Channelling

Today, I have been channelling Vegan Chickie and her amazing (insert OCD) organisational skills.

I have notebooks and journals for user names and passwords (even though all of my devices code and save them automatically), website building resources (all the sites for colour coding, colour palettes, free images, photo editing and sizing, fonts etc), affiliates, reviews, blogging ideas, stockists, ebook ideas and outlines, ideas for the recipe page, names of possible guest bloggers and the list goes on!

One might suggest that I have used this 'channelling' as a procrastination tool!

Whenever I come to a hurdle or obstacle, procrastination is my closest friend. I do something constructive while my brain processes the difficulties ahead and then when it (my brain) gives me the go-ahead, I move forward and hopefully OVER the obstacle.

Whatever. I can still see progress and feel like I'm doing ok .. even though I have reached and passed my self imposed deadline.

Believe me, it's frustrating for me too!

I've spent the evening planning my morning tea for Tuesday's LeReve party. I have a fabulous list of delicious food to make .. however, I may have bitten off more than I can chew! I think I can do it!

I'm quite looking forward to the party. I expected that I would become anxious and try to find a reason to cancel it, but there are a couple of new ladies coming along and it will be nice to introduce them to my friends.

We had no luck at the club tonight. Well, I shouldn't say 'we', because half of our table won prizes in the raffle and our partners, husbands, brothers and neighbours, who were sitting outside, almost ALL won something as well! So I will rephrase that ... 'I' had no luck at the club tonight.

Best get some sleep now.

Nite all.

Never ending

I think I know what I'm doing.

It's usually when I'm feeling the most confident, that I discover I have no right to feel that way!

There has been a lot of meaningless chasing up today. iBooks and iTunes and ATO and Amazon and inmotion hosting and Apple and Wordpress. All tiny little things that seem to take an enormous amount of time.

Or perhaps it's just me being too careful, trying to understand stuff that I don't need to understand, following too many links, reading too much information. I'm certain that all this could be finished with just a flick of my fingers but I'm being too cautious.

I'm also easily distracted (as you know too well) and even though I'm working hard at it, my uncanny ability to procrastinate seems to rear it's ugly head when I least need it to.

Today was my deadline day, but alas it has passed without the fanfare that I'd hoped for.

It could be tomorrow, if I can just focus and get a smooth few hours. I know exactly what I need to do .. or so I think haha.

We were threatened with some nasty storms this afternoon. They made lots of noise and the light show was pretty spectacular, but not a drop of rain was to be seen or felt! The psychotic dogs were very stressed and demanded to be let onto the 'storm chair'.

At least I got some washing done today.

I haven't been out on my trike all week. I'm off to bed now, so that I can get an early start in the morning and go for a trike ride, sit by the water for a bit before getting my morning coffee, have a quick visit with The Motivator and be back home to get cracking at my desk.

So much to do, so little time!

Have a fabulous Friday!!

Nite all.

Christmas Cheer

Here I am, way past midnight, watching movies, shopping online and blogging ... talk about multi-tasking!

I just made my first jewellery order, which should be here by next Wednesday, ready to sell on my website .. let's hope I can have the website live by then!

We had a fabulous lunch at the Woodgate Pub for our lady's Christmas break-up today. The weather was glorious. Just a touch windy on the return trip. The food was good. Not spectacular, but good enough. The service was warm and friendly and even though a lot of the regular ladies weren't able to attend today, the group that we had was a good mix and we had some laughs.

Needless to say, I have done nothing else today, except relax with Adoring Husband since I returned from lunch.

I haven't even edited the photos from today, so I can't share them yet.

I did discuss, with a new lady, the idea of taking paying groups on photography outings, to teach them how to use their cameras and how to take photos.

It's definitely time to seriously consider this option in the new year because I've had four different enquiries in the last 12 months. Perhaps it can be my mission for the new year.

I was also invited to art classes, which I am very excited about! The first session will be creating a pottery bust. The classes begin in the first week of January.

So much to look forward to next year! Art classes, my website, a seminar in Sydney in February, babysitting Chicklet in March, Adoring Husband's big 60th birthday bash in October, a road trip at the end of the year. It's going to be a good year.

Now I'm going to attempt to climb into bed before 1am.

Nite all.

The Finish Line

I feel certain that I could have made my website live this afternoon, if not for the near catastrophe that befell me and caused me to lose almost two hours of valuable time.

I thought that I had lost two months worth of work with just the press of a button!

I had contacted my host to get some advice on changing my domain name, but he failed to give me all the information (not his fault), so I followed the link that he provided and found the instructional video, which I watched and followed to the letter.

Then I pressed 'enter'.

Everything GONE.

A big fat 404 error.

Page not found.

Nothing.

I spent an hour trying everything I could think of. I scoured both my host's website and the Wordpress website trying to find some answers.

Just as I was feeling the terrible effects of hyperventilation, I decided to ask for help.

Thank goodness my host has a fabulous chat function on their site, so I contacted them again and pleaded for assistance.

A gentleman by the name of David H (different from the first man), was incredibly helpful, investigated fully, explained exactly why it happened and then took ten minutes to restore my website to it's 'pre-disappearance' glory.

When he was finished, he sent me an email with a copy of our discussion and a link to my website.

I clicked on the link.

WAHLAH!!!

There it was on the screen. Just as I remembered it.

I could breathe again.

At that point, I decided that I needed a break. Too many hours in front of that screen over the last three days was crossing my eyes and frying my brain and causing me to make unnecessary errors.

I don't want this to be a stressful experience. The whole idea of the website is to bring me joy and happiness! Today, it did NOT do that.

Luckily, tomorrow, I have a booked engagement, so I will be away from the screen all day. Just what I need. A social outing to help me relax and recuperate.

I'll be fresh and ready to finalise the site on Thursday!

It will be an early night for me - 10pm - and I'm off to bed.

Nite all.

Big Day at the Office

I'm done!

No. I have not finished the website.

BUT ... I've been working on it for ten hours today!

I've fine tuned and fixed some of the stuff that I wasn't sure about.

I've created accounts in Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest, which means I can link them to the site tomorrow.

I've spoken to a printing company about self publishing my book, but even after I provided them with the name of the book, they emailed me with costings and had incorrectly quoted the book title, so they've already lost my business at the first hurdle.

It shows that they are not very diligent and tells me that I can't trust them with my precious baby.

I was excited to have my registration accepted by a wholesale company that stocks my favourite journals, only to discover that for 80% of the journals that I wanted, they are 'out of stock'. That was disappointing.

I am now registered with half a dozen wholesale stockists, so it's going to take some time to wade through their stock to see if they have anything worth putting on my site, but I'll do that AFTER the site goes 'live'.

It's almost 11pm and I feel that I'm about to fall off my chair, so I'm off to bed.

Enough is enough!!

Nite all.

Sunday in a Nutshell

A few minutes with the boys at The Seat of Knowledge.

Coffee.

A surprise stop at The Motivator's house. I had asked her to critique my ebook, which she did, with surprising results! She was impressed.

While we were chatting with the bubba Tawny Frogmouth chick high in the tree, The Motivator noticed the mother sitting on the ground in the driveway!! This is my interaction with her ...

I came home at 11am and spent four hours in my workspace .. with nothing much to show for it! I've asked Adoring Husband to bring my coffee in the morning, so that I don't have to leave the house and can spend the entire day working at my desk.

It took me AGES to cook up a billion pork/chicken meatballs tonight, but at least there is enough left over for AH to have for lunch tomorrow and I won't have to stop work to prepare his meal.

That is it.

Almost 11pm and I'm off to bed.

Nite all.