Brain Blockage

I had a whole day to GSD.

So why didn't I get GSD???

I have a definite brain blockage and I'm not sure how to clear it!

Something is stopping me from sitting at my desk. It's strong. I can feel it, but I don't recognise what it is, so I don't know how to overcome this problem.

I will give it some attention tomorrow, because once again, I have a whole day to GSD.

This morning, I received two packages. This was one of them ...

... and THIS was the packaging for such a tiny item ...

It's time to send a meaningful email to zulily and have a word to them about their environmental duty to the planet. That box is big enough to fit a pair of shoes inside it!

Anyway, it's midnight. I'm off to bed.

Nite all.

Out of Sorts

I just couldn't seem to get myself organised today.

Perhaps it was because I forgot to make a 'to do' list?!

I swept the floors and then priced some new stock to put out on my table.

Adoring Husband collected the mail and one of my Pillow Talk orders arrived, so I unpacked my lovely new hand towels and aqua waste paper bin.

Beauty made a quick visit and after she left, I pedalled to Reality TV Queen's house to deliver her LeReve order.

I'd planned for it to be a short visit so that I could spend the day working, but she had invited The Blonde Bombshell (aka yip yip) to join us, so I was obliged to hang around quite a bit longer and it was almost midday by the time I returned home. It was a good visit and I had a nice time with the girls.

I made lunch for Adoring Husband while he spent a ridiculous amount of time on 'hold' waiting for somebody from Dyson to speak to him regarding our cordless vacuum cleaner which hasn't worked for some time. The wait was worth it and it seems we have a satisfactory result.

He then left to run some errands in The Bay and pick up our FROG box. This gave me some alone time to GSD.

I had no idea where to even start.

I finished pricing the last of the jewellery and I tidied my desk. Then I sat down and looked blankly at my monitor. I had one natural gemstone pendant that I couldn't find the price for, so I decided to go into the seller's website and search for the price.

Annoyingly, the site kept giving me a user error, so I couldn't go any further than the first page. I attempted a few different fixes to get past the problem, but none of them worked and eventually I gave up.

I remembered that I had some clothes in the machine and on the line, so I resorted to spending time with my washing basket and folding and sorting and hanging and blah blah blah.

AH arrived home with coffee and the organic food, so I unpacked the FROG box and then sat down to enjoy my coffee.

AH has SES duties tonight so I whipped up a quick dinner for him before he left and now I'm switching between channels on TV sharing my time evenly between the football and Big Bang Theory.

I think I'll head to bed and rest my brain - hopefully it will work more efficiently tomorrow.

Nite all.  

Lotta Ladies. Lotta Noise.

I didn't need to be ready for my ride to lunch until 11am, so I had plenty of time to get ready this morning ... in theory.

The trouble was that I asked Adoring Husband to go to the butcher to pick up our meat order and to check the mail while he was there.

He came home from the Post Office with a package for me, which was full of new bracelets and snap buttons. There were 19 new buttons (not counting the two at the bottom of the first row).

I simply had no choice but to go through them all one by one, trying the buttons on different bracelets, putting combinations of buttons together on the 5 button bracelets and creating the perfect bracelet to wear to lunch today!

Some time later, after the excitement and novelty wore off for me, I realised that it was 10.15am!! This meant that I only had 45 minutes to get ready.

Ugh.

Due to my self imposed time restraints, I had to forego washing my hair and rushed around like a chook with it's head cut off to get ready in time for my lift!

Maid Marian arrived right on time and luckily it only took me a minute to finish racing around and be ready to walk out the door.

I think there were 23 of us at lunch today. We were the only people in the restaurant and made a hell of a noise all talking over the top of each other attempting to catch up on our news.

I had to put my fingers in my mouth to whistle very loudly and capture their attention for this photo!

Beauty was nice enough to get this photo of me with the lovely Tweedle Dee...

Lunch was interesting. It was at an Irish Pub and I don't think I've ever seen so much food served on such large plates for each person. Very few of us were able to eat everything on our plates (as you can see by the plate in front of me).

I had Chicken and Prawns with mash and vegetables. It was nice and I received the pensioner discount without even asking for it! I'm thinking that I should probably be insulted lol, but grateful to pay $27 instead of the price on the menu which was $30. My vodka and tonic cost me $6 and my coffee only cost $3!

After we all parted ways, a few of us took a slight detour and spent some time at the local Bowls Club before returning home.

It was a good day and I'm glad that Tweedle Dee convinced me to go.

Next month will be a trip across the river on the barge to Woodgate, where we will have Christmas in July at the pub. I'm looking forward to that one and we've already fully booked the boat.

I'm looking forward, also, to a quiet day at home tomorrow, although I have a few visitors coming to look at my jewellery and Reality TV Queen will be picking up her Le Reve order that was delivered while she was away.

I may even have an early night tonight!

Nite all.

Will I? Or Won't I?

I had decided to NOT attend this month's lady's luncheon because the GF options on the menu of the selected restaurant, were very limited.

However, Reality TV Queen is back from her extended holiday and will be in attendance, along with 21 or 22 other ladies. That's a big crowd and the only really important person who will be missing from this lunch, is Lady Lynn (sad face).

So I've decided that I WILL attend and to take a piece of cooked chicken with me and order a garden salad to have with it.

Adoring Husband seems to think that I could be asked to leave if I do that. If that's the case, I have a back up plan haha.

It's my little secret.

We had a great coffee morning with seven of us all cackling like mother hens around the table and I didn't get home until after 11am.

I wasted an hour fluffing about until Adoring Husband returned home from SES duties and then made him some lunch before retreating to my workspace.

I watched some training videos in the Academy, researched some additional plugins for my website and partially wrote a post for the Life As Roz Knows It blog.

It was great to receive a phone call from Number One Son this evening and we talked for about 30 minutes before dinner. He has applied for a job in Sydney and it's looking pretty positive at this point. Good luck to him!!

That's all folks!

Nite all.

A Little Surprise

I just happened to be browsing through my 'saved' posts from Facebook and found one that I posted way back in 2009.

It was a photo of the front of our house just after we moved in...

Then there was a series of photos taken after we landscaped the front garden ...

So I headed out the front with my phone and took photos of what it looks like today ...

There are lots of dead frangipani leaves over the front lawn at the moment because it's Winter and that's what they do! We are not the kind of people to make it spotless every day and the only time our front entry gets used, is when people visit us unexpectedly.

If we know people are visiting, we usher them in through the garage and into our dining/family room area, so our front porch and entry are always a bit of a mess with dirt and leaves and stray gravel from the garden.

It's kind of embarrassing because everyone we know has a lovely entrance to their home, but it is what it is and we don't care enough to give that much of a rat's pizzle haha.

Anyway, the point of the photos is to show how things have grown and changed in nine years!

My day has been filled with things OTHER than what I'd planned! No decluttering and no work at my desk. I was easily distracted today.

Adoring Husband decided to work on the back lawns, including whipper snipping and mowing, so this meant that I had to remove all the clothes from the washing line. Of course, this meant folding everything (remember, there was all the bedding from yesterday + more) and putting it all away blah blah blah.

The bath mats were still a little damp, so when AH finished the laundry area, he called me from my desk to let me know I could rehang these items. By this time, the next load of washing (which included all the ekoWorx cloths that I've been using in my cleaning frenzy) was ready to hang out. *sigh*

I decided to pedal to the Post Office to check our mail. No mail, but I browsed through the supermarket and discovered that cauliflowers were on sale. Cauliflower and leek soup sounded like a delicious idea, so I bought everything that I needed and headed home.

The first thing I did was make lunch for AH who had done as much of the lawn as he was capable of for the day.

Then I got started on the soup. It took much longer than I expected and by the time I finished packaging it and cleaning up the kitchen, it was after 3pm and I felt the need to put my feet up.

I am now in my office, where I was going to do some work, but once again, I was distracted by this blog post.

It's time to cook dinner, so here is where I sign off ... with a little side note to say that I did NOT get a perfect round in my footy tipping this week, because the last game of the round yesterday brought great disappointment to me. *another sigh*

Nite all.

Declutter Day One

I woke up late, relaxed in bed until 10.30am and decided that I would spend the morning doing the last thing on yesterday's declutter list that I told you about. That is, clearing the dressing table and culling my jewellery.

I decided to spend the morning doing that and then the afternoon at my desk.

What a joke.

I spent two and a half hours clearing and culling, then stopped to make lunch. Adoring Husband was working, mowing the lawns at the shops so he needed sustenance in between jobs.

Before I got back to the culling, I had to package up the chicken broth that I'd had simmering overnight, so that took up a bit of time - especially because I spilt half a container on the floor!! I called the dogs in to do some of the cleaning job for me, but only one of them was interested in licking it up and she took too long, so I had no choice but to do the entire job myself.

 
After that, it took me more than an hour to finish clearing and culling the jewellery.

I threw away a whole shopping bag of jewellery, cardboard tags off clothes, jewellery cleaning cloths, Friday night raffle tickets (that I'd been saving up to put into the bucket for the end of month draw - but I NEVER remember to take them so they are GONE now), pens and old make up.

I tossed all of those single earrings that I'd kept in case I ever found it's partner. I got rid of broken chains, or chains that I hadn't worn in years. I threw away all the old rings that I'd bought at markets and crystal shops - the ones that I never wear because they require constant cleaning. Everything that was broken - that I intended on repairing, but never got around to it  -  is now gone.

I'm certain that I could probably go through it all tomorrow and cull half as much stuff again. There are items that I no longer wear, but which have such amazing memories attached, that I just can't part with them. Quite a few pieces that belonged to my Mum and I know that my girls won't want them when I'm gone, but I just can't let them go yet. Jewellery that I made myself and I no longer wear, but 'might' in the future.

My beautiful leather jewellery box needs replacing, but this was the first birthday present that Adoring Husband gave me thirteen years ago and I don't want to let it go. Both the locks on it are broken, which means that the entire front wall of the box has to lay open permanently. Maybe AH can find a way to fix it for me.

It was well after 3pm when I finally finished this chore! By this time, the first footy match of the day was half over, so I sat down with my coffee that Adoring Husband brought home for me and put my feet up.

So far, I have all the footy tips correct this week. The game that I was worried about last night ended up having a result in my favour when they ended the 80 minutes tied and it went into golden point. My team kicked the field goal to win by one point!! The final score 25-24.

Right now, Sharks are playing Manly. I've tipped Sharks and they are losing by 7 points at half time. Eep. Adoring Husband (who is a big Sharks supporter) can't handle the stress and has opted to sit outside and read his book!

I would like, very much, to spend the entire day tomorrow, at my desk, however, my mind keeps directing me to the linen cupboard in the laundry, so I'll wait until tomorrow morning and decide then what I deem to be more important.

For now, I'm watching the end of the footy, before starting on my duck dinner.

Nite all.

Happy Dancing

Honestly, I can't recommend this stuff highly enough.

ekoWorx is my new best friend and I am obsessed!

I walk around the house with my atomiser bottle and a cloth, thinking to myself ... "I wonder if it will work on this?!"

Today, I had a massive win!

In our hallway, ever since we moved in, there has been a splash mark low on the wall. I think the builders or some kind of tradie in the house splashed something on the wall and didn't clean it off. Whatever is was, set hard and fast on the wall. It was the colour of treacle and it set like shiny concrete.

We have tried every cleaner known to mankind on that mysterious splash, we've tried steam cleaning, we've even tried to scrape it off with a paint scraper to no avail. I figured that when it was time to repaint the house, we would have to sand it off before applying the new paint.

Today, while I was wandering around the house spot cleaning the walls, I stopped at this hideous and annoying splash and thought "I doubt if it will work, but I'm going to try ekoWorx on it".

I had to apply and rub the ekoWorx three times to get it off, BUT IT CAME OFF!!

I tell you, I did a little happy dance up and down the hallway feeling very pleased with myself. Even Adoring Husband was amazed because he too had tried many different ways to remove it!

Even though I climbed out of bed with every intention of going immediately to my workspace and spending the day absorbed in my studies and adding to the website, I was very quickly distracted and ended up spending my entire day cleaning!

I made some breakfast - tomato and onion on a GF bread roll - the new Helga rolls - delicious.

I dragged out the slow cooker and put a big batch of chicken broth on for 22 hours.

I put a very large load of washing in the machine, then stripped the bed and put my new Doona cover on the Doona using this method ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFOhjljieqs

... it was SOOOOO easy, I can't believe how much time I've wasted over the years wrestling with my Doona when I change covers!

Even if I do say so myself, it looks fabulous!

From there, I cleaned the main bathroom and toilet with ekoWorx and then lay out my new teal bath mats, which look great.

Another load of washing in the machine, hung out the big load, took other washing off the line.

Swept the floors. Mopped (with my new ekoWorx mop) the little black doggy footprints off the floors. This morning, Colli went running in the wet grass, then across the black sand and then straight inside onto the tiles! Bloody hell!

I walked around the house spot cleaning walls and skirting boards until the Blonde Bombshell popped in to have a look at the ekoWorx bundle and while she was here, she even did some shopping!!

After all of that, super Saturday football started, so I had to sit down to watch the footy.

So far, I'm doing well with my footy tipping, although I'm not confident about this last game between Roosters and Storm. I've tipped Roosters, but the Storm are winning by 6 points at half time.

I feel it might be an early night for me tonight.

Part of my studies for working an online business includes a section in decluttering your house - which I totally understand, because some days I struggle to focus, knowing that there are chores to be done in the house.

My 'declutter' list includes:

• Clearing out the linen cupboard.
• Pulling out the washing machine, cleaning behind it and cleaning the big glass sliding door.
• Pulling out the bed and the side tables and giving it all a good dusting and a clean.
• Both the spare bedrooms need to be cleared.
• Windows need to be washed.
• Bathroom drawers need to be cleaned out.
• Kitchen cupboards need to be emptied, crockery culled and shelving washed. 
• Spare wardrobes need to be cleared and the clothes need to go to charity.
• Ceiling fans need to be cleaned.
• Dressing table needs to be cleared and I need to cull a LOT of jewellery that I haven't worn in years.

I'm sure that I have other stuff on the list on my desk. It's time to write the jobs on cards, pin them to the cork board again and work through them like we did last year.

Gawd, I'm exhausted just thinking about it!! Small steps.

What I really need to do, is earn enough money with my website to hire a cleaner!! I'll put that on my wish list :)

I'm off to watch the last half of footy.

Nite all.

 

Date Day with AH

We had an early start to get into The Bay by 9.15am for the morning showing of this movie ...



It was great. I'm not sure about Chris Pine for the lead male role, because I'm so used to him playing Captain James Tiberius Kirk in Star Trek!

There was one disappointing moment in the movie, but it was very brief.

I thought Gal Gadot was perfect for the role of Diana (aka Wonder Woman) and all of the other characters and the actors who played the roles, were great too.

Oh and the bad guy sported a moustache that was all kinds of wrong!

After the movie, I braved Bunnings!! Yes, you heard that correctly ... I voluntarily entered Bunnings!

This is where I stocked up on silicone, the squeezie gun thingo to get the silicone out, grout, tools and few tiles so that I can practice mosaic-ing during our art break. Creative Cath is having us over to her house for some creative, artistic, arty farty time.

With no art tomorrow, I hope to spend the day at my desk. I have a few things on my 'to do' list and if I can get a few hours on a run, I might just be able to achieve something!

On that note, it is rapidly approaching midnight, so I'm off to bed.

Nite all.

It's here!!

I've waited, very impatiently I might add, for the delivery of my ekoWorx pack which arrived today!!

You know that I'm all about the easiest way to get housework done with the least toxic products that are available.

I found this fabulous company on a Facebook advertisement. I did my research and found so many positive reviews everywhere ... including their Facebook page, which is full of rave reviews. Every time I see a new ad, I look at the comments attached and they are always positive.

So, I bit the bullet and put in an order during their end of financial year sale.  I got my pack for 60% less than the usual price.

This is what arrived ...

6 litres of ekoWorx cleaning liquid
1 Spray mop with 7 pads
3 Atomiser spray bottles
24 Cleaning clothes with different weaves
7 Diamond sponges

As soon as I got it home, I unpacked it, changed into my cleaning clothes and started cleaning!

I started in the ensuite bathroom. I didn't take a 'before' photo because, quite frankly, I was embarrassed by the state of it and couldn't bear the the thought of anyone seeing it.

The only tine I use our ensuite shower, is when we have visitors staying with us. The reason being, it is a tiny, poky little room with minimal storage space and hardly any room to move. When they built our house, they made a mistake in this bathroom and made the shower recess too big, so there is little room to move in the space that's left.

Anyway, Adoring Husband is in charge of the ensuite, and you know what men are like. Need I say more?

It took me over an hour to clean it from top to bottom, but it is seriously sparkling clean and the only mould that I couldn't remove, is that which is under the silicone. We don't use bleach ever. I've tried so many different products, without success, but this one is fantastic.

The cloths are great. The diamond sponges excellent. The atomiser sprayers are fabulous.

It easily removed the soap scum from the glass and the tiles (and there was a LOT!)

I finished the ensuite and after standing there admiring my handiwork for about ten minutes, I returned to the kitchen and decided to test out the new mop.

I swept the floors first and then put the mop together, which was easy peasy. I filled the attached spray bottle with the ekoWorx cleaning fluid, stuck the pad to the bottom and off I went. Far out! So quick. So easy. So clean. Quick drying. Very very happy.

Fancy ME enjoying housework! Who'da thunk?! If you want to check it out go here.

I have to say that my body is not happy with all the stretching and bending and using muscles that haven't been used for a long time. I'm seizing up big time tonight!

After my cleaning fix, I headed into my office and rebounded while I watched some video lessons from the Academy - may as well completely overdo the exercising for the day!!

I created a survey that I hope will get sent out tomorrow some time.

I returned that phone call about Govt funding and now I need to draw up a business plan to go with my application - no rush for that lol - I'm not going to stress about it and will take my time.

Best get some sleep. Movie date with AH tomorrow morning.

Nite all.

State of Origin Number Two

Here I sit on my couch, wearing my State of Origin shirt and my silver Queensland charm necklace, tasting the promise of victory - it's a do or die game tonight for we Queenslanders!

Kick off is any minute, so this is a quick post so that I can watch the game from Go to Woe.

Today, I posted a recipe onto my website and wrote another post about decluttering, which I'll add to the site early next week.

I returned a phone call about the funding that I applied for on the weekend, but the girl with whom I need to speak, was not available. We'll try again tomorrow.

We had a big lunch of Honey Roasted Vegetables with roast chicken and gravy for lunch, so our dinner was a light chicken and gravy roll.

I did plenty of rebounding while I worked and feel quite energised for it! But I haven't been drinking enough water, so I've been trying to make up for it this afternoon and this evening. I knew that I needed to drink because I started to get a headache and I don't usually get headaches.

Oh my goodness that game has started. It's hard and fast. Gotta go!!

Nite all.

Kitchen Love

It was a beautiful Winter's day ... not that anyone would guess that it's Winter!

Here are the temperature ranges in other places around Australia ...

Melbourne   4 - 13C
Canberra.    -4 - 12C
Griffith         1 - 18C
Adelaide       5 - 18C
Brisbane       9 - 21C
Sydney         8 - 18C

Here            13 - 24C

Clear skies and sunshine all day long and sometimes even too hot to sit in the direct sunlight. There was a stiff breeze today, which kept it quite cool.

So it all started at coffee with Lady Lynn, The Blonde Bombshell (aka yip yip) and Beauty. Tweedle Dee was home with a cold and feeling under the weather, while everybody else is away travelling.

After another pleasant morning with the girls, I did some grocery shopping and exited the shop to be greeted by the smiling faces of the The Pom and The Crazy Publican. For the past 8 months, TCP has  endured some very heavy treatment for cancer and I must say, all things considered, is looking incredibly well! Her last results were good and she's hoping the next tests will show continued improvement.

After about an hour with these two lovelies, I pedalled home with my groceries and headed straight to the kitchen.

I had three very large punnets of strawberries, so I topped them all and brought them to a simmer in a saucepan with vinegar, maple syrup and salt to make a tangy strawberry sauce.

I had some leftover pureed cauliflower from last night, so I made a Shepherds Pie with lots of zucchini, carrot, celery, onion, spinach and garlic and then sprinkled it with Cayenne pepper which gave it a delicious bite.

Instead of making the usual Hainan Chicken with my regular order of chicken thighs from the butcher, I chopped each thigh into three equal sized pieces, then lined the baking tray with onion slices. I lay the chicken over the top, sprinkled generous amounts of (Himalayan) salt and pepper over the top, drizzled my favourite maple syrup over the chicken skin and then lay slices of lemon over the top of that.

Popped it in the oven for 25 minutes, removed the lemon, turned up the heat and gave it a further 10 minutes until the skin browned.

That was served to Adoring Husband with a salad for lunch.

Finally, I slid some butter and fresh coriander under the skin of a whole organic chicken, pierced the skin and sprinkled salt and pepper over the top. I stuffed the cavity with chunks of lemon, heaps of garlic cloves and some more butter and baked it in the oven for an hour, turned off the heat and let it continue cooking in the residual heat.

By this time, it was mid afternoon, so I only got about two hours at my desk, where I watched a seminar on 'GSD' which, depending on whether you're naughty or nice, means either Getting Stuff Done OR Getting Shit Done.

I probably need to find a year long course on this subject, because I feel that my biggest downfall is the old favourite 'procrastination' which causes me to NOT get shit done.

There is still more than two hours of this seminar remaining to watch, so hopefully, I'll take on some important motivating information which will help me get stuff done. Haha.

My plan for tomorrow is to work Work WORK!!! I'm going to Get Stuff Done!!! When I'm finished here, I am writing a 'to do' list and then I'm off to bed for an early night.

GO ME!!! *raises fist in the air*

Nite all.

Another One Bites the Dust

I'm referring to the day.

Adoring Husband and I drove into The Bay today.

I bought a couple of small round tables on which I plan to practise mosaics.

I bought some make up from Big W.

I replaced my stock of coconut ice cream.

I checked the local Art/Craft store for mosaic materials. Zilch.

Adoring Husband renewed his licence.

We were home by lunch time.

Lady Lynn came for a quick visit.

I opened my holiday money tin and was disappointed to see that it was only half full! It felt almost full to the top! There was more than $1000 in it, so AH and I packed all the gold coins into the little plastic bags and took them to the Post Office to deposit that lovely money into my safe bank account.

There were two packages at the Post Office today. One for me, which was a top I ordered a while ago, and a BIG box sealed in plastic that had "Smithurst and Griffin Retirement" as the header line on the address.

Inside the box was a wine cooler, a set of barbecue tools presented in a hard silver box with clip locks, a barbecue apron, two hats, a pen, a stubby holder and a couple of fridge magnets ... from our financial advisor.

I wonder what the really rich customers received in their retirement box????

I'm looking forward to receiving a couple more packages this week.

That was it for my day!

No work!

My Monday, which is usually my most productive day of the week, because it's the only day that I have wholly and completely to myself, was frivolously wasted. Now I have to find a way to make up for it.

Still, it was nice to spend time with Adoring Husband and it was a beautiful day, so it wasn't really wasted was it?

It's almost midnight.  I'd best get some sleep so that I can be up bright and early for coffee with the girls.

Nite all.

More Madness

Yesterday afternoon, I sent Adoring Husband to the local shops to buy some eggs (!) because our chookies have suddenly gone off the lay and they have not produced anything for over 2 weeks.

While he was gone, I made the decision to bake him some of those delicious flourless chocolate cookies that he loves so much. I printed out the recipe and checked that I had everything I needed from the ingredient list.

He walked into the house with the eggs and said to me "Sweetheart, what are the chances of you making some of those chocolate cookies that you made before I went away the other week?"

*look of genuine shock*

It's not often that we are in sync, so when it happens, it's a funny feeling!

Before I even started on dinner, I whizzed up a double batch of cookies. Instead of the usual ten cookies, the double mix multiplied into 22 cookies. I took them out of the oven at 6pm and they were cool enough to munch on for 'dessert'.

I enjoyed two of them, but at 1.39AM, I woke up buzzing! My cookies are full of raw cacao, which contains a stimulant very similar to caffeine, called Theobromine. It's (apparently) not as strong as caffeine, but it sure knocked me around last night!

I had been asleep for less than two hours, when I woke up with a start and try as I might, could NOT get back to sleep. I stayed in bed and tried for an hour to force sleep, to no avail. I decided to read and it was almost 4am when I felt tired enough to fall back into dreamland.

While I was trying to force sleep, the image going over and over in my mind, was patterns and colours and styles of mosaic-ing the bathroom bench top! Weird.

So the first thing I did this morning, was grab my leftover mosaic tiles and took them straight to the bathroom. It took me 45 minutes to create this ...

They are only placed (not glued) and it's not exactly what I want, but the colours are very close and a swirly or wavy pattern is what I want to achieve.

After I was done in the bathroom, I prepared myself a very early lunch, and in the process, discovered that there were only ten cookies remaining!!! I gave AH a rap over the knuckles and banned him from the cookie jar!! Ten cookies in 15 hours, and for nine of those hours he was sleeping!

From there, I escaped to my workspace where I made a very brave move and completed an online application for government funding to support my business website.

I know right!?

There was an initial questionnaire, the results of which gave me a total figure of what I MAY be eligible for. Surprisingly, the figures totalled a LOT!!

There were a number of different initiatives and I certainly don't expect to qualify for every one of them, but any assistance would be helpful for business education, website improvements and assistance to gain some traction in the business community.

You never know until you try. They can only say no ... and that's not going to kill me.

I printed out some more exercise sheets and booklets from one of the courses that I'm doing and listened to one of the webinars. Then I completed two more of the courses from the Academy.

I received a phone call from a customer who wanted to come buy some jewellery, which was a pleasant surprise and then I phoned Vegan Chickie and spent an hour chatting with her and Chicklet.

It's been nice to have contact with both of my girls this weekend. I must phone Number One Son this week and catch up with his news too.

Well, it looks like a reasonably early night for me. I'll try to catch up from last night.

Nite all.



 

Mosaic Madness

Well! I can't say that it's finished yet, but I actually got to bring home one of my projects today. It still  needs another layer of grout and then I'll coat it with a layer of clear resin.

Considering that it's our first attempt, both Creative Cath and I were pretty happy with our efforts.

We are both very critical of our own work because we can clearly see how differently we would do it if we had the chance for a do over.

On the day that Teach announced this project, she told us to bring plant pots in for our first mosaic project, and there were plenty of tiles available for us to break up and use, but "I" was the instigator with the table top and when CC saw mine, she returned home to get hers as well.

This was not even close to what Teach had in mind and all the tiles that we took to the class were of different thicknesses, which is not ideal for grouting.

It means that our table tops are very uneven, which is why I plan on putting the clear resin on top, to hopefully even out the surface, so that it can be useful as a table.

So we were our own worst enemy.

A few pics to show some of the process.

Smashed up some tiles with a rubber hammer. The action was quite therapeutic, but the noise was disturbing!

Used a special silicone to stick the tiles to the table top.

A bucket and cloth used to wipe the excess grout from the table top.

This is what I've brought home ...

So, now we are on a break for about seven weeks. I have a couple of mosaic-ing ideas in my head, however, I doubt that I will get to start them, because there is always something else, more important to do, before time can be spent on such frivolous matters.

I'll spend the first 2-3 weeks focussing on the website and after that, we'll see.

I know you're thinking "It's only three hours on a Saturday morning", but for me, because of the strange way that my brain is wired, it wipes out the entire day. I simply don't have the motivation to do anything else when I get home and usually spend the afternoon on the couch watching meaningless TV with Adoring Husband.

It means that for the duration of the break, I will have approximately 56 extra hours to play with .. and I should be able to accomplish a LOT in that time. "SHOULD" being the operative word.

It was a very pleasant morning at Art and we learnt a lot about each other. There were only two students, including myself, so there was a lot of personal information shared and we had some good laughs too.

Everybody has a story.

I think I'll head off for an early night now.

Nite all.

 

Desk of Strength

Earlier in the week, I booked Adoring Husband to assemble the new sit/stand desk that he picked up from IKEA for me, on his way from holidays last week.

While I was relaxing in bed this morning with my coffee, I heard the annoying sound of power tools, which sounded way too close for comfort. After about ten minutes, I realised what Adoring Husband was doing, and remembered that the annoying noise was for my benefit!

Soon enough, he appeared in the bedroom declaring that he had done as much as he could at this point and he was waiting for me to clear the area in my workspace so that he could continue.

Remember the photo that I posted on Wednesday?

This is the 'after' shot ...

I must admit that my legs got quite tired after about two hours of standing and bouncing on the rebounder while I worked, so I wound down the desk and sat on my exercise ball on the rebounder.

Even though I spent many hours at my desk today (not even stopping for lunch), as far as work goes, I was very unproductive.

Tomorrow is Art class - Woot! Woot!

Hopefully, the remainder of my weekend will be highly productive at my desk. I feel like I have just a few small gaps to fill with my technical education before I can surge forward and make headway with the website. Once I've filled in those gaps, I can get started on other important business opportunities.

Anyway, enough of this frivolity.

I'm off to bed.

Nite all.

Muddy No More

What a grey, wet day.

I enjoyed my usual slow morning in bed reading and drinking coffee.

Before we drove to Scaryborough, we stopped to pick up our mail, which included the package I've been waiting for!! Woot! Woot!

We drove in the very strong wind along the highway to Maryborough, to meet with Best Cousin in the World, who was delivering my Lorraine Lea order, while I returned the recipe book that she loaned me a couple of weeks ago.

We met at 71 Wharf, which was once Muddy Waters Cafe. I was disappointed in the food. I had the only gluten free option that didn't include bread and was told that it was gluten free because it contained rice noodles. Honey Prawns and Calamari noodle salad. The calamari was very leathery, there were no noodles, the salad was limp and drowning in the honey dressing and there were only four small prawns (which were delicious).

The coffee was delicious and both Adoring Husband and Best Cousin in the World enjoyed their meals. BCITW had Moroccan Chicken Salad and AH had steak with chips and salad.

Anyway, I'm prepared to give them one more chance ... I always give cafes and restaurants a second chance.

It was nice to catch up with BCITW. We had some good belly laughs, as we do when we get together.

We left at 2pm and headed for Hervey Bay where it was raining very steadily and looked like it had been for quite some time.

We parked at Stocklands and spent about an hour inside buying lotto tickets (I must check to see if I'm 30 million dollars richer tonight), two tops and some groceries. It was still raining when we left and it rained the entire trip home. We stopped at Craignish to pick up our FROG box on the way.

There has been no rain since we arrived home.

Adoring Husband is off on SES duty tonight, so I've watched a wonderful movie called 'Lion' which I bought on DVD ages ago. It was still sealed in the plastic! Dev Patel and Nicole Kidman were both fabulous. I have a real soft spot for Dev Patel and he's one of those actors that draws me to a movie ... I would go see any movie that I knew he was in.

Now I'm watching GIRLBOSS until AH returns home.

Have a fabulous Friday!!

Nite all.

Good and Proper

It was raining this morning, so instead of riding to the Post Office, Adoring Husband was kind enough to drive me there.

I was a bit disappointed to discover that none of my orders arrived in the mail today. I was certain that the important one would be there. Maybe tomorrow.

After spending about 30 minutes doing some random housework, like removing the dry clothes from the line, decluttering the seat beside where I sit on the couch (I tend to accumulate a lot of paperwork, books, pens, jewellery and other crap), and making the marinade for our chicken wings for lunch, I made a beeline for my workspace.

Let me think what I achieved in my productive day.

I completed the first part of a mini 'Get Rich Lucky Bitch' course. Funnily enough, Part One was all about decluttering. Decluttering your house. Decluttering your relationships. Decluttering your health.

There is much to declutter!

I finished the Social Media course from the Academy, which I'd begun about six weeks ago, and then commenced the Product Marketing course, which is interesting and from which I have a LOT to learn!

I almost ordered some books from the recommended reading list. Some under the 'Business' heading, some under 'Marketing' and some under 'Business Biographies'. I decided that I already have about six books that I need to read before I consider purchasing any more!

I printed out the 'Magic Money Making Kit', which is basically a monthly checklist of tasks to do to run a successful online business. Both 'simple' and 'amazing' ideas that need to be done religiously to keep momentum and improve business.

I added more to my book ideas and now I need to create some sketches and artwork to use in the book. This has to be a priority now, while maintaining the website a bit more efficiently than I have been of late.

I decluttered my desk and sideboard. I removed my flaking office chair and replaced it with my exercise ball on top of my rebounder - much more fun to sit upon!

In the middle of all that, I cooked the chicken wings for lunch and then tonight, made some meat patties to cook for home made hamburgers. Lots of onion, zucchini, capsicum, tomato, kimchi and home made spicy tomato sauce.

So this is my desk 'before' and you have to wait until Friday to see the 'after' ...

We've got a trip to Scaryborough tomorrow to meet with Best Cousin in the World. She has some LorraineLea stuff for me to pick up and I have to return her recipe book.

So I'm off to bed.

Nite all.

Awkwardly Easy

It's been an easy day.

I didn't want an easy day.

I wanted a full day jam-packed with an intense workload that, in the end, would be perfectly completed.

It all started very pleasantly with Lady Lynn and Maid Marian over coffee. We enjoyed a relaxing ninety minutes having a great catch up. It's been a long time since LL could manage a leisurely morning with us, so I think we made the most of it while we could.

I returned home to my workspace, but felt quite discombobulated at my desk.

So many things to do, but where to start?!

I kind of just clutched at straws. I did a little bit of this and a little bit of that, all the while thinking I should be doing something more important.

I watched a couple of webinars on creating passive income, business coaching, upgrading certain areas of your business, decluttering, manifesting - all the totally non-productive stuff that I didn't need to know about, on a day when I should have been super productive!!

By late in the afternoon, I decided that a 'to-do' list might be necessary, so that's what I did next.

Tomorrow should be more productive.

One very fun thing happened today! One of my jewellery orders was delivered!

Some new snap buttons and a few different bracelets/bangles (my apologies for the crappy phone photos) ...

A small selection of the new buttons ...

This was Adoring Husband's handiwork yesterday ...

It was a birthday gift from The Motivator (which was in April) that has finally found a home.

Adoring Husband, at my request, purchased this new skinny cupboard from IKEA on the way home from his trip away last week. It's to replace the ugly old brown one that has been in our bathroom for the last 9 years.

Next on the agenda will be my new desk that AH is booked to assemble on Friday. Watch this space for photos of that!! I'm excited!!

I guess I should get some sleep so that I CAN BE SUPER PRODUCTIVE tomorrow!!

Nite all.







 

Abundantly Clear

It's abundantly obvious that I have money blocks that I need to clear.

You could probably spend a good deal of time writing down many stories from your childhood, youth and adult years where money was a problem.

Can you hear your parents or your partner or even you saying "No, we can't afford it." or "That's too expensive." or "We've got three bills to pay this month, so we need to be careful with our money." or "You've got enough pairs of shoes." or "We can't touch our savings." or "Don't be so extravagant!" or "Turn off the air conditioner or our power bill will be too high."

Do you remember scrounging around in the bottom of your bag to find enough money for that loaf of bread?

Do you worry about breaking that $50 note because it will disappear faster?

Do you wait until that beautiful dress is on sale, only to discover that your size has gone?

Do you have memories of your father getting into trouble for spending the last of the house money on a horse race or a bottle of beer?

Did your parents struggle to find the money for you to go on a school excursion?

Did you wish that you could afford to give your kids the $200 Nike shoes like all the other kids had, instead of the $20 daggy K-Mart runners?

Did you ever have to live in Government Housing because you couldn't afford anywhere else?

Did you ever have to choose between health insurance or house and contents insurance because you couldn't afford both? Or perhaps you couldn't afford any?

Did you ever have to go to the emergency ward at the hospital because you couldn't afford to go to the doctor's surgery?

On the opposite end of the spectrum ...

Did you ever have to miss out on something amazing, like a weekend away or a show because your friend couldn't afford it?

Have friends or acquaintances made the "Life is tough for SOME people." comment because you have regular holidays, or buy a lot of shoes, or wear expensive jewellery or eat at nice restaurants?

Do friends or family often ask to borrow money because they think that you are 'well off'?

Do you listen to people make judgements and derogatory comments about others who appear to be wealthier than the average person?

Honestly, there is so much negativity surrounding money, earning, saving, spending, budgeting etc.

One of my courses required me writing down every money memory that I could think of. I filled ten pages in an hour and every day, I think of more. Both positive and negative .. but mostly negative.

Those are the memories that need to be let go. Decluttering and cleansing the negative money memories and creating new positive beliefs and plans for future money experiences.

There are so many opportunities to create personal wealth and brilliant ideas just waiting for action, but money blocks prevent or limit forward movement.

On top of money blocks, are the self beliefs. Not smart enough. Not good enough. Not fast enough. Not pretty enough. Not skinny enough. Not qualified enough. Not competent enough. Not talented enough. Not strong enough. Not brave enough. Blah. Blah. Blah.

These imagined failings are mostly believed by older women, of themselves, because history has given us roles that were usually caring or supportive roles and we rarely cared for, or about ourselves. We Baby Boomers were always looking out for the men and children. Women held everything together or worked the menial jobs, while the men went out and paved the way for future generations of other men.

Well, guess what ...

The times have changed. With today's technology, opportunities are there for everyone to take hold and create an abundant future for themselves. I want to grab my opportunities and break down my self built barriers every time I hit them ... and I know there will be many along the way ... keeping the momentum will be my challenge.

I have a 'shit to do' journal. It will help keep me on my forward path.

One of the best things to help keep me energised on my forward journey, is a good night's sleep!

So ...

Nite all.    

G & F Sunday

What a perfectly divine Sunday.

Yesterday afternoon (Saturday) when I bought my arvo coffee, I bought two and put one in the fridge so that I could reheat it this morning (Sunday) and climb back into bed.

My morning lasted for it's entirety - it was noon when I decided to greet the day properly.

I completely took over the king-sized bed with my stable table, laptop, iPad, iPhone, journals, books, pens, paperwork, water bottle, glasses, TV remote, fan remote (I had to turn on the fan last night!) and of course, my coffee.

It was heavenly!

Considering it was after midday by the time I rose, I heated up some beef vindaloo curry for lunch, which was extra delicious after 24 hours in the fridge.

I had a quick visit from The Old Speckled Hen and Dirty Old Man when they delivered a birthday invitation to his 80th birthday in August.

After that, I sat down to Netflix and watched (for the third time), Series 3 of Grace and Frankie.

Adoring Husband arrived home from his weekend in Bundaberg just before 5pm, so we caught up with our news before watching some more G & F and eventually, I found my way to the kitchen where I prepared lamb rack with vegetables (beans, peas and broccoli) and fried potatoes. It was delicious and satisfying.

Tonight, I've watched Bridget Jones's Baby (also for the third time) and thoroughly enjoyed it as well.

So, that was my perfect Sunday :)

I hope to spend the next couple of days at my workspace ... I have been very neglectful of my website for almost two weeks and I need to change that.

So ... time for bed.

Nite all.

Ready For Bed

Gosh, I feel like my day has been full on.

I worked first thing this morning, after which I pedalled down to get my morning coffee.

When I arrived home, I drank my coffee, did a quick tidy up, made my lunch to take to Art class and then sat down to order some jewellery that some of my ladies have asked for.

At 9.30am, my lift arrived and we drove to The Motivator's house to pick up her pottery bust. She can't attend the classes for the next couple of weeks, so 'Teach' is taking care of it for her.

We only have one class left next week, before a six week break ... which I'm a bit sad about ... but one of the girls is going on a cruise for a month and then 'Teach' will be away for five weeks, so looking on the bright side, I may even get to sell my wares at the markets next month because I'll have a Saturday free!

My time in class was spent attaching some more tiles to the table top and 'Teach' showed me how to mix the grout, so I grouted all the tiles that were in place, which was about a quarter. Hopefully, I will finish the whole thing next week and MAYBE even get to bring it home.

Once again, the three hours flew by and it was time to leave.

No sooner had I arrived home, when the doorbell rang and Beauty was at my door for a quick visit to pay me the last little bit of her order and look for a gift for a friend.

After she left, I enjoyed a slice of key lime pie and then decided to pedal to the shops to get myself an afternoon coffee. I was almost tempted to buy some junk food, but instead I chose to be kind to my body. I'm pleased that I made that decision now and I'm going to be even kinder, by having another early night.

Adoring Husband drove home from Bundaberg this afternoon to get his medication and immediately left to return to Bundy for the second half of his course tomorrow.

I'm watching the football at the moment and there have been some good games on today. Unfortunately, I have not got any of my tips correct today. In four weeks, I have gone from second on the ladder to about second last!! Ugh.

Anyway, I'm off to bed. Have a happy Sunday!

Nite all.

Oh My Goodness!

Can you believe it? I was in bed by 7.30pm and after reading for a while, was asleep by 8.30pm. I woke at 12.19am for a visit to the bathroom and then slept soundly until 5.30am. How fabulous!

While I sat up in bed this morning, in my summer pyjamas, drinking coffee and reading some more of my book, with the window open and enjoying the crisp breeze floating across the room, Adoring Husband was wandering around the house all rugged up as if it was snowing outside and berating me for being so weird.

When I finally decided to greet the day, I pedalled to the Post Office to pick up a delivery. It was one that I had hoped would be here by last Wednesday, because it contained all the presentation stands for my snap buttons and jewellery. Better late than never.

On the way home, I stopped at The Motivator's house to deliver her jewellery that she'd bought during the week and we had about 40 minutes before some friends of hers arrived for a brief visit. After quick introductions, I ducked out the back door and headed home, where Adoring Husband was packing for his trip to Bundaberg.

He's participating in a 4WD course for SES, but he has gone off without his medication, so he's feeling a bit annoyed with himself right now.

He's also just put the mockers on my footy team, The Broncos, by saying that with ten minutes to go, they should beat the Rabbitohs with the current score of 22-12. No sooner had we finished our phone conversation, and the Rabbitohs scored! Whenever AH makes a rash statement about what he believes will happen ... the OPPOSITE happens!

I told him that if Broncos lose because of his rash statement, I won't go to work for him in the morning.

Time's up ... Broncos won ... lucky for him!!

It's almost 10pm and I think I will head to bed for another reasonably early night.

Just want to say that I have these kinds of people around me ...

You know who you are :)

Nite all.

Run Down

Today, I felt very lethargic and a bit run down.

It's 7pm and I'm yawning my head off, so this is a quick post and I am off to bed.

That probably means that I'll be awake before midnight and then be out of bed at stupid o'clock, but I really need to sleep right now.

Adoring Husband also needs to sleep the last of his illness off.

I've spent the day providing fresh juice, home made soups, fermented vegetables, Vitamin C, essential oils, probiotics and sending him outside to get some midday sunshine. I also had to remind him to drink water. He should be as good as gold by morning (haha).

AH is supposed to be attending a course this weekend, so I plan on spending every waking moment at my desk. I have a lot to catch up on, so I need to be re-energised.

So enough of this frivolity.

Nite all.

A Happy Event

I know!!  Yell at me!!  Slap my forehead!! Grunt in disbelief!! Groan in dismay!!

I did not take any photos today.

Ugh!

I honestly did not expect the day to go as it did.

I imagined ten ladies coming through my door, spending $10-$15 each, sharing drinks and nibbles with me while I delivered a well planned speech to describe my website, who it was aimed at and what I hoped to achieve with it.

What actually happened, was that sixteen ladies came through my door, another three ladies gave me an order over the phone and each of them spent a LOT more than the $10-$15 that I imagined.

Between greeting my visitors, pouring drinks, taking money, putting food out and chatting with everybody, by the time my overwhelm had passed and I could stop and think, half of the ladies had left and the photo opportunities were well and truly gone.

I have to say, it was such a nice day. Everybody was happy and chatting away, giving and receiving advice about their choices. The Motivator was motivating everyone, using her design expertise, to select the perfect snap buttons to accessorise. The Margaritas, Cosmopolitans, Chardies, SBs and non alcoholic punch all went down a treat.

The nibbles got nibbled, the chicken wings and pork/chicken meatballs were gobbled up. I forgot to serve the key lime pie (it's still in the freezer).

So, I forgot to take photos, I forgot my speech and I forgot to serve sweets. They say things run in threes lol.

Speaking of threes, my entry into the Flickr challenge came third this month. The theme was 'Red' ...

I'm off to bed. I'm exhausted.

Nite all.

Very Busy and Important

This will be a very short post because I am busy getting things organised for tomorrow's gathering.

I need to marinate some chicken wings so that I can cook them first thing tomorrow morning. I also have to cook up some mini meatballs with a dipping sauce.

I'm making a key lime tart and some energy balls for sweets to have with tea and coffee.

There'll be a cheese platter, veggie sticks and two dips with crackers.

My new punch bowl will be filled with a non-alcoholic punch, and I'll have two pitchers, one with margarita mix and the other full of cosmopolitan mix.

So much to do, so little time!

I guess I'll see some of you tomorrow (or today as you are reading this now), but I'll be sharing photos here in tomorrow night's post, which I hope will show what a fabulous time everyone has had!!

*happy dance*

Nite all.  

Cleaning Bug

Instead of Spring cleaning, I am Winter cleaning.

Today, my focus was the oven, but I must admit that it was a half hearted effort.

Judge me if you will, but I rarely clean my oven. I do a LOT of my cooking in the oven too, because I hate standing over the stove and wasting time in the kitchen. This is why the slow cooker and the oven are my best friends .. because I can do the preparations, shove it in the oven and then walk away.

The state of my oven is/was pretty disgusting.

I used the Enjo cleaning paste which removed almost all the baked on dirt and grease with just a chux wipe! There was a little muck left over that needed scrubbing, but I didn't put much effort into it and only spent 80 minutes to get a decent result.

Cleaning the sliding doors to the outdoor area was on my 'to do' list today, but I just couldn't be bothered. I guess I'll add it to tomorrow's list.

I made a cauliflower and broccoli soup for dinner tonight, which was lovely, but jeez I made a mess in my clean kitchen! I'm about to give it a good clean before I go to bed. It's not even 8.30pm and I'm hoping to be in bed by 9.30pm.

The only other cleaning that I did, was the floor in the kitchen/family room.

This was my view while chatting with the boys at The Seat of Knowledge this morning...

There is still plenty to do tomorrow, so I'm off!

Nite all.

I'm SO done!

It was difficult getting out of bed this morning.

I'd slept for a solid eight hours and woke up to spend an hour reading, and enjoying a slow start to the day, but eventually, I needed my morning coffee and since Adoring Husband is not here, I had to go get it myself!

Lucky for me, it was a glorious day, so it was an enjoyable ride to the shops.

It was 10am by the time I got home and I sat down to enjoy my coffee before beginning the tasks on my 'to do' list. I turned on the TV to discover yet another terrorist disaster in England. Ugh. The world is now on notice .. expect the unexpected .. anywhere and anytime. It's so horrible and the ripple effect touches us all.

I can't even comprehend how devastating it must be for the friends and family of those who were attacked. Strength, love and light to them.

When I couldn't watch any more on TV, I switched off (so easy for me to walk away - unlike those who are directly affected - and I felt shame) and started working in the kitchen.

Before I started cleaning, I seared a rolled lamb roast and popped it in the oven. That will be my lunch meat for the next few days.

I listened to 80s music on the radio while I cleared out my fridge, cleaned all the shelves and drawers, restocked with the still fresh food and then cleaned the outside as well. I filled a medium garbage bag with everything that was out of date or rotting.

Next I started on the pantry. It was chockers full of bags of flours and sugars and grains and seeds and nuts and cooking chocolate and powders and dried fruits and goodness knows what else! It took a long time to sort through it all and combine bags and store them in sealed containers.

There was plenty of out-of-date packets to toss out and I filled another medium bag to put in the sulo bin. By the time I'd finished, three hours had passed since I began my kitchen cleanout.

After that, I needed a break, so I sat down to watch the football .. a very stressful game where the team that I had chosen in my footy tips lost by just one point UGH!! It was my only incorrect tip for the week, so I missed out on a perfect round because of it.

I desperately wanted that game win, to have even a remote chance of catching the tipping comp leader (who just happens to be Adoring Husband) in the near future.

After the footy, I headed back to the kitchen in disgust and began scrubbing the stove and exhaust fan, clearing the bench tops and decluttering paperwork and recipe books, scrubbing tiles and building up a sweat.

Very satisfying to finally have a clean kitchen, although I should clear out the drawers, but that can wait til another day.

I was pretty happy with my Enjo cleaning products during this process. The cleaning paste for the stove and tiles was fabulous and made the job so much easier. The fibrous cloth for wiping it afterwards was also amazing.

Good enough that I am now looking forward to attending an Enjo party this month and will check out the other products available.

Adoring Husband has been having such a good time down in Armidale with his mate, that he has spent a total of six minutes on the phone with me since he left. This is my passive aggressive way of making him feel guilty enough to spend eight minutes talking to me tomorrow *wink wink*

I can't believe that it's already 10.30pm!  I'm off to bed!

Nite all.