Michelle Bridges 12 WBT and Me (long post)

Hi,

Its been ages since I have been here!

I have missed blogging, but the little prompt I need to get back in the "Saddle" so to speak has come from a totally unexpected source!

Michelle Bridges!

OK so lets take a little step back to the beginning ...

In the last 10 years I have slowly, but with much enthusiasm put on a stagering amount of weight.  Its been fun - lots of wine, lots of beer, lots of amazing food, lots of stress and not much exercise at all!  See I said it had been fun!

Then ... just before my 42nd Birthday, in November this year, I went to put on my size 18 shorts and I couldn't do them up ....  WOW that was a mind blowing moment  ... I just couldn't get the button and the button hole to meet, it was like they were magnets opposing each other!  Now I could have gone down the mental track of telling myself that " they were new and this was the first time I had washed them so they must have shrunk" but they weren't new and I had washed them heaps of times before.  So even though I had used this excuse in my head on previous occassions when I was "going up" a size, I just couldn't do it this time! 

I sat down on the floor in the robe and had a little cry, not a big cry, no sobbing or anything, just a little cry.

I cried for my body and for me!  I no longer looked like the person I was, and the person on the inside was starting to change because of who I was on the outside!

Then ... my Aunty put a picture up on face book of me, my MIL, SIL, Cousins and herself at a recently family gathering ... I was so shocked at what I saw that I had another little cry.

Talk about emotional!

And my inside self said to my outside self that enough is enough and I need to move on!

So I did!

I signed up then and there for the Michelle Bridges 12WBT.

A friend had just completed the previous round and had lost a staggering 9kgs - she looked great, was getting really toned and was feeling so good about herself - she was a an INSPIRATION!

I was all set to go, the fact that Round 4 was starting on my Birthday seemed like some sort of message!

Then I slipped in the shower!  OOPs

My knee was really badly banged up, torn muscles, bruised leg, bruised ego - you name it, it was bruised.  So I spent the three days leading up to the start on my butt with ice packs as my new best friend!

Now in the past this would have been an excellent excuse to quit, to say I just can't do it - but my mindset had changed - I just didn't quit!

To date - 3 weeks in - I have NOT kept up with the exercise component of the program, its just to painful - but the pain is decreasing, I am walking more and slowly working up to it.

But the Food - well that is another story, I have loved the Food, my Family love the food and I am loosing cm's and kg's!  7kgs to date.

I love it!  Its not that hard, I am not starving, I am hungry from time to time, but I am having healthy snacks, and I am not drinking alcohol!

Each week we have a "surprise, like a challenge or task to complete - this week it is to nominate a blog - so I am going to nominate mine!  Not that I am looking to win the prize, there are soooooo many great blogs and bloggers out there who are documenting their journey with grace and good humour, but more that I use this as an outlet for me to document my feelings and experiences as I take this trip back to being me!

So if you want to come along for the ride, please feel free to hop on the Convergence Blog!

Cheers

Nic

Moving again and so much more

For those that know me well, you know how our little family moves all over this Great Southern Land!  And as the end of the year draws near, we are moving yet again - but this is the last move!

15 odd years ago, we quit our jobs, sold my car, decked out Kevin's Ute, packed up the house and heading off to explore Australia, with the promise we would be back in 12 months - who were we kidding!

The more we explored the more we found to explore! Along the way we got engaged, then married, had two beautiful daughters, met some of the most amazing people and made lifelong friends!  Now we are going home!

Not home to NZ or PNG for me, but to Cairns, my Aussie Home!  My Mum and Dad, Sisters, Kevin's Mum and Dad and Sister along with Brothers-In-Law, Neices, Cousins, Friends, God-Daughters and Uncles and Aunties - all live in Cairns, so it is Home in every sense of the word!

We are excited and scared, no more moving for this little family, Cairns has changed a lot in 15 years, but the people are still the same!

Now we have to find a house to be our home, no easy feat!  We have been looking and looking and looking and hopefully soon the right one will find us!

The next few weeks will be insane!  Packing, travelling and hardest of all - saying goodbye to our sensational friends, especially our neighbours, we surely were blessed the day we signed the lease on our little Adelaide home, it will be hardest to say goodbye to these wonderful people, but they know they will always have a place to lay their heads in Cairns!

So during the coming weeks I thought I would document our move, this will be our 5th in as many years, and a lot of people ask how I do it, well its a family effort, but as it is one of the most stressful things in life I have learned some coping tricks over the years and thought I would share. 

Life will be chaotic, so this documenting will not be regular, but I will try!

Mojo

Many years ago I started to blog about my creative outlet - scrapbooking!! As well as life in general for our family.  It seemed like a good way for our families to follow us as we drifted around the country.  But, I got lazy, I started working fulltime and then I even lost my Mojo!  OH NO I hear you scream!

But ...

I think I have it back!!!

Thanks mainly to this awesome and inspiring shop I discovered not far from where I live in Adelaide.  I wandered in there a couple of weeks ago - full of flu and really just wanting to see what new product was out there (not like I need to add to my overflowing stash), but what I got was a big smack on the back of the head!

This shop is so well set out, it is inspiring just wandering around!!!  The staff are soooooo friendly and it was all too too nice!  So I got a few supplies, came home, sat down and scrapped!  First time in almost 2 years!  And I loved it, I really loved it!

The layout may not be perfect and the techiques were a little rusty, but all in all I was pretty happy! I even went back to attend a monthly scrap challenge group and am now busy planning my layouts for that! (will keep you up to date)

So to Mandii & Tracey at Paper Flourish - THANKS!!! Hope to be seeing more of you!

http://www.paperflourish.com.au/index.html

Check it out - just beautiful!

Apple Picking in the Adelaide Hills - what joy!

Morning,

I just wanted to share some of the most fun I have had in ages!  After a word from my amazing friend Helen, who is a wealth of knowledge on all things "Adelaidian", I headed into the Adelaide Hills on Saturday morning with my two Darling Daughters and one of said Daughters' BFF's!

We drove through wonderful winding roads, skirting the edge of streams and little farms, some of which had the most amazing stone cottages on them - that will have to be an exploration for another day -all the while enveloped in a misty rain.  We even found a castle, well at least what remains of a castle.

After only 20 minutes or so we found our way to Summertown and Hollidays Rd and an old apple grove.  We were met by two kindly farmers who explained which apples were ready to pick and we were off!  The kids were so excited and were running everywhere, I just sort of stood there, with a lovely gobsmacked look on my face and inhaled the scent of wet grass and fresh apples!!!!  Glorious indeed.

We spent the next hour picking apples and exploring the grove, we found the older trees had "knitted" together in one section to create something out of a fairytale, just magical.

The Fruits of our labour!

If you are interested in picking fresh apples then head up to Hollidays Rd, Summertown - the easiest way is just to follow Greenhill Rd all the way to the top, once you get to Summertown, turn left into Hollidays Rd and the Apple Grove is on the Left about 500 metres down the road.  They are open on Saturday and Sunday mornings from 11am through till July.

Enjoy!

Now I am off to make some apple sauce, jam and pies ....



Settling in to SAHM status

So it's been the better part of a month since I gave up full time work!  And I have been really busy!  Helping out at our girls local school, catching up with mending, ironing, cleaning etc at home, I haven't really had a free day for weeks - and I love it!

Get to see my girls every afternoon without them and me being so tired we can barely hold a rational conversation and I have been cooking up a storm!

Now that I have caught up a bit, it's time to tackle som projects around here - so I am going to start documenting my progress here on my blog!

Time for a change

Huge day for me - I quit my full-time job!  Yippee for me!

I am at a point in my life where I need to spend more time being a parent and less time being an employee .. my "little" girls are not so little anymore and they need their Mummy, won't be long and the Mummy will be just Mum or something else! 

So I am looking for a part-time job that is not an hour commute each way that will let me contribute financial to our household, but will also let me be the kind of Mummy my girls deserve and the kind of Wife I want to be - ie that is one not so exhausted that home life becomes a chore!

A hard decision to come by, but now it is all over and done with I feel like a weight has been lifted!!!!

So Yippee for me!

Girls Rooms - Matching Lamps

My two little darlings love to read their own books at bedtime so they each have a little kid friendly bedside lamp.  Isabells had a plain white shade on it while Lillian's was a very bright turqouise blue - of course this didn't match at all, so with a little bit of hot glue and their chosen Ikea fabrics we set about to make these match with the rest of the new decor:

Lillians Lamp:

1. Position your exisiting shade on the "wrong" side of your fabrice and roll it over the material and use a pin to keep in place while you mark around the inside with a pen.

2. Remove the pin, unwind the material and you have your basic pattern.  Add approx 2cm above the lines and cut.  Then snip the material every 1-2cm - this makes the fitting easier.

3. Glue one end of the material onto the existing shade and again roll the material around the shade - glue and secure the other end of the material.

4. Fold and glue the top and bottom of the material - pulling taught as you go.  Easy peasy.

The finished product:

Isabell's lamp:

1. I used the same process to make a band of material as I did when I made the curtains for the room.

2. I secured one end of the band to the lampshade with hot glue, wrapped it aroung the existing shade and secured the other end in the same fashion - again really easy and very effective.

Both lamps still give out enough light for reading at bedtime and now they look heaps better!

Girls Bedroom - Banded Curtains

One of the projects that turned out better than expected in the girls rooms were the curtains.  I'll let you in on a little secret - I didn't sew anything on them!  Crazy I know, but true.

I had seen a few tutorials on YouTube and various decorating blogs showing how to used Iron On Adhesive to hem and make curtains and although somewhat sceptical, I thought I would give it a try - so glad I did.

I purchased these curtains:

Ikea Alvine Flata Curtains

I think I may actually be in love with these curtains, so much so they will soon be making an appearance in every room in our house.  They block out the glare from our harsh Australian sun, without blocking the light - which is really important to me especially as the house we are renting is a bit on the dark side. 

The quality is surprisingly good and the price amazing - $29.95 - sensational, they came with a little pack of iron on adhesive heming tape and I also purchased another two packets to add the bands to the bottom of the curtains.

So it is as easy as this:

1. Hang and hem your curtains using the iron tape

2. Select and cut your contrasting material to the desired width - remember to allow an inch at the top and bottom to foldover.  Fold in the edges and press

3. Add some tape under the folds and press again to hold



4. Measure on and mark on the curtains where you want the band of contrasting material to go, again layout adhesive tape and iron on, fold around the edges of the curtain and adhere at the back with tape.  I used pins to keep mine in place throughout this process.

Finished product - pretty cute hey!

More posts to come on my little projects.