Spring has Sprung

Wednesday was a day in the Bay, where I purchased 3 t-shirts, 3 singlet tops and 2 dress tops.

Now I need to declutter my wardrobe again. Every time I buy a new garment, my rule is to remove an old garment, but I haven’t done that for the last 5 or 6 times! I need to remove at least 8 items, but I think I can go as high as 12 items, maybe even more 🤷🏼‍♀️

I also bought some Matcha Powder (which was much more expensive than I expected) and some Chlorella. I haven’t taken any of it yet!

We were home by 1.30pm.

I cooked three different dinners.

I’d forgotten that I had 2kgs of lamb mince in the small fridge in the art room so I had to cook it. Luckily it was cryovaced so not urgent, but necessary.

I did a Rogan Josh curried mince and it was hot but delicious. Adoring Husband chose that for his dinner and I served it with boiled rice and papadums.

BGWLBH chose the leftover chicken with creamy lemon sauce which I served with boiled rice and salad.

I had my last two chicken, mushroom and garlic sausages with salad.

I fell asleep reasonably early (for me) and woke at 2am to pee, so I turned on the TV for US Open tennis which I watched on and off as I dozed through the remainder of the night.

I took Harley out to play at 9.30am but he got freaked out by some strange noise and wanted to stop playing quite early. Turns out he’s scared of the ironing board, which BGWLBH was setting up inside the house. We can’t figure out what triggered this fear, but he’s freaked out the last three times she has done the ironing.

Go figure 🤷🏼‍♀️

I decided to go for a ride on my trike, so I made myself presentable, took BGWLBH’s order for the supermarket and off I pedalled. 

This is what greeted me …

The most perfect Spring day that you can imagine.

I had received a text from the PO reminding me to pick up a parcel before the 10th September, so I showed the text to Amelia and she searched high and low without success. I left empty handed and she promised to contact me by phone later in the day.

She phoned and left a voice mail apologising and advising that the parcel was nowhere to be found, so I did some Sherlock Holmes work of my own and following the clues and facts, discovered that AH had picked up said parcel exactly one week ago!

Amelia was at lunch when I phoned back so I left her a message advising of my findings.

I still can’t figure out why I received the text 🤷🏼‍♀️

I arrived home at midday, made myself some lunch and returned to bed with Harley. As beautiful as the day was, it was lovely in my bedroom to while away the hours watching Jet Lag, journaling, watching tennis and napping.

I didn’t leave the room until it was time to cook dinner.

Lemon butter barramundi done in the oven, with fried rice (I had cooked extra rice on Wednesday night for just this purpose). Quite delicious.

After dinner, I came straight back to bed.

Tomorrow (Friday), I have a catch up date with The Gypsy while she house and pet sits around the corner.

BGWLBH is working, so AH will be in charge of Harley and the house for a couple of hours.

Right now, I’m watching my Broncos play their final game for the season and at half time the score is 10 all. They are playing the Bulldogs.

I might be asleep very soon.

Nite all.

Meditative Epiphanies

I was late to mediation class this morning.

It was my own fault for procrastinating and attempting to fit too much into too short a time period leading up to class.

Class was a bit overwhelming for me today because it brought up unhealed “stuff” that has been triggering me a lot and bringing up anger, fear and frustration for quite some time.

That in turn, raised issues for others in the class, and deep conversations ensued.

I left feeling fragile and vulnerable, but with a plan to set in motion upon my return home.

I spent some quality time soaking up the beauty of the river on this first day of spring.

After chatting with Adoring Husband and BGWLBH, working on my patchwork jeans for about an hour, I made myself a cup of soursop tea which I took to my room with the raspberry and white chocolate cheesecake treat that I bought myself so that I could get comfy on my bed and commence my healing plan.

I found this journal in Tinkerbells Mystical and Fantasy almost a year ago and I’ve been holding on to it and waiting for just the right purpose. 

 

What does ‘self love’ look like for me?

I responded with five written pages and included:

• Using traffic control - stopping frequently during the day and checking my thoughts and actions while reminding myself that I am a peaceful soul.
• Recognising my triggers before they make me react in anger and frustration.
• Feeling grateful, not just for all that I have now, but for all the lessons, struggles, obstacles, difficulties and challenges that I have faced, overcome and worked through to become who I am today.
• Remembering that I am a soul, caretaking and driving this physical body.
• Independently providing my own love, acceptance, tolerance, strength, kindness, peace etc., and not expecting others to provide those things for me.
• Forgiving myself for being angry about how Parkinson’s has affected my life and remembering that I am still loved by Adoring Husband, myself and The Divine.
• Removing self-doubt, self-judgement and self-criticism from my inner dialogue.

That’s just a select few ‘self love’ actions that I wrote in my journal. It will be an ongoing project and I already feel lighter for it. The test will be putting it all into practise on a daily basis and not fall back into bad habits, which I know is easily done.

I played with Harley around the pool and felt gratitude for this little oasis in my own back yard.

Tonight’s dinner was a creamy, lemony sauce over chicken breast for BGWLBH and a pork loin chop for AH. I served it with roasted pumpkin, spinach and pine nut salad and boiled buttery potatoes.

Now it’s after 11pm and I need to get up early for a day in the Bay.

Nite all.

Golf to Tennis

I’ve been awake since 3am because I set my alarm to watch the final round of the FedEx cup.

Scheffler proved exactly why he is number one in the world and truly deserved the win.

I was hoping for better performances from Adam Scott, Min Woo Lee and Rory McIlroy.

I switched it straight over to the tennis before the golfing celebrations began.

At first I was disappointed that I wouldn’t get to see Djokovic play because they were televising the Australians playing. They announced that we could only watch the Djokovic game on Stan Sport and I cancelled my subscription to Stan Sport last year.

At the beginning of his match, it started to rain and the outer court matches were cancelled! Because he was playing on the Arthur Ash arena, which has a roof, they switched the telecast to his match!

I was so happy.

Until, early in the match, Djokovic began to fade, and he struggled through the entire five setter. I’ve never seen him so bad and while he had a slight recovery in the 2nd and 3rd sets, he just couldn’t get to the end.

There are no players remaining in the draw that I would sacrifice my sleep to watch play, but the time difference between New York and Australia means that play continues until after lunch here, so I may get to watch some good matches anyway.

Tonight’s dinner was crumbed chicken, wombok salad, garden salad and boiled potatoes with sour cream.

I also read a book today …

It was a quick, but interesting and insightful read.

Now I’m going to sleep because tomorrow is both the first day of spring and meditation day.

Nite all.

Sleep or Sports?

I left the tv on so that if I woke up during the night, I could catch up with the golf results, so this meant that my sleep was broken and interrupted.

Yes. Self inflicted.

I woke up properly at 6am and watched it til the last hole was played.

At 9am, I took Harley out to play and requested a coffee from Adoring Husband so he went for a drive and returned with our Sunday morning caffeine injection.

I made myself a prawn omelette for breakfast, which was delicious, but a couple of hours later, my belly objected strongly. My body simply doesn’t like eggs and it’s about time I accepted that fact.

My first choice for the day was to watch a Netflix movie called “Unsung Hero” which was based on a true story about the singer Rebecca St James and her family. It was a decent movie. A bit slow to get going, but a nice ending.

Most of the afternoon was spent in bed watching the football and nursing my sore belly.

I made a huge batch of spaghetti bolognese sauce to feed the team tonight and to freeze for a future five nights.

I watched The Voice tonight and I’m ready to sleep because I want to wake up at 3am to watch the final round of the golf.

Also, the US Open tennis starts tonight, but the only match that I’m keen to watch on day one is Djokovic and it starts at 9am, so that’s handy.

Nite all.

Celebrating Life

Friday was a quiet day at home and I tested out the new slow cooker. My lamb shanks, after 6 hours, were not as I expected and it seems that I’m going to have play around with the settings and test some more to get it right.

I had an early night so that I’d be fresh for Saturday morning and the “celebration of life” for our friend Linda.

I was picked up at 9.50am and we drove out to Mrs Fabulous’s house and transferred to her car to drive into the Bay.

There, we picked up The Gypsy and drove to the botanic gardens where the service was being held in the Treehouse.

We were a touch early, so we walked across the road to the bakery for coffee and cake. The Gypsy and I did not partake but Mrs Fabulous and Miss Telstra enjoyed the wares.

Soon after, we joined everybody at the Treehouse and sat through an hour of moving speeches, photographs and a mind blowing eulogy which proved that none of us knew Linda as well as we thought.

The one common thread through it all showed that she was a shining beacon of light and love who touched many people all over the world. Every single photo (and there were MANY!) from childhood and covering 79 years of her full and rich life, showed her beautiful beaming smile.

She will certainly be missed.

I was home by 1pm. I made myself some lunch and planted my emotionally drained body on the couch for the remainder of the afternoon.

I’m now in bed watching the football and I hope to see some of the golf during the night. It doesn’t start until 1am so we’ll see!

I’m looking forward to a quiet Sunday..

Nite all.

All the Best People

This was my view at morning coffee today …

Such a perfectly glorious day!

There were four of us catching up and boy was there some news to share. Some serious medical situations for all three of the girls that I met up with. Very worrying times ahead but relief for others.

I had to leave the girls early to get home in time for my zoom meeting with The Gypsy and I had received a text to inform me that there was a parcel at the post office, so I stopped there first.

The parcel was 2 out my three material pieces that I’ve ordered for my patchwork. One more to go.

I spent two quality hours with The Gypsy until she had to leave for a client.

I made myself a late lunch and caught up with The Voice before taking Harley out to play. He gave up before I did and dropped the ball at the gate indicating that he was done playing.

While I had every intention of using my new slow cooker, I just didn’t have the time to do the prep work, so I chose to create a new dish using slices of chicken breast, the last of my chilli creamy vegetable soup as a sauce and konjac noodles. I served that with green beans and boiled potatoes in their jackets.

It went over well and Adoring Husband ate the leftovers.

He had played golf today and was obviously pretty weary by the end of the evening.

BGWLBH worked today.

I’m now in bed watching the Broncos get beaten by the Storm.

The final of the FedEx Cup golf championship starts tonight and the US Open Tennis starts on Sunday! I’m going to be exhausted for the next couple of weeks.

I’m off to catch some sleep before the 1am golf start.

Nite all.

Out and About Again

At 9am, after a solid 7 hours of sleep, I accepted BGWLBH’s invitation into the Bay.

Her mission was to purchase a new phone charging cord.

My mission was to refresh my lotto tickets and find some chicken breasts at the butcher.

Fresh roadworks have commenced on the main drag into the Bay and traffic lights have been set up, so we were stopped for 10-15 minutes at a red light, extending the length of our trip by two thirds!

We decided that Office Works was the place for cords … and we all know what a dangerous place that is for me … but I’m proud to announce that I controlled my spending and only bought 2 rolls of mentos.

No journals.

Our next stop was the newsagent at Pialba. The queue there was eight people long with only one person on the till.

I am constantly surprised at how many tickets people buy for all the lottos. Aren’t we supposed to be right in the middle of a cost of living crisis? Yet people are paying high prices for concert tickets, theatre tickets, sporting events, restaurant meals etc etc etc.

I can’t see any penny pinching going on. I just hear mainstream media telling me how tough it is out there and that we should hold on tight to our pennies.

Suffice to say, it took quite some time for these people to check their multiple tickets and replay them. A couple of people had a dozen tickets to check.

My butcher let me down and didn’t have the chicken breasts that I so desired. Instead, I found some lamb shanks to test my new slow cooker. They also had chicken, mushroom and garlic sausages that I desperately wanted to try, so I got 8 of them.

The last stop was the Jam Jar for our juices.

Another long ride home because of roadworks, but as soon as I arrived home and had my Harley cuddles, I cooked up a couple of the chicken sausages for a late lunch.

They were bloody delicious!

For dinner, I made salmon and potato patties with pickled tomato, cucumber and red onion, wombok salad and grated carrot/cheese.

Also delicious.

Tomorrow I have morning tea with my art girls, followed by a zoom meeting with The Gypsy, so it’s time to sleep.

Nite all.

Change of Plan

I’m trying to remember what I’ve done today 🤔

Due to illness (not mine), meditation was cancelled this morning, so I got to stay in bed until 8am.

Adoring Husband knocked on my bedroom door to take my water bottle, which he fills for me every time I leave the house. He didn’t know at that point that I wasn’t leaving, so Harley took that opportunity to escape the confines of the room and I was left on my own.

It was such a glorious day that I decided to go for a ride on my trike, so I showered and made myself presentable, took coffee orders and off I rode.

The river looked amazing with the sunlight sparkling off the blue water. The sky was mostly clear and there were boats making their way out to sea for a good days fishing. People were out walking their dogs, tradies enjoying smoko at the park, cyclists in groups and couples walking hand in hand.

Ours is a busy little community these days.

I found myself an isolated bench seat in the sunshine, away from the crowds and overlooking the beach where I sat soaking up the vitamin D and enjoying the peace and quiet for about 30 minutes.

It was lovely.

I dropped off a bag of passionfruit at the free food bank table under the church ramp.

I wandered through the supermarket where I found wheat free GF SR flour and plain flour so I grabbed a packet of each, a couple of other baking items for future use and I ordered our three coffees on a cardboard tray.

After I secured the tray of coffees to the mini frame in front of my trike, I slipped into the bakery for some GF profiteroles.

On the way home, I hit a few bumps which splashed a lot of coffee out of the drinking holes in the cup lids and I was worried that there might not be much left in the cup by the time I got to my place! As it was, there was a lot of cleaning up to do before I handed off their coffees AND I reheated mine in a saucepan because it was lukewarm.

Perhaps I’ll remember to take the mini esky next time, to contain the overflow and keep the coffee hot.

My new Instant Pot Pro arrived by courier - it has 10 different functions …

Electric pressure cooker, slow cooker, sous vide, rice/grain cooker, sauté pan, steriliser, cake baker, steamer, yoghurt maker and food warmer.

It looks good!

After 2 hours out and about getting exercise and sunshine and social interactions, I needed to rest in my room!

That’s where I watched an interesting interview on ‘Diary of a CEO’ about sunlight and other natural health phenomenons …

The Magic of Sunlight

So far, I’m really enjoying these interviews. He has the most amazing experts in so many different fields and backs it up with links to all of the research papers and journals for scientific proof. He also asks the best questions.

For dinner, I cooked crumbed beef and served with boiled buttered potatoes, wombok salad and garden salad.

I had the last container of home made tomato soup with toasted sourdough. It was bloody delicious!

Now I’m ready to sleep.

Nite all.