Ms Fifikins

This week’s My Place and Yours has asked us to share our favourite pair of shoes.

I have a bit of a confession. I actually don’t like wearing shoes. I would so much prefer to go around bare footed. But to pick a favourite pair of shoes… I actually couldn’t decide between the following two:

1. My runners.

2. My bike boots

Yes, both of these pairs of shoes are comfortable, but it is the function they serve when I am wearing them and the activities associated with them that makes them favourites as without them I would not be able to work out at the gym, nor ride my bike.

You may note a stain on the left runner… I ride my bike to the gym most times and a few months ago I had a small oil leak through the gear stick! All fixed now and I should thrown them in the washing machine!

MIML™ has always been one who appreciates his own space. I have not been used to the concept and it has taken me some time to figure out what it is all about.

I know it is not rejection, but more a time when he needs to be by himself to collect his thoughts and chill.

My space time tends to lead me to just being lazy. I faff online, or lie in bed, or watch the cooking channel. Yes, I zone out, but I don’t use the time to my advantage.

One of my tasks I set for myself on my 101 in 1001 days (too tired tonight to link it in, but it is up there somewhere for you to click!) is to find 5 indulgences that aren’t food related. I think this ties in with space. I need to find things that refresh me. That reinvigorate and re-energise me. That help me be a better person for me. Perhaps I do need to be selfish at times and say no.

So tomorrow (er today now!) when MIML™ has his space I will be cleaning and decluttering upstairs and down. And I will be involving the kids! I think maintaining an ordered house will help me maintain an ordered mind.

And if anyone can think up any indulgences for me, I would be grateful!

I am so glad that this week’s My Place and Yours is the outside of your fridge as the inside of mine is a little like a horror movie at the moment. Either that or a science lab. I think green mould that has turned orange is bad, right?

See this is the front:

See, next time you go to buy a fridge, make sure you take a magnet with you and check if it sticks. Sigh. I do have some sticky things at the top that magnets stick to, but I try and save them for notices. Being early in the term there aren’t many yet! The kids weekly chore charts are up there, some postcards and at the bottom are my Queensland Right of Entry permit and WHS Entry permit. Actually, although they have been sitting there for a while they are now in my purse this evening!

The side is magnetic…

And has lots of magnets on it! I do heart my magnets!

Last week’s theme was your kitchen, and I took pics but never posted them. So here is a quick peek at my kitchen seeing I wiped down benches and did dishes and stuff to take them:

See we were having corned beef that night in the slow cooker and I had just chopped veggies! Oh and I do have a clutter pile just by the back door of mail and bills and stuff.

Why not join in and show us what’s on your fridge this week!

This is another one crossed off my 101 in 1001 days list!

When I was drawing up my 101 things I perused the Day Zero site for ideas. One of them that came up over and over was to send a certain number of postcards via PostCrossing.com. I chose 25.

Why 25? Good question! I suspect I doubted myself as to whether or not I could keep this particular challenge up. See, I have a habit of avoiding the Post Office as I know that when I get mail it usually contains bills. But I stocked up on postcards and stamps and I discovered that most of the places that sell postcards around here also sell stamps! Win! And there is also a huge variety of postcards available in this neck of the woods!

I actually reached 25 cards a few weeks back, but early on I did not scan cards and some people don’t have access to scanners to scan them themselves. Now I scan every card before I send it and then once it is registered at the other end the image automatically appears! It is awesome!

There has also been an added plus for me with this project- I forgot that I would be receiving cards too! I have had some gorgeous cards in the mail. They can be seen here! It is so lovely going to the PO Box and finding pretties in there and not just bills!

This is a project I have loved and I will continue with! I now look at the post card racks at shops around town and have a stash of around 15 waiting for people to send them too! I suppose for me this task is easier than for some as I do live in a tourist town with plenty of cards available to me. It also gives me plenty to write about- although telling people I live in tropical Australia between World Heritage Rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef is getting a little repetitive!I now have no doubt that I will send 100 cards before this project is over. Bring it on!

Figure I might as well join in this week’s noicities that recap last week. You get that, right?

See last week was a noice week, despite everything! See parts of last week were good…

1. I turned 38. See. I admit it. I had a lovely relaxing day. I was spoilt by MIML™ with a gorgeous bracelet and ring*. And dinner at our favourite restaurant!
2. Also received some awesome gifts from my mum including some tea (always goes down well!) a bag, some lavender hanging thingies to make my wardrobe smell noice and some drinkbottles.
3. My brother sent me a voucher which I will use to buy a book (should have gone to Myer whilst the stocktake sale was still on…)
4. My ‘MIL’ sent me a gorgeous charm/bead bracelet she had made herself and also a book of her favourite recipes! I suspect MIML™ is more excited about some of the recipes as they are those of his childhood!
5. It was noice that I ate really well all week. I really feel I am back on top of the eating thing at the momrnt!
6. I burned 1143 calories at boxing at the gym yesterday! And I didn’t blow it on chocolate or cakes or anything
7. Both kids are home after trips interstate to see their grandparents! So glad they got to go, but it is noice having them home.#

Yes, I suppose there are some not so noice, but bearables…

1. MIML™ was on nights. Say no more!
2. *My ring isn’t back from being resized yet and I want it like yesterday!
3. # Yes, the kids are home which has meant the constant peace and quiet of the last 2 weeks has been interrupted with bickering…

So onto this week! I’m sure it will be as noice as the last one, even more so that MIML™ is no longer on nights.

Perhaps I should have posted a warning… This week’s My Place and Yours theme is ‘What you look like when you get out of bed…’ I did choose a morning when I needed to wash my hair and I have 4 huge pimples on my face, but still, this is about normal!

Must admit I am loving wearing my dressing gown in the mornings!

So there you have it… I dare you to post a pic of yourself first thing in the morning.

The title of this post is a quotation by Emily Dickinson. We studied quite a bit of Dickinson’s poetry at school. One of the poems for Year 12 English Lit was Because I could not stop for death. It is only this evening I have thought of it again when searching for quotations about aging.

How wonderful it would be to be too busy to die! But I am not proposing to talk of death. But rather aging. You see, tomorrow is mah birfday.

Last weekend I had a total meltdown over it. It was not the meltdown that I am now closer to 40 than 35, but rather the pressure I have on myself to mark the occasion or celebrate it. The kids are with their father and his family in NSW and I am thrilled for them. It is their cousin’s 18th birthday and also their Grandad’s birthday whilst they are there. But it does mean they will miss my birthday. MIML™ is currently on nights- a week of working 10pm til 7am starting last night, so the original plan of heading away for the weekend was blown to shreds.

And then it struck me. Most of my good friends live interstate of overseas. We keep in touch online or by SMS or the occasional phone call, but it is not the same as having them over for tea and birthday cake or a celebratory Gin-dependence Day cocktail!To say I lost it last Sunday would be an understatement. But I worked through things. MIML™ and I plan to head away for a night in a couple of weeks. At the end of the month the kids and I will do something to mark my birthday.

I’m not actually looking for presents either. I still can’t think of things I want when MIML™ or the kids ask. Yes, there are things I would like, but I can also live without them.

So tomorrow will be quiet. MIML™ will sleep until at least the early afternoon. I will research raised garden beds and work out the best way of putting some in the back yard. I might even do some blogging, catching up on my 101 in 1001 days reports! We will head out to dinner, probably at our favourite restaurant!

But I am getting newer. My thinking has changed so much in the last few years. I like the person I am and the person I am becoming. I am renewing all the time. And it is only through aging that this is happening.

Oh and finally…

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

I will try and have cake tomorrow too!