Fancy lunch out :) It’s birthday month!

Greetings from sunny Hawke’s Bay!

Paul and I started our birthday month in style, with lunch at our favourite winery, Craggy Range in Havelock North.

It was a stunning day and so nice to dress up. I wore my pleather trousers from Blue Illusion, red Hogl shoes, and a gauzy mini-leopard blouse from Farmers. With my Prada bag of course. And Dior sunglasses circa 2003 from when I worked there. Happily the flat oval shape is back in style. Yay!

I had red nail polish and chose to not wear my sleeve and glove for the afternoon. Just took my puffy hand along a la naturelle :)

 

 

Craggy Range does a divine lunch menu throughout the winter months and we caught the tail end of it for our birthday. The lunch was my mum’s birthday gift to us :) The theme was ‘An Early Thanksgiving’.

 

 

 

They do gluten-free very well, and the homemade bread comes in a gluten-free version also, served with camembert butter and honey. The light sprinkle of salt on the butter is such a nice touch. I mean, you could go home quite content from the bread course alone, but Paul and I were troopers and stayed for the whole menu :)

 

 

 

Paul had the pork belly for his entree, and I had the gnocchi. There was so much richness and flavour packed into every bite. I don’t really eat pork products, just not a fan, but I would eat anything put in front of me here as long as it’s gluten-free, it is just that good. (The gnocchi sauce was pancetta flavoured, with tiny cubes of pancetta too. It tasted amazing even though I don’t eat pork haha.)

 

 

For our mains, Paul had the turkey and I chose the salmon. Paul enjoyed his turkey although I think he has enjoyed other Craggy Range lunch mains more, and my salmon was delish. I loved the bright vegetables accompanying it too.

We started off with a glass of Tattinger champagne each, and had a glass of Gimblett Gravels Chardonnay with our mains (it was like drinking a glass of butter, and I mean that in the best possible way, le sigh!)

 

 

 

And for pudding there were donuts, but you can see they are more like donut holes. The pumpkin cheesecake underneath tasted like buttercream it was so rich and good.

 

 

 

 

And because it was our birthday we got a little extra plate, it was an ice cream cake and we managed to polish that off too :) The chocolate Happy Birthday was melted dark chocolate, so good with the ice cream.

They asked us whose birthday it was when they brought the ice cream cake over, and we both said ‘Mine!’ since we have our birthday later in the month on the same day. Such fun.

 

 

It was just such a lovely lunch, and we went home with happy tummies.

 

 

Yay for a most excellent start to our birthday month!

I hope you had a great week last week too, no matter what you got up to.

x Fiona

 

PS. I’ve been writing! I know! I’m so excited for being back in the groove again. It’s been in-out-in-out this year for sure :D

I am working on a book that I’d already written almost half of pre-cancer-diagnosis and I am completing the remaining chapters. It’s a goodie and I can’t wait for you to read it.

In the meantime, browse my 28 other titles here to see if anything takes your fancy!

Or go to fionaferris.com to see all my links.

 

 

(My Amazon link is affiliate, at no extra cost to you. Thank you for choosing to use my Amazon link if you are considering any Amazon purchases!)

Nina cat appreciation day :)

 

 Hello friends,

Last week I came across Nina cat’s original ‘birth certificate’, her paperwork when we adopted her from a cat shelter 😊

I thought she was about 14 years old now, turns out she is 16! 💕

She really is so ageless I’m not surprised we missed a couple of years. She came to live with us at 18 months, and has loved life ever since.

She still tears up and down the lawn outside, brings the occasional mouse or even rat in (I KNOW), and as I’m typing this in my office she appeared at the window to be let in. (She knows she is being talked about.)

This photo of her the other day is in one of our guest rooms Nina claimed as her own, so I put her bed there for her to soak up the sun. She naps there most days.

It’s the room I have set up as my audiobook recording studio, with plenty of soft furnishings and blankets draped over the mirrored glass drawers (it looks great as you can imagine 🤣).

While recording I shut the bedroom door and put a draft excluder down to muffle any dogs snorting under the door trying to find me (DAPHNE).

Nina is not a fan of my audiobooks though. I don’t shout them, it’s just my voice, and I only do short sessions at a time, but as soon as I start recording, she indignantly hops off the bed and waits to be let out.

So the dance ALWAYS is to open the door, let Nina out, close the door again, reposition the draft excluder and restart my recording. (She doesn’t leave until I start recording, normal talking doesn’t annoy her 🤣). This happens every single time I do a session.

Apparently Nina loves having staff, so much so that despite letting her in my office window a few minutes ago, she appeared there again like an apparition. She must have gone straight out after the first time I let her in, and back up onto my windowsill!

Aren’t cats funny? I used to think they don’t have their own personality like dogs, but they definitely have. And Miss Nina is a real character, as well as being an eternal kitten even at 16.

She’s tiny too, as you can see, weighing only 3.2kg (7 pounds). Yet eats like a horse! (She has had worm tablets so don’t worry 😊).

Tell me about your cat(s). I bet they’re cute too and do crazy things just like Nina.

x Fiona

PS. ‘The Autumn Reset’ is high in the charts at the moment, thanks to all of you in the northern hemisphere reading it and loving it. I appreciate each and every order, review, mention, and share of my books. Truly!

And, I’ve just started uploading to Kobo at a reader request. I started with ‘The Autumn Reset’ and will do the others one at a time. There is no bulk upload that I know of, so I’ll work through them over time :) ‘The Autumn Reset’ is on Kobo Plus too.

Of course, now I need to write a Spring book to complete the set, which is in the planning stages. I love dreaming up new titles and getting all excited for the ideas inside each book. I love my ‘job’ so much!

 

 

[My Amazon links earn me a small commission, at no extra cost to you. I’m appreciative if you are happy to use my links when shopping on Amazon!]

Favourite clothes - one of my pieces

 

Hello friends :)

You know how when you have a super-duper-favourite item of clothing and you know you can't make it last forever which makes you sad, but you're determined to treat it so well it can't help but anyway?

That's how I feel about this red boho blouse. I bought it from Banana Republic in the US in August 2019 so it's just celebrated its seventh birthday.

I love the colour, the softness of the cotton, the little tufted squares, the detail above the bustline. All of it ❤️

Thankfully styles like this are forgiving of weight gain or loss, and of larger or smaller busts, since I went from large to medium this year! (#silverliningofbreastcancersurgery)

I've been enjoying moving things around in my closet in preparation for the warmer spring temperatures, although it's been up and down, as spring does.

It's so nice to wear a light blouse instead of multi-layers, even if I do still have my compression sleeve and glove as constant companions.

I try not to think about it too much though, and just focus on creating my most beautiful life. In a relaxed, laid-back kind of way of course.

I’ve been journalling, sewing, reading… all my favourite things to do, and walking every day as well.

My walk in the morning is one of the highlights of my day, and it really does help to have an audiobook on the go. I just started Swan Song by Charles Spencer, about Princess Diana, and he narrates it too.

(Swan Song is here on Amazon at my affiliate link.)

I loved her style when she first married Prince Charles. I had the ‘Lady Di’ haircut, wore a pie-crust frill plaid blouse, and had corduroy knickerbockers too. That was when I was about 11 😊

What are you reading at the moment? Anything to recommend?

And, do you have a piece in your wardrobe like my red blouse? Let me know what it is and where you got it from (and when!)

xx Fiona 

The best way to enjoy fish (my new favourite recipe)

 

Hey friends,

One of our lovely neighbours dropped by one night recently and offered us two beautifully fresh just-caught crayfish.

It was so thoughtful of him to think of us.

(They’re only called crayfish in New Zealand, but I think they’re like lobster or rock lobster elsewhere? They live in the ocean anyway.)

When I was a child my family had a boat and dad would catch crayfish. I remember him dropping them into a big pot of boiling water and we’d eat it freshly poached.

He always told us the legs were the best bit and us kids would sit there with our pile of legs drawing out the fine straws of meat while the adults tucked into the tails 😂

Was that actually true that the legs were the premium part??? I have my doubts now 🤣

Paul and I, having never cooked a crayfish in our life, did some research online.

We found out the humane way to cook them, and also came across a simple recipe.

We served the cooked meat over boiled new potatoes, with melted butter and lemon juice poured over top, and plentiful fresh chives.

Here is the recipe we used although it’s so simple you don’t really need a recipe. I didn’t do the butter sauce with water, just melted it and it was just as delicious.

We liked this recipe so much we recreated it with fresh white fish on another night (see below). With slightly less butter though, and I added steamed veggies 😍

I always get fresh fish when I do the groceries each week; it’s a good routine for us to get those different nutrients.

Paul wasn’t a fan of the weekly fish at first, he felt like it didn’t really fill him up, but if I don’t try to make it too light and healthy he’s a happy boy. Hence the butter and potatoes 😊

I actually really think potatoes get an unnecessarily bad rap. In my healthy slim lifestyle I eat them pretty much every night. I might have trimmed down the quantity, but I still love spuds. They have so much fibre and nutrition.

Are you a seafood fan? What is your favourite and how do you cook it?

 

~~

 

 

 

And here is how I recreated the crayfish recipe with snapper (it was a hit too!)

It really was so simple to make:

💫 Air-fried or roasted potato chunks (or you can boil little new potatoes like the original crayfish recipe)

💫 Steamed broccoli (I like mine lightly cooked, still crunchy, bright green, and tossed in a dash of olive oil)

💫 Pan-fried snapper (I use olive oil spray in the pan, not butter, since I’m using butter for the sauce)

💫 Melt some butter in a pot on a low heat and let it brown while you’re cooking the fish. Those speckles on the white fish are toasted milk solids from the butter. YUM! Once it’s nicely browned, pour over the fish and potatoes at serving time, and add a squeeze of fresh lemon juice too.

I am such a fan of browning butter in recipes, it provides a beautiful caramelised flavour. I remember often making a Donna Hay recipe in the early 2000s for ‘fish with brown butter’. It was always a favourite.

[I recently made a blondie recipe from Smitten Kitchen and it calls for the butter to be browned too. I made it for Micky dog’s funeral and everyone said how good it tasted. It was the browned butter that made all the difference!]

💫 Then a scattering of something green. Here we have spring onions, but I’d use parsley or chives at other times. A fresh green sprinkle is always a welcome addition both for sight and taste.

💫 Also, I really think part of the appeal lies in using a bowl to serve as well, rather than a dinner plate. In restaurants they often use big bowls, and the food is stacked up rather than spread around the plate. It really did look more restauranty to me, arranged like this.

And this, my friends, is how to get your husband to be excited about fish for dinner! 🤣

 

~~

 

 

 

Spotted: A real cutie when visiting the library this week.

Who wouldn’t want to sit on the seat in preference to cold looking cobblestones?

I do love a girl who has standards.

xoxo Gossip Girl 😍 Oops I mean Fiona :)

Have a great week!

Personal style and home decor style, and keeping track of the days :D

 

Hello friends!

In the colour palette world, I am a Soft Summer. I had my colours ‘done’ in the early 1990s, and I still have swatches showing all my best colours. I love it so much!

Over the years I’ve come and gone from these shades, but I’ve stayed pretty close, and when I’ve gone too far away and see a photo of me in a tone that is too warm or sharp for me it really shows.

One thing I instinctively did for myself within the Soft Summer palette was to choose the brighter shades which give me a happy feeling.

I even write about my love of ‘soft-brights’ in some of my books when I talk about clothing. And looking back at my Soft Summer swatches, they’re all right there - watermelon, geranium, and the kind of green I’m wearing here but don’t really know the name for.

They’re kind of like a bright colour that got left out in the sun and faded a bit. ‘Sun softened’ shall we say.

I’m just so fascinated by colours and how one can make you pop and another just looks drab.

My mum is a Winter, and she looks stunning in black, and icy cool clear shades as well as deep jewel tones. Her light blue eyes are so vivid when she wears those colours. Her hair was darkest brown-black when younger, and now is a cool platinum grey.

I always think it’s really helpful to look back at your colouring in your earlier years, and gather together photos where you look really good - maybe the colours are contributing, so what are those colours?

It’s just such a fun thing to study for me, and it fits in with any budget too. The most expensive designer outfit in colours that don’t reflect well on you won’t be as lovely as a mid-range or inexpensive outfit in your best shades.

Here are my vintage ‘Color Me Beautiful’ swatches :) 

 

 

 

What I like about the colour palettes for each season is that they contain all the colours - I have reds, blues, greens, even yellow, just in the tones that are good for me. I have neutrals too. It’s all good!

I remember it being expensive at the time, but it really has been an investment that I’ve enjoyed over the years.

These days you can do it for free with YouTube videos, books, and AI even, but I like that I had a person drape me with the fabrics.

Let me know your season if you’re into colours too!

 

~~

 

 

 

I thought I’d share a favourite corner in our living/dining room. I like to have a small television tucked in there with background music playing on YouTube which I know others might not. To me it looks like just another piece of art on the gallery wall. (I use it for Pilates sometimes too).

The metal sideboard, lamp, and three smaller pieces of art came from an auction house when we first moved to this place.

My dad made the bookcase based on one I saw in a magazine that looked like a ladder.

Paul gave me the French gilt mirror for my birthday when we were first going out.

The two green vases came from Korea as a gift to my dad when he did business with a Korean company back in the 1980s. (He had an engineering business making fruit grading machinery.) I’ve always loved the vases and now I get to have a turn of them.

And the crazy bird picture is from my brother’s interiors shop when he had it.

I love a mix of traditional and whimsy in my home style.

When we were first building up the decor style after moving into this home I decided on ‘Ralph Lauren on a Budget X French Chateau’. (Luckily Paul was on board too.)

Since then I’ve also added in a dash of sexiness/glamour/relaxedness to prevent things feeling too staid.

The rug is also from the auction house, and we have plain sisal-style carpet.

What would your decor style be if you could give it a name? I love dreaming up themes and directions and thinking about elegant yet effortless decor - let me know yours!

 

~~

 

 

~ Flowers in our bathroom ~

 

How is everyone’s week starting out?

Mine is going well, even though half the time I don’t know what day it is...

And it’s because of this: Paul works for a local winery and his weekend is Tuesday/Wednesday. So even though today is Monday here it feels like Friday, lol.

Still, that’s the modern way isn’t it, when you don’t worry about the day of the week since so many people work shifts and non-Monday-to-Friday jobs.

I’ve always liked being a bit out of sync too, relaxing on a Tuesday afternoon and working on a Sunday morning. It suits my rebellious (’soft rebellious’) nature.

How I organise myself is yes, I do like to know what day it is, even if my schedule is not the norm, because every day has it’s own feeling, you know?

I use a calendar. It used to be a paper diary, but in recent years I use the calendar on my phone. I’ve gotten into the habit of checking it each day to see what I’ve got on.

I love that you can do automated recurring appointments as well as to-dos. I take a high dose of Vit D once a month for my bones, and I have a daily recurring ‘audiobook recording’ since I have a few more audiobooks to complete. I do a chapter or two each day and then they’re done.

[I am currently re-recording Luxurious Weight Loss because for some reason Audible declined it due to sound issues. I don’t know why because it was recorded in exactly the same way as all my other audiobooks and Audible accepted those. So that’s why this particular book is not available on Audible, but it will be in a few months!] 

 

 

 

So yes, the life of a self-employed author is not the usual, and adding on Paul’s topsy-turvy work week can you blame me for having to stop and think a minute what day it is?

Still, I’m sure it keeps my brain young, when everyday life is such a puzzle :)

Wishing you an excellent week!

xx Fiona

PS. For those of you in the Northern Hemisphere, join the fall fun in my book The Autumn Reset. And if you’re Southern Hemisphere like me, there are still a few relevant chapters in it for you! (I always like to join in the ‘fall vibes’ aesthetic while enjoying our early spring weather - we get the best of both worlds under the equator!) 

 

 

 

My Amazon links for are affiliate, but the prices don’t change for you. I’m appreciative if you choose to use one of these links if you are making a purchase :)

A winery outing, and tussock for Micky

 

 Hello friends,

The past few weeks we’ve been getting used to being a household of two dogs not three.

It’s sad that I no longer expect Micky to pop his head around the doorway when he hears a noise coming from the kitchen that could possibly mean food.

And there are still times when tears spring to your eyes at a sudden memory.

We bought this baby tussock plant because Micky loved a good sniff around the tussock when we went for a walk along the waterfront at Ahuriri Beach.

We thought it would be a nice way to mark his grave.

Paul planted it a few days ago so Micky will be loving having his own tussock all to himself.

I think you’ve got to do the fun, silly things like this.

It just feels like the right thing to do 😊

 

~~ 

 

And we had a fun outing recently. A local winery that we’re a part of their wine club offered a tasting of their new season releases.

 

 

 

It was set in the winemaking area itself, and it was cool to see all the barrels. One of the winemakers told us they cleaned the rooms up a lot for the event, because usually there would be forklifts coming and going. But on this day it was pristine.

Honestly, it looked like the setting for a Hallmark movie it was so perfect (you know, the one where the main character is running the family vineyard and a hotshot from the city comes into town trying to buy her out and they end up falling in love).

 

 

 

The snacky food table looks so beautiful and lush looking, don't you think?

 

 

  

There was even a dj playing. All the details were on point 😊

It was a nice little outing on a Saturday afternoon 🍷

Happy weekend to you.

Spring is here in Hawke’s Bay.

It’s lovely to feel a bit of heat.

xx Fiona

 

PS. My most recent book Life Is Good is now available everywhere on audiobook. Go and take a listen if you’re interested! And please ask your library to order it in (paperback or audiobook) if you’d like to read or listen to it for free. (It helps me out too because then other people can find it at the library who otherwise might not know who this Fiona Ferris lady is.)

 

 

Goodbye Micky, our little ray of light

 

It has been a quiet, sad week here.

On Monday we said goodbye to our sweet prince Micky, 14 years young.

Over the past month he had started limping but we didn’t know how he’d hurt his leg.

It wasn’t getting better so we investigated further. An x-ray showed he had aggressive bone cancer which had eaten away his pelvis and when it reached his hip joint is when he started having trouble walking.

Sadly there was nothing that could cure him, only pain relief for comfort, and even that didn’t stop him moving around trying to ease the pain.

Micky is now flying high with all our other pets who have departed over the years. He had had two little ‘turns’ earlier in the year and so I think that was the beginning of things.

 

 

 

I have always asked the Universe to give me a clear sign when it is a pet’s time to go, and I was given that for Micky.

I also always think of things from the pet’s perspective. Yes we could have brought him home for another few days with us on painkillers, but it would have been for us, not him.

Micky came to live with us four years ago aged ten, when my brother moved overseas. He has been a wonderful member of our family, giving our other two dogs more confidence and being a ray of light in our household.

How cute is his first-vet-visit puppy photo? 

 

 

 

Micky was so gentle, loving, relaxed, and sociable. A real extrovert. He was half Jack Russell, half Shih Tzu, and his Jack Russell side meant that walks would take twice as long as necessary due to all the sniffing.

 

 

 

We took Daphne and Chloe out for their first walk without Micky the next day and Paul commented that the walk was so quick without all the extra stops to sniff. Too quick when he was used to standing around waiting forever for his boy.

 

 

 

Paul was the ‘pawbearer’ and I let Micky ride home in the front seat, me in the back, since the front seat was his favourite. He and Paul would often go out for a boys walk together, and if I joined them with our other two doggies, Micky would be quite miffed that he couldn’t ride on the front seat. 

 

 

 

He is now buried at home in a lovely sunny spot up a hill. We are going to plant a little tussock for him as he loved to fossick around in the tussock along the waterfront.

 

 

 

In his final months I put a blanket over him often, and he looked like a mermaid when walking off with it on. And one day he couldn’t get back in the cat door due to the stuck rug :)

 

 

 

Goodnight darling Micky, we were so lucky to know you. Sleep well.

 

~~

 

 

 Just last week, on one of Micky’s favourite walks at Ahuriri, Paul and I had sushi on the waterfront, rugged up in the winter sunshine.

It was such a nice few hours to have our lunch outside and walk the doggies, and aren’t the colours of the salmon and avocado bright and luscious?

 

 

 

The lemonade can adds a pop of colour as well.

Because... thrifty... we brought our own cans from home, and I brought myself a straw too because I do love a straw.

I don’t usually drink fizzy with my meals, but it felt festive to take one with us for our lunch plans.

It’s fun to make your own outing for not much money, making the most of natural areas around you.

There are public outdoor tables where we went available for anyone to use, but otherwise we could have sat on a picnic blanket on the grass or sand.

We didn’t know it would be only days before we had to say goodbye to Micky, which makes it all the more of a precious outing. Micky loved being out and about with people.

Give your pets an extra big hug today for our buddy boy.

x Fiona