13 weeks til Christmas...

Now it is only 13 weeks til Christmas and equally excitingly our beach holiday that I told you about here last week.

So I have begun my search online for decorating and craft ideas for our temporary Christmas beach house, ideas for cooking and baking with a summer, beachy feel and I am on the look out for gifts for the girls that can easily be transported so not too big in size but still give a 'wow' when opened!

Here's what I have found so far...

I absolutely love these glass Christmas baubles filled with sand and shells....they would make a perfect decoration and activity at the same time....okay so transporting glass baubles in a trailer load of supplies might be a bit tricky...but I'm definitely going to give it a try!

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I love this idea for watermelon Christmas trees that I found over at www.eatingvibrantly.com ....perfect for the summer and beach themed Christmas....and they don't look too hard to achieve which is what I need!!

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And as for gifts I think these Dot To Dot books by Thomas Makes Stuff would be perfect for the older girls....they won't be hard to transport, will provide an activity that can be started on holidays if we encounter rainy days, and the finished product can be displayed in their rooms when they get home...so I think they are perfect.....and I want to do the Elvis one!!!!

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So tell me, have you started planning your Christmas yet....or is it still way too early for you to even think about it!??

Making Healthier Choices...Part 3

The whole energy in versus energy out thing sounds so simple.....but in reality it is a whole lot more complicated!  New habits are so hard to form!!

I am still doing okay in the coke and chocolate department...but the daily exercise department...that's a different story!

My best effort for this week was three consecutive days of exercise....nothing too strenuous...but exercise nonetheless.

I am hoping to kick start some of these school holiday days with an exercise dvd before the girls wake up and the day becomes too busy.  By night I am full of motivation for such ideas...but come morning when I am tucked up in my bed well I am not so motivated!

Hopefully I can dust off the wii fit and wii dance and have a bit of fun with the girls whilst getting some exercise too!

School holidays are always a hard time to stick to healthy as cupcakes and brownies are much more desirable than fruit smoothies....but with a fridge full of fruit I am hoping to work towards changing that perception!!!

End of year holidays are creeping closer so I really need to get my butt into gear!!!

14 weeks til Christmas !!!

Wow....only 14 weeks til Christmas...can you believe it??!!

This year has gone by at a lightning pace and the next 14 weeks will be no different, especially when they start to fill up even further with dance concerts, drama performances, school Christmas activities, parties and get-togethers with friends.....busy busy!!

I have to admit that I love, love, love Christmas!!  

I love thinking about what to buy people, I love sneaking all the presents away in places that I notoriously forget by Christmas eve, I love Christmas craft and Christmas cooking and I love going to cut down our Christmas tree, bringing it home and decorating it as a family...

This year we will be away from home for Christmas which is hugely exciting...we will be here....

and to say that I can't wait is an understatement!!  Firstly it means that I won't have to have our house clean enough for guests on Christmas day...yay! Secondly it  means that we can have a beach Christmas....my mind is already racing with ideas for decorating and baking!!

We arrive at the house we have rented on Sunday 21st December....and I am hoping to smuggle as many Christmas decorations into our packing as possible!  It also means that I am on the look out for Christmas presents that are going to survive the trip in the trailer, will be small enough to mean I can have a good number of gifts for each of the girls and yet will still have a 'wow' factor.

So join me over the next 14 weeks as I start my online Christmas shopping adventure, share any bargains that I find, search for decorating ideas for our (temporary) beach house, and have a lot of fun along the way....Christmas bring it on!!!!!!

Do you love Christmas as much as I do??  Are you counting down already?!

Making Healthier Choices...Part 2

Well the past two weeks haven't seen too many good choices in the healthy department....probably due to a lack of planning and really busy weeks!

I spent three consecutive days at school one week with Father's Day gift wrapping and sorting, the next day with Miss 5's tabloid sports carnival and the next day with the Father's Day liturgy, morning tea and stall.

I managed to still go without coke during this week but cakes and chocolates crept in!

The following week Miss 5 was home for three days with conjunctivitis so I was pretty much housebound except for school drop offs....not having been organised with grocery shopping I turned to what was in the cupboard....and there was coke, chocolate and biscuits!

Even though I did have a can of coke here and there I am finding that I can have a can one day and not just fall back into having it everyday so that's a good thing.

Recently I have been seeing chocolate fudge everywhere....at the shops, at the markets, on tv....everywhere!!  I have been planning to try making some and this week I came across a Thermomix recipe so I decided to give it a go!

Needless to say it was delicious.....and maybe I over-indulged a little or a lot...and now I could go for a very long time with never seeing another piece of fudge....so perhaps I have done myself a favour there!!

Hubby and I have been saying each week that we would do some exercise...but weeks come and weeks go and no exercise!  Well today hubby did half an hour on the exercise bike.  So now that meant that I had to do half an hour too.

Oh my gosh....that was the longest half hour....ever!  My legs felt like jelly when I got off the bike.  But then I decided to do half an hour of kettle bell exercises....I have no idea where that came from but I was impressed!

So my aim for this week is get back to no coke and no chocolate and to exercise each day...and to start making better food choices....hmmm sounds like a lot to ask when I write it down!!!!

My Sleep Deprived Stupor

With the baby and toddler stages well behind me (lets hope I didn't just jinx myself there!!!) sleepless nights are few and far between here.  Well except for the last two nights that is....and let's just say that I am not coping well with this broken sleep.

It started when I was about to go to bed around 10.30pm on Tuesday night.  One of the perils of sleeping on the fold out sofa in the lounge room is that sometimes you catch a glimpse of some late night television and although you know you should just turn the television off, roll over and go to sleep....you just can't!!  That is exactly what happened when hubby and I started watching a program where parents spied on their unsuspecting teenagers at a festival....it was tragic but we just had to watch!

At 11.30pm I was already regretting having watched the program....but there is something so sweet about being awake when all the girls are asleep!

By now it was 11.40pm...time for a quick mental calculation of the maximum amount of sleep that I could get.  I could still get 6 hours and 40 minutes....I needed to go to sleep stat!!

A few minutes later hubby's snoring filled the room.  Then the cats decided that a game of chasings was in order.  Can cats get bruises....because I am sure that our two would be covered in them from head to tail.....they were running into walls, racing under our bed, wrestling and fighting for what seemed like forever.

I was close to dozing off when Miss 5 cried out.  On auto pilot I made my way out to her. And she was fast asleep....arrrghh !!!  I waited a little while and she seemed to settle so back to bed I went.  Now I lay there awake in anticipation of Miss 5 crying out again...like you do!

By now I was refusing to even look at the time because I knew that my maximum hours had crept below 5....and for someone who doesn't function too well on less than 8 hours sleep that was devastating!!

I think somewhere between 2.00am and 4.00am I fell asleep....only to be woken by the heavy rain on the carport roof.  Then my thoughts turned to how I would get everyone to school in the rain, from there my thoughts jumped to mentally running through my to-do list for the day....then the things that I had to do next week, then to Christmas holidays...and on and on and on!

At 5.00am I was still hopeful that I could perhaps get an hours sleep in....perhaps like a power nap from which I wold wake up refreshed for the day.  

But no....basically I laid there feeling sorry for myself...very, very sorry!

The day didn't get much better from there either.

Having an important meeting to go to I showered and dressed, even brushed my hair....only to then discover that Miss 5 had woken up with conjunctivitis...just great!  

Leaving her with hubby and Miss 16 I got all the girls to school and then drove 3 minutes down the road to Woolworths.....I walked into the store and stood there, my mind a complete blank.....I had no idea what I was there for....eventually I remembered....MILK!!

At the chemist I dropped my car keys on the floor when trying to pay for the saline for Miss 5's eyes.

Off to the important meeting at primary school and my tiredness really set in.  Being interviewed by a panel of three people to answer questions that they asked about various aspects of our school I just willed myself to formulate intelligent answers.  Although when they asked what I would change at our school if I had a magic wand absolutely nothing intelligible was coming!!  My mind was jumping from fairy wands to Barnaby the Busy Buzzy Bee...with all eyes on me I think I mumbled something like 'that's a tough one...I think I need more sleep'.  I hope they didn't write that down!

Came home from that and managed a nap...well if you can call it that when Miss 5 is with you!

Got lost on the way to physiotherapy because rather than trusting my instincts I listened to navman lady and she sent me the wrong way!!!

I was glad when dinner was served and the dishes were done.  A bit of television and off to bed....hopeful for a good night sleep!

40 minutes later Miss 5 was crying with a stomach ache.  Thankfully that settled within 15 minutes and I was back in bed.

50 minutes later Miss 5 was screaming in pain....the middle of the night ear infection....argh one of my all time most hated ailments!!!  Miss 5 has never been a fan of medicine so painstop was out of the question, but with quite a lot of bribing and convincing we managed a bit of Nurofen and a warm face washer over her ear and half an hour and a lot of tears later she finally fell asleep.

I stumbled back to bed, lay down now anticipating further disruptions.  Next thing I knew there was some sort of air raid taking place....oh wait that was  my alarm...seriously it can't be morning already?? 

And so another day dawns, my eyes are heavy, my head aches....I am useless on broken sleep!!  Miss 5 on the other hand has found some energy from somewhere and is keeping my on my toes!  Fingers crossed for a full nights sleep tonight....please!!!!!!!!!!

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Do you cope well when you are sleep deprived...tell me I'm not the only one...please!!!

Making Healthier Choices...part 1

Today was my first sip of coke in 21 days!  Hubby and I had planned a day out, which doesn't happen often, so I decided that I would have a coke with lunch!

Selfie at the movies...well we were the only ones there lol !!!!

I am happy to say that it wasn't all that satisfying and having a taste hasn't left me craving for more.  

Over the past 8 days I have also managed to reduce chocolate consumption.....yay me!  I went 5 days with no chocolate and then I weakened a bit on the weekend. On Saturday I had 2 squares of chocolate....which I made last forever rather than just eating so quickly that I am left wondering if I actually ate it or not!  And on Sunday I had a Freddo Frog after I did the grocery shopping.  

Chocolate I am finding a little bit harder to kick....it was consuming my thoughts pretty much every waking moment for the first few days.  Now I just have to fight the part of my brain that is very quick to suggest that I reward myself here and there with little chocolate treats!!

I even managed to lose a little weight this week...and when I say 'little' I really do mean 'little'!!  Think it was about 200 grams!!

In reducing coke and chocolate I must admit that I have probably just replaced them with lemonade and red frogs!!!  So now my aim is to find healthier substitutes....maybe water and an apple!!

Well I said I was going to take baby steps...and you can't get much smaller steps than the ones I have taken so far...but it is a teeny tiny start!!!