Brookers Cordials

" 37"

"Georgia Anne"

"On Fire"

A solid mesh fence, the kind used to keep vandals out of building sites, surrounds 37 Church St, Yass. The wild oats in the big yard are high and the front door oscillates between being kicked in and boarded up.

Kids may now sneak into this derelict building to smoke and smash beer bottles, but it was once home to Brookers, a local cordial manufacturer.

Christmas Decorations

After an end-of-the-year hiatus, I'm back and ready to take on 2010 with a new camera, the Canon Powershot S90. As professional as a point 'n' shoot digital can be, this baby is perfect for street photography ... slim and unobtrusive, yet capable of manual focus and shooting raw. I can't wait to take it to Scotland in June, where I'm visiting my sister Kirralee for a month.

In the meantime, I've got a backlog of images to get through from my other cameras, including these happy snaps of my Christmas decorations.

Top: The gorgeous Eddie Ross, who you may remember from the second season of Bravo's Top Design, inspired the bauble wreath. His blog is a gem for how to style on a budget and using vintage finds.

Centre: I snapped up half-price decorations at Ikea a couple of weeks before Christmas ... boxes of 40 cute baubles were under AU$5 and hand-blown glass hearts and spirals were under AU$1 each. I particularly liked the range of heart decorations ... so fresh, full of love and outside-the-square.

Below: I found this plain mug holder at my local Salvation Army Store, where I volunteer every Friday ... it made the perfect mini Christmas tree for the table next to my front door.