2010 resolutions

With school holidays almost at an end and the beginning of a brand new school year which sees my kids in Years 10 (yikes! how did that happen????), 8, 6, 4, and 2 and new challenges for all of us, I thought it would be good to really set some goals for this year. These aren't hard and fast rules but things I would sincerely like to reach by next Christmas.

I have been feeling really unsettled for the last year or so, and never totally happy. I am happy with my family, I love them to bits but the unsettled feeling within me just won't go. I think it is because I just have so much I want to do and achieve that I just don't know where to begin.

This year my goals are:
To lose weight and get fitter. I don't need to be a supermodel with perfectly toned body, I just want to fit back into my clothes and look nice and just feel fitter and stronger. I have my nephew's wedding coming up in mid April and by then I want to at least fit into some of my nice clothes again.

To declutter our entire house and give alot to charity and sell the really really good stuff online to earn us a few extra dollars. We desperately want to save up for another trip with the kids to Queensland before my eldest gets to the stage where he doesn't want to be seen with us anymore lol. So if I can make a few extra bucks from our clutter all the better.

My plan is to go through the house room by room. and paint and decorate each one to make it more homely. My ex and I bought this house just over 8 years ago when I was pregnant with my youngest. We had wanted to redo the kitchen and paint it then. Well my new hubby and I have done the kitchen (except the tiling lol....just can't make a decision on that bit!!) but it still hasn't been painted!!

I have decided that decluttering is going to be done bit by bit. My aim next week when the kids go back to school is to tackle one shelf/surface/drawer each day and no more. I tend to want it all done at once but I realise that I am driving myself crazy with that approach so one shelf a day it is. I will only be keeping things we are using/things we love. All the stuff I keep for "just in case" can go. Surely if I haven't needed it in a year I won't be needing it and I'm sure most of it I could easily find something close to it in an op shop if I need to.

I also want to try to live by need instead of want. Even though we do that more or less now due to financial constraints I do believe we can cut down even more, particularly when it comes to food. Food seems to take up so much of our weekly budget its ridiculous. We don't eat alot of takeaways, but I think home baking needs to become the norm for me rather than buying biscuits and cake. The kids prefer it anyway. I finally found a really nice banana bread recipe that my family (well all except two that don't like banana lol) love, so I now don't throw out bananas!! Yay!!

I will keep you updated on my missions.....lol there you go maybe if I make it sound like a game I may just succeed!!!

Its amazing how your views change as you get older.....

Sitting here today, I am looking at the calendar and it has suddenly dawned on me that the kids only have 15 days of school holidays left. I can't believe it, it seems like only yesterday that a couple of the school mums and I were counting down the days till school holidays began with looks of horror on our faces lol.

Today I wish that I still had weeks ahead of me before the beginning of the school year. I am dreading the school routine kicking back in. Back to the early mornings and before school rush. Making lunches and recesses, and the hassle that becomes with 2 kids who hate sandwiches. Making sure everyone gets the fruit that they like lol. The after school mayhem when they are hot, tired and cranky and you are guaranteed to be yelling before you even complete the 5 minute drive home. The joy of having tearful children as they are sent to their rooms to calm down for 5 minutes for hitting their brother or saying words they shouldn't. The homework help that is required by the high school kids and the battle to get the younger kids to do theirs. The list goes on!

I am also dreading the younger two starting back at school because last year was anything but enjoyable, dropping off crying children and spending way too much time with the principle as we try to devise a way for kids to settle better.

AAAAGGHHHHHHHHH I don't want holidays to end!!!!!

I really do wonder if home schooling the younger two at least would be more beneficial to them. I don't know if the stress that goes with schooling for them is worth it......but then again they don't like to mix with kids so I know that if I was to do that, then I would have that battle to contend with anyway. Parenting some days is just so hard lol.

I remember just a year or so ago when school holidays just gave me the horrors. When I used to count down the days with joy while the kids would count down with horror. Now I join them.

Maybe I am just getting older. I look at things with so many regrets at times,,,regrets and guilt. Should I have done more with them when they were little, is that why they struggle with their learning. Should we have played more games, did more colouring etc etc. Should I have had a bigger age gap so that each child could have been given more one on one time with me.

I don't know the answers. I so wish I could have a "do over" of the last 16 years and just start from scratch. How I would have done things differently and not taken one second of their lives for granted. I would have let the small things slide, do they really matter. Does having a tidy house really matter?

Today I sit here in a house that is very lived in. It is by no means perfect, it is over cluttered, not to the point of being a total mess but just not up to the standard that alot of other mums I know would really approve of. We have too much stuff, something I hope to fix this year in a series of major decluttering and redecorating.

This year is the year for me to get fitter, lose weight and to get my house turned into a home. To make it a place we love to come home to, instead of a place where I constantly feel stressed and feel pressured to be cleaning up. I want to be able to relax and enjoy my family in this home not be rushing my times with them so I can get the coffee table wiped down or the floors swept. Right now all the cleaning feel like it takes forever because there is too much stuff. I want to be able to wipe a surface down without having to move things all the time.

This has turned into yet another ramble. I haven't posted in a while lol, so you have all my whinging to enjoy at the same time!!

Ok I am off to clean the kitchen benches and then there might be time to squeeze in a board game with at least one of the kids....(as you can probably guess they all like vastly different games as well lol)

Pssst,,,BTW do you like the new look? I signed up to the blog frog and of course it refused to fit into my old layout so I changed. Still not 100% its the one I want but it does make me feel kinda holiday like, or at least of where I dream of being sort of....you know the view, beautiful beach with no housework for miles around lol.

How many more things can a girl want to do???

I made a decision last night that saw my hubby just kind of smirk and go "aha" in that way that only a man can do when his wife adds yet another thing to her "want to do list" lol. I decided that each time I cook something (something that has a recipe lol) I will photograph it and scrapbook a recipe card for it. Once I start I will also post them into this blog so in effect I will be sharing my cooking with whoever wants to take a peek. This makes me just want to start cooking all my favourites,,,,my kids would love it as the house would be full of home baking but oh boy I can also feel my waistline growing!!!! For someone that is desperately trying to lose the weight that idea may not be so good but I am going to do it anyway lol.

Tonight we are taking the kids down to the beach for a picnic tea and a swim. It is quite warm here today so it should be really nice down there tonight. Originally we had planned to do it tomorrow but Mr8 has been invited to a friend's house (his best friend that recently moved house) and I don't want him to miss out on either of these outings, so I will just work around him.

This morning I went to help out with the spelling tests for Mr8's class. I tested 19 kids and 14 of them got a score of 8 out of 10 or higher. I thought that was pretty good for a Year 2/3 class. There was in fact only one that scored below 6 and that was mainly because she gets her "b" and "d" and her "p" and "q" back to front lol.

Mr6 has actually managed to have a whole week in a row where he hasn't cried. I am so proud of him. He has now filled up his sticker chart for this week at school and has earnt himself a lucky dip from his teacher and he gets to play with his much longed for electric guitar for the weekend (it is Hubby's and Mr6 so desperately wants his own lol),,,,must remember to dig out some earplugs I think!

Ok off to get ready for the picnic, we are taking savoury biscuits, cheese, kabana, garlic mettwurst, ham, french onion dip, roasted capsicum dip, watermelon, rockmelon and some salad which I haven't decided upon yet lol.

The What to Attack First Dilemma........

Well I have survived school holidays and am now back into that dreaded school lunch packing routine again lol. I love the few hours of "by myself" time that school terms bring but I just hate packing lunchboxes lol I have a couple that are pretty fussy and school lunches aren't their favourite things in the world so I am always trying to come up with things they will at least have a nibble at. The school holidays went pretty quick actually. Unfortunately money is tight and we didn't really get to do anything but we went to visit 3 different parks and got in a trip down to Glenelg beach and a visit to the museum just to get them out the house at least. The boys don't mind staying home too much but too long in each other's company can be a little tedious and it turns into a yelling match between them a little too often lol.

Now that I have a little time to myself I just don't know where to start in the house. There are so many things I want to do but just can't seem to get stuck into anything because I look around and think "oh that really needs doing first" etc etc. We decided to redo the gardens and we have decided to help save money that we would start up a vegetable garden. We have a peacharine tree growing in a pot. I have planted a passionfruit vine that I am hoping (if the snails don't keep eating it that is!!! grrr) to grow up the trellis in front of the front door. I have also got growing 2 tomato plants and 2 capsicum plants. We have gone a little crazy on seeds too, I have so many packets of flowers its not funny lol. I have also bought pumpkin seeds, watermelon, cherry tomatos, cucumbers, rockmelons, guava (not sure if this will grow in Adelaide but will try anyway), yellow and black passionfruit and also I bought some mulberry tree cuttings from a guy on Oztion. I'd like to plant a mulberry tree out the front so will see if the cuttings take off. He sent me six so surely one of them will grow lol. I just want a nice looking garden but also one that can be productive. I have never really grown veggies/fruit before so have my fingers crossed. I don't want a traditional veggie garden though I thought I might try just planting things here and there and see how they go in amongst "normal" plants. The front yard is going to become a cottage garden once summer is over. I am just letting the grass die off over summer (this won't be hard it has dried off already!) and then once the weather begins to cool a little we will get some top soil an stacks of mulch to smother it and see how we go.

At the same time I am itching to get started painting my house. This has been something I have wanted to do since I moved in here almost 7 years ago, so as you can imagine it is long overdue. I am wanting to just go room by room and do up each one (as far as the budget will allow at least) as I go. I have always had this plan to start in the toilet and work my way through. So my "do up" plan goes like this......toilet, bathroom 1, bathroom 2, laundry, bedrooms x 5, lounge, kitchen, family room. This is going to take a while lol.

Best I go and achieve something for today then huh!!! I really need to do the floors, they are looking a little disgusting and then I should do some ironing oh well....here I go!!!!