By Linda Ellis

This …

Moved me.

Friday was a day in the Bay. It was a public holiday branded as “show day” but around 50% of the shops were open for business.

BGWLBH and I stocked up on some art and craft goodies and did some grocery shopping, while Adoring Husband visited a sick mate in Maryborough hospital.

My dinner consisted of cold meats (pork, ham, turkey and prawns) with fresh cherry tomatoes from the garden, avocado, coleslaw, beetroot and cranberry sauce.

I watched the footy, followed by some golf, but I was asleep by midnight.

I woke up when my alarm sounded at 7am.

The reason for the alarm, was for a zoom date with The Gypsy at 9am. I gave myself time to play with Harley and to make a fruit salad for breakfast before setting up in my bed for the zoom. While AH had a coffee date with mates, I ordered a small coffee from him, so he brought that into my room before 9.30am.

Our zoom lasted for 2.5 hours and was full of chat about her upcoming surgery on Monday and some great spiritual discussion. We could have talked for another couple of hours, but she had a phone date with her son, for which she ended up running late!

BGWLBH did a long stint of ironing, including mine.

I stayed in my room until I was ready to make my ‘fend for yourself’ meal of prawn cutlets. I originally wanted to make pizza on a Lebanese bread base, but the local supermarket didn’t have one of the most important ingredients (cabana) and for me, there is no substitute!

The AFL footy came on before the NRL so AH and I watched some form of footy all afternoon, but were in bed before the second NRL game started at 7.30pm - our usual bed time.

I have a catch up date with The Motivator booked for tomorrow, so sleep is important.

Nite all.

Found Some Mojo!

I found some ‘mojo’ ever so briefly!

It was 7.30am when I opened my eyes, but it was lovely cool weather, just right for staying under the covers for “just a bit longer” so I didn’t rise until 9am.

After Harley play, gardening and making my breakfast (of fresh crab meat, avocado, cherry tomatoes from the garden, salt, pepper and a light squeeze of lemon juice), I found my way into my art space.

I set up my very expensive work light, that I’ve had stored in my bedroom for a year, and it is amazing!

Even though my work table is directly in front of the glass sliding doors, the fact that those doors are tinted glass, reduces the natural light considerably. This work lamp has highly concentrated white light, but only on the small area where I direct it, and it makes the world of difference.

I also brought the amethyst crystal lamp from the bedroom to sit on the desk beside me. It looks and feels lovely.

The light showed me the flaws in my old bracelets, so I began to pull them apart and set aside the beads and charms that I want to re-use.

I began to put together an “extra large” bracelet in blues …

In a previous life, when I was selling the bracelets, I received a few complaints about them being too small, but I was buying the chains pre-made at a certain length, with a fob connection.

Now I have lengths of silver chain, so I can make them to any length.

I got to the halfway mark with this bracelet - it had taken me 2 hours to get to that point - and I was struggling to put a slip ring on one of the charms, so I gave up for another day. Maybe tomorrow.

By the time I found all of the findings, then the beads that I wanted, pulled apart an old bracelet to use some of the quality beads from that, set up the lamp on the desk, found my glasses, made a cup of tea and got halfway complete with the bracelet, more than 2 hours had passed and I was getting frustrated with that darned slip ring and charm, so I thought it best to take an extended break.

I went straight to my bedroom with Harley and lay down for 2 hours, checking my emails, watching my quiz shows and dozing a little.

For dinner I did baked vegetables (potato, pumpkin, onion, carrot, capsicum and tomato), steamed greens (beans, snow peas and broccolini) and baked barramundi in garlic butter and lemon.

Key lime meringue pie for dessert.

An hour of trivia and in bed by 7.30pm.

I’m feeling a bit weary now.

Nite all.

Busy in the Bay

A day in the bay, from one side of town to the other.

1.  The Jam Jar for morning juice.

2.  The nail salon for BGWLBH.

3.  Priceline looking for specific probiotics.

4.  Coles to do a walk through in preparation for the afternoon shop (killing time until BGWLBH was finished).

5.  Pialba Newsagent for lotto renewal.

6.  Salt cafe for bacon and eggs and tea.

7.  The Ibis Boutique to browse.

8.  A walk to the Pier Markets that we discovered are no longer operating on Wednesdays - bugger.

9.  A browse through Luxe Boutique where I found a top that I loved but decided it was too expensive.

10. Urangan Fisheries where I purchased some fresh crab meat and some green king prawns.

11. Dayman Street Bakery for some house sourdough bread.

12. Back to Luxe because I changed my mind about the top.

13. Go Natural still looking for the probiotics.

14. Coles for groceries.

15. Jam Jar for more juice.

16. Farm Gate for fruit and veg.

17. Fresh Seafood for barramundi.

18. Home - in time for important financial advisor phone call.

I made three meals for dinner.

1. Fried rice to go with BGWLBH’s leftover butter chicken from last night.

2. Hot and spicy fresh prawn soup for Adoring Husband.

3. Fresh crab meat on fresh sour dough bread for me.

AH and I watched the second half of the movie “Gray Man” before heading to bed early. Well, not early haha, just our usual time.

Now it’s already past 11pm so I’m signing off.

Nite all.

A Free Day

Meditation was cancelled this morning so I got to sleep in.

At 9am, I took Harley out to play and tended the garden before making myself some breakfast and a cup of soursop tea.

Adoring Husband, after doing some quick outdoor repairs, joined me in the lounge room and we watched the new version of the movie “Twisters”. It was better than I expected.

We started to watch “Gray Man” with Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans and Billy Bob Thornton. It was interrupted by a call from our financial advisor so we’ll watch the second half later in the week.

I took some Butter Chicken out of the freezer for dinner so heated that and boiled some rice. Nice and easy.

We played trivia for an hour and all in bed by 7.30pm.

There’s been some bad activity in town in the last couple of days.

Four businesses were broken into, robbed and damaged.

Police were in town today searching for two dangerous men, so the town is feeling a bit fearful tonight with lots of social media conversations trying to get to the bottom of it.

We are all being extra careful, checking that doors are locked and windows are closed.

I’m off for an early night so that I can enjoy a day in the bay tomorrow.

Nite all.

More Baking

Another long night of golf watching, although I DID get a solid four hours in the middle somewhere.

It was 9.30am when I forced myself out of bed.

30 minutes playing with Harley.

10 minutes in the garden.

While I made breakfast, I sent Adoring Husband to the shops to pick up my parcel from the PO Box, buy some butter and a small takeaway coffee.

I planned to bake for a while and THEN create jewellery.

Not using a recipe, I made a key lime pie. Problem was that I made too much crumb base, so I decided to make a passionfruit cheesecake filling and fill four small tart bases as well.

Then I realised that I’d made too much meringue so I plopped the leftovers onto a flat tray and cooked it for 2 hours in a low slow oven … which created marshmallow.

By this time, I’d been in the kitchen for over 2 hours and certainly had no motivation to create jewellery!

Approximately 2 weeks ago, I slammed my ankle into the metal frame of the sliding laundry glass door. It hurt like the Billy O, took my breath away and made me curse. I don’t bruise, so I couldn’t get any sympathy from my house mates. 

Today … 2 weeks later, I found this!

I was so happy to prove I had an injury!

I sat down and rested for an hour before reentering the kitchen to make a wombok salad and potato salad to go with the crumbed chicken that I’d removed from the freezer in the morning. The very same crumbed chicken that I’d prepared on Saturday during my cookathon.

We had an hour of trivia before all heading to bed.

Lots of funny stuff on TV tonight, but I believe I will sleep well tonight, and very soon.

Nite all.

Too Tired to Start

Surprisingly, I was motivated to make some jewellery today.

I say ‘surprisingly’ because I watched a whole lot of golf last night and this morning - dozing on and off during the night - so I didn’t get any kind of decent sleep.

Out of bed at 10am.

Harley play, 10 minutes in the garden and I made my breakfast of sourdough toast with avocado and prawns and a cup of soursop tea.

I watched the second half of an annoying TV program “House Hunters” where there was no final result or conclusion. Seems to be a regular occurrence in the British version of the program.

That inspired me to lift my butt from the lounge chair and move into my art space.

I’ve decided to make some bracelets to sell at the art/craft expo at the end of June.

It took me about 90 minutes to sort through the cupboard full of beads, charms, findings and tools. Then select the ones I wanted to use, then pack all of the containers back into the cupboard, by which time I was too tired to even start creating!

All of the goodies are laid out on my table ready to go when I experience my next burst of motivation.

It was almost time for the football to start anyway, so I rested on my bed to watch that. 

It was ‘spaghetti bol Sunday’ so all I had to do was cook the spaghetti and heat up the sauce which I’d taken out of the freezer in the morning.

I did ok in my footy tipping but am still even with my sister at the top of the table.

Now the final round of the golf has commenced, so I’m off to doze in front of that for the night!

Nite all.