Too Fast!

I can’t believe how quickly today passed!

It started with morning coffee and even though there were only four of us, the conversation flowed and before we knew it, 90 minutes had passed and it was time to go our separate ways.

Next thing I know, a delivery of stock appeared, which I directed to the back room.

During the next hour, I sorted through all the tax paperwork for The Happy Abode to have it ready for The Motivator who was coming to visit. Her birthday was over a week ago and my gifts for her were still waiting behind my office chair!

I’m so slack but I could have sworn her birthday was only 3 days ago!

We spent over an hour together, which was so nice, but I still forgot to give her the metal sign stand and all her art - I think we subconsciously forget stuff so that we have a reason to connect in the future.

After she left, I unpacked the new stock and while I was pricing 72 owls, Adoring Husband strolled through the door and I realised it was 2.30pm! Far out.

I finished pricing and AH and I displayed them in little clusters all over the shop.

We set up the training room for meditation and dragged ourselves to the car at about 3.15pm.

There was plenty to do at home including tending to psychotic dog Ruby’s eye, bringing in some washing, hanging out some washing, photocopying some information for a customer, creating a new meditation sign to stick on the shop door on Wednesdays, designing a new FB post for this weekend’s art workshop, adding some names to the shop’s membership list and emailing the newsletter, checking my emails and starting a new book for processing gift certificates.

Dinner was mango chilli coconut chicken tenders with salad, followed by the lime slice from Su Jus Bar.

Now it’s almost 11pm and I have to be up at 6am for meditation, so I’m outta here!

Nite all.

Shopped til I Stopped

In order ...

Harvey Norman to research laptops for Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair.

Office Works to research Calligraphy pens AND laptops for BGWLBH + I spent $80 because I have no self control.

Su Jus Cafe Bar for GF/DF/refined sugar free slices and muffins plus a green juice.

Shoe Frenzy to check prices of the clothes, bags and wallets that I also sell in my shop. Some of their prices are lower and some are higher.

Fantastic furniture to order two glass cabinets which probably won’t arrive until September, and I purchased two small round tables for the shop.

Spotlight for more canvasses and paint.

Heaps Discount for for more paint, squirt bottles and pouring cups.

JBHIFI to research laptops for BGWLBH.

Dropped off all the purchases to the shop and bought some food for dinner.

Home by 2.30pm to find a big mess made by the dogs which took us an hour to clean up.

Ugh.

Chicken and cabbage for dinner, followed by those yummy slices from Su Jus.

Now it’s time for sleep.

Nite all.

I’m Back!

This video goes for about 5 minutes ... unless they’ve removed it again ... they don’t want you to know how nutrition and your health status can save your life when dealing with COVID-19.



I didn’t feel like doing a blog post last night (Saturday) so I didn’t! 🤪

Saturday was an average kind of sales day and I spent most of the morning adding email addresses to Roz’s Happy Place Membership list as they flowed in to me via private messages, phone calls, messages on the FB page and even a couple of texts..

I made a few tweaks to the inaugural newsletter and sent it out on Saturday night. I forgot to change it to a PDF and some people were unable to open and read it, but they messaged me and I fixed the problem.

I’ve received some positive feedback about the newsletter, so that’s nice.

Most of my Sunday has been spent in bed doing very little that’s productive. It was really about closing my brain to all the work stuff, playing around in FB, Youtube, Twitter and Instagram, watching the footy and inspecting Adoring Husband’s great work in the garden around the pool.

I cooked corned silverside for dinner and did sweet potato in their jackets with snow peas and broccoli on the side. Avocado choc mousse with blueberries for dessert.

 

We’ve planned a big day in The Bay tomorrow so I’d best get some sleep.

Nite all.

Love the Lists

It’s the only way I remember to do all the things!

Lists!

Good sales today.

Paid the rent.

Did some filing.

Boxed up Chicklet’s big dragon and added a couple of cards and a small engagement gift for Vegan Chickie and Prince of Perfection, then sent it in the mail - cost a fortune in postage!

Priced some pre-loved clothing and put them on the rack.

Paid The Jewel for two of her items that I sold.

Created a membership book and a leaflet which explains the concept ...

Stuck three leaflets around the shop.

Spoke to a lady regarding my upcoming journaling workshop.

Created a lay-by book so that I can offer that service to “special” customers.

Made a new ‘to do’ list for next week.

That’s a fairly productive kind of day.

My only home chore was to tend to psychotic dog Ruby’s eye.

I’m looking forward to a quiet Sunday and enjoying some R&R this weekend. My energy levels have improved significantly since I started showing myself some love by feeding my body more nutritious foods.

Today’s nutrition: lemon water, chicken broth, water, coffee, coconut yoghurt with blueberries, strawberries and banana. 2 chicken wings. Fruit whip.

It’s wonderful to not have pain after eating and I can’t believe that I did that to myself for so long.

I wore my smallest jeans to work today because I’ve lost 2kgs and I was able to do them up for the first time in about 18 months.

It’s almost 11pm so it’s sleep time for me.

Nite all.

Productive and Fruitful

In just one short hour of sales, I was happy with my day!

I was also productive enough to create this ...

... which I hope to do every month.

I had a great conversation with a now regular customer about CBD oil and she provided me with some details to follow up.

I received a phone call from Sandy at ‘Lafitte‘ who supply Australian owned and made socks with fabulous colours and patterns. She sent me a catalogue so that I can make an order, which I will do after I find the money to pay rent AND the rates 😳

Making a note in my diary to warn myself when the rates will be due so that I can be prepared!

I had a GREAT conversation with a ‘like-minded’ woman with precisely the same beliefs as I do about COVID-19 and she was even more passionate about it than me!! Who’da thunk!?

For both of us, it was like finding an old friend and to be able to have a genuine conversation without fear of judgement or ridicule was incredibly refreshing.

It’s nice to have a small circle of personal friends to share new information that goes against the mainstream but frustrating as hell that so many frontline workers in the form of doctors, nurses and scientists with first hand experience and who have conducted and published their own research and findings are being censored by all forms of media including television networks, media journalists, and all forms of social media.

I don’t know who is controlling who, or why they’re doing it, but I DO know that Mr Gates has announced that he hopes to make $200 billion out of a vaccine. That means he has a lot to lose if all of the truths are revealed.

Well, I’ve had a good start to my footy tipping this week with the Bunnies defeating the Dragons in the first game of the round. I’m happy about that!

Now it’s time to sleep.

Nite all.

Wicked

What a crazy day.

I was up bright and early in the chilly winter air to be at the shop for meditation at 7am.

It was a full house with three newbies and I had to pull a chair from my desk and sit in the doorway so that I could participate and keep the social distancing rules!

Afterwards some of the ladies got coffee and came back to the training room for a chat, while The Gypsy and I chatted at my desk. We have the deepest philosophical discussions and I always feel enlightened after our time together.

It was an average day of sales and I couldn’t help the man who wanted a beer glass or the lady who wanted a peak cap or the other lady who wanted clothes for an 18mth old.

Twice during the morning, different men came to explore the shop and left claiming that they would tell their wives. Maybe their wives will turn up tomorrow!

I posted a sign on the door explaining that I was closing early and left the shop at 1pm for a special date in The Bay. While I was there, i enjoyed a late lunch at the golf club, did some Christmas shopping and some clothes shopping and was home by 4pm. It was a most enjoyable afternoon.

My nutrition for the day was probably my worst in three weeks. Lemon water, water, coffee, GF Hawaiian pizza, more coffee, choc avocado mousse with frozen blueberries, strawberries, banana, coconut yoghurt and maple toffee.

That’s it for my day and I’m ready for sleep.

Nite all.

Not Enough Hours.

Adoring Husband and I arrived at the shop early enough to clear the training room and set up for morning tea with the girls but all of the larger art pieces were still very wet and trays beneath them were full of running wet paint.

All we could do was slide the tables to one side of the room and hope that an extra few hours would help them dry out.

This left enough room for our small table and some chairs for the girls.

I got to spend about an hour with them before the first customers took my attention. Any time is quality time with the girls, especially when the giggles start!

It was after 11am when I was left to my own devices.

I priced some pre-loved clothing and hung them in the shop, rearranged the new clothing displays so that more clothes would fit on the racks, did some filing, printed some paperwork, wrote some family mail and cleared the table behind the counter to put some of the still wet art out to dry.

AH arrived to help clear the training room, which was a fairly epic event in itself.

We rolled up the full silicone mats and propped them in buckets to catch the paint, then covered them with big garbage bags to stop them spilling in the car.

We moved all the wet art to safe positions where they were out of the way but still able to dry.

We folded the big wet plastic table protectors and put them in big bags to take home and clean.

AH folded the big tables and put them in their usual storage positions.

I vacuumed the floor and we arranged the chairs into their social distancing positions.

It was after 3.30pm when we left the shop.

AH immediately took all of the art paraphernalia outside to hose down and attempt to clean it.

I got changed, fed the dogs, hung out the washing and put another load in, prepared my clothes for tomorrow and then sat down for about 40 minutes before it was time to prepare dinner.

My nutrition for today:  lemon water, coffee, water, 2 chilli chicken wings, eye fillet steak with leftover sweet potato fritters and salad of mixed lettuce, cherry tomato, cucumber, pear, onion, beetroot, avocado and snow peas. Dessert was chocolate mousse made with avocado, coconut cream, coconut oil, dark chocolate, chocolate hemp powder, maple syrup and salt - strawberries and maple nut toffee ...

A lot of effort after a big day at work!

It’s almost 11pm and I have to be up before 6am tomorrow so I’m outta here.

Nite all.

Comparitively

This time last year, in Australia, there had been 430 deaths from seasonal flu.

This year there has been 36 deaths from seasonal flu and 155 deaths from COVID-19.

Every year, in Australia, between 1500 and 3000 people die of seasonal flu. There are 18,000 hospitalisations and 300,000 Drs visits. Follow this link to read about it Seasonal flu stats

I just want to understand why nobody ever cared about high seasonal flu deaths but the entire country has been shut down for Covid and Victoria is panicking about 42 people in intensive care.

The longer this goes on, the more confused I am about EVERYTHING. None of it makes any sense.

Compare the two

Anyway, today has been another day of R&R.

I received a package of bamboo towels and bath mats + king sized bamboo sheets that I ordered last Tuesday ...

My nutrition for the day:  lemon water, chicken broth, coffee, water, coconut yoghurt, strawberries, half duck breast, sweet potato fritters, fruit whip (pineapple, banana, mango, coconut cream, coconut yoghurt, maple syrup, salt).

This evening I played the BBC Radio 2 Pop Master Quiz at 7.30pm. I got 9 points in the first round and 24 points in the second round. Vegan Chickie, Prince of Perfection and his Mum all play together every night and I was invited to play tonight.

I have to invite Adoring Husband and Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair to play too.

Gotta work tomorrow, so I’d best get some sleep.

Nite all.

A Day In

I was not capable of ‘people-ing’ today.

I stayed in bed doing very little until Adoring Husband came in to ask what I wanted for lunch.

While we were in The Bay on Friday, I bought 1kg of green king prawns so they needed to be cooked today.

I fried them in the wok with garlic, butter and honey.

Delicious.

Back to bed for another few hours of nothingness.

Up to prepare dinner of Peking duck.

Back to bed at 8.30pm.

My nutrition today:  lemon water, chicken broth, coffee, water. Lunch of honey prawns and snow peas. Dinner of half a Peking duck breast with half a cup of rice. Dessert was frozen fruit whip of pineapple, banana, mango, coconut cream, coconut yoghurt, maple syrup and some salt.

We had a nice short sharp storm this evening with very strong winds and heavy rain. It blew the ottoman cushion around in the pool area and the rain forced its way through the screen into the outdoor kitchen area.

I have an infected finger.

Absolutely no idea why or how this has happened but I’m dipping it into colloidal silver every couple of hours. It’s hot and throbbing and tight and tender ... that’s my finger I’m talking about 🤪

Ouch.

I may require a pain killer to sleep but I’ll wait and see.

I’m hoping for another lazy day tomorrow.

Now it’s sleep time.

Nite all.

What was I Thinking?

A LOT of people came into the shop today but few were in a purchasing mood.

Luckily for me, the art workshop made up for it!

I stupidly gave the participants four technique options. What was I thinking?

Seven of them chose three different techniques, so this meant that I had to demonstrate all three techniques one after the other, very rapidly because we had to fit a practice piece in and then the main piece.

Prior to that, everybody had to mix their own pouring medium and then mix their own paint colours, so we fit quite a bit into 2.5 hours!

Needless to say, I was mentally exhausted by the end of the workshop.

Normally, the participants help clean up and wash all the tools and cups and cloths but when they headed to the kitchen, Adoring Husband had beaten them to the sink and said “No, it’s ok. I’m right.”

They asked “Are you sure?”

😳

Who was the dumb bunny who had to spend the next hour washing up and clearing the mess??

Me 😭

AH knows now, and filed it under “for future reference” that participants are supposed to help clean up the mess.

Poor AH copped a gob full from this tired little possum.

It was after 4.30pm when we arrived home and thank goodness I had already prepared the lamb shanks the night before and they were sitting in trays just waiting to be reheated. Straight into the oven! Easy peasy.

We watched two and a bit games of footy.

Ate blueberries and strawberries for dessert.

My nutrition for the day: lemon water, bone broth, coffee, watermelon, strawberries, leftover avocado and prawn mixture, literally two mouthfuls of leftover lime cheesecake, lamb shanks, onion, sweet potato, carrot, tomato, mushroom, blueberries, strawberries, banana, nuts. Water.

I forgot to mention the other night when I was talking about the benefits so far of my changed eating habits - I had dropped 1.5kgs after 10 days. A little more would be nice but I won’t be bothered if it doesn’t happen.

It’s after 11pm and I’m in need of sleep.

Nite all.

Jam Packed

Today was another full on, jam packed day.

Not in sales 😳

I set the training room up as best as I could, but still needed supplies, so a trip into The Bay was on my agenda.

My shopping list required visits to Office Works, Pialba Shopping Centre, Bunnings, Spotlight, Heaps Discounts and Coles.

While we were at Pialba, we visited Su Jus Bar (which made the closure announcement a couple weeks ago, but came back from the dead) where we bought a green juice and three sweet treats. Their sweets are GF, DF and refined sugar free, so I got a lime cheesecake slice, a rocky road slice and for Adoring Husband a raspberry muffin.

The universe took good care of me today because there was just one bottle of Floetrol left at Bunnings, the Elmers Glue-all was on sale from $23 down to $17 and even though the paint stocks were low at Heaps Discounts, they had all the colours that I needed.

I now need to fill two art workshops to get a return on what I spent for them today!

We left the shop at 2pm on the dot and returned to the shop at 5.30pm to pick up my laptop, iPad and cash tin.

My nutrition for the day: chicken stock, coffee, filtered water, J5 juice = pear, cucumber, celery, spinach, apple and lime. 6 king prawns mixed in mashed avocado, lemon juice, salt n pepper. Two chicken wings. Half a lime cheesecake slice and 1/3 of a rocky road slice.

All the running around this afternoon in the wet weather has worn me out so I need a good sleep to get me through my huge day of sales and art tomorrow.

I think I wore AH out because we came to bed 20 minutes ago and he is sleeping soundly beside me.

Big Happy birthday wishes to Bubbles who turned 36 today and to The Motivator who can be whatever age she chooses to be!

It’s a chilly evening and I’ve closed the bedroom window, but I must say that the rain has been very refreshing and I think we’ve had about 30mm.

Nite all.

Slowed it Down

I took it a bit easier today.

The training room is now partially set up and I printed out some colour swatches ready for the workshop.

I did a little book work and served some customers.

It was another surprisingly good sales day and I say “surprising” because it rained for most of the day and for this neck of the woods it was quite chilly, so I expected the locals to stay indoors!

There were a lot of people out and about.

I mailed Bubbles’ birthday present and then realised I still had more at home that I should have added - I guess she will receive two parcels!

My nutrition for the day: lemon water, chicken broth, coffee. Lunch was coconut yoghurt with banana and blueberries. Dinner was a chicken thigh with sweet potato discs and mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, onion and baby spinach baked in butter and 2 tablespoons of liver pate stirred through. That was followed by a bowl of watermelon.

AH enjoyed dinner so that’s a bonus.

I’ve put some lamb shanks in the slow cooker which I will set aside for our dinner on Saturday night. Pretty sure I’ll be too exhausted after the art workshop to be spending extended time in the kitchen!

Adoring Husband and I watched a few episodes of a series on Netflix called ‘Good Witch’. It’s a nice easy show to watch. No brain power required and little to no heavy drama ... so far.

I’m off to bed to watch the footy now.

Nite all.

More Chilled

It was an incredibly interesting meditation this morning with The Gypsy going deep into a new discussion that we, as a group, requested a couple of weeks ago.

It inspired great discussion, created a fabulous energy in the room and the class went 15 minutes over time!

Afterwards some of the ladies bought coffee and returned to the training room to chat together, while The Gypsy and I sat at my desk for a catch up.

Just before TG left, my friend Aggie turned up to try on some clothes that she was looking at yesterday. She purchased her selections and then sat with me for a while. We had a good old chin wag  managing global problems, creating world peace and venting about important issues.

There were few customers today and they spent up big OR they lay praise thick and fast about the shop and how beautiful it is with a real ‘Zen’ energy - I can listen to that all day!

Adoring Husband picked up our FROG box from Craignish, unpacked it at home and arrived at the shop to help me close, but I put him to work setting up the tables for Saturday’s art workshop.

It was after 3.30pm when we drove home and Psychotic dog Ruby required my attention as soon as I walked in the door.

I got to sit down for an hour before it was time to prepare dinner. AH cooked on the barbecue while I  did the salad and the last of the hash browns.

Today’s nutrition:  lemon water, filtered water, coffee. Chicken broth for lunch. A raspberry and white chocolate muffin which I did not enjoy because it was tooooooo sweet, so I’m happy to remove that from any future menu. Dinner was 2 sausages with hash browns (I’m so sad to say goodbye to potato) baby spinach, cucumber, raw fresh snow peas, a cherry tomato, half an avocado, sauerkraut and onion. A mandarin for dessert.

Today was day 10 sugar free until that dastardly muffin and what changes have I noticed in my body?

The only reason I wake during the night is to empty my bladder and I am able to fall back into a deep sleep immediately. I’m averaging 7 hours a night. Prior to that I was averaging 4-5 hours of broken sleep.

I’ve had no gut pain for 6 days straight - I can’t eloquently express to you the relief I feel because the pain really was debilitating.

I have loads of energy, which I have not been using efficiently because I’m going and going and going until I can’t go any more. I hope to pace myself better in the future, take breaks and not push it so hard. Just because I’ve got the energy, doesn’t mean I have to use it all up!

I just realised that my joint pain in the mornings has gone. I still have joint pain when I get up off my lounge chair after sitting for an hour or more, so I will monitor that, but morning pain has gone.

That’s it for now. Continuing my health improvements.

Time to sleep or I’ll never fit my seven hours in!

Nite all.

Full Speed

I could NOT have fit another job or activity into today if I tried.

My comfortable shoes were far from comfortable by the end of the day because I barely sat down for a minute.

Morning tea sounded like it was great. Rebel Mardi made a surprise appearance and I think there were eight of us in attendance, but the customers came in earlier than usual and took my attention away. I was also distracted by the packages that were delivered.

The girls got some “first” and “second” dibs on the stock that came in and it was well after 11am when the last of them walked out the door.

In between serving a lot of customers, I unpacked, checked off, priced and displayed five deliveries.

I cleared the folding table behind the counter so that it could be removed and replaced with the new white table that finally arrived from Fantastic Furniture. It was only 6 weeks late.

I vacuumed the training room floor of all the tiny packaging mess so that I could set up the room for meditation.

I attempted to clear off my desk before leaving the shop - it’s my one constant - to come to work every morning with a clear desk to begin my day.

We arrived home at 3.40pm and I got changed and began preparing dinner. I knew if I sat down, there’d be no getting back up! So we were sitting down to dinner at 4.45pm!

I hung out a load of washing before coming to bed at 7.30pm where we watched Big Brother and now I’m writing this blog before the sweet allure of dream time sweeps over me.

My nutrition today:  lemon water, coffee, filtered water, chicken broth for lunch, lamb chop with broccoli, cauliflower, fresh snap peas, sweet potato, onion, garlic and bacon. A mandarin.

I need to sleep now because it’s an early start for meditation.

Nite all.

Oopsy!

Sooooo tired ... again!

As much as I wanted to spend hours in bed, I was up and out the door by 10am.

We arrived at the shop and Adoring Husband attempted to repair a chair, vacuumed the floors and set up a table for my meeting with the supplier.

I cleaned the big sign on the fence and stuck the new sign over the logo, moved the displays from the front of the windows and then cleaned the glass so that I  put two new signs on the top panels. I put the displays back and rearranged the art and craft area.

I sent AH home in the middle of all that.

The supplier arrived a little early and I spent 2.5 hours going through all of his clothing lines. I had a budget but more than doubled it because I wanted it ALL! The beauty of it was that I could take it on the spot - no ordering - no shipping costs - no waiting.

I purchased two items for myself immediately ... that’s the advantage of owning the shop ... first dibs!

After the supplier left, I immediately banked all of my spare cash to cover my costs and picked up a delivery from the post office.

It took me thirty minutes to hang all of the new clothing, which I will price tomorrow.

AH took down the big table and set up the small one for morning tea with the girls.

I packed up all my goods and we came home at 3.30pm.

No rest for the wicked.

I had to bathe psychotic dog Ruby and tend to her eye, do two loads of washing and check my work emails.

My nutrition for the day:  lemon water, chicken broth, filtered water, coffee, chicken wings and a mandarin. Not much! I was too busy to eat and too tired to prepare anything for dinner. AH did the chicken wings.

It’s now 8.30pm and I’m feeling weary and ready for bed.

Nite all.

Sunday Done

This wasn’t my usual type of Sunday.

It was totally and completely unproductive.

No study, no planning, no ticking off the list, no writing, no checking emails, no reading, no work stuff, no nothing.

I did spend all day in my pyjamas but I think I was out of bed at about 9.30am because Adoring Husband wanted to watch the new Paul Hogan movie and I didn’t want to miss it.

It was a weird movie with some big names and an interesting lesson in mainstream media antics. Some strange but familiar characters, a couple of questionable story lines and a warm and fuzzy ending.

Don’t go out of your way to watch it.

My footy tipping this week was pretty dismal with only four out of eight correct.

I received a video of Chicklet finding out about becoming a sister. I’ve replayed it a hundred times and it makes me cry every time. She is so excited.

My nutrition today:  lemon water, chicken broth, water, coffee.

Lunch of bacon, baby spinach, mushroom, onion, snow peas, tomatoes, sauerkraut and leftover guacamole.

Dinner of eye fillet, cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, snow peas and sweet potato followed by a juice of cucumber, celery, baby spinach, apple, mint, coconut water and water.

We watched the final of The Voice which was a disappointing result. I think the Hillsong Church may have used their numbers to bring it home for the winner. Yes, he is very talented and deserves success, but I thought others were better. Australia decided.

I’ve got a big day planned for tomorrow, putting up the remaining signage, cleaning the shop loo and vacuuming the carpets, washing the glass doors, taking some deliveries and meeting with a supplier.

Time for me to sleep (7.5 hours of sound sleep last night).

Nite all.