Catch Up

I'm still attempting to catch up.

I didn't realise how far I'd fallen behind with everything in the last month and how many things I'd put off until I had more time.

Not only that, but trying to fit in all the 'things' that we want to do in the time that we have available is positively wearing me out!

Knowing that I'll have another three days to play with next week certainly takes the pressure off.

Today, while Adoring Husband ordered our coffee, I spent a short fifteen minutes at the local markets where I supported some local stall holders (aka spent money!).

We drove to Springvale plant nursery where we priced some big buddhas, water features and plant pots for landscaping around the pool. We found a large water feature buddha that we love and it currently sits on top of our wish list.

While we were there, I fell in love with a mirror that I simply had to have! You know ... sometimes you see something and you know it was meant for you? This was it for me ...

I know that you're a little surprised by this purchase because you probably don't consider me to be a 'bee' person. This is my symbol for 'Lucky Bitch' and I am definitely one of those!

After we finished viewing and pricing their vast array of garden statues, water features and pots, we drove to another location where we checked the prices of some of the same items. I was surprised to discover that the supposedly cheap shop "Truckloads" (you know ... the equivalent of Flash Harrys) was $300 dearer than any of the other five suppliers so far!

They did however, have an amazing metal dragon almost as tall as me, made out of shiny silver metal. If the price was more reasonable OR if it doubled as a water feature or did something interesting, it would have gone to the top of my wish list. The price was astronomical for what it was.

While we were at the shopping mall, which is one that we rarely get to on our trips into The Bay, I simply had to slip in some personal shopping so I bought myself three tops and two pairs of shoes.

A quick trip to Stocklands to purchase some desperately needed bras, then a stop at Harvey Normans to pick up the photos that I ordered yesterday and we rushed home to make it to Blonde Bombshell's house for her La Reve party which began at 1pm.

I did enjoy myself while I was there - of course a couple of glasses of wine helped! I ordered some more reed diffusers and a couple of gifts to put away for Christmas. I made a wish list for the next party which will probably be at The Happy Abode in September.

There was good food, good friends, some good laughs and more than two hours later, The Motivator dropped me home.

I'm feeling pretty exhausted after such a busy day. I've been awake since 5.45am and tomorrow we are taking our chooks to Gundiah, where Best Cousin in the World is going to take possession of them. Lunch will be served and we'll have to return mid afternoon for Adoring Husband to meet a commitment.

It's only 8.30pm but it feels like 10.30pm. That'll teach me for drinking wine! It's been a long time since I drank wine.

Have a wonderful Sunday!

Nite all.

Day Out With My Man

There was no sleeping in this morning.

I had to put all the photos that I wanted to print onto a USB stick to take into town with me and I had to hang a large load of washing on the line and then write a 'to do' list so that we didn't forget anything while we were in The Bay.

The 'to do' list was left at home *rolls eyes* so I had to rely on my memory, which surprisingly, did not let me down!

First on our agenda, was to go to the cinema to see 'Mama Mia! Here We Go Again'

It was amazing and I loved every second of it! I can't wait to see it again!

From there, Adoring Husband and I went in search of some interesting things to add to the landscaping of our pool. I've decided that, if possible, I want something completely different.

My original plan was to have a big buddha in the corner, but I'll try to find something else that is unique and beautiful that still invokes a feeling of peace and harmony. We'll see what pops up.

Tomorrow, we will visit a couple of the big plant nurseries that stock large water features and statues to see what they have to offer.

Eventually, time was running out, so we did some grocery shopping and then headed to Harvey Norman so that I could order some new photo prints for the shop. It's time to change things up a bit and add some new prints to our walls.

It's also time for me to get out and about with my camera to capture some more local images, as well as put together a calendar of local pics for 2019.

So much to do!

We arrived home in time to feed the psychotic dogs, make a quick change and AH drove me to the club for my usual Friday night.

I had some luck on the pokies and it was a quiet night up there for the raffles with lots of empty tables.

I posted my sunset photo onto the Flickr website yesterday and as I type this, it has had 23,000 views!! My phone buzzes every time somebody adds it to their 'favourites' and almost 300 people have done that. The buzzing is becoming quite annoying ha.

It's just gone past 10pm so I'm off to bed. I have a big day planned tomorrow, including a party at 1pm.

Nite all.

New Hair Day

I didn't have to get out of bed until 11am.

I had a midday hair appointment, so I had to get up at 11am to make myself presentable for public viewing.

Adoring Husband dropped me off at the hairdressers so that he could pick me up afterwards and drive to Bambooland to price their bamboo sheets, with which we are going to line two of our existing fences around the pool.

But firstly, I have to say that my visit to the hairdressers was fabulous. I love my hair, but I just happened to run into a lady that I met almost a year ago, who lives in our street, but her illness keeps her indoors the majority of the time.

She had her back to me but heard my voice and called me over, introducing herself to me again. We spent the next two hours chatting up a storm, talking about everything and anything. It was thoroughly enjoyable and it was very noticeable how the energy in the shop changed when she left.

My hairdresser told me that she thought my son was 'hot'.  She saw him with us outside the cafe one afternoon and then she almost accidentally ran him over as she left her driveway another time. She said it wouldn't have mattered because she'd have gladly given him mouth to mouth to save him!

Almost three hours later, I left the salon with my lovely new hair and feeling very happy.

At Bambooland, AH and I found some stunning planter pots and I selected three different sizes, a 'possible' buddha water feature and a Bali bench seat that is also on the 'possible' list.

If I was 'into' elephants, there was an amazing elephant water feature that was reasonably priced.

We weren't there very long but saw and priced everything that we were interested in and can now compare prices elsewhere.

When we returned home, we did some grocery shopping and then I spent the next hour and a bit in the kitchen making cauliflower patties and a chicken curry. The cauliflower patties took a lot longer than I expected, but they were delicious.

Adoring Husband headed off to SES for the evening and I did some washing, cleaned up the kitchen and then sorted through my photos so that I could put them all on a USB stick and will decide tomorrow which ones I'll print for the shop.

My hairdresser said that she is interested in doing my next photography workshop and she thinks her girlfriend would do it with her. But first, she needs to get a camera!

Anyway, it's now after 11pm. Adoring Husband is home and trying to sleep while I tap away on my keyboard, so I'll sign off here.

Nite all.

On A Break!

That's me.

I'm officially on a break.

How funny that I'm hesitant to take this break! I love The Happy Abode and while I know I NEED to take this break, I certainly don't WANT to take it.

It's a forced, self imposed break so that I don't reach a point where I'm not having fun.

It was a slow day for sales in the shop until the last half hour, when a few customers came in and then right on closing time, one lady asked if she could have a look. She found much to fall in love with, so piled the items on the counter and lifted our sales to better than acceptable!

The Motivator and I had some fun and practiced some silliness. We made another stock order and listed some stuff from another supplier. I think we're going to busy next week when all of this stock arrives at the shop. Trying to figure out where it goes will be fun.

Adoring Husband made a casserole in the slow cooker today, so I didn't have to prepare dinner at all and could spend the afternoon and evening relaxing. He's definitely a keeper.

I had another look at the photos of the sunset last night and came up with this ...

Now I think it's time for bed. I have a hair appointment at midday tomorrow and I intend on staying in bed until the very last minute!

Nite all.

This Close!

We began our Tuesday in the usual way ... enjoying coffee and a good laugh with the ladies in our lounge area. There were eight of us in attendance.

It was 11am when the last lady left and by then I think we'd had one small sale in the shop.

One of our suppliers of local art/craft came into the shop at that point and spent some time chatting and showing us some of his new work.

It was after he left that things began to pick up big time.

We were so close to breaking our highest sales record today.

It was such a slow morning, I wondered if we might break our lowest sales record!

By late afternoon, we were feeling confident enough to begin an order with a new supplier, so we did a quick search and selected some items that we thought would serve us well for Father's Day.

At the end of the day, we were feeling pretty pleased with ourselves, so it was hugs all round and smiles on our dials as we said our goodbyes.

This is the first Tuesday of the month, which means our monthly neighbourhood barbecue at the river, so Adoring Husband and I did a quick grocery shop and headed home to prepare our salad and stack our esky with all the goodies to take with us.

Because I'd had the photography workshop on the weekend, my camera gear was all packed in the bag and ready to go, so I took it with me hoping that our sunset would be worth the effort.

Just when it felt like the cloud cover might smother the colour, it gradually changed and became brighter and more fiery by the minute ...

What a spectacle! With every minute that passed, the colours and the light kept changing.

There were lots of people out with their phones and their cameras capturing the beauty of it. It triggered lots of conversations between strangers and all of us agreed in the glory of Mother Nature.

Soon enough after we ate our barbecue dinner, it began to get quite cool and we headed home, but it was nice to catch up with our neighbours, who, surprisingly, we really only see once a month at these barbecues!

It's after 11pm and I need to be up early for meditation tomorrow, so I'd best get some sleep.

Nite all.

Let's Go Shopping!

The Motivator has returned!

It was the slowest day in the shop that we've had for weeks, so The Motivator and I went shopping!

We spent the entire afternoon online ordering new stock. Some to replace the stuff we've sold out of and some new stuff to cater to Father's Day and some new stuff 'just because'.

Some Pure Essential Oils, new handbags and wallets, a new black and red scarf for someone special, some Intrinsic affirmation cards and some men's wallets, man bags and bumbags.

The Gypsy was booked out today, but customers were few and far between. The two who came rushing into the shop just after 3pm when we were closing, made up half of our sales for the day!

The supermarket and the butcher complained loudly about how quiet it was for them too, so it wasn't just us.

I'll probably take a couple of days off at the end of the week to catch up on some housework, deliver our chooks to Gundiah and set out a plan for Adoring Husband to start clearing the yard in preparation for the pool.

I'm looking forward to coffee with some of the girls tomorrow morning and probably ordering some stock from some new suppliers with The Motivator.

Meanwhile, I'm off for an early night *yawn*

Nite all.

Missing in Action

This month's photography workshop originally had seven people listed, a family of three pulled out due to a death in the family, one woman had to withdraw due to her work roster, one man pulled out but asked to do the next one and another lady just never returned my calls. This meant that just three days before the workshop was to commence, I had ONE person left!

After a few phone calls, a few emails and an announcement at my talk the other day, two more came to the party and I could still run the workshop with three fabulous participants ...

It was another great workshop and they were lovely people whose company was a real pleasure, which made the weekend really enjoyable.

I would like to share this story highlighting my weak (some might say 'complete lack of') organisational skills.

I was running a 'Photography for Beginners' workshop this weekend.

On Thursday afternoon, I began setting up, but couldn't find my worksheets or course material.

I searched all through the shop to no avail, but wasn't too concerned, believing that I had taken it all home after the previous workshop.

That evening, I searched all through the house to avail, and this time I was very concerned because I had no idea what had happened to it all!

Nowhere to be found.

Back to work on Friday where I logged into the Photography Course file on my iMac and discovered that only about one third of it is stored there.

Ugh.

So I printed out what was there, knowing that the remaining two thirds was on my MacBook at home.

Still not concerned, I came home on Friday afternoon, got ready and went out for my usual Friday night at the club.

We came home from there a bit after 7.30pm and cooked dinner, sat down to eat it while watching the football, after which (by this time, it's 10pm) I put my MacBook on my lap and began the search for the remaining course material.

To my dismay, the information sheets were there but my 'example' photos were not.

Ugh.

Seriously?!

I spent the evening printing the info sheets and then searching for new photos to print. My originals were not on file, so I had to search for and print new example photos.

Then I had to put it all in order in preparation for day one of the workshop.

I made extra copies to set aside for future emergencies.

It was 1am when I finally made it to bed.

Hence no blog post for Friday night.

Day two of my workshop is always only partially planned because the participants always ask at least one question on the first day, for which I do not have an answer, so I write the question/s down, research the answer and provide new information sheets on day two.

One of the participants this weekend was a little more advanced than the others and asked questions that a true beginner would not think of, so Saturday night was about creating a new information sheet for day two.

While I was doing that, I thought of something else so I worked on that to add to day two.

It was after 11pm when I headed to bed, hence no blog post on Saturday night!

Ask me where all of my course material is right now? Right now, as I sit here writing this blog post, I have no bloody idea where my course material is ... not even the extras that I printed for emergencies!

There is no hope for me.

Nite all.

Who Knew?

Who knew that this time of year would be so busy?

September was our first month of business last year and it was crazy busy for two weeks of the school holidays, but this past three weeks has been totally unexpected and so much better than we could have hoped for.

Thankfully, it has come in the form of a steady flow of customers through the door, and at no time was there a long queue of people becoming impatient with me because they weren't getting served quickly enough!

So even though it's been busy, it has also been easy and enjoyable and quite fulfilling.

The fact that it's all been so manageable without The Motivator on board is both a surprise and a relief.

Today was another great day for business.

Adoring Husband came to cover for me at The Happy Abode this afternoon when I had to attend the Friendship Group at the local hall to give a talk on photography. I was gone for an hour and by the time I'd returned, he had taken a sale and closed the shop.

What a legend.

I think my talk went well. There were a few questions and everyone was keen to look at my photo book and touch my camera. There were a couple of enquiries about the workshop this weekend, so maybe they will come see me tomorrow to book in and fill my class.

I had a rough night last night with cramps. The toes on my left leg were all sticking straight up, my foot was cramping to the right, my calf and my shin were cramping to the left and my thigh was cramping to the right.

I couldn't walk, I couldn't stretch anything because all the muscles were cramping in opposite directions and try as I might with breathing and focussing, I couldn't relax any of the muscles. It lasted for about fifteen long minutes and I almost woke Adoring Husband to help me!

While sitting on the couch tonight, I've had some more cramps in my feet, so AH has filled a small square tub with warm water and dumped some of the magnesium mineral salts that our pool guy gave us into it and my feet are now soaking.

It feels so nice.

AH also made a hot honey and lemon drink to help with this stupid runny nose that is annoying me. It comes and goes during the day, so it doesn't even feel like a cold ... it feels more like an allergy of some sort, but I can't pinpoint what it could be. It seems to be worse at home, so I need to be more aware of what I'm doing and where I'm doing it!

We're watching the first NRL game of the week and my Broncos are losing at half time to a team that is equal second last on the ladder! I'll watch the second half and then head to bed.

Big day tomorrow, so hopefully cramps won't disturb my sleep again tonight.

We didn't win OzLotto OR Powerball this week, but they've jackpotted and are now worth $70million and $80million so I'm willing to win one of those next week. I still promise to share with a LOT of people.

Nite all.

  

Quietly Does It

After Monday and Tuesday madness in the shop, it was a very quiet Wednesday.

I priced some new stock and rearranged some displays, chatted with The Gypsy, met some new customers and this afternoon I welcomed The Motivator for her first, but brief visit to The Happy Abode, since she returned from Sydney with the flu.

Adoring Husband helped me close the shop and I rode home to make an early dinner so that we could attend the trivia night at the club. I have no idea where we came out of the eleven teams, but I have one thing to say to Adoring Husband ...

CUBA!!! (you had to be there)

He did a really good job on the final round, which was a picture round of 'tools' and he named them all.

We've come home to watch the iconic movie 'Mean Girls'

Tomorrow, I have to give a talk to the local 'Friendship Group' so Adoring Husband will look after the shop from about 2.40pm so that I can walk over to the hall and talk about photography! I have no idea what I'm going to say, but as usual, I will wing it and it will all work out in the end.

I think it might be time for me to climb into my warm bed ... there is a definite chill in the air tonight.

Nite all.

Not According to Plan

My day did NOT go according to plan.

I mentioned yesterday that I would leave early enough to visit the Seat of Knowledge this morning, but it was so cold, I wasn't prepared to slide out from under my toasty warm doona until the very last minute.

So, I arrived at work with just enough time to go buy a coffee before opening the shop.

Three of my girls arrived right on time - just as I received a phone call from OzCare confirming that they were bringing a group to the shop for morning tea and a shopping trip!

What?

It seems that 'someone' had spoken to The motivator about whether we had the facilities to accommodate a morning tea group which would be followed by a shopping spree in the shop. She confirmed that we did, but there were no concrete arrangements made.

A month ago, The Blonde Bombshell told me about the OzCare newsletter that stated there was going to be a trip to Burrum Heads to have morning tea at The Happy Abode, followed by shopping, followed by lunch at Lions Park.

The Motivator and I had a discussion and I assumed that someone from OzCare would contact us to verify the trip before the date.

That did not occur. Instead, they phoned the shop at 9am today, to confirm that they would arrive for morning tea at 10am!

*Panic*

No need to panic. They brought their own food/tea/coffee/cups, so all I needed to do was set up a table in our training room, and they did the rest. They cleaned up their own mess and then filled the shop with their walking sticks and wheelie walkers as they shopped until they almost dropped.

One gorgeous lady, who was wearing a big purple woolly coat, was a hugger and she and I shared three very long cuddly hugs before she bought one of our little frog ornaments.

Another lady wanted a snap button glasses hanger but the conversation consisted of :

Her - 'I would like a glasses hanger with that owl button'

Me - 'Yes of course. Here you are' as I handed it to her.

Her - 'So I just wear it as a necklace?'

Me - 'No, you wear it like this' I demonstrate on myself how it is worn.

Her - 'Oh how marvellous! So I just wear it as a necklace?'

Me - 'No, it's a glasses hanger. You wear it like this' I demonstrate again.

Her - 'Oh what a wonderful idea! So I just wear it like a necklace?'

Me - 'No, you wear it like this.' I put it on her blouse and hang her glasses on it.

Her - 'Oh that's wonderful! Do you just slide the necklace through the hook?'

Me - 'No, you just wear it on your blouse. It's like a brooch with a loop to hang your glasses from'

Her - 'Oh what a marvellous idea. It's such an unusual necklace.'

She was such a lovely thing and terribly happy to have a new necklace that wasn't a necklace at all.

Having said that, both of the carers saw the glasses hanger and decided that they needed one each for themselves.

Three ladies chose bright colourful scarves and put them on before they walked out the door.

One of the ladies dropped her wallet on the floor, which I discovered just before they left the carpark, so I was able to run outside and hand it back before they disappeared.

During all of this, Reality TV Queen arrived late for morning tea and sat in our lounge area waiting patiently for everyone to leave so that we could catch up. It's been a long time between visits and there was plenty to discuss, but we were interrupted often by a regular stream of customers.

Adoring Husband visited as she was leaving and did a lunch run.

The Telstra guy arrived to instal the new NBN modem which won't be connected for some weeks yet.  He gave me a list of worst case scenarios and what I should do if they occur.

I received a phone call from a lady wanting to enrol in my photography workshop.

All the while, I was rapidly using up a box of tissues as my nose was running like a tap! It's ok because I feel well enough, I just have a runny nose. Most annoying!

My last customer left the shop at about 3.30pm. I cleared the table and chairs from the training room in preparation for meditation tomorrow morning. I priced some new jewellery stock and rearranged some displays to fit them in the shop. I added up the takings for the day. I dropped off some mail to The Motivator on the way home.

Adoring Husband had helped me close the shop, checked the mail with me and we grabbed a late coffee. He brought home a bag of goodies for me and dropped off our signed contract to the pool builder.

I arrived home and sat for an hour before making a roast pumpkin/roast cauliflower/spinach and pine nut salad with crispy skinned chicken for dinner. What a bloody mess I made of the kitchen!

I broke my own sales record in the shop today, so I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself, but it was so busy and mostly unexpected and unplanned.

In spite of all that, I loved every minute of it. It was a great day that had me smiling most of the time and I am feeling incredibly grateful for the life that I have right now.

My Adoring Husband is amazing and every day I feel lucky to have him as my partner and friend. He makes everything so much easier (most of the time), he fills my life with love and I feel totally nurtured.

While the word 'Fearless' had centre spot on my vision board this year, the word 'Happy' has been pretty much first and foremost and centre stage in my life.

Life is good.

Nite all.

Manic Monday

I assumed that today would be very quiet in The Happy Abode.

I thought that everybody would have spent all their money at the Childers Multicultural Festival and that people would be having a very quiet week, not spending money and staying at home to recover.

I was wrong.

Today was non stop busy until the afternoon. Not a soul walked through the door in that last 90 minutes, but it didn't matter. It was nice to just sit and breathe and tidy up and fill the gaps that the customers had made in the displays when selecting their purchases.

Adoring Husband brought the vacuum cleaner to work this morning so that I could vacuum the very leafy floor. The guy from the real estate office chopped down some branches from the trees last week and for some reason, dragged them to the front of our shop to put them in a trailer, which left a trail of dead leaves to blow through our doors.

It felt much better to have a clean floor.

Some more snap buttons arrived in the mail, as did some lovely earrings.

The Gypsy had a busy day and is almost booked out for Wednesday as well.

We are having perfect Winter weather at the moment and I might make a quick visit to the Seat of Knowledge on the way to work tomorrow, so that I can check out that gloriously crystal clear water in the river.

I'm looking forward to seeing the girls at coffee tomorrow and at the end of the day, I'm looking forward to winning $50 million in Oz Lotto. No, really! I can feel it in my bones! I promise to share!

The Motivator is still under the weather and won't be at work for a few days. I visited her this afternoon and got her up to speed with what's been happening while she has been away, caught up on some gossip, swapped some important 'stuff' and hugged her germy body!

I'm off to bed now - after a quick dose of warm lemon and honey - just as a precaution haha.

Nite all.

Multi-fun Day

The 'Happy' song blasted me awake this morning at 6am ... and I mean BLASTED! It was a sudden awakening and there was no going back from there.

We showered and gathered our goods, drove to our regular coffee haunt (just in case we couldn't get a  good coffee at the festival) and then headed off to Childers for the Multicultural Festival.

Our usual parking area was open and we were given the perfect parking space which was beautifully shaded when we returned three hours later.

We (meaning 'I') spent a lot of money on some wonderfully unique, hand crafted pieces that were obviously made with love, and for the creators I feel much respect and appreciation.

Adoring Husband bought me a fork.

A fork lovingly treated and polished and shaped into the most beautiful bracelet ...

I love it ... even though AH declared "it's a &%#$ expensive fork!"

He also bought me a clay fish ...

... to replace the fish that suffered an unfortunate accident at The Happy Abode recently. I couldn't get exactly the same colour, but I think I prefer this colour anyway. It can be used to burn mosquito coils or citronella candles and it will look fabulous in the area around our new pool when it's built!

We made the decision, just this afternoon, to purchase a concrete pool and the build will commence at the end of September. How exciting!

Back to the Festival ... I bought myself a new wallet, which can also have a strap attached to make it a cross body bag. It's hand crafted leather and I looked at these last year, but didn't buy. I'm really happy to have this one now ...

I also bought a new evening bag.

I found a deliciously big citrine crystal, a blue kyanite and a jade buddha. I've been searching for a jade figurine for a while, so I was pretty chuffed to find this one today.

I also bought a few gifts for special people, which of course, I won't share here.

We ate German Kransky for lunch and drank fresh iced lemon and ginger tea (AH had mixed berry).

It was a glorious day and thank goodness we got there so early because by 11am, the crowds were crazy and it was difficult to move freely, so we escaped and arrived home by midday with a fresh coffee, again, from our local.

The Motivator arrived home from Sydney today, but sadly, she is sick with the flu and won't be at the shop for a couple of days.

Psychotic dog, Jack, has been having trouble with muscle cramps again and the magnesium oil wasn't working as well or as quickly as we hoped, so our pool people gave us a bucket of mineral salts. We gave Jack a warm bath in the laundry tub with half a cup of the mineral salts in it and he seems to have settled considerably since then.

I think he might be having regular swims in our pool once it's in the ground.

Now, I think it's time for bed. It's been a big day.

Nite all.

Productive

I was up bright and early this morning with the intention of checking out the blood moon/eclipse, but there was a heavy fog and I couldn't see any moon from any point in my back yard.

Adoring Husband said he saw it earlier in the morning when he was out and about.

So, instead, I cleaned the bathroom.

I just want to put it out there ... I hate cleaning ... ugh ... I want a cleaning fairy to come to my house every night while I sleep and make my house immaculate. Walls, windows, blinds, floors, cupboards, bathrooms, dusting, ironing, decluttering, pantry, fridge, fans etc etc etc.

I don't think that's asking for too much.

I still had time to visit the boys at the Seat of Knowledge on my way to work, grab a coffee and then walk into the shop at 8.50am.

I hugged The Happy Abode ... I always have that warm and fuzzy feeling when I walk through the door ... and I thanked the Universe for helping us create such a wonderful space ... it's all about the gratitude.

The day was crazy busy!

The staff at the supermarket complained that it was incredibly quiet, but I had people through the door all morning and took almost double what we usually do on a Saturday. If I wasn't committed to an appointment, I would have stayed open til at least 3pm.

After I did a grocery shop, I arrived home and put a batch of bone broth in the slow cooker (I had my last container of broth yesterday and there was none for me to have for breakfast this morning) and then cleaned the glass corner table, cleaned the handles on the fridge and the freezer and washed a window before that 2pm appointment arrived.

We had a third pool company come in to do a quote, which should be sent through to my email tomorrow. So far, just going by the meeting, I prefer this one, but it's all about the price, so we'll wait and see.

After they left, we made our way into the lounge room to watch the footy. I was one of three people in the footy tipping who picked Manly to defeat Penrith and I was excited momentarily when Manly was winning by a BIG margin and I believed that I had moved closer to AH n the footy tipping ladder. Alas, in the final seven minutes of the game, Penrith scored four tries to surpass Manly's score and I was left feeling disappointed and frustrated.

Between football games, I hung out two loads of washing, put another load in the machine, brought in the dry clothes and folded them,  bathed one of the dogs, cooked dinner and then parked my butt permanently on the couch.

I'm feeling pretty energised today. I hope it lasts for tomorrow because we are driving to Childers for the Multicultural Festival. We LOVE this yearly festival and I'm hoping to get some natural crystals while we're there.

I guess this means that I should get some sleep!

Nite all.    

Surprise Surprise

I sold a photo today!

That's two photos in a week!

It was a very slow day in the shop.

I met a crystal healer and a holistic healer - not together - one of them was a big talker and spent 40 minutes talking to me while booking an appointment to see The Gypsy for next week.

The other was very softly spoken and selected one of our lovely selenite towers to add to her healing collection.

There was some gift selections by a couple of customers, and one asked me to set hers aside, promising to return tomorrow to pay for them. We often have people pop in during their daily walk without any cash on them and they either ask us to put something aside or they return later with money to purchase.

We donated some gifts for the big Heart Foundation raffle being run by the Bowls Club which will be drawn next weekend. The gentleman in charge of that dropped by to pick up the package.

I printed out some leaflets for my photography workshop and put them on the tables outside the supermarket.

I spoke to Telstra about our appointment next Tuesday to have the NBN connected.

I booked three appointments for The Gypsy.

I ate a punnet of raspberries.

I filled an online shopping cart with Ivy's products - we are almost out of Ivy's bags and purses!

I was out the door at 3.30pm and pedalling home to prepare for my Friday night at the Club.

I was a winner tonight, winning a variety meat pack!

Now I need to sleep.

Nite all.

Australia's Got Talent

I posted this on Facebook and it was the  highlight of my day ...

*** Weirdest thing just happened ... you know how all of you who know me have told me, at some time, to shut up when I sing? Yes, pretty much every single one of you!

Well ... I was singing a Carole King song in the shop this morning while two ladies were browsing.

I was thinking to myself "Poor things .. but it's my shop and it's the price you pay for walking through the door."

One of them walked up to the counter and looked me straight in the eye. She said "You have a beautiful tone when you sing. Even when you hum, it sounds lovely!"

I looked at her and waited for the punch line and she could see the disbelief in my eyes, so she said "I'm serious!"

She made my day - which is why I'm taking this moment to brag.

Thank you very much (in my best Elvis Presley voice)***

The reason I make such a big deal of this is because I KNOW I have a terrible singing voice. I recorded myself singing "I Honestly Love You" when I was a teenager. Until I heard that recording, I believed that I could sing.

I remember the devastating disappointment when I realised that I was tone deaf and would never be a famous singing star!

Many people, during my life, have laughed hysterically at my singing.

Many people have told me to 'not give up my day job' when listening to my singing.

Even Adoring Husband, who loves me, has asked me to NOT sing.

This is why I make such a big deal of today's experience with the lovely lady who told me I have a beautiful tone.

Aside from that, for the first time, I've signed up a male to my next photography workshop. There should actually be two or three males in this class, so that will be interesting ... and very different.

It was a good day in the shop, with quite a few new customers ... and still the locals' catch cry "I didn't know you were here" is echoing in my ears.

I made an appointment for a third pool quote. This will be a concrete pool, instead of fibreglass, and they're coming to see us on Saturday afternoon. A decision will be made very soon after that.

Now I'm going to watch the second half of the footy between my team and Adoring Husband's team. Fingers crossed that my team wins!

Nite all.

Happy Hump Day

Lots of new snap jewellery arrived today, including the new glasses hangers ...

... everybody wants the glasses hangers and the last customer bought seven of them. She wanted ten, but I only had seven left! Now we have seventy of them!

We have around 900 different buttons to choose from, including these lovely new rose gold buttons on the bottom half of this tray.

I spent a lot of time unpacking and pricing and separating and rebagging and rearranging the trays. Tomorrow I will rearrange the button drawers and the jewellery drawers, because there was a box of new pendants and bracelets delivered today and the drawers are all looking a bit out of control at the moment!

It's just like Christmas when the boxes arrive - there are always surprises because we can never remember everything that we ordered.

Meditation was great this morning and it seems Wednesdays are much better for me, for The Gypsy and for others - especially starting fifteen minutes later than usual. It's amazing the difference fifteen minutes can make.

I enjoyed my chats with The Gypsy between customers today. We always have lively conversations analysing and making fun of ourselves and the strange ways that our minds trick us. Always enlightening and insightful!

The afternoon was VERY quiet and not a soul walked through the doors after 1.30pm. I still had a lot to do so I didn't close the doors until almost 4.30pm, but still ... nobody came!

The Butcher only had five customers all day and he was complaining about how quiet it was. Even The Happy Abode had more than five customers and we're hidden up the back!

As every customer leaves our shop, I ask them to spread the word and it seems that they are all doing exactly that. Some take extra business cards to pass around, some take our postcards and some just walk out the door excited to tell all and sundry about the beautiful little shop hidden behind Elders.

But still the locals are coming through the doors saying "We didn't even know you were here!"

After TEN MONTHS!

If I had a secret that I didn't want anyone to know about, the whole town would know in matter of days! But when we WANT the whole town to know about our little shop, it takes a year or more for the word to spread!

Go figure!

Anyway, it's after 10pm so I'm off to bed. Sleep time for me.

Nite all.  

The Craziness Continues

It was crazy busy in The Happy Abode today with lots of new customers.

A customer on Saturday asked if she could take a handful of our postcards to hand out at the caravan park, so I handed her about twenty postcards.

She returned to the shop on Monday and told me that she had handed them all out to everyone she saw in the park.

I'm certain that all of those people who received a card came into the shop today, all gasping in awe at our shop and all of them wanting to spend money.

I sold one of my photos to a lady who had just moved into her brand new house in town and needed something special for her entry area. What an honour!

It was a big day and I had to draw the winner of our '300 likes' on the Facebook page celebration. The winner won over $100 worth of beautiful products from The Happy Abode.

It's now almost 11.30pm and I need to be up really early for meditation in the morning, so I'm outta here.

I've done my Deepak Chopra meditation for the night - I'm doing a 21 Day challenge - The Energy of Attraction - to bring health and happiness to our lives. Today is day two. There is a message for each day, a twenty minute meditation with Sanskrit Mantra and three or four journal entries where a question is asked and we write our thoughts, experiences and desires.

I do like Deepak Chopra and fall asleep to his 'Perfect Health' meditation every night.

If I don't go to sleep now, I'm going to struggle to get out of bed in the morning.

So ... nite all.

Local Connection

How strange that in the last few days, I've had three different locals tell me that they hadn't been to The Happy Abode because they thought it was a hippie new age type of shop and that's the type of thing that they're not interested in.

There were quite a few locals who came into the shop today, straight from 'craft' because they admired some jewellery that one of the ladies was wearing and were told it came from The Happy Abode.

As usual, they were pleasantly surprised by what they saw and heaped praise in our direction.

Another lady said that we had obviously worked hard to create a harmonious and welcoming environment with a warm atmosphere and that she loved being in the space.

On the weekend, at the markets, I commissioned a lady to create a bracelet for me and today, she delivered it to me at the shop ...

... the light is not good because I took the photo tonight beside a table lamp, but I *LOVE* it so much!  It's blue and silver and I especially love those big shiny silver dragon heads to remind me of Chicklet!

Here is the updated photo of the display that I changed last week ...

I did some more rearranging today and I spent some time with a lady who came especially to see me because her husband has been diagnosed with Parkinson's. Somebody told her that I might be able to offer some advice.

We chatted for about half an hour and then it got busy in the shop, so she left with an open invitation to return any time. We had a good chat and I think she was relieved to get a lot off her chest.

The Gypsy was in today and was booked out for the morning, but had to leave early to run an errand in Gympie. She's almost booked out for Wednesday too.

Adoring Husband was kind enough to come to the shop and do some 'lunch' shopping for me - an avocado, some shallots, a lemon and some smoked ham with a coffee. He then returned at 3pm to help me close the shop.

Some new snap jewellery arrived in the mail today and there should be more arriving every day this week and next.

Before I head off to bed, I must offer some birthday wishes!!

Happy birthday to my 'much cleverer than bubbles' daughter who reminds me of my favourite AA Milne quote ...

I hope you have the most fabulous day ever!

... and to The Motivator who still hasn't caught up to me ...

I hope you have an amazing day in Sydney with your family and you get to feel the love.

Obviously 24th July is a very special date producing very special people!

Nite all.

Super Sunday

I've had a super Sunday.

My only achievement was getting my washing done.

Adoring Husband found this in Facebook, which describes my Sundays perfectly!

Who knew that other people do this cocooning thing on Sundays?

I gained two points on Adoring Husband in the footy tipping comp!

There was a blackout during the night. I got out of bed at around 4.30pm to go to the bathroom, but when I switched on the light, nothing happened. In my sleepy head, I though to myself "Damned light has blown. Must tell AH in the morning."

I realised as I opened the bathroom door to return to the bedroom, that the street lights were out and it was VERY dark in the bedroom. No idea why the blackout occurred and I'm not even sure what time the power came back on, but that's the only thing of interest that happened during my Sunday.

So I'm off to bed for an early night. No early meditation tomorrow because we've changed it to Wednesdays.

I thought I'd share these before I go ...

Nite all.

Super Saturday

Beautiful Winter's day today!

It was busy for a Saturday, which was surprising considering the big Coal Fest was on in Howard today.

I met and had a long chat with an amazing 85yr old woman. I guessed her to be in her early seventies, so when she told me her age, I was truly amazed! Very strong and fit. Sharp as a tack and bright as a button, with fabulous stories to tell about her life ... and what a life she's lived! We only talked for about 30 minutes but I could have comfortably spent the day with her.

I thanked her for coming into the shop (she contributed nicely to our takings for the day) and told her how much I enjoyed our chat and how pleased I was to have met her. She said that she would return and wished us the best of luck with our shop.

She was the best part of my day.

Adoring Husband and I closed the shop a little after 1.30pm and did some grocery shopping before he drove off for home.

As I was pedalling back past the shop, two ladies came out of the cafe and were walking towards our shop and expressing regret that they were too late and the shop was closed, so I stopped and offered to open up for them.

They happily came inside and did a little shopping with the money they had with them and one of the ladies asked me to set aside a couple of items promising to return on Tuesday to purchase them. It was worth the effort to open up and we had some good laughs, making fun of husbands and old friendships.

I arrived home in time to put away the groceries, watch the end of a movie with AH and then settle in for Super Saturday football.

Sadly, I was unlucky with he first game and my selected team lost, but the game I was most looking forward to was first place on the ladder, South Sydney Rabbits, playing 10th placed Wests Tigers. I tipped the Tigers for an upset win because I felt like their two top players had found their mojo in their last couple of games and had a big win in them.

I was right!

I was the only one in the tipping comp to select the Tigers, so their win helped me move up a position on the ladder. Wahoo!

Now I'm off for an early night. The big week has worn me out.

Nite all.