Weekend: Werribee Zoo & Mansion!

This weekend, B and I went to Werribee mansion and the zoo! Driving there was easier than I thought. When I was looking at google map, it was confusing for some reason there were two mansions! We visited the Rose garden first, it's an entire garden filled with roses. There were so many different colored roses there you wouldn't believe!

 

My camera is crap so the garden doesn't look as nice as actually being there.

Next was the mansion, it's a huge building. I was expecting something really fancy but the outsides were actually quite run down. Also, I don't really understand why the two buildings are different colors.

 

Me being silly lol I don't even know what that pose is for.

 

Good thing about the zoo and mansion is that they are five minutes apart by car. 

 

We went on the safari bus tour around the open range zoo. The Zebra was hoping to get closer to get some of the giraffes left over food but every time he got close the giraffe would get narky and push him back lol.

 

 Pretending to be archaeologist

 

Finished the day off with my favorite cake - Carrot cake!!! I was thinking about it all day since I saw it at lunch time. It was a tiny bit crumbly other than that it was yummy!

For some strange reason, my photos are darker than usual today. I'm lazy to learn how to photoshop stuff lol

What did you get up to on the weekend?

Cherry Blossom Wedding cake!?!!?

Who would have though searching for a cake can be this much trouble. My sister has a friend who is a pastry chef, who I emailed asking for a quote to make cherry blossom cupcakes. She quoted me $7 per cup cake plus like another 200-300 for the fruit cake, that cake would cost me $1k eeeek.... There's a perception that cup cake towers are cheaper than an actual wedding cakes but its not!! omg the opposite. I wanted a yummy cake but I don't know if ppl can tell the difference between a $1k cake vs $600-800. Anyway so I kept looking around (by this time didn't really care if it was cup cakes or not). We found a place this afternoon that can do a very simple cherry blossom cake which isnt as crazy as some of the cherry blossom cakes on google like these guys. A bit too over the top with the flowers lol

Our wedding cake has two of our favourite things on it - cherry blossoms & pink bows.. you may think it sounds lame but it's pretty looking. It's a 3 tiered cake and I got different flavours for every tier. Good thing is we have flowers on the top tier so we don't need any cake toppers since the last one I bought was lost in the mail.

Christmas Eve & Sangria time!

Merry Christmas everyone!!! I know i'm a day late and HAPPY BOXING DAY LADIES! Going to head out to Chaddy soon.

My family likes to celebrate Christmas on the Eve, as usual we had too much to eat. I saw on taste they had a Sangria recipe so we decided to make it... boy was it strong lol after two glasses I was feeling really tipsy. The recipe makes about two jugs, so we had to finish that! It tasted really yummy.. a lot better than what's in restaurants. If you don't have the drinks/ingredients at home it is a little expensive. I got Cointreau in Safeway for $40 & two bottles of sparkling Shiraz for $20 plus caster sugar and fruits so all up it would cost you $65.

Dinner was a mix of food - we had pasta, spring rolls, fried chicken and chicken/beef skewers lol My mum also bought a Christmas log cake thingy but no one in my family really likes cake so it was all up to me to eat it. If the cake was not enough we also had an apple pie to finish!!

My sister got me matryoshkas measuring cups, they are heaps cute. I've seen them around but never thought I needed them but bonus that my sis got it for me. I normally like to guesstimate when cooking never used any measuring cups probably explains why no one wants to eat my food lol

Puffing Billy & Yarra Valley Wineries!!

Visited Puffing Billy and Yarra Valley Wineries today, it was a very intense day lol We had to meet up at fed sq at 7.45am to join the tour group. Our first stop was at some park (can't remember the name of it), you can buy bird seeds and feed cockatoos there. Not very exciting but at least we got morning tea, where I had two lamingtons. If you don't know what lamingtons are then you are missing out! It's a cake with jam in the middle coated with chocolate and coconuts on the outside. Next stop was puffing billy, it was filled with very excited parents and kids. We got off at menzies station where our bus driver picked us up and picked up an additional 12 newbies to our tour group (not exactly the best mix of ppl)

 We then went to Fergusson Winery for lunch. Lunch was roast with vegies. The meal was average, probably because I had such high expectations for it. After lunch, was the wine tasting. Only managed to try 2 types wine at this place. Their moscato was quite yummy! Second winery we went to was Dominque something lol really bad with names as you can see.

Last stop was at Rochford - I do really like this place. Tried around 6 types of wine here, their fortified wine was really nice (only coz I like sweet wine) After the tasting, we all went for some dessert. They had a lot of macarons, cakes and fudges. Last time I came here, I got fudge so I didn't get it this time. This time I got a carrot cake with a green tea. It was very yummy, was perfect with the cream.

The newbies that joined our tour ended up drinking so much they were really annoying on the way home. They kept talking really loud and said some things they shouldn't be talking about in public. One of the guys came down to speak to the driver and told him they wanted to be let off. The bus driver agreed and dropped them off and everyone on the bus was clapping coz they left. When they were outside the bus, one of the girls decided to flash herself at everyone!! Who does that??? It's not like they were even young, they look like they were in their early to mid twenties.