On Friday afternoon I got a very welcome email from the lovely Emma from 1000heads, inviting me to the Miracle Moist Aussie party on the following day. Of course (knowing how amazing the Aussie events are) I jumped at the chance to fill a slot that had been freed up due to a few guest cancellations.

I managed to sort my self out & get ready in record time after a relaxing afternoon at the park, and so at 7pm on Saturday evening I arrived at the Island Bar on Suffolk St Queensway in the City Centre. I was all on my lonesome because none of my girl friends were available at short notice, so I was feeling rather shy and nervous – I didn’t know anyone who was going apart from Emma! A few of us arrived at about the same time and we headed upstairs to the Tiki Bar, where we were greeted by Emma and given some yummy cocktails. I felt like a little bit of an imposter because I’m really in the Luscious Long tribe – though I do use Miracle Moist occasionally so I wasn’t entirely out-of-place!

The evening was great fun; there was lots of chatting with the other angels, great food and drinks and a pair of fabulous hair stylists who gave us a lesson in looking after dry hair, and did our hair in fabulous do’s throughout the evening (they tried their best to give me some curls but they mostly fell out, my hair is just so heavy and thick!). I got some great tips about looking after my sensitive scalp, and some good advice about how to have my hair styled next time I head to the hairdresser.

The highlight (and main event) of the evening was Scott’s Cocktail Masterclass, which was absolutely hilarious. The group was split into two teams, team 1¹ and team 2. Each team was given a quick tour of the bar and shown where everything was (although I missed this bit due to my hair being done) and then Scott, the oh so marvellous barman, taught us how to make a Tom Collins cocktail.

One person from each team had to go up against another, with Scott timing the proceedings and judging the cocktails once completed. We even had to serve it up with a napkin and a straw, complete with the correct garnish. It was actually quite tense when you were behind the bar – the time limits were really low and there was gin and all sorts of things flying all over the place! All efforts had to be consumed by their creators, and shots were issued to any people breaking the rules or talking during the demonstrations - Fi in particular had to have quite a few (increasingly disgusting) dirty shots!

The competition continued with us learning how to make a Bramble, Cosmopolitan² and then a B-52. Great fun, and I even remember most of the instructions! I think Scott decided to make me his personal mission after I layered the perfect B-52 shot though, and proceeded to make me incredibly strong custom cocktails… a red tequila drink, then a blue one, then an orange. I think he thought I was far too sober in comparison to everyone else. That combination of drinks pretty much finished me off, and I was as sloshed as everyone else by the time we stumbled outside into the cold night air, that had absolutely no sobering effect on me at all.

Most importantly… Team One won the cocktail competition. Though nobody knew the score for sure, as the ‘drink everything you make’ rule messed with everyone’s ability to count! I did manage to get some blog addresses written down into my Moleskine so I should be able to keep in contact with the new friends I made, which is good.

Yesterday morning I was quite horrifically hungover (I suspect the tequila) and so my wonderful husband looked after me, and fed me coffee and a bacon & egg sandwich. I did manage to surface after lunch and headed downstairs to relax on the sofa for the afternoon, thankfully. On the plus side, because of the mousse the hair stylists put in my hair during the party, every time I rolled over in bed I got a gorgeous whiff of Aussie!

Thanks so much for the invite Aussie… I’m really looking forward to the Luscious Long party next month!

Loads more photos to see over at 1000heads’s flickr set & mine!

1. go team one!! [↩]
2. not sure this one was the best idea as it involved naked flames… We were all pretty merry by this time and there had been a lot of hairspray sprayed on us! [↩]