Melbourne: Hit The Laneways

My travel checklist for Melbourne contained many things when it should have said only one: pound the city pavements. Traditional guides will tell travellers to venture to Yarra Valley, Philip Island, and the Great Ocean Road among others (all well and beautiful in themselves) but locals will lure you into cafés and to come, sit a while. While staying in might seem like missing out, it seems that over the years, the people have made the streets of Melbourne the sole institution, the main feature.

Laneways - that's what they're called. Where entrepreneurs of all kinds set up shop, daring to release their inner creativity and vision, hoping to cater to the niche and the crowd. Where paperback bookstores, jewellery boutiques, art galleries, barber shops, chocolate connoisseurs stand side by side, offering services and stories...

TravelDeanne BanaresMarch 8, 2017Melbourne, Australia, Travel, Laneway, Cafe, Culture, LifestyleComment

The Thrill Of Monotony

I stumble out of bed with my head disheveled from odd dreams, my eyes squinting from the sunlight. Another dawn, another flip on the calendar, yet it’s the same old, same old story for me.

To Do List: Do the grocery (didn’t I just buy cereals and bread?). Schedule a general cleaning session for the apartment (because no matter how much I clean, it’s still not spic and span). Buy the medicines and toiletries my husband needs (what was it again?). Buy a frame for this painting (this room needs an art piece)…

It goes on and on and on. Facing the long list is daunting but my mind will go haywire if I don’t spill the many contents of it into something else.

I move seamlessly from errand to errand. After almost two years of being a housewife, I know where to go, whom to talk to, how much it costs. A rhythm has been established. But you know what else? Boredom, repetitiveness, ordinary. I move seamlessly, yet reluctantly. I move efficiently, yet unenthusiastically...

MarriageDeanne BanaresMarch 1, 2017Housewife, Errands, Vocation, Love, Service Comments

The Social Media Spiral

Social media can sometimes feel like a beast, can’t it? But I have come to realize, over the years, that its attacks… they’re more like a whisper than a roar. It doesn’t smack you on the face and make you grovel on your feet. Instead, it seeps into your everyday thinking, controlling your moves, thoughts, desires. The chess player and the chess piece. We have become the piece. Or at least I have.

Facebook. It’s weird. I know that an acquaintance is stuck in traffic at this very moment, at exactly what intersection. I’m aware of a college friend’s blatant opinion on politics these days (is politics the new icebreaker?). I have an image of my colleague and her husband and children’s morning look every single day. It’s intimate, but not really. Personal, but not really. And yet I scroll...

ConversationsDeanne BanaresFebruary 27, 2017Social Media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, OnlineComment

A Married Kind of Date

How Married People Plan Valentine's Day:

Do you want flowers? Too expensive on this day.

How about a special dinner? In the city? Along with every other couple?

Oh yeah, remember our second Valentine's? When that restaurant looked like a scene out of a chick flick?

A getaway? I'm pregnant.

Well, what else? Hmm, didn't I just clean the condo for you today? And didn't I just do the grocery?

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I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It's harder to plan Valentine's Day when you're married. Suddenly, the apparently romantic ways just won't do anymore. Maybe it's because you have every day to show your love, other more appropriate ways to express it...

MarriageDeanne BanaresFebruary 23, 2017Valentine's Day, Letters, Marriage, Antonio's, Romance Comment

Useful, Beautiful, Joyful

Most of the days, in the thick of the routine and ordinary, it's hard to find beauty... especially when you're toting around a bump so huge that limitations abound. It's harder to get around, to do things, to step out of your room.

I was getting tired of the same old, same old day. My creative reservoir was empty. I noticed I was in need of inspiration so I drank off the things closest to me - books, magazines, and blogs. As each chapter, each image and post filled me, the yearning to create consumed me. The desire to just make anything useful, beautiful, joyful. I had been parched for a long while and I decided it was about time to do something about it...

Life & StyleDeanne BanaresFebruary 13, 2017Flowers, Cake, Beauty, Styling, TablescapeComment