Grocery Shopping Chinese Style

It was Chinese New Year on Monday 23rd January.  We cook a lot of Chinese and Asian style food, so I often head to Chinatown to buy groceries.  The official Chinatown is in Fortitude Valley in the city, but I go to Sunnybank on Brisbane's southside where there is a large Chinese shopping centre.

Sunnybank is great.  You will find Chinese butchers, a large Chinese supermarket and seafood.  It's so interesting and diferrent.  The kids love it.

This is the sign in the butcher.  I ordered half a peeking duck which was $14, so maybe it was the fourth item on the list?

Did you know there was more than one type of dried shrimp?

 and how's this for a selction of mushrooms?

It's always fun to go out to Sunnybank and try new things.

Rust proof your Outdoor Lights

When we built our outdoor entertaining area, I was trying to save money (as always) and bought an IKEA light fitting to hang above the table.  Unfortunately it was made of wrought iron and over the years it has rusted and is basically ... well it's stuffed! 

I was worried the chain was so rusted that the light would come crashing down.

I have been looking for another light to replace it for quite some time and have seen a few I like but $1,000 for a light fitting .... really?  The IKEA one was only $79.  I have finally found a new light fitting.  Unfortunately it is also made of some type of iron so to prevent the same thing happening again, I had to give it a spray of Rust-Guard metal paint before the electrician installed it.

Here's the light hanging in my garage so I could paint it. 

It's a six pendant lantern light - $179 on special from Recollections.

It's an antique bronze colour, so I chose black rust-guard paint.

and here it is...

I think the black works better with the dining chairs than the antique bronze.

and at night...

So here's a lesson learnt.  If you have metal objects outside, it may well be worthwhile to rust-proof them in the beginning.

Happy back to school in Queensland today.

Some Garden Lanterns

I have always wanted garden lanterns hanging from shepherd's hooks in the garden.  This was my pinspiration.

I looked and looked for sherpherd's hooks everywhere and finally found some at Perfect Living in Bulimba.  Well actually I mentioned my frustration to Kylie (the owner) and she found some for me.  Shortly after I found some pretty garden lanterns on clearance at the discount shop for $14.95 each.  So now my pinned garden lanterns are a reality.

The lantern candles are actually battery operated.  At first I didn't like this idea, but after using them, they are great, and I'm not worried about kids touching them.

They look so pretty lit up at night.

Here's to alfresco dinners on balmy summer nights.

Sharing at A Beach Cottage

The Brisbane International Tennis

I'm still in holiday mode, so no decorating posts just yet.  On Monday we went to the Brisbane International Tennis.  If you haven't made the trip out to Tennyson, you really must.  The facilities are excellent and they worked hard all year to repair the damage caused by the floods in January 2011.  This is Pat Rafter Arena.  There really isn't a bad seat - you can see clearly from anywhere.

And this is who we saw play

The Brisbane International is now a premier WTA tour event and with prize money set to increase to $1 million in 2013, it's sure to attract some of the best names in women's tennis.

Ivanovic was my son's favourite - hmmmm, I wonder why?

and we saw the powerful Sarena Williams.

Talk about up close and personal

and finally Queensland's own, Bernard Tomic

Monday was also Kids Day at the tennis.  We registered our son and he was able to join in all the activities.  He played on a mini grass court.

and had his service speed measured.

It was such a great day, and we're going back tonight to do it again.


Thought I'd share this with Sarah from A Beach Cottage .