This morning (Saturday) our pretty ballerina was needed to perform at a local church fete. It has been a very exciting week for her, with not one but FIVE ballet lessons to prepare the girls for their grand debut. To be perfectly honest, the girls look so sweet in their skirts, slippers and ribbons that I doubt it mattered how well they danced. The audience expects a charming imperfection when little girls dance. Always eager to live up to expectations, my daughter wa the one who came out, craned her head until she spotted us in the crowd then waved madly as the other children remained immaculately in position. She is irrepresible, my little ballerina!



Of course, the other wonderful thing about an Anglican church fete are all the great bargains to be found amongst the stalls. I have taken photos of my haul so you can all be jealous of me!There were a couple of produce stalls, and I bought bunches of basil, rosemary, sage and mint. The basil I will use tonight to make pasta sauce. The preserves I bought were sweet orange marmalade, apricot jam and three fruit butter (flavoured with lemon, lime and passionfruit).


From the jumble stalls I bought three vintage patterns, at the extravagant price of 50 cents (about 35c US). They had a big box of them, and I am sorry I didn't just buy the box!


These two bone china trios were about half what you would pay for the same elsewhere, and I simply could not resist them! I collect tea related objects, and daydream about elegant tea parties, with all my precious tea treasures. I love "playing ladies".

I also need to thank you all for your kind comments on my previous post. I really appreciate that you took the time to say those kind words and pick me up out of my doldrums. Thank you, more than I can say!

I am no Martha Stewart. And I don't even pretend to be. But I need to face the grim reality here. My house is a mess. (This post is a thinking out loud post, and I apologise in advance for its erratic nature.)

I know I am not a bad mother. My family is well fed. I can stick to a budget. Every day I send the kids to school in clean clothing, on time and with homework done. But the truth is that our home is chaotic. I really really worry about what this is doing to my kids. I fret that they have not learnt to take good care of their belongings. I can't chastise them for it, because I am not a good example. I worry that the messiness adds to my brilliant but easily distracted son's attention issues. I shed tears that the clutter is paralysing my perfectionist daughter and adding to her worries. I hate that my darling husband, who works so hard every day to keep us comfortable comes home to an uncomfortable house, with a frazzled wife. I feel guilty about enjoying craft work while the piles all over the house keep growing.

I need a plan. I have tried Flylady, I have spent hours developing routines and schedules, but nothing has reall fit. I spend a couple of hours most mornings at the school, volunteering, and somehow that seems to throw me out for the day. I seem to have less energy than a lot of other people. I need regular breaks or I simply will not make it to the end of the day. So that's my problem. Truthfully, there are a whole bunch of emotional issues wrapped up in there too, perectionism, self doubt, and so on, but I am working on those already, and now I need to pull this home together and start living the life I think we deserve.

I am going to spend the rest of today rescuing the house ... fifteen minute blocks in each room until it's up to scratch, but while I do it, I am going to be thinking about how to get out of the emergency cleaning rut I am trapped in. Decluttering, organising and coming up with functional routines are my big goals for the rest of this year.

Any advice would be gladly welcomed!!

I am still around, just so busy and tired. I have been looking at everyone's blogs in my spare moments, but have not had much inclination for posting.

My Mum has been visiting us for a week. It's been so nice to have her nearby for a little while. Our family has been through some suffering lately, with the loss of my wonderful father in January, and I have been very worried for my Mum. It goes without saying that she is very lonely without Dad, but she is moving on with her life, studying a Nursing Degree at university, and traveling the world. I am so proud of her, and I know that Dad is too.

As well as the frivolity of having Mum visit (and an indecent quantity of latte and cream filled cakes) I have gone down with a sinus infection. As I type this I am snuggled in a warm bed, with a beautiful husband bringing me cups of tea at regular intervals. He's such a sweetheart!

Tada! I finished off the candlewick cushion I was stitching on the weekend. As you can see, the tea washed out of it nicely. I spent six hours on Saturday creating that magnificent ruffle around it. It started well, though it took a while to tack the lace to the fabric. Then the instruction told me to zigzag a length of crochet cotton onto the ruffle in order to gather it. *sigh* I am the proud owner of my grandmother's Singer sewing machine. To zigzag stitch you have to attach this complicated looking piece of machinery instead of the regular foot and somehow, miraculously, the machine does zigzag. Provided no child has removed an essential screw from the zigzag mechanism. Soooo, I found myself hand stitching the crochet cotton onto the ruffle. It took AGES. I discovered I really do have need for a thimble, as I literally wore the skin of my finger. So after much whining and stitching the ruffle was gathered. My poor machine struggled through stitching it all together, but I coaxed and cajoled it to the end. I am extremely proud of it, aand it takes pride of place on my glider chair. Oh, and the reaon I know it took six hours? I watched the entire BBC Pride and Prejudice while I did it. Six episodes! And loved every minute of it!!

Here is my beautiful Samara modelling her brand new glasses. She's so cute!!

Time for another vacation photo. This was one of the best evenings I have ever spent with my family. The beach was deserted and so beautiful. We walked, collected seashells, drew and wrote our names in the sand. We couldn't go into the water, because summer in tropical north Queensland is jellyfish season, and anyone who's watched Finding Nemo knows how hazardous that is!

I started to write the list from Sarah's Meme With a Difference but got to 7 and deleted. I have clinical depression. I hide it pretty well most of the time. I am willing to bet I have family members who don't know about it. The problem with my list of embarrasing things was that it turned into a list of reasons I don't like myself. I realise that the spirit of the list was nothing like that, but I discovered that it's just not something that I can do. So I am sorry, Sarah, but I'll do the next one! I will confess, however, that I like John Denver.