Bonjour, Autumn!

The 1st of May, and it’s now officially the last month of Autumn! I love the crisp Autumn mornings in Brissie, 25 degrees and sunny, how lucky are we - I remember when I lived in London for nearly 7 years and some of our summers over there never even reached these temperatures. There is just something about the change of seasons I adore, nature taking its course, reminding us that life begins and ends and begins again, not to mention being able to ‘rug’ up with hats and coats and boots and scarves…This beautiful Autumnal leaf photograph was taken by my very good friend Craig Holloway whom I knew when we lived in Russell, Bay of Islands, New Zealand. Craig now lives back in his hometown of Ballarat, Victoria and runs his photography business ArtFocus from there – his stunning photography can be seen on his website: www.artfocus.net.au or on his own blog: click66.blogspot.com

I take a morning river walk every morning around our local ‘Hood’, (the black and white pic above was taken by Banx over Easter in Abbott Street, New Farm just down the road from us here, one of our favourite streets in the neighbourhood), and each morning my reward is a cappuccino at a different café. One of my favourite cafes is ‘Bonjour Patisserie’ at 876 Brunswick Street run by Francis and Elvira. Francis is one of the most passionate people I have ever met. He starts works at midnight each evening, baking his delicious works of art fresh each day. We know, because we wake up to the delicious smells wafting through our window, talk about subliminal advertising! Ha!

Francis is a fully trained, experienced French pastry chef hailing from Paris and his artistic mouth-watering temptations are nearly all gluten free. His tiramisu dessert cake and his petit-fours are to die for, and would definitely be on my “last meal” wish list 

Julia Cameron, one of my favourite authors on creativity, says in her book ‘The Sound of Paper’ there are three things we must try to do every day to get those creative juices flowing: one is morning walks; another is journal (or blog!) writing; and another is taking ourselves out on dates/ romancing ourselves… I figure I do this most mornings!  Enjoy Autumn! Mmmm which café tomorrow morning..?