A Day to Myself

The good news was that DH had decided to take the kids sailing for the day. The bad news was that it was 45 degrees and not much fun outdoors. Now, in years gone by, a day to myself would have meant a day at the local Westfield, but with my new save money mindset in place I content myself with a day at home.


Firstly I get the horrible chores out of the way. Luckily (or unluckily I suppose) I can still iron in air conditioned comfort.

Would you believe there is 2 hours worth of ironing in that basket?

Next, a reward for all my hard work. Morning tea and a movie.

Then a little bit of pampering, after all it is "my" day. A quick pedi by the pool. And then a swim. Bliss......

I've now just realised it's the perfect opportunity to do some more decluttering. Especially as DH is gone and I can ransack his side of the bedroom as well. I do love a tidy bedroom.

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I thought about riding the exercise bike for half an hour...... but no it was not to be........

Maybe I need to Ebay that. It is kinda large for an ornament and that's about all it does.


This is the result of all that decluttering. This is the recycling corner. Packed to capacity with lots of useless crap that I am ashamed to say I bought into the house.

The it was time for a shower and into bed. What a lovely peaceful day. But I can't wait for the gang to get back.

First Sewing Project.

One of the ways I am trying to save money and acquire new skills is learning to sew.

Luckily, I have a friend who offered to lend me a spare sewing machine to see how I would go and if I would like it. (I do)

My first project was an Amy Butler bag. I like Amy's patterns as there is no assumed knowledge. She spells it all out for you step by step. Sure, there were plenty of stuff ups - like ironing the interfacing to the ironing board cover but overall I was pretty pleased with the end result.

It is quite a big bag and I use it when we are going to be out at somebody's place till after dinner and then I will pack all of Rhianna's toiletries and Pj's etc in it.

Other than that it hangs on the back of this chair to remind me that I'm not to old to learn new stuff.

More Decluttering.

The school holidays have been a very lazy time for us. Lots of sleeping in, hanging around in our Pj's till lunchtime and plenty of time to potter.

I love to potter as it allows me to sort through our junk and toss, toss, toss. I have broken the house down into rooms to declutter. Obviously, I am starting with the easiest ones first. No point burning out in January is there?

The Patio.

Not much to do here really, just a straighten and a tidy. You can't see it but this area borders the pool so lots of towels and cossies and goggles often live here. In Summer it can look really untidy.

The bar area.

This is not really my area as I'm not a big drinker. This is more where Will likes to hang out and of course we use it when we entertain. Not much decluttering to do here although Will has offered to drink up any alcohol that I feel is in the way. Haha

The lounge area.

This area needs daily decluttering thanks to a little 6 year old we know who likes to do craft, gymnastics and cubby building in this area. But I have limited the stuff kept in this area to DVD's, books, Wii stuff etc.

Another thing that has to be done is to go through the DVD's and Ebay any we are never going to watch again. I mean how many times can anyone really watch ET?

The study

This "room" is a bit of a cheat by me as I call it the study, but really it is a desk and a chair in the corner. Still, it accumulates its fair share of crap on top and in the draws.

Will has one draw that I am not allowed to touch and as such, it is still a mess but the rest is decluttered. By the way if anybody needs a paperclip just ask me, I must have 10,000.

Next week I'll do (I can barely stand to type it) Broc's bedroom. If I'm not back on here by the weekend send in a search party to find me.

Hope you are having a great day

Vanessa

Cooking Competition

Western Star Butter is running a cooking competition for kids.

Kids have to devise a recipe using the butter, cook the recipe and then picture themselves with the finished product.

With Australia day around the corner, Rhianna and I decided to make Aussie Cookies. We even used chocolate icing to detail the states and mini m and m's to locate the capital cities in each state. A cooking lesson and a geography lesson. Put me down for Mother of The Year. LOL




If you'd like to enter too just have a look at Westernstarbutter.com.au

Retro Fun and Crafts.

You can tell its nearing the end of the Xmas School holidays when inspiration and funds start to run low. Time for some retro fun and an easy craft.


This will be a blast from the past for most people reading this blog. The old paddle pop sticks around the tin can trick. We have pencils, crayons and textas coming out of our ears around here so another container is always welcome. The sticks cost $2 and the tin was from the recycling basket.

We are mad recyclers in this house and we also love our diet coke which is a great combination for making a home made ten pin bowling set.

We washed out the bottles, wrapped with some undesirable scrapbooking paper and then Rhianna decorated with stickers. To make it a little more interesting Rhianna has added a points value to each bottle so we can score. Great fun, no cost and little fingers entertained for an hour or so.

Hope you and your kids are enjoying the holidays as much as we are.

Mini Me

One of the greatest joys in my life is having a daughter. Finally I have someone who is interested in dong the same things as I do. Even if I just start to do some washing up she wants to help.


Rhianna is 6 now and as the years go by I let her undertake more and more tasks as she builds her skill level.

I also firmly believe in making children as independent as possible as early as possible. She is also learning that being in a family means being a team memebers and all members must contribute. Except the dog - he just has to look cute - which he does very well.



This year Rhianna wants to learn to knit and to actually make a simple garment to wear on the sewing machine. I encourage her in these efforts as far as my patience will allow. I have learnt to only give her old pillow cases to iron, plastic bowls to wash up and old scraps of fabric to sew on.



I'm really excited that as she grows older our passion for all things "homey" as she calls it will grow and develop. At least until she hits those teenage years when me and everything I do will be considered "boring". But those days are a little ways off and I intend to enjoy every minute till then.

Simple Living

One of my 2010 goals this year is to get back to basics. Now this can mean many things to many people but for me its about living simply with the minimum amount of "stuff" that I can get away with.

As a reformed shopaholic this creates a bit of a dilemma - how to offload all the "stuff" I already possess. Luckily some bright spark invented Ebay for people just like me.

So this year I intend to tackle the house room by room, decluttering all the possesions that are simply taking up room and not contributing in any meaningful ways to our life.

A by-product of this decluttering will be that each room will have a specific purpose and items that do not contribute to that purpose can no longer live there.

For example the lounge room is a place to relax, watch movies, read books or listen to music so only items that relate to those pursuits may live in the loungeroom. So all toys, craft items, computer bits and pieces etc must be removed at the end of business each day.

The first room on the agenda is the dining room (see pic).

I cheated a little bit in starting with this room as it was pretty easy. This room has a table and chairs. It has a small pantry that is only filled with food, so everything good there. It has a small cupboard with my appliances in it.

The only thing I have removed was a candle centrpiece from the middle of the table. Firstly, we never actually lit the candles and secondly I was always having to move it when I wanted to use the table for craft or sewing. So not only was it not useful it was actually an annoyance on occassion so off it has to go.

Next, the office.