Dinner plans

One Friday night, after an exceptionally busy week, I was lying on the floor of our spare room mindlessly scrolling through Instagram when I remembered some advice from a friend. At the time I was hungry, a little delirious and trying to decide whether it quicker to get takeaway or make gozleme as planned at home.

I chose the latter and instead of texting Tony to see when he might be home, I took my friend Marina's relationship advice and called to say 'help!' instead. Her advice is good - it's about not expecting your partner to read your mind.

Tony was back within half an hour and we started making gozleme together and catching up on our days. It was a good reminder to cook together more often, instead of divvying it up during the week.

We made Hetty McKinnon's kale, mint and haloumi gozleme, which looked like giant dumplings! They brown slowly on the stove, which meant that by the time dinner was ready, the washing up was already done too :)

Who does what in your house?

Did you see the comic about the mental load last year? It really made me think. I am a worrier and a planner, which means I'm right across the tiny goings on of our little household from how much money we have in the bank, to what's running low in the fruit basket.

After the mental load comic, I wanted to reclaim some of that brain space. It sparked a long conversation with Tony about all the things that need to be done in our home each week, and how we were divvying them up.

And then we came up with a solution that we've managed to stick to. We thought about the two biggest and most time consuming jobs and split them. He does all of the laundry, and I do all of the shopping. It's helped me stop thinking about a whole chunk of house stuff and best of all - it works.

It's not super strict - every now and then Tony will join me at the markets or I'll help hang out a load of washing if it's late at night. But it's really nice knowing who's responsible for what. If the washing basket is looking full, or I need a particular item washed - I just ask. Same goes for Tony if he needs something from the shops a bit more urgently. I also love being the food person - and I've always had a strange love of grocery shopping :)

And here's a little confession... we also have a cleaner who comes once a fortnight to do the big stuff - the kitchen, bathroom and floors. I initially resisted the idea, thinking we didn't need it but that kind of cleaning, and getting it done on weekends, was something that we'd struggled with and fought over in the past. Having some help has also made bursts of travel and intense work periods so much easier, created pockets for things like blogging, and made weekly cleaning not a big deal.

Lucky dip dates

I've borrowed a sweet idea from Sydney stylist Megan Morton. A year ago I read that her family jots down fun activities on pieces of paper and pops them into a vase. It becomes a lucky dip when they have a pocket of free time to spend together.

Inspired by the idea, Tony and I have started a date book, which is filled with different kinds of activities we'd like to do together. We spent a lot of last year exploring places to eat in our new hometown so we're trying think of things other than eating :)

So far we've checked out a cute speakeasy's jazz night where we sipped gin fizzes and ate a huge bowl of olives. We happened to go on a stinking hot night, which was especially great because the bar was underground and air-conditioned - something we don't have at home.

And last Sunday we hiked up Mount Ainslie before breakfast, which we've been meaning to do for almost a year. Mount Majura has gone into the book for another time :) I'm yet to convince Tony to go for the lucky dip idea but for now it's been really fun - and we feel like we're getting heaps more out of the city.

P.S We've also started doing chore dates, which is mainly an excuse to eat ice cream after Sunday errands :)

Neighbourhood date night

Last year when Tony was on an art school residency in Canberra, I would drive up to see him on Thursday afternoons and stay for a couple of nights. It was a good excuse to visit a city and the change of scenery was good for the soul.

Because we spent a good chunk of last year apart, Tony and I always treated ourselves to a meal out on Thursday nights. It was a fun way to explore different parts of the city and sample food that was hard to come by in Wagga Wagga.

Now that we live in Canberra we've kept up the tradition, partly because Thursday is the almost-there day of the week that feels worthy of a little celebration. Plus it's a fun way to explore different suburbs in our new city.

The other night we went on a neighbourhood date in Braddon, which is a suburb between our two offices. We had drinks at a microbrewery and walked over to one of our favourite cafes, which is open for dinner one night every few weeks.

We sat in the front window, ordered all of the sides and tucked into to very delicious chicken burgers. And there was just enough room for a gelato dessert. It was really fun to try out a few new places in one night. Next up, I'm keen to explore Dickson.

Aziz Ansari on love and text

On the weekend Tony and I finished watching Master of None, and while I wait to see if there will be another season (fingers crossed!), I'm getting stuck into Aziz Ansari's first book, Modern Romance: An Investigation.

I first heard about it in this hilarious This American Life segment, Romancing the Phone. Part stand-up, part real-life investigation, it's an intriguing look at the role of texting in dating today. 

I picked up the book this morning and am already hooked. Even though I haven't dated for years and years, flipping through it reminded me of how fun - and torturous - texting can feel if you really like someone and they don't message you back. 

There's an audiobook, which Aziz Ansari narrates himself (super funny teaser here), and I was really tempted to listen to it but the book has photos, funny text interactions like they'd appear on a phone, and charts too - it is a non-fiction book after all ;)

I also stumbled across this back issue of The Happy Reader, which has a great profile and Aziz's summer reading list. Super fan much?

P.S - Another awesome author read audiobook is Jon Ronson's So You've Been Publicly Shamed.

A laid-back first anniversary

Tony and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary over the weekend and it was so much fun! We decided to have a simple celebratory weekend at home, which was a lovely break after weeks of travel.

We stuck to tradition and exchanged paper inspired gifts, and I couldn't stop laughing at our almost matching wrapping paper. Tony gave me three cookbooks I've been eyeing off for ages, along with three special drawings he made himself.

I gave Tony a tea strainer and two framed poems that were written on our New York honeymoon by a guy who was writing and selling poems on the sidewalk. He wrote one on the theme honeymoon and another about adventure, and we're planning to hang them above our bedside tables.

Sunday was so lovely and warm and we walked into town to have lunch at one of our favourite cafes. At night, Tony made a much-loved pasta and I baked a strawberry and coconut cake, which was one of our wedding cake flavours. With a gifted bottle of fancy champagne, it felt equal parts cosy and celebratory :) We had such a great day and by 11pm, Tony was already looking up what the present theme was for our second anniversary - it's cotton!

P.S Do you celebrate anniversaries?

Wedding photo by Wattle + Lace.

A lovely observation about marriage

Tony and I have been married for close to eight months and every now and then someone will ask whether our relationship has changed and what married life is like. Put on the spot, I never know what to say.

I've just finished reading Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking and while it is a book about her first year as a widow, it's also very much a book about married and family life.

I loved this line the most, 'Marriage is memory, marriage is time.'

I felt like it goes a way to explain why very small things can feel significant - like the purchase of a table and two chairs for our front porch, or plans to take a few weeks off in June to drive to another state as slowly as we can. It highlights the smaller moments that I'm sure will mean all the more later.

And here's a funny photo we took in Sydney a few days before our wedding - we both look so tired from all the last minute prep!

P.S Relationship advice from our wedding guests.

Do you celebrate anniversaries?

Today is Tony and my seven year anniversary and for the first time we've decided not to do anything to celebrate because this year we're switching to wedding anniversaries!

I'm so curious about what other couples do to mark relationship milestones. For our very first anniversary, we went to the aquarium at night to see the dugongs and ate dumplings afterwards. It was really fun - did you know that dugongs eat whole heads of lettuce and can smile?

Since then, we've made fancy meals at home (one year Tony made poached chicken and blue cheese Arancini balls!), exchanged silly cards (I've been buying these ones for years), shared cupcakes and used it as an excuse to go to Momofuku Seiobo.

I'd love to know what you do, if you do celebrate. My brother-in-law and his wife have been back to the place where they had their wedding reception for lunch and friends have stayed in a fun new hotel for a wedding anniversary. We're tempted to stay in the exact same place come September.