Day Two of Fifteen

Another successful day .. just!

My 7.30am smiley face Chicklet alarm was good again this morning.

First request was to watch me play the Minion game on the Ipad, which lasted about 20 minutes and it was around then that Mama phoned us from New York!

Chicken Little was next, but it only lasted about ten minutes before she wanted to go outside and I was definitely NOT allowed to have a shower beforehand, so I made a deal .. 15 minutes outside and then I could have a shower.

After my shower, and after some 'on a knife edge' behaviour, we all bundled into the car for an adventure to Civic.

The Bare-chested Chef and I both agreed that Chicklet was a little manic and that today was going to be testing.

So the first stop was for me to get an 'extra large' coffee while Dadu and Chicklet went to the kids play area. By the time I arrived, Chicklet was complaining loudly that there were too many BABIES there and she HATES babies!!

Luckily, fortune smiled upon us and a little girl about her age turned up and wanted to play, which completely turned Chicklet's mood around.

After about an hour, while Dadu got some groceries, Chicklet and I bought some new stickers for the 'safe space' then stopped at the coffee shop for a couple of little GF treats before finding our way back to the car.

Woops! I left Chicklet's shoes behind under the seat near the play area .. luckily Dadu was prepared to run back and find them!

The plan was to sit on my bed watching 'Chicken Little' while eating the treats.. which we did.

Next up was 'activities'!

We drew a shaggy dog with a cut out red paper bow and then Chicklet added 8 puppies.

We made a big black spider out of black wool, with big googly eyes and eight hairy legs, then drew a giant spider web for him to sit on. Of course he needed about 10 flies to be stuck to his web for dinner.

We made a big red, green and black snake with a red forked tongue.

By now, it was lunch time, so while Chicklet and Dadu ate bananas with sprinkles, I hibernated in the bedroom, where I surprisingly fell asleep for half an hour! Next thing I heard Dadu yell out "Bozzy Wozzy, we are going for a walk!"

I took the opportunity to hang out some washing, sweep the floors, put away the dishes and tidy up a little.

Dadu and Chicklet arrived home about an hour later looking very hot and bothered - Dadu forgot Chicklet's hat so I gave him a gentle reminder. Today was very hot outside and they walked in probably the hottest part of the day.

The only remedy for this was to go to the 'activity drawer' and remove the giant sprinkler snake out of the box, connect it to the hose in the shaded area of the back yard and have some cooling down fun in the water!

This turned out to be a perfect opportunity for Chicklet to release some pent up energy. Lots of squealing and running and jumping and laughing and yelling until, after about 40 minutes, she was exhausted!

More water to soothe the savage beast, by having an early bath to wash the grass and mud off.

Apple dipped in peanut butter for afternoon snacks and some more Ipad Minion games!

Dadu headed off to work a bit after 4pm and we watched the rest of the movie.

Boiled eggs for dinner - nice and easy.

We watched half of Chicken Little (we almost know the script by heart!), removed butterfly number 14 from Mama's time line, ticked off Mama's 'to do' list (so far she has flown in a plane, arrived in the USA and visited the Empire State Building), added another heart to the cuddle heart, had story time and then chatted about our favourite and least favourite parts of the day. The snake sprinkler was the clear winner for both of us as our favourite.

She finally fell asleep around 7.30pm .. she certainly fought it for a while.

My 30 minute nap today must have rejuvenated me because I'm not feeling tired at all tonight.

Tonight I'm sending lots of love to my BFF, BGWLBH. Biggest warmest hugs from afar.

Wishing we could.

Nite all.

Day One of Fifteen

I would brand day one a success!

She woke me at 7.30am with a big smiley face requesting that we begin our first activity for the day immediately! So I climbed out of bed and got dressed .. not allowed to have a shower this morning .. too much to do! I heated up my broth and while I drank it, I was instructed to play the minion game on the Ipad.

The first activity was the big book of dinosaur stickers which also included 8 dinosaurs to make out of cardboard cutouts.

We made the dinosaurs and then played with them for about 15 minutes, during which time, we received a phone call from Mama to tell us she was at the airport in Brisbane, checked in and waiting to board the plane. She sent through a photo of the plane for Chicklet to see.

Chicklet and I created a few masterpieces with blank paper and dinosaur stickers and decided to have a 'mailbox' each for Mama so that we could keep everything that we make over the two weeks for Mama to look at when she arrives home.

After we got bored with dinosaur stickers, it was time to watch the second half of 'Chicken Little' .. the first half of which we watched before dinner the night before (yes, we have watched it 3 times in two days, and would have been four if I hadn't convinced her to try a different movie this afternoon .. 'Open Season', which she turned off after 30 minutes).

When 'Chicken Little' was finished, we got dressed and jumped in the car with Dadu. Chicklet and Dadu went to the libraray together, while I spent some time in retail therapy .. always good for the soul.

Dadu and I both thought we had each other's phone number and agreed to text each other when ready to go home, but discovered later that neither of us had any phone numbers, just email addresses!

I found a health food shop and bought some raw organic honey, some raw organic cacao and some organic coconut oil. I'll make some chocolate muffins some time in the next couple of days.

I got myself a couple of tops at 40% off, bought an iron in Big W as well as some more stickers and the 'sad' doll from 'Inside Out', which is Chicklet's favourite character in the movie .. but she wasn't the slightest bit impressed by my choice!

A couple of hours later, I was walking through the mall and looked up to see this little blonde child running headlong towards me with the biggest cheekiest smile on her face! So cute!

We all did some grocery shopping together and bought a mango smoothie and a coffee on the way out before heading home.

Chicklet and I spent the afternoon putting stickers on the frame of her 'safe space', watching .. you guessed it .. 'Chicken Little' .. again .. while munching on mango, blueberries and watermelon.

We played outside and got photos of a kookaburra on the fence (Chicklet guarded the kookaburra while I retrieved my camera from inside). We played on the swing for about twenty minutes and then made a nest out of the washing basket, hoping to lure some birds into the back yard.

Soon it was dinner time and the Bare-chested Chef made a delicious and hearty chicken and corn soup from scratch. Chicklet must have been hungry because she ate a bowl of pasta, some cucumber and carrot, followed by a mango ice cream. She barely spoke during dinner and we could see that she was extremely tired, so she had a quick bath and story time from Dadu before falling into a deep slumber.

I've had a headache for a couple of hours this afternoon but I drank heaps of water over a one hour period and it has almost gone .. I really must remember to drink more water during the day! I have to look after myself while looking after Chicklet.

Before she climbed into bed, Chicklet took down butterfly number one off the wall (there are 15 butterflies for each day that Mama will be away and at the end of each day, she takes down a butterfly and puts it in her safe space). That way she can see how many days til Mama comes home.  She also took a small heart (which represents a Mama hug) and placed it inside the big blue heart on her bedroom wall.

There are big blue hearts in various locations around the house and whenever she needs a Mama hug, she has different sized and different coloured heart stickers from which to choose and stick on the big blue hearts. Mama will give her all of those hugs when she returns.

So day one has been a success.

It's not quite 9pm and I expect to be asleep before 10pm because we have another big day planned for tomorrow, including a bus ride.

The weather is uncomfortably warm and even with the window open and the fan on high, I still feel warm, however, it's going to be 3 degrees warmer up north at home tomorrow, so I'll be grateful to be here instead!

I hope Vegan Chickie is having an enjoyable flight.

Nite all.

Ready? Set? Go!

As of 5am tomorrow, Vegan Chickie will embark on her solo holiday to New York and Paris, while the Bare-chested Chef, Chicklet and I attempt to run this family and household without her for two whole weeks!

As daunting as it feels .. due to the unbelievable stress that Vegan Chickie has been experiencing and sharing in the days leading up to this .. I am quite excited about having so much time with my little Chicklet and it will be fun sharing the numerous activities that have been planned in advance, watching the long list of dvds, attending her swimming lessons, enjoying bus rides to and from our coffee dates and creating new adventures together along the way.

No doubt we will have some hurdles (I can imagine Vegan Chickie snickering at the word 'hurdles') along the way, but we will manage and we will survive.

So my final message to you Vegan Chickie, if you are reading this on the plane, is 'WE'VE GOT THIS! Relax and enjoy yourself!'

It has been another full and fun day today.

It started with a smiley good morning at about 7.30ish and an invitation to a coffee date in Civic with VC and Chicklet. We got dropped off at the shopping centre, ordered our coffee and a muffin and sat in the comfortable chairs by the children's club while Chicklet made some friends and climbed over the play gym.

A little bit of shopping for more stickers to put on the 'safe area' and I bought myself a top before the Bare-chested Chef arrived to take us home.

The first priority was to adorn the safe space with the stickers, then we created a piece of artwork each with some more stickers, followed by a game of 'Minion Rush' on my Ipad. She wanted to watch me play the game and offered words of encouragement every time I failed to pass a level. "It's okay Bozzy Wozzy. Just keep practising and trying. You will get better. Don't give up!"

She was right. I must have played for at least an hour, at her insistence, and reached level 6 eventually.

We had a nice lunch and then played with a bunch of her stuffed Octonaut toys, a couple of crocodiles and a dinosaur or two, using our imaginations.

Next on the agenda was a water balloon fight! The Bare-chested Chef spent a good deal of time filling MANY MANY water balloons and putting them all into a washing basket ready for us to play.

I got a couple of pics before the camera needed protection, so I brought it inside and then ventured outside to face the music, or in this case, the water! It was a lot of fun and Chicklet giggled herself silly running up and down the grassed yard, chasing Mama and throwing her balloons, making them explode over us and then squealing with delight.

The fight probably only lasted about 30 minutes, if that, but it was hilarious and Chicklet declared "That was too much fun!!!" when it was all over.

We decided to have an early bath and put on our pyjamas before climbing onto my bed to watch a dvd. She hadn't seen 'Chicken Little' before and it had been a while since I had seen it, so we got comfy with a plate of snacks (pear, blueberries and sunflower seeds) and began to watch it.

Well! She went through the full gammit of emotions! Angry at the people for being mean to Chicken Little, then sad because his Dad didn't believe him and then scared because of the spidery aliens. She was jumping up and down, yelling at the people, hiding her face, calling out to Mama - I was fully doubting this choice of dvd and I kept assuring her that everyone would be happy in the end - much to her disbelief!

Finally, to my relief, it was over and I was preparing for a big debrief to make sure she wasn't going to have nightmares tonight, when she jumped up and yelled 'Can we watch it AGAIN!?'

Luckily, dinner was ready, so we had a break from the movie briefly .. but as soon as we'd finished eating, it was back to the bedroom to watch it again! We got halfway through it before Mama announced bed time.

No bed time stories from me tonight. Chicklet is sleeping in Mama's big bed so that she gets to say goodbye in the morning. Tonight is special cuddles and stories with Mama night.

It's already 10.30 pm and I think it's time for me to get some sleep in preparation for a big day tomorrow.

Nite all.

Midnight Rambling

Well, as you can tell, I didn't get to post an update here last night!

Adoring Husband and I left home at about 8am yesterday to head south to the Sunny Coast. We stopped for a short break in Gympie and then continued through to arrive at 11am.

After a warm greeting from the Chicklet family and then dropping all of my paraphernalia at the house, we drove to 'Sunspace' cafe for lunch. It was a beautiful day and Chicklet got to play in the garden in the sunshine, first with her Dadu, then Poppy Barry and then me.

We enjoyed a pleasant lunch and left around 2pm so that AH could head back home before it got too late. I was sad to see him go, knowing that it will be almost 3 weeks before I get to see him again.

I had lots of play time with Chicklet and we climbed onto my bed, along with Vegan Chickie to watch the movie 'Inside Out'. The Bare-chested Chef tossed up a most delicious salad for dinner, which we all enjoyed very much.

Bath time with more than 50 new rubber duckies followed soon after, then it was story time in bed. Chicklet was very restless, so it was Mama who finally lulled her to sleep.    

Vegan Chickie and I then sat up talking til midnight, at which point, I conceded defeat, turned off my light and fell into a deep sleep for two hours - pee break - more deep sleep for four hours - dozing for an hour and then greeted by my smiley Chicklet!

We had another full day as the Bare-chested Chef dropped us off at Tewantin shopping centre on his way to work this morning.

Norma Jeans was our first stop where we spent about an hour sitting in the reading corner, enjoying a LARGE coffee and reading a few of the available kid's books from the book shelf.

We went searching for some interesting stickers for Chicklet to decorate her 'safe spot' and also did some grocery shopping. The lady in front of us spent $300 and didn't collect the dinosaur cards that she was entitled to, so the girl on the checkout kindly gave us her share as well as ours! She was immediately crowned 'our favourite check out person EVER'.

Chicklet has the dinosaur book and this morning only needed 20 more cards to fill the book (there are approximately 80 cards to collect). With our haul today, she only needs 6 more to complete the book!

After the supermarket, we headed up the hill to the children's park where Chicklet loves to play, but to our surprise, it was being upgraded and will not be finished for three weeks!! That was terribly disappointing for all of us because it was going to be a part of our daily itinerary. I guess we now need a Plan B.

Our original plan for today, was to catch the bus from that park to Civic where there is an indoor play area for kids, and we would have had a leisurely lunch while Chicklet played. Unfortunately, the day was much warmer than expected, Vegan Chickie had only 2-3 hours sleep the night before and I got a little carried away at the supermarket, so we had to carry more heavy bags than expected.

Taking all of that into consideration, we decided to catch the bus directly home. When I say 'directly' home, I mean 'as close to home as possible' because there is still about a kilometre to walk from the bus stop to home.

It's a pleasant enough walk. Even though it's a large housing estate, the streets are lined with tall trees and the houses back on to heavy wooded bushland, so there is shade, the birds are singing and the wind is rustling the leaves high in the trees. The footpath is paved the whole way, so it's a comfortable walk.

We arrived home safensound and after a light lunch, Vegan Chickie attempted to have a nap while Chicklet and I played. Chicklet decided to give one of her new purchases, a rubber squeaky duck, a workout. I expected her to get bored of the squeaking after 5 minutes, however, it was still squawking long and loud and hard 20-30 minutes later, at which time poor Vegan Chickie came skulking heavily through the house with a seriously furrowed brow.

She looked at me and said 'Is that not annoying the crap out of you???' I replied 'Well, I hoped that she would get sick of it before I did. Obviously she has more stamina than I bargained for!'

I had closed the bedroom door, but apparently, it didn't make any difference to the sound. Oops.

We coaxed the duck out of her hands by promising a swing out in the garden. Her stamina did not extend to swinging today .. it lasted about 3 minutes. We played catch for about ten minutes and then hit the sand pit for about 15 minutes.

An early bath time seemed like a good idea and calmed her down somewhat.

Chicklet watched Wile E Coyote cartoons while I prepared dinner .. just a simple chicken, broccolini, asparagus and sweet potato dish. Chicklet tried sweet potato but declared that it was 'yuk'. She wasn't very excited by my choice of dinner, so after a few slow mouthfuls, she decided that her play room was more exciting than the dinner table.

She fell asleep before we could even think about story time tonight. It seems we wore her out!

Adoring Husband experienced a bit of unexpected excitement at home this afternoon. A bat and her baby got caught in some netting that we had around our peach tree, so he called the RSPCA who sent a couple of ladies out to rescue them ...

AH was very impressed by their efforts and when he discovered that they were volunteers who even had to pay for their own fuel when rescuing our wildlife, he made a generous donation to the cause.

We had attempted to net our peach tree this year because we didn't get any peaches from it last year due to the birds. We had a small piece of old netting (apparently you can get 'bat friendly' netting these days) that AH had in his shed and it wasn't even big enough to protect the tree. We should have taken it down because it actually served no purpose at all .. except to trap unsuspecting bats obviously.

We have plenty of fruit trees in our back yard that the birds and bats steel from. Mangoes, mulberries, grapes etc. I guess they can take our peaches as well.

Well, it's almost 10pm, so I will attempt to get a better (or longer) night's sleep tonight. I'm not sure what's on the agenda for tomorrow, but as long as there is good coffee, I'll be happy.

Nite all.

Hello Wine (Halloween)

It was an early start for Halloween yesterday. I decorated the front garden ...

... and filled the witches hat with lollies.  I had tape across the pathway daring the children to enter and had the ghostly skeleton guarding the lollies.

The first kids began arriving at 5pm!

I believe we had approximately 50 children trick or treating. I had to fill the hat twice and luckily saved some lollies for Lady Lynn's grandchildren, who were the last of the kids to appear. I was really hoping to get a photo of them, but it was too dark by the time they arrived and the batteries in my flash are flat so that was the end of that idea! Bugger! Next year :)

I jumped on my trike and pedalled over to Sonny and Cher's for the big 70th birthday bash. It was well and truly pumping by the time I arrived.

Mum H was there, as were The Speckled Hen and Dirty Old Man. The Pool Guy and Mrs PG were there too. Mr and Mrs Builder were in attendance, along with Mr and Mrs Club. Seriously, half the town were there.

Cher got me a wine and then showed me where to get more if I wanted it and after a short chat with some of the locals, I set up the camera on the tripod and the different family members came and stood in position for their shots.

Afterwards I wandered around the party and took some happy snaps of the guests and of the cake and speeches and the gift opening.

The food was good - especially that deconstructed pavlova!! The music was my era and I think if people had been dancing I may have joined them, but there was no dancing to be had.

It was a much later night than I expected. I thought I would be home by 8.30 or 9pm but I think it was well after 11 when I pedalled home with Mum H right beside me.

Poor Adoring Husband had to make his own dinner.

Today has been quite hectic attempting to get everything organised before I leave tomorrow. A few loads of washing done. I finally 'unset' the table and put the new dinner sets in the cupboard - so the dining table is clear except for the gorgeous flowers that AH bought me on Friday.

I made up an extra batch of dog food for while I'm away. Baked a chicken for dinner tonight which we ate with fresh beans picked from the garden. AH can eat the leftovers tomorrow night when he gets back from the Sunny Coast.

We took down the Halloween decorations, AH finished building the new chook pen and I've packed everything but the kitchen sink! The car is going to be filled to the brim!

Unfortunately, I have done something to my neck and I can barely move. I have an idea that this injury occurred yesterday when I stepped into a hole while decorating for Halloween. I felt something jar across the top of my shoulders at the time, but I had no pain until this afternoon when I sat down for a break and suddenly felt this muscle cramp in my neck.

I don't think I've ever felt such pain! It's not a constant pain but it comes on suddenly and frequently. I've rubbed my neck with the oil that 'Beauty' left for me the other day, but it hasn't had any effect. I've used the electric massager, which also had no effect. I'm sitting with a neck cushion at the moment - it helps a little.

I hope that a good nights sleep will rest the muscle enough to heal it overnight. I may even need pain killers tonight! I will attempt to sleep without them, but if it continues to cramp even while I'm lying in bed, I'll have to try something!

This means that the sweet goodies that I was going to make for AH didn't get done and I'm a bit behind with my packing.

I need to sleep and get up early to get everything done.

*sigh* Why did this happen now??? Worst timing EVER!!

Nite all.

Magical Day

It was a terrible start to my day .. that seems to have been a common thread this week .. and we left home for our adventure much later than planned.

We needed to leave by 9.45am to be at our intended destination by 10.30am, as per the email instructions.

My day began with opening the laundry door for Colli (it is where she sleeps at night) to discover that she'd had diarrhoea during the night, so a clean up job was to be had for me and then I needed to bath the dog. NOT the most pleasant way to start my morning, by any stretch of the imagination!

To save time, AH was going to buy my coffee while I had a shower, until he reminded me that the staff at Foodworks were dressed up for Halloween, so I wanted to go with him and take photographs.

 
There are other photos to show in tomorrow's post.

Then we drove by the Seat of Knowledge to call out good morning to the boys but they told me that the Tawny Chick was out on a branch, so I climbed out of the car with my camera to capture the image, however, I had the wrong lens with me and didn't get a good enough pic to share .. hopefully tomorrow will be my lucky photography day.

AH then decided to park the car and visit the boys while I photographed - which we simply didn't have time for!

By the time I dragged him home, ironed his clothes, washed and blow dried my hair, applied make up, filled my handbag with essentials, located my glasses and swore at AH for dropping my camera lens, it was 9.55am!

Of course Murphy's Law dictates that the traffic in front of us should drive at least 10km below the speed limit, just to slow us up a bit more!

As we finally approached the Boat Club, our luck seemed to change. We found a 'rock star carpark' and made our way to the function.

Obviously everybody else was running late and as seats were not allocated, we selected a table right at the front of the room and chose seats that would face the small stage. We were very happy with our timing and selection.

Others soon arrived and asked to join our table. We had some lovely friendly couples seated with us and I enjoyed some light conversation with them before the first speakers took the podium.

We had to listen to an hour of 'financial planning' information, but the speakers were entertaining and and it was much more interesting than I expected.

The main meals arrived before the speeches were finished. I had beef cheek with mash and asparagus with a red wine jus. AH had a stuffed chicken breast served on rice and roasted capsicum.

Soon Wayne Bennett arrived and stood up to speak.

He was hilarious and related some funny stories about his coaching and some less than intelligent footballers. He then compared coaching with financial planning. He talked about risk and comfort and ethics and honesty and being accountable. He was warm and engaging, funny and light hearted, honest and inspiring.

He spoke for about an hour, but it seemed like only twenty minutes! When he called for questions, I told him about AH being a staunch Sharks supporter and I asked him if he would consider moving into Cronulla Sharks territory to help the Sharks win their first premiership. He responded with the fact that even the great Jack Gibson was unable to help Sharks win a premiership!

AH got to ask him a question about his 'father-like' role with young footballers.

Dessert was then served - we were given a GF chocolate mousse with strawberries and cream - then we were all invited to come forward with any paraphernalia that we wanted signed and to have our photos taken with Wayne.

I didn't have anything to sign. If I hadn't been running so late in the morning, I may have remembered that I had Wayne Bennett's autobiography in my bookcase. I could have had that signed.

Ah well.

Prior to this function, I already had the utmost respect for Wayne Bennett, but now my admiration has increased beyond my expectations. He really is a great and honourable man.

I hated to leave and would have loved to hover and stalk him for another hour or so after the function was over, but we had errands to run.

While grocery shopping in Coles, I assisted a lost looking young man choose some sanitary napkins for his wife who recently had their first baby and wasn't prepared for a 'mishap' during their first outing as a family. That was another highlight of my day! He was most appreciative :)

We were running so late coming home, that AH dropped me off at the club on the way. It was an enjoyable, but not a winning night.

Just three more sleeps til I make my way south to have some quality time with my little Chicklet!

Right now though, I am going to make my way to the bedroom and sleep soundly til morning.

Nite all.

A Gathering

What a day!

The Motivator and I had organised our first Jeunesse presentation for today and I was feeling very nervous because my favourite girls weren't involved.

The first thing I did when planning this gathering, was create a preferred list names of who I knew I would feel most at ease with, and who I knew would not feel obliged or pressured by the occasion, so that I could relax and practise.

Unfortunately, the first two I invited, already had other plans and simply were not available, so I decided that if I couldn't have them all together for my first presentation day, I would invite a different group and save my favourites for the next one (you know who you are .. so don't dare believe that you've escaped my clutches!).

In my discombobulated state this morning, everything I did took much longer than it should have. I was supposed to prepare two dips and some sweet energy balls, but I only 'just' managed to make the dips and I still couldn't get to The Motivator's house (where the gathering was taking place) until an hour later than I'd promised.

The Motivator was struggling to be organised and The Holistic Healer, who was supposed to be leading this presentation, was also  running late!

Then two of my guests arrived 10 and 20 minutes late! What a crazy start to the morning! Worst of all, I left my all important folder and Ipad at home! *sigh*

Amazingly, the tricky start didn't deter us and it all ran fairly smoothly from there.

The Holistic Healer kicked things off and The Motivator and I both had input. Through it all we learnt a lot and I think that the two of us working as a team is going to suit us well.

While I expected to be out for approximately 3 hours, the day ran much longer than that for The Motivator and I! After five hours, I finally departed and headed straight for a coffee .. funny that I should need coffee and NOT alcohol to unwind!

I arrived home just in time to help Adoring Husband prepare for an SES meeting, so we barely crossed paths today.

Tomorrow, he and I have a big day planned. Lunch with The Brisbane Broncos coach, Wayne Bennett. I am very much looking forward to that!

It's fast approaching midnight and I believe that I can hear a pillow calling my name!

Nite all.

Nerves NOT of Steel

What a great day on the Sunny Coast browsing and spending at Eumundi Markets.

Adoring Husband drove me, The Motivator and Mum H to the service station at 6.15am where we boarded the bus.

It seemed to be a pretty quick trip down there and the weather was mild and overcast which made the drive very comfortable. There was lots of chatter going on as everybody caught up with each other's news.

We arrived at about 8.45am and all excitedly spilled out of the bus to, firstly, use the rest rooms, and then to scatter in all directions in search of bargains and any lovely goodies that took our fancy.

I stuck with The Motivator for the day because it was her first time with the lady's group and also her first time at Eumundi. She had a great day and declared that she would like, very much, to join the ladies every month for our luncheons.

I bought some jewellery, a top, two hats and a slate vase .. very difficult to describe, but I will create some floral art with it and take a photo over the weekend to post here. It is Adoring Husband's christmas present to me - even though he had no choice in the matter! I did text him to get his ok, but he didn't respond quickly enough, so I had to make an executive decision.

We were very lucky that the rains didn't come until we were leaving the markets. It was certainly coming down as we arrived at the Noosa Yacht Club for lunch! It rained the entire time we were there and was still raining lightly for most of the trip home.

I sit here in my lounge room now listening nervously to a very nasty storm descending upon us. The storm caused a lot of damage in Chinchilla earlier today with large hail stones and strong winds and has taken a few hours to reach us.

The Higgins Storm Chasing site has warned that there could be tornadoes lurking within this storm, so I'm about to go store my electronic devices in the walk-in wardrobe and prepare for the worst. I'm using the power of my will to force the storm to weaken before it reaches us, but I don't like my chances.

We experienced a brief but wild storm during the night last night. We had three dogs huddled in bed with us for two hours as we waited it out.

I'm not keen to end such a lovely day on such a scary note. Wish us luck!

Nite all.

Happily Productive

A visit to the Seat of Knowledge.

Morning tea with the girls (minus Lady Lynn), including some yummy coconut lemon balls made with love by Mardi.

I arrived home a little after 10am and popped a whole chicken in the oven so that it would be ready to eat for lunch. First I slid some butter, garlic and thyme between the skin and meat of the breast, then stuffed the chicken with some lemon wedges, sliced garlic and some butter. After the chicken was cooked, I used tapioca flour to thicken the juices that were left in the pan. Delicious.

While the chicken was cooking, I purged two extra large garbage bags and one small grocery bag full of expired, stale and unwanted items from the pantry. Yes!! That's right!! I finally cleared the pantry!!

I completely filled the dishwasher with 'locknlock' containers after I emptied their contents into the bin.

At the same time as all of this was in progress, I made up another bottle of colloidal silver.

Once that job was complete, I had to make up a batch of dog food, so I chopped and cooked a giant pot of pumpkin and made 16 days worth of doggy goodness.

My plan for this evening's meal is to make some chilli chicken meatballs.

It will be an early night for me tonight because we will be on a bus tomorrow at 6.30am heading south to Eumundi Markets! I'm looking forward to a great day with 21 other ladies. We will shop til we drop and then eat lunch at Noosa Yacht Club before heading home mid afternoon.

That's it! My day here is complete.

Nite all.

Honest to Goodness

This is legit ...

*********

Here is something that I read today, and I know that there are a bunch of you out there who can SO relate to everything I'm about to write ...

You may be diagnosed with A.A.A.D.D. (Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder)

This is how it manifests:

I decide to water my flower tubs.

As I turn on the hose, I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.

I go to get the car keys off the hook and notice the mail on the porch table.

I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.

I lay my car keys on the table, put the junk mail in the bin under the table, and notice that the bin is full, so I place the mail back on the table and take out the rubbish first.

But then I think .. I can run down to the post-box when I take out the rubbish, I may as well pay the bills first. I take my cheque book off the table and notice that there is only one cheque left. My extra cheques are in the computer desk. So I go into my office to my desk, where I find the can of soda I've been drinking. I'm going to look for my cheques, but I need to push the can of soda aside so that I don't spill it.

I notice that the soda is getting warm so I decide to put it in the fridge. As I head toward the kitchen with the soda, a vase of flowers on the window sill catches my eye. They need water.

I place the can of soda on the ledge and discover my glasses that I've been looking for all morning. I'm going to put the glasses away, but first I need to water the flowers. I set my glasses back down on the window ledge, go fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote. Someone has left it on the kitchen table. I realise that tonight when we go to watch TV, I'll be looking for the remote, so I decide to put it back in the living room where it belongs, but first I'll water the flowers.

I pour some water into the vase, but some spills on the floor, so I set the remote back on the table, get some paper towel and wipe up the spill.

Then I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do.

At the end of the day:

The tubs aren't watered.
The car isn't washed.
The bills aren't paid.
There is a warm can of soda on the window ledge.
The flowers don't have enough water.
There is still only one cheque in my cheque book.
I can't find the remote.
I can't find my glasses.
I have absolutely NO idea what I did with the car keys.

Then when I try to work out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all darn day and I'm really tired. I know this is a serious problem and I try to get some help for it, but first I check my email!

*********

Adoring Husband had an uneventful return train trip to Brisvegas today for his specialist appointment.

On impulse this morning, I walked into my hairdressers and I explained that I wanted to make my grey hair stand out more by highlighting it without making it 'obviously' coloured. So she gave me an appointment for 1pm and I walked out at 2.40pm feeling slightly disappointed. 

She changed my greys to ash blonde.

Luckily, she only put in minimal foils, so most of my original greys on the top of my head are still there, and luckily the ash blonde doesn't look terrible, but I'm disappointed that my greys at the front of my head are now slightly hidden by the blonde.

I wish I'd made the effort to get my old hairdresser in Griffith to do it while I was down there in August.

Ah well. I don't hate it.

Time for sleep.

Nite all.

A Cure for All

This is what I learned today.

Two thirds of the immune system surrounds your gut. Antibiotics, while they destroy the bad bacteria, they also destroy the good bacteria, which weakens the immune system, which in turn, slows or stops your body from healing.

It's important to eat lots of fresh fruit and vegetables (preferably organic) and include celery, broccoli, sweet potato, pumpkin seeds, berries and citrus fruit. Sugar impairs the immune system so it's vital that you reduce your sugar intake to the absolute minimum.

Strong, good quality probiotics are very important to help rebuild the good bacteria, which in turn strengthens the immune system to help you heal quickly.  

A healthy human body is self regulating and self repairing. It will protect itself from infections, slow down the ageing process and if it finds cancer, it will eliminate it. It will keep the blood vessels open to prevent headaches and it regulates blood pressure.

When your immune system is strong, your body will always be healthy.

I learned lots more, but this is all that I'll share today.

I enjoyed my evening at the neighbour's house last night. I caught up with friends and with neighbours who I see rarely and even met one couple for the first time. I heard some interesting life stories, discussed quilting and patchwork, talked about travel and health and drank a whole bottle of wine on my own!

I'm surprised that I wasn't more inebriated! I was louder and happier than usual, but I wasn't alone there and I was capable of riding home on the Leggy Blonde's trike. I guess I drank it over a period of 4 hours, which helped.

I wasn't hung over this morning and spent three hours clearing out the middle bedroom.

On Wednesday a guy from the blind shop is coming to our house to measure our windows, and to quote for exterior blinds on the western wall. We want to be able to open and close the blinds from the inside, so we needed to clear the room so that he could access the far wall.

What a job!! It had become a storage room for bedding, clothes, photos, books, dvd players, cushions, wall art, jewellery, toys, dress up paraphernalia, mail boxes and padded bags, you name it! Like I said .. what a job!!

He will also measure our outdoor area for screening.

I think I will finally attack the pantry tomorrow. I'll see how motivated I feel in the morning. Adoring Husband has to travel to Brisbane for a specialist appointment tomorrow, so I'll be to doing his job in the morning before I attempt to get motivated for anything!

Finally, I got a fabulous phone call from my little Chicklet today. Just one more week and I'll be with her for almost 3 weeks. I think there is a lot of fun stuff planned and I can't wait to see her!

I have an early start, so I'd best sign off an get some sleep.

Nite all.  

A Learning Experience

As I was about to post the above video (which only goes for about 5 minutes), I received an email from 'The Truth About Cancer' to advise that for the next 48 hours, they would be replaying every episode of their last series for free. So here is the link. I think it's important to watch the first episode, but after that, even if you pick out a couple of the episodes where the title draws your interest, they are worth viewing.

After watching the previous series and then some of this one (I didn't have time to watch all of them this time round, so I will definitely catch the ones that I missed over the next 2 days), I was positively inspired and felt good realising that a cancer diagnosis is not a death sentence.

I watched the first series around the time that Adoring Husband was diagnosed with bladder cancer, so I used a lot of the tips and information from that series to make changes in our diet and lifestyle to improve his chances of conquering the disease.

It's where I learned that we had to do everything in our power to create and build a strong immune system so that the body could heal itself. I believe that what I learned in that first series contributed to AH's improved health and subsequent clear result after the initial treatment.

I finish watching these episodes and wonder how the hell we have so easily allowed the medical industry to control our lives and our health so completely, with such poor results.

Anyway, I hope you get to watch at least a couple of these videos. They are not just about curing cancer, but about preventing it as well. They are both educational and interesting.

I've posted this early because I'm out for the evening and I'm not sure if I will be home early enough or sober enough to post later!

Have a lovely Sunday!

Nite all.

Just Briefly

Just dropping in to share this ...

The chick has grown a LOT in six days!

Today I delivered photos to some happy customers, paid my neighbour for the beautiful place mats that she made for me and created an Oregano Essential Oil mix for a friend who can't get rid of her persistent cough after being ill for a few weeks. I will be interested to see if it has the desired affect.

We were hit with the edge of a storm this afternoon that dumped some much needed rain, though not enough .. we need two or three days of steady rain to make our surrounds happier and healthier. The storm looked a lot more menacing than it was, thank goodness!

It's two minutes to midnight, so I'm outta here. Sleep time for me.

Nite all.  

Neighbourly Love

I think I need to have another dinner party!

Obviously, flower arranging is not my forte!!

I'm trying to decide whether to leave the table set so that Adoring Husband gets the shock of his life when he wakes up in the morning, or clear it all away before I go to bed.

I had a very nice day in The Bay with Woman of Many Talents, although we experienced gale force conditions in there!! We could feel the wind gusts moving the car as we drove home.

I bought some lovely bright yellow bath towels and matching bath mat from Pillow Talk.

Yellow makes me feel so happy!

Late this afternoon I had to ride to the supermarket to get some storage containers to freeze my bone broth. The head wind was so strong, it almost blew me backwards! It was a real struggle to get there. Luckily, I had a tail wind on the way home, although the wind gusts almost sent my tray of coffees flying a few times.

It's been another very good day.

Nite all.

Birthday Boy

Today was Adoring Husband's 58th birthday.

We spent the day in The Bay doing bits and pieces and nothing in particular.

We had coffee at Aquavue on the waterfront, shopped at Go Natural, got some photos printed, browsed and priced some good quality coffee machines, outdoor lounge settings and some outdoor blinds. The hot Summer afternoon sun wreaks havoc on the western wall of our house making the bedrooms and bathrooms hot, steamy and uncomfortable. We hope some blinds will alleviate that problem.

I wanted to buy some shoes, but the sales attendant wanted to chat and we became deeply engrossed in a share-fest about high functioning autism and aspergers and how diet and lifestyle have a profound affect. Her youngest of three children is high functioning and she was describing all the changes that she has made and how incredibly their lives have improved over the last few months.

By the time we finished chatting, I decided to not leave AH sitting alone in the car any longer .. especially taking into account that it was his birthday!

For something different, AH decided on lunching at the RSL Club, but it was extremely crowded, the queue in the bistro was a mile long and there were no free tables in the eating area, so we made a quick exit and drove back to an 'old faithful' instead.

At the Wild Lotus, we enjoyed a delicious lunch. Three courses for AH and two for me. I had a couple of Sav Blancs and AH drank a light beer. It was quiet and relaxing. Good food and good service. My shout.

We picked up some dry cleaning that we had forgotten from a couple of weeks ago and stopped for some groceries and some halloween decorations, finally arriving home after 4pm.

I'm looking forward to Halloween now - we have never acknowledged this American holiday before, but it seems the kids are getting more and more 'into' it, so we're happy to join in the fun.

I had only sat down at home for about 10 minutes when the doorbell rang and there stood my back neighbour with my brand new hand-made table setting of six place mats and a table runner. She is a quilter and I commissioned her to make these for me, asking for bright colours, with lots of yellow.

Well, she couldn't have made them more perfect if she tried. I'm over the moon with the result and with her fabulous colour choices! I was going to set up my table with the table cloth, place settings and new dinner setting so that I could take a photo, but the table is covered in bags of money that AH counted out of his money tins this afternoon.

I will do it tomorrow and share it here.

We had a very light dinner tonight and because it was his birthday, I gave AH the night off from his kitchen clean up duties.

I have another big day ahead of me tomorrow, and it's fast approaching midnight, so I'd best get some sleep.

Nite all.

Totes Moted

That stands for 'Totally Motivated'

After five hours of learning some more of the business side of Jeunesse, working through the website, downloading the app, getting copies of the information sheets, watching some short dvds and all three of us trying out some of the skincare products together, we finished the day feeling satisfied and motivated.

The Motivator provided a delicious lunch of chicken, fresh crab and salad.

The Holistic Healer was very generous with her time and her expertise and her contacts, sharing a lot about herself, her holistic healing business and Jeunesse.

I also met the Honey Spinner and we shared food and health stories. Her fresh home grown honey sounds delightful and I'm definitely going to buy some of her product down the track.

There is still so much to learn and so much to do before my Jeunesse business gets rolling, but I have started a Facebook page Jeunesse with Roz.  Feel free to head over, 'like' my page and share it with everybody and anybody. No obligation.

It's a work in progress right now, but I'll get there.

Before all of that even happened, I enjoyed morning tea with some of my girls.

That is always the highlight of my Tuesdays!

Right now, I need to close all of my books, websites and information packages and head off to bed, otherwise I will sit up all night getting deeply involved with it all. My brain needs to have some quiet time now.

Nite all.

Little Surprises.

"It is easier to fool people, than to convince them they have been fooled" - Mark Twain

It may appear that I am a little obsessed with cancer and cancer treatments. We've all lost people to this disease and if we're lucky, we've had people win their fight against it. Personally, and it will come as no surprise to those who know me, I believe the treatment is more dangerous than the disease.

People die from the treatments long before the cancer kills them.

I found this interesting chart today on the Cancer Australia site ...

All cancers - incidence v mortality

You can see more information here.

You would think that for the billions of dollars raised around the world for cancer research, that a much bigger gain would have been made in saving lives.

We're told that early detection is the key, but early detection for most, just means earlier death.

Considering that the statistics show one in two men and one in three women will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime, I believe it's important to educate yourself, while you're healthy, and know what steps you will take if it happens to you.

Don't wait until you're sitting in the doctor's surgery office panicking with an unexpected diagnosis and then blindly following the path that doctors have been trained to put you on.

Even if you do choose to go down that path, you need to know how to strengthen your immune system during treatment to help your body fight the disease and fight the ravages of the poisons that will be overwhelming your body.

The failure of the medical/cancer industry, is in not educating you about how to build your health during and after treatment. The failure is in not educating you about how the cancer developed inside you. The failure is in sending you home to continue doing everything that you were doing that contributed to your diagnosis.

Don't be a failure to yourself. Be educated. Do your research. Know what other treatments are available to either replace conventional treatment or to support conventional treatment. Conventional treatment on it's own has a very poor long term success rate, so don't rely solely upon it.

That's my medical opinion for today.

This morning, I visited my little tawny chick and got this ...

She is growing very quickly and I suspect that there is a second chick hiding in there too. Hopefully, I will see two curious faces in the coming days, so watch this space!

I also discovered one of my favourite flowers growing in somebody's front garden.

This afternoon, I got some special surprise visitors!

Lady Lynn popped by with her grandchildren, who's school, I assume, was on a pupil free day. I want to provide special names for these gorgeous kids, but they have to be perfect, so until I can think of the perfect names, I will call them G1 and G2.

They wanted to meet our chickens. Surprisingly, two of the chickens, Helen and Harriet, had escaped from the fenced vegetable garden and were wandering around unsupervised in the other part of the yard.

I hadn't been in our back yard for a few days, so I was surprised (and a little embarrassed) by how long the grass was. It was only a couple of weeks ago that Adoring Husband spent days grooming and manicuring and mowing and edging and planting and watering, but the weather has obviously been conducive to rapid growth and the grass is lush and long and a little out of control!

Anyway, I took the kids into the garden where the chook pen is situated and we opened the lid of the nesting box to reveal Happy sitting on seven eggs. I nudged Happy out of the way so that we could collect the eggs and the kids took an egg each to take home and cook, plus one for G3 who wasn't on this visit today.

I'm looking forward to seeing the kids again at the end of the month for Halloween. I think I'm going to decorate the front porch in spooky paraphernalia and figure out the healthiest, yummiest and most memorable way to treat the kids. I've got my thinking cap on!

Tonight, I was excited to discover that the first episode of the new series of Grey's Anatomy is showing, so I am watching and typing at the same time.

Looking forward to morning tea tomorrow and then a meeting with The Motivator and another lady straight after.

It will be another good day, as I hope yours will be too!

Nite all.

Sunday Housework & Music

Today, I finally found some motivation and spent 3 hours on a housework kick.

I started vacuuming to loud Creedence Clearwater Revival and moved on to mopping with Housework Songs III.

I cleaned the outside of the kitchen cupboards, tidied up some accumulated crap from the kitchen bench, found a home for nine pairs of shoes, three handbags and assorted jewellery, did three loads of washing, sorted through and thinned out my underwear drawer, watered my few remaining living indoor plants, and rearranged one kitchen cupboard to accommodate my new bright yellow dinner setting.

That pantry of mine is still waiting for the spring clean!

A new series of 'The Truth About Cancer' has begun. This is episode two and has lots of relevant information about breast cancer preventions and cures, so I really wanted to share it with you. It goes for about 90 minutes and I don't know how long it will be available for free (by the time you try to watch it, it may already have expired), so try to watch it as soon as possible.



I watched this one and episode 5 (episodes 3 & 4 have sadly already expired for the free watch, but they will air it for free again in a few weeks).

Adoring Husband arrived home from his SES 'Get Ready' display in Maroom at around 4pm and he came bearing gifts .. well one gift .. a large cup of coffee from Sexie Coffee. What a treasure.

For dinner, we had crispy skinned chicken with zucchini, asparagus, snow peas, mushrooms and onion steamed and then quickly stir fried in the rich and tasty chicken juices and fat from yesterday's lunch and a side of sweet potato chips.

I am now watching reruns of Series 3 of Sex and the City on the BoxSetsHD channel on Foxtel.

Another good day for me. I hope it was the same for you!

Nite all.

The Education of Me

I'm currently watching a new series of interviews with hundreds of doctors about the effectiveness (or not) of chemotherapy and radiotherapy treatments for cancer.

I'm only a third of the way through the first two hour long episode and have already learnt some interesting facts.

You know that I've written about how doctors are branded as 'quacks' if they speak up against any medical treatments. Today, I discovered that George Washington actually died as a result of 'blood letting' which was recommended and performed by a number of medically qualified doctors.

I did a bit of a search to find information to back this story and found this ...



I also discovered that the first doctor who recommended that surgeons wash their hands prior to performing surgery, was branded a quack, as a result of this suggestion. Really?

Here are some facts that completely astounded me. In the early to mid 1900s, a group of pharmaceutical companies, including Bayer, Hoechst and BASF formed 'IG Farben Industries' and used inmates from the German concentration camps in WWII as slave labor to build their industrial plants. They rotated the inmates every 3 months, killing each retiring crew in the gas chambers.

They also manufactured and provided the gas to the Nazis for the gas chambers as well as actually building the extermination camps and gas chambers (using slave labor).

Of the twelve tribunals that were conducted after the war, this pharmaceutical group were the 6th to be tried and it was proven that they were responsible for, among other things, building the camps and conducting torturous experiments.

They were never punished for these atrocities.

More of my searches uncovered this! and this!

If they were capable of committing these horrendous acts back then, in the name of money and profits, what makes anybody believe that they are not capable of doing the same thing in a more modern and secretive way in this day and age? (especially if they were never punished back then)

To finish my blog on a more happy and pleasant note, I got a little peek at one of the chicks in the Tawny Frogmouth nest today! It was very brief and not very clear, but at least I know that there is at least one chick and maybe more will be revealed as time goes on!

I have to say that it's a beautiful day and I'm looking forward to spending a couple of hours with Woman of Many Talents this afternoon.

Later: I enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine with my friend and today has been a good day :)

Nite all.

False Pretences

People who we consider to be 'Australian'

Nicole Kidman .. actually born in Honolulu, Hawaii
Olivia Newton John .. actually born in United Kingdom
Mel Gibson .. born in New York, United States
Guy Pearce .. born in United Kingdom
Sam Worthington .. born in United Kingdom
Naomi Watts .. born in United Kingdom
Hugo Weaving .. born in Nigeria
Isla Fisher .. born in Muscat, Oman

There are very few 'apparently' famous Australians, actually born in Australia ..

Chris, Liam and Luke Hemsworth .. born in Melbourne
Hugh Jackman .. born in Sydney
Cate Blanchett .. born in Melbourne
Geoffrey Rush .. born in Toowoomba
Heath Ledger .. born in Perth
Eric Banner .. Melbourne
Simon Baker .. Launceston
Rose Byrne .. Sydney
Toni Colette .. Blacktown
Melissa George .. Perth

We really do claim a lot of 'unAustralians' as our own!

I won a chicken tray in a raffle tonight and took some money out of the pokies, but not enough to brag about.

There weren't many of us at the club tonight .. very quiet. Adoring Husband arrived quite late in the evening after his important SES meeting. He has a big SES weekend ahead of him too.

It's not even 9.30pm yet and I am feeling very very tired, so I might just head off to bed and see if I can fall asleep early. .. I may even wake up with enough energy and motivation to clean the house!

That's about all I have the energy to share tonight, so I hope your weekend is amazing and I hope I have something interesting to share beyond the weekend.

Nite al.

Socially Acceptable

For some strange and inexplicable reason, I felt the need this morning, to socialise! Maybe because I missed my morning tea with the girls on Tuesday.

I started at the Seat of Knowledge, then bought my coffee, and half way home, I decided to drop in on Apple, knowing that The Reality TV Queen would also be visiting during the morning.

For the last 3 months, the Reality TV Queen has been dog sitting a long haired Jack Russell named Harry. Today was her last day with him, so she was taking him for a walk to say goodbye to everyone. I think she was kind of torn. Happy to have her life back, but at the same time, sad to be losing him.

We three spent a couple of hours over coffee, bitching, laughing, bragging, whinging and telling animated stories. The Reality TV Queen is the second best story teller of all time and makes me laugh so hard. The only story teller better than her, is Tweedle Dee, but she has left town, so her top spot is on offer.

I finally found my way home around midday, by which time, the motivation level for cleaning was pretty low! No cleaning today!

I cooked lunch and then an early dinner because Adoring Husband had a meeting tonight. While he was at the meeting, I disappointingly overcooked some chocolate lava cupcakes. They will have to be mixed with coconut cream and berries, because they are too dry to eat as they are.

I'll attempt another batch over the weekend.

This evening I added a quote to one of my own photos ...

... and found another one in facebook that I liked ...

I received my Statement of Attainment for the studies that I completed. It seems that I am now able to confirm your physical health status, communicate effectively, make referrals to other health care professionals and provide basic dietary advice.

My GPA (Grade Point Average) was 6.4 (the grading is between 1 and 7).

So there you go.

You never know, one day I might re-enrol and finish the course!

But right now, I am enjoying my life.

Nite all.

A Day Full of 'C's

Coffee, crabs, cooking, curry, cabernet sauvignon, casserole, cleaning, complex circuitry and cancer.

My day was full of 'C's.

As usual, my day started with some time at the Seat of Knowledge and my second stop was for coffee and comestibles (I needed a word starting with 'c' that meant 'food').

The Motivator had her 'cooked crabs for sale' sign out, so I stopped to visit her, talk a little business and bought six nice sized sand crabs before pedalling home to decide whether to cook or clean!

Since I had the comestibles fresh at hand,  I decided to cook.

I made four meals of curried chicken, four meals of casseroled beef and some 'cibo' (Italian for food) spaghetti bolognese sauce, which I flavoured with a nice swig or two of cabernet sauvignon.

While I was preparing these meals, I shelled the six crabs and stored the meat in a container in the fridge, so that I could nibble during the day.

I was also called to assist Adoring Husband in the garage as he tackled the complex circuitry of the break/tail/blinker lights of the box trailer. Much to his frustration, this task eventually proved unsuccessful for the right side lights.

Only minimal cleaning was performed by me. Some sweeping, dish washing, dusting, but by 3pm I was ready to sit down and take a load off.

I took this opportunity to have a look through my Jeunesse paperwork and wrote down some questions to ask one of the experts next week when we meet for some website training.

Finally, I found this very interesting article written by a reporter, who herself, was dying as a result of the treatment she received for breast cancer. She says all of the things that I've been trying to convey for years and considering the amount of research she did over the years of her illness, I find her words painful to read. I can only imagine her overwhelming frustration.

It has been a long and productive day for me. Hopefully, tomorrow, I will wake with the same level of  enthusiasm and get the desperately needed cleaning done! It would be nice to step into the weekend with a clean house and a clean conscience!

I hope that tomorrow I can bring you another 'C' word. CHICKS! The Tawny Frogmouth chicks have hatched and are making Dad squirm on the nest ... their fluffy white selves should be poking their heads out for a look at the world any day now. I'll be ready with my camera.

Should be an early night for me :)

Nite all.

An Enthusiastic Introduction

What an interesting morning.

I'm glad that I made the effort and sacrificed my morning tea with the girls to meet the amazing people, whose passion, enthusiasm and experience with Jeunesse was contagious and inspiring.

Again, I learnt a lot and Adoring Husband has now been recruited as my guinea pig to test out the Jeunesse healthcare products over the next few months. This is what we do .. we try everything and anything that looks like it might be effective in some way. You just never know what might work.

Doing something, is better than doing nothing.

So I am getting behind the Jeunesse movement and while using the skincare products on myself (properly this time) and the healthcare products on AH, will share the experiences and our progress here, so watch this space for the expected miracles lol.

So if you're interested in what Jeunesse has to offer, you can look here.

Also, one of the health products, 'Reserve', has the main ingredient of Resveratrol, which you can learn about on this 60 Minutes report ...



Did you hear at the end of the program where he announced that those Drs' startup company was sold to a pharmaceutical company for three quarters of a billion dollars? That usually means that the prize ingredient (in this case resveratrol) will either never reach mainstream population because it has the potential to replace all of their other profit making drugs, OR, it means that they will take advantage of reports like this and create a product that has so little resveratrol in it, that it will not be in the slightest bit effective.

Anyway, the Jeunesse 'Reserve' (containing resveratrol) is one of the products that I have introduced to AH and he commenced taking it this morning.

It will not be an instant fix, although some medical conditions have been known to disappear after just a couple of weeks, but Parkinson's Disease (PD) is a little more complex than most conditions, so it may take a bit longer. It may have no affect at all, it may ease the symptoms just slightly or it may have a big impact.

AH will take this product, in conjunction with a couple of others, that I will tell you about in another post or two.

It's a matter of 'wait and see', so watch this space!

Oh and because the Jeunesse meeting that I attended was across the road from Shoe Frenzy, I, of course, took the opportunity to both browse and buy!! I will be wearing new shoes on Friday night!

Nite all.

Quotes of Encouragement.

Tonight, I accompanied The Motivator into The Bay and attended a Jeunesse meeting where I learnt more about the many and varied products that they have available,  how the company came into being and how and why it continues to flourish.

What attracts me the most is that the products are certified organic, GMO free, hypoallergenic and phthalate free.

It was a very interesting evening and I learnt a lot, however, I am attending another meeting tomorrow morning to learn more, so I'll tell you more about it after that!

In the meantime, here are some quotes of encouragement.

I just wanted to mention that I was torn about attending tomorrow's meeting because it means that I'm going to miss morning tea. I LOVE my weekly morning tea with the girls and I HATE that I'm missing it this week!! It may seem like such a small thing, but I struggled making the decision to attend the meeting instead.

So girls, I apologise for the short notice and I'll catch up with you soon!

Nite all.

Boring Cars

Bathurst weekend .. ugh!

Every year I complain about the cars driving round and round and round and round... for five or six hours!!!

Why do (mostly) men find that so appealing???

How much money is spent on running this race every year? I just can't get my head around it and I don't understand the fascination.

I am very grateful that it's over for another year.

So my Sunday has been one to easily forget. A nice big breakfast of bacon, eggs, tomato, avocado, mushrooms and spinach to start the day. Stuffed baked zucchini for lunch. Steak and rocket/pear/candied walnut salad for dinner.

The Seat of Knowledge was very pleasant this morning with high tide and sunshine to welcome the day. The boys were in fine form.

The Tawny Frogmouth is still not showing his chicks, but I continue to monitor the nest.

It was mental health week in Queensland last week so I thought I'd give my tips on keeping or finding good mental health.

1. Make sure you spend time in the sunshine to get a good dose of vitamin D daily.
2. Exercise, even if it's just a twenty minute walk every morning or afternoon.
3. Walk barefoot on the beach or on the grass in the back yard.
4. Eat nourishing fresh food and avoid processed foods and sugar.
5. Drink plenty of filtered water to help your body remove toxins.
6. Listen to your favourite uplifting music.
7. Spend time with animals - very therapeutic.
8. Pamper yourself - a bath, a pedicure, a movie, a nice lunch or morning tea with the girls.
9. Random acts of kindness - make soup for sick friend, leave a good book on a park bench as a pleasant surprise for a stranger to read, pay for two coffees at your local cafe so that the next customer gets them for free, visit an elderly person and brighten their day.
10. Get a solid night's sleep. Seven or eight hours of sleep every night helps your body rest and heal itself ready for the next day.

When I get into a rut and I'm feeling a bit down, it's easy for me to hibernate and neglect myself, which in turn sends me deeper into that rut and closer to depression, so it's important for me to be aware of my habits and be proactive by taking control of the little things.

One small step at a time.

That's my advice ... for what it's worth.

Three things I'm grateful for today ... Adoring Husband and his love, this caring community in which I live and friendships that bring comforting routines and a long history of unconditional loyalty, dependability and commitment.  

Nite all.

Totally Clueless

I had a good time at the Murder Mystery night at the club.

I wish I'd taken my reading glasses because there was a bit of reading to do and the slips of paper were small with tiny print, which is very difficult to read in low light, let alone without glasses!

This was my first Murder Mystery night, so I had no idea what to expect. Everyone at our table were a little confused by the whole thing.

Here is what I figured out by the end of the evening...

1. It's important to mingle with as many people as possible (there were 50 guests!)
2. Ask lots of questions and listen carefully to the answers.
3. Go to the website and study the main characters before the event.
4. Take notice of the one piece of information that EVERYBODY is sharing.
5. It's very easy to be distracted.
6. It's very easy to get confused.
7. Take your reading glasses .. you will be reading clues and questions and people's name tags all night.

Everybody made a fantastic effort to dress up as the characters that they were assigned. I think I was the most boring character - Gigi Opal, a homemaker married to a football star who is never home and mother to 5 children. My costume (if you can call it that) was jeans, a top and a matching head band.

There was a Doctor, a pharmacist, a mayor, a movie star, a tennis player, a comedian, a food stylist, a baker, TV producer, personal chef, hitman, lunatic, police officer, real estate agent, florist, a pilot, a marathon runner, a travel agent, a lumberjack, a teacher, a roller skating rink owner, a model, a librarian and the list goes on and on. Everybody dressed accordingly and had props to match.

Happy Harry and Lady Lynn looked absolutely amazing and totally looked like their characters - the 'food stylist' and the 'florist'. In fact if they were giving out prizes for best dressed, I'd have given it to Lady Lynn. Happy Harry's hair was pretty great too .. it deserves a special mention.

Dinner was a choice of lamb shanks or avocado chicken and there were two desserts, which I couldn't have because they weren't GF, but I was given 4 meringue mushrooms with ice cream, which were delicious!

The night was loud and confusing but fun and interesting. I, nor anyone at my table, had any idea who the murderer was. I don't think anybody in the room guessed it correctly.

Now that I know how it works, I think I'd like to attend another one, just to see if my theory gets me closer to figuring it out.

Anyway it's well after midnight, so I think I need to go to bed. Just thought I'd pop in here and give you a report on the evening. I shared a bottle of wine with Lady Lynn, so I'm completely sober at the end of the night!

Nite all.