Wednesday 30 May 2012

Wordless Wednesday : Cupcake Heaven

Baking doesn't happen in our house very often, but when it does, snack time is the favourite time of day!






Linking in with My Little Drummer Boys for Wordless Wednesday.



Monday 28 May 2012

One Down!

In my last post, I was very excited because my wool had arrived.

Well, ta daaa!!!!





First project all finished!

It is so lovely and soft and warm!! In fact, sometimes it's a bit too warm! I wore it this morning for the first time, taking my kidlets to school and kinder, and once I got to kinder I had to take it off! Phew...I was almost sweating! (Of course, it also might have had something to do with the fact we were running late and had to rush!)

It was really enjoyable to knit because it was so fast and easy.

For those that are interested, it is in the Panda Teddy Fur 'Everyday Glam' booklet, No 301.




Now I'm ready to start the next project. This is going to take me a bit longer as it's fiddly. Will post some pictures as soon as I'm done!



What project are you working on at the moment?



Friday 25 May 2012

New Project!

Look what arrived today!



I promised myself I wasn't going to start any new projects until I've finished the ones I've already got, but I couldn't resist!
Anyway, rules are meant to be broken!

The black is for a lovely furry cowl, which will help to keep me snuggly and warm this winter.
The camel is for.....well I might keep it a surprise! Something that is not going to look knitted, that's fur sure (get it, fur sure...the wool is called fur. Anyway....)!

Photos to follow!

 I can't wait to get started. I love starting on something new.




Do you like starting a new project? What have you started recently?




Thursday 24 May 2012

A Fleeting Moment of Silence.

I treasure silence.

It is so rare to get even a few seconds of it, but when I do, it feels almost like the world stops, just for me.

Most days, my ears are ambushed by noise constantly, but this afternoon, just for a moment, it ceased.
I had curled up on the couch with a cup of tea, and briefly closed my eyes. Just as if it sensed what I needed, the universe stilled.

My son was playing with his little cars so quietly that I almost forgot he was there. There was no television or radio on, no cars going down the street, no neighbours maintaining their gardens. The wind stopped blowing the trees, the birds closed their beaks, and our little foster dog Meesha stopped scratching.

Not a sound.

When I opened my eyes, Meesha was sitting as still as I've ever seen her, just gazing out the front window. It was almost as if she knew that to move, would mean the end of the peace.




The moment was too beautiful and unusual to miss, but my camera, always close at hand, disturbed her quiet reflection, and mine. The world started turning again and nature resumed her cacophony.

Meesha looked at me with as much disappointment as I felt, before scratching, shaking and trotting off into another room.

Glancing at the clock in the kitchen, I saw it was time for school pick up.

I stood and stretched, readying myself to continue with my day.




Do you manage to find quiet moments?





 


Tuesday 22 May 2012

Enough Already!



Some days are just crap!

There's no sugar coating it....it's just the way it is.

Crapity, crapity, crap! CRAP, I TELLS YA!!

It started this morning, after the third successive night of next to no sleep, thanks to children and nightmares, being cold, the 'stand in' milkman being an inconsiderate prick and parking with his high beams on in the driveway (which shines straight into our bedroom), and dogs wandering around the house instead of being on their mat.
Sometimes it sucks being a light sleeper.

Then, whilst putting my hair up into a ponytail, I put my neck out. No, I wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary....it was just a standard, hair elastic around the hair kind of ponytail, but I must have just jerked my head the wrong way slightly, and the next minute I could barely move.
Great!

It started raining as soon as we started the mad dash to school, (which was slower than usual considering I was having trouble turning my head), so once we pulled up out the front, we were madly pulling on raincoats and opening umbrellas. The pain of trying to hold an umbrella over my head was incredible, but it was that or end up looking like a drowned rat, so hold it I did. We got all the way to my son's classroom when I realised we'd left his school bag in the car and I would have to go all the way back to get it, and bring it back again.
Fuck!

After, finally, dropping my youngest at kinder, going back to the school again to process the school banking, (I am the student banking co-ordinator), I left for the nearest park, to struggle through collecting fresh branches of leaves for the possums in care. I had been in the park for about five minutes, when it once again started to pour. My umbrella of course was in the car, not that I could have carried it anyway, with both hands full of branches.

See what I mean?

Even managing to get an emergency appointment at my chiropractor didn't brighten my day, because it hurt like hell!!!
And to be honest, I don't feel like it's helped much. I'm still in agony and unable to move normally.

Can you tell I feel miserable? I was hoping my glass of wine would dull the pain a little, but no such luck.

Here's hoping I can at least get some sleep, and look forward to a, hopefully, better day tomorrow....



How was your day? How do you cope when you have a bad one?

Sunday 20 May 2012

Pet Hate!

I have a few pet hates. I'm sure everyone does. You know the ones....they make you grit your teeth and feel like your head is about to spontaneously self-combust!

I was confronted by one of mine when I got up this morning. There, lined up on my kitchen bench, was my son's toy cars.






I love my son, of course, but I can't stand his toys on my bench!

I have mentioned my son before, and the little peculiarities he has due to his autism. They generally only last for short periods of time, before being replaced by other odd things, that are all just a part of being Darcy.

Well, I have been waiting and waiting for this to disappear, but unfortunately, it looks like it is sticking around, dammit!

From the moment my kitchen bench was at his eye level, he has played there. It was the perfect height for him to be able to push his cars back and forth, while watching the wheels very closely. And study them he does, with a focus that is sometimes hard to break.

Now he's taller than the bench, but it hasn't lessened his passion for playing there. Most days I have to ask him to remove at least four or five cars before i'm able to start preparing a meal, and I usually have to remove a few myself before making lunch, while he's at school, as they've been left there in the morning.

Grrr!

I actually think I handle it really well, considering how much I hate it. Most days I stop, take a deep breath, and then ask him nicely to put them back where they belong so I can use my bench. But some days, I have to admit, I just get completely fed up!
"DARCY"!!!!!
What can I say....I'm human!

Now, to infuriate me even more, his younger brother is doing it too! And why wouldn't he, when he has watched his big brother doing it day, after day, after day, for years.


I guess I'm just going to have to put up with it for a bit longer. And grit my teeth I will!


What are your pet hates, and how do you deal with them?



Thursday 17 May 2012

Sweeeeet!

Photo Source : Forbes

On May 1st, I gave up sugar.

It wasn't a sudden decision! I had actually been planning it for months. And a plan is exactly what you need if you're going to be successful. Which I have been....so far.

I just got to thinking one day, about the amount of sugar I ate, and decided it couldn't possibly be good. I mean, the experts recommend no more than ten teaspoons of sugar a day, yet I would have that just in my cups of tea alone. Then there was also the bickies or cake after lunch, and the chocolate that I liked to nibble on of an evening, as well as ice cream sometimes. Not to mention all the sugar that was in food that I wasn't really aware of even having sugar in it, such as sauces, mayonnaise, muesli bars and cereals. Of course I knew that some had sugar in them, but I wasn't aware of just how much!
Did you know that tomato sauce is roughly 50% sugar? And BBQ sauce is even worse?
Now that I'm reading labels for everything I buy, I'm amazed at the types of things that have sugar, and how much.

It was recommended to me to read the book 'Sweet Poison', by David Gillespie, which I did, and boy, was it an eye opener! If you want to learn more about David and his book, click here, but basically this book is the result of David's mission to learn about what was making him obese, and why diets never worked for him. What he discovered is pretty scary stuff!

Sugar is really bad shit!!!

If you don't want to read an entire book on the subject, then a good article was written by David DiSalvo at Forbes.com, which will only take a couple of minutes to read. It briefly explains similar things to that which David discovers during his research. Click here to read the article. 

Another great story regarding sugar recently aired on the program 'Sunday Night' and the video is in two parts.
Click here to see Part One.
Click here to see Part Two.

If you too eat a lot of sugar, it would really be worth you looking into it a bit further. It was enough for me to say 'enough is enough' and give it up. And I have to say that I thought it would be a lot harder than it has been! In seventeen days now I haven't had any chocolate at all, which is a miracle in itself! I never thought I could go without chocolate!

I'm not saying that I won't ever have sugar again! I'm happy to occasionally meet a friend for coffee and cake, for sure! But it won't be a part of my diet on a daily basis any more, and it is no longer going to control me like it did.

I'm doing it for myself, and my children. Even my husband is giving it a go now as well, although he is happy to stick to products that contain less than 5g of sugar per 100g, rather than giving it up completely like me. But that's a start.



What about you? How much sugar do you eat, and how much is too much?






Saturday 12 May 2012

Fresh and New!

They say a change is as good as a holiday.

They could be right!

I'm finding the new look of my blog pretty refreshing!

I started to think it was looking a bit on the boring side, so after nearly two days of nutting through it (for me!) and some severe geeky handiwork from my hubby (thank goodness for him!!), I have a lovely new look!

What do you think?

I'd love some honest opinions please!


Wednesday 9 May 2012

The Unexpected

Some days, something happens. Something totally unexpected, that completely floors you.
You see something.....
Or hear something.....
Something that you had no inkling of when you got out of bed that morning, yet it has such a profound effect on you, that you can't imagine ever feeling the same.

Last Friday was that day for me.

I had a lovely visit from a girl I went to school with and I've been thinking about that morning every day since. We have seen each other a few times since leaving school, here and there, but not for approximately the last twelve years. And she is exactly like I remember...the same laugh, the same twinkle in her eye, the same funny sense of humour. It could have been yesterday that we last saw each other, except for the fact that we both had our five year old boys hanging off our leg.

Anyway, I got out one of my old photo albums with the photos of our last school year, and we were happily immersing ourselves in our youth, when she pointed to a photo of a girl I was quite close to at school and said "Did you go to Leanne's funeral?"

She might as well have slapped me.

For a second, I didn't think I could have possibly heard her right. But I knew I had. And I almost couldn't breathe.

Leanne and I had gone through most of primary and secondary school together. We lived around the corner from each other, and went to the same dance school for years. We were even in the same dance company (group) for a while. Although we had other best friends, we hung around in the same circle, and even shared a Queensland holiday with four other girls after finishing Year 12.

So many times in the last couple of years I have thought of her, and typed her name into Facebook, waiting for her profile to pop up, but it never did. I just kept trying from time to time, as I thought that one day for sure, I'd see her smiling face looking back at me. After all, who wasn't on Facebook in this day and age? Now I understand.....

She was such a beautiful person and I have such fond memories of her.
I remember practising our dance routines in her lounge room, for hours on end, and then laughing and giggling, watching tv, while drinking long, cool glasses of cordial.
We both got caught in a rip while swimming at the beach on our Queensland holiday, and had to be rescued by lifeguards. I can clearly remember our complete disgust and disappointment at the fact that, at our one chance of a true life and death rescue, like in the romance novels, the lifeguards on the beach that day were female and not the hunky, sun-tanned males that we'd seen on previous days. Crap!!
In fact, the only time I ever remember seeing her without a smile on her face is when we were caught in the rip just mentioned. She was always so cheerful and smiling. So larger than life.

Apparently her life was cut short due to a battle with stomach cancer. She had left behind her long time boyfriend, (who had since become her husband), and two young boys. My heart just breaks for them.

I don't really know quite why this news has affected me so much. I mean, we had lost touch since school finished, when work and life got in the way.
Maybe that's why.....the guilt of not having stayed in touch, when we'd had a friendship lasting so many years.

Life is so short, isn't it? In a blink of an eye it could all be over, for you or someone you love. That's why its so important to wake up every morning grateful for every minute you have with your friends and family. I already do that a lot due to nearly losing my son a few years ago (read my post
Tears and Ashes here), but it is easy to get overwhelmed and let the small things take control.

It is written more poignantly here....



                                                    Picture Source: Cultivating Happiness

I wish I could tell her one more time how wonderful I thought she was. That she was someone I thought about often, and would have loved to see again. Unfortunately, I can't.

But you know what? There are other people in my life that I also feel that way about.....some whom I haven't seen for a long time.

I'm going to ring them in the morning. It's important to me, that they know.


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