  International Year of Peace
http://www.foundationexpo88.org/pavilions/international/nepalpavilionandpeacepagoda.html

Brissy

I had a fabulous time with Jon Swaimy in Brisbane! I got to meet his partner Aneta who is originally from Poland (they met while they were both living in London) and their cute little baby Calum who is 10 mo.
(more later)

I went to GoMa (Gallery of Modern Art) (saw the Valentino exhibit but a post on that later) and The Queensland Art Gallery that had a fabulous collection of Australian artists. Some of my favorites are

     James Gleeson

I love the brush  strokes, color, and texture of paint found in Grace Cossington Smith's paintings. 

I love the purple flower trees! They were all over Swaimy's neighborhood and throughout the city.

I like that real flowers at the bottom of the painting. 

A delicious chocolate and coconut muffin with mocha I had after viewing the museum at the museum's cafe on the river. I love chocolate. 

View of the purple flower trees from Swaimy's front door.

More stories and pictures later!

But if you are curious now, I uploaded all the pix to photobucket but I must warn you there are many random pictures of trees and flowers!