H A P P Y  N E W  Y E A R !

I hope you all had a gorgeous holiday filled with summer sunshine, good food, fun stuff and happy friends and family, after all isn’t that what December holidays are all about? I know I certainly did. We filled the holidays by riding bikes on the beach, swimming, eating ice creams and spending some good solid time with our family. I know not EVERYONE gets to take time off during this busy period, but the beaches are still abuzz, the festive vibe is still around and I know most of us can’t help but get that holiday feeling, work or no work! (I am sorry if you didn’t get a holiday though)

I know there are a lot of people out there that roll their eyes at New Years resolutions and repost “New Year. New Me” memes with snarky comments, you do you boo. That is simply not my style. To me a new year is a chance to reset, reasses and reconfigure and yes, I could probably do that at any stage in the year but N E W  Y E A R kind of seems like the perfect timing. I have been meaning to get back into the swing of things but I couldn’t bring myself to write down my “resolutions” because I kind of know that once I put them out there that I really have to do something about them. Sometimes making these sort of life changing commitments to yourself is far harder than making a commitment to someone else- especially if you mean it. No matter how amped I felt about “2016” I was super apprehensive and not really sure I wanted to make a million little commitments this year.

A N Y W A Y, I was clickity clicking around the internet (okay fine pinterest) and I stumbled upon an article on minimalism and I was immediately drawn to it all. The Minimal Life. The Minimal Wardrobe. The Minimal Home. Now anyone that knows me will know me as a lover of things, a collector of beauty and a user of gadgets…so this idea probably sounds pretty ridiculous to you. What you probably don’t know is that I love clear spaces, I love neat corners and I crave a quiet and still home. What? Me? Crazy Candy Cake maker? Yes. Me. Sometimes when your days are filled with the most intense and gratifying creative magic it is nice to eat dinner at an uncluttered wooden table and it is relaxing to lie in a stark bedroom and hell my ADD would thank me for doing admin in a neat and bare office.  I suppose it is really all about balance isn’t it?

This year, 2016, I am going to become a minimalist. Perhaps not the kind of minimalist you are imagining, but my own kind. I have somehow managed to find all the things I want for myself under this umbrella title.  Sounds pretty drastic right? Well let me break it down and grow the idea for you (as seen in my notes)

H O M E /

I love being surrounded by beautiful bits and bobs but as I said above, my crazy creative mind needs space, it needs oxygen and it needs order. Guys, it is not normal to have 3 sets of cooking utensils and 2 million throw pillows. It is lovely to have a couple of really divine statement pieces for your home, but I think they sort of lose their shine when there are so many of them. Aside from having a really full kitchen and a cushion addiction, we also have a bit of a storage problem. When the house was being renovated I thought I was really clever and we pulled out the two sets of built in cupboards in the bedrooms. They were really ugly but at least they were CLOSED storage. We also share our space with three guinea pigs, two cats and one inside dog…all the more reason to have things neat and easy.  S O this year I am going to clear the clutter, amp up the storage and massively simplify. If something doesn’t have sentimental value or have a function it is going to be sold / donated / chucked. I really look forward to sharing my progress here, who knows, it could inspire your inner minimalist!

H E L L O D U F F Y M O O N /

2015 was the year I found my footing in the baking world, going from a technical cheffy background to a creative fashion position I found a balance between the two and I developed a business identity, a reputation and business boomed - especially in the second half of the year. In 2016 I hope to continue growing and flourishing with the baking side of the business with a couple little tricks up my sleeve which include really pushing the boundaries of cake making ! In addition to baking my heart out, 2016 will be the year that this blog reaches it’s full potential and I finally launch my online shop. I don’t want to spoil / reveal too much before we finally cut those ribbons - but keep an eye out around here for some changes. Along with all that jazz I really want to be more consistent with my online presence so check out / follow / subscribe to my F A C E B O O K / I N S T A G R A M / P I N T E R E S T / T W I T T E R to keep up to speed!

F R I E N D S /

I always thought that if you were a cool, nice and fun person you had lots of friends and were constantly surrounded by all sorts of people that liked you and made you happy but in 2015 I really discovered that you cannot measure your value by the number of friends you have. I know this may sound either really “duh” or really stupid to some people but as a person that is really hard on myself when I started to cut people out of my life (by choice or by circumstance) I started to feel like maybe I had become a shit person and that is why I could count my friends on my hands. BUT the best thing happened, my best friend in the world Daisy came to visit me after F O U R years and it was like nothing had changed. Yeah we have grown up in some ways like falling in love (us), running businesses (me) and almost finishing getting a degree (her) but in all the best ways we were exactly the same and nothing had changed in our friendship. After a night of all you can eat sushi and impossible amounts of giggling I cried on the way home to Darren and said I didn’t know if it was good or bad that I had had the best time with my best friend who was going back to the UK in a couple of days. It was either going to be horribly sad or eye opening, so I chose the latter. The friends I have are friends for life, they love me, they roll their eyes at me when I am being silly and they are there for me when things go wrong. These friends don’t place conditions on our friendship and I don’t have to do anything to make them like me more, they just do. This year I am going to nurture my friendships, I am going to spend time with beautiful, funny and soulful people and make friendships without conditions.

W A R D R O B E /

Oh boy where to start. My Wardrobe is a gorgeous double open rail - built from scratch by my loving darling Darren. It is a beautiful light wood, has copper rails, sweater shelves and a shoe rack. It is paired with a gorgeous set of white drawers with wooden legs. These vessels suit me perfectly, it is 80% of what is in them that just does not. My Wardrobe is a mix of old and new - most of all things that I just don’t wear but I hang onto “just incase”. I have pretty pastel skater dresses that don’t suit my pale complexion and a mustard pullover with an eagle on the front(wtf?) When it comes to putting on “casual” outfits I opt for jeans, a vest and a hoodie all of which represent me 0% and when it comes time to dress up I root around trying to find something all black without bubbles on it. I watched these really helpful videos (link : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvIaf-RCk5mQiH8rI0rODlg/videos ) by Rachel Aust and in it she explains how illogical it is to spend all your money on “statement pieces” instead of spending it on basics. So, this year, I want to ditch all the crap and things that I don’t wear in my wardrobe and invest in my personal style a little more. If you are comfortable and feel good in something - you should wear it until it doesn’t feel good anymore, I need to find my personal style. I’ll keep you updated on how that goes.

F O O D /

Food oh food. I won’t give you great detail about my relationship with food, but needless to say (seeing as it is my life) that I love good food. I love cooking and creating in the kitchen and tasting delicious dishes. As I have gotten busier, I have become more and more lazy with the food I make and eat. Opting more for quick and easy over creative and exciting. SO, this is the year that changes. I want to go back to basics. I want my “cheat” meal to be homemade ravioli with freshly grated parmesan…not a microwave meal or chicken wings. I want to make fancy foods and experiment with the cooking techniques I was taught and share them here - I want to be crazy with my cooking like I am with my baking. That is 20% of the time...I want to spend 80% of the time eating really simply and being really healthy. I want to find that sweet spot, the balance.

W A S T E /

This year is the year that we are less wasteful in the Pretty Little House. Oh my soul we can be bad…especially with food going off. We have the best intentions with our weekly shopping but at the end of week two there is a lonely and forgotten cucumber, some creepily shriveled grapes and something in a jar that goes straight to the bin. I am quite certain that we are all guilty of it but that doesn’t make it okay! I am so tired of buying expensive artichokes and condemning them to the bin a week later. More planning less wasting. Less wasting also means turning lights off, unplugging chargers, more recycling (the glass recycling is opposite us. Opposite) and just less. L E S S.

M E /

So this is possibly the hardest bit to write, right? I said to my mom the other day, I surround myself with all this stuff to place less emphasis on M E and as I said it - it really struck, hard. I hadn’t put much thought into it before I said it, but as the words tumbled out of my mouth they really hit home. So this is the year I place more emphasis on me, me not defined by other things but me just being me. I want to place emphasis on taking care of myself, my hair, my skin, my body, my mind and I want to be kind to myself. I want to reach my goal weight, I want to run a race, I want to find a skin care routine that works for me and I want to glow from the inside. I am ready to love myself and treat myself with care. Instead of going the cheap and easy route - I want to make investments. That doesn’t necessarily mean spending more money on things, that just means researching and choosing what is best for me…instead of grabbing what is cheap / convenient. What is best might be cheap, but it also might be an investment.

I am really looking forward to this year and I can’t wait to share it with you!

Love,
D U F F Y M O O N
xxx