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360- lemonade out of lemons

Place: My Desk

Poison: Museli

Favourite Things: Surprise dates on Friday and long sleep in Saturdays.

In the midst of our Christmas messyness, one of our cars (the one we only brought 6 weeks ago) completly died. It was a lemon!

Not great.

My Husband has been pretty stressed about it. At the end of the day however, what can we do? Freak out, blame people, want recompense.

Yes maybe, but also with 9 weeks or so till our little one arrives, we just have to make lemonade out of lemons.

Life throws us the unexpected.

Life is often very unfair.

But at the end of the day we have money to put food on the table, we have a healthy baby growing, we both are healthy with amazing opportunities to live a life of influence.

I think we have brought a lie both in the Christian church and also in society that everything needs to go our way everyday, for our behaviours and attitudes to reflect peacefulness.

However we truly have the choice of offence.

Do you want to be offended or not?

Do we make the best out of a situation or not?

What is our response?

Its our choice and so often we act like our emotions and our responses to situations are all consuming and we can’t control them.

I beg to differ.

It doesnt feel great, but today my family is making lemonade out of lemons!

Drink anyone?

A

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Surprise dates

Place: on the train

Poison: pineapple lumps

Favourite things: little jars with flowers in them on my coffee table.

Today is the date, that Charl invited me on a proper date, that slowly shifted our friendship into something more serious.

This time a few years ago I was nervous, tentative and worried we might ruin something that was great by turning it into something that might not work.

The risk paid off and look at us now, married, pregnant and life long partners in creative and inspirational crime!

So I am on the train, surprising him at work with a picnic blanket and some love, to re-create our first date.

A photo has been texted.
A surprise has been hinted at.

And our night is underway!!!

We want to be really careful in this new season of babyhood and familyness, that we dont loose the excitement and expectation we felt as we tinkered in the land of…does she like me? Does he like me? Do we risk this? Or don’t we?

Life is far too short for beige relationships.

Make sure you keep your accounts short and the intrigue high.

It doesn’t have to cost alot or even mean leaving the house but write a note and put it in a bottle, hiding it for your partner to find. Record a video and send it via email. Type a note declaring your love and thankfulness. Cook some biscuits and hide in their lunchbox. Light a candle, turn off the TV, don’t check Facebook as your falling to sleep, write dreams and goals together, get a babysitter, do anything; just be creative in keeping your love alive!

Expectantly

Mrs V

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362- swollen ankles

Place: My Desk

Poison: Lemon and lime soda

Favourite Things: Getting jobs done…

I haven’t really had many moments of nesting during this pregnancy, but today it has felt so rewarding to get jobs done. Post Christmas messyness, my bathroom is now finished therefore I have a washing machine now plugged in and good to go…so 4 loads of washing later, a good food shop full of fresh fruit, vegi’s and meat, paying bills, cleaning the house and a couple of vases of my aunts roses from her garden and I feel more sane.

What is it about clean washing, flowers and bills paid that makes us feel satisfied?

I think its the capacity to strike things off the memory banks task list, leaving our head space a little clearer to think about more lovely things.

My husband can’t understand how obsessive I am about having the house with a sense of order before I can relax. I was chatting with my friend Annie today about it, and we both agreed that creative people, have a high sense of skinlessness, which means that we sense and feel the overall order of a room, party, place. This skinlessness means that I love creative chaos, but I also need order and clarity to be able to re-create.

All of this activity has ended in very swollen ankles, so off to the beach I go to soak them back into some sense of normality.

If you relate to this skinlessness, make sure you declutter your creative spaces and homes. As much as you love a plethora of bits and bobs, they will also make you feel overwhelmed, confused and frustrated if everything doesn’t have its proper place.

This is the best time of year to clean out and recycle. Declutter and create space for the new. Donate all your goods to the op shop and make your head clear enough for some fresh inspiration.

swollen ankles are so worth this sense of satisfaction, with my house just a little more ordered!

Love ya

Mrs V

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363: New Year Reflections

Place: Home

Poison: Cordial

Favourite Things: My husband home from work early, the sea breeze, our neighbours, simple summer evenings…

It has taken me a few days, but I am actually on a proper computer not just my iphone so I can write properly about my new year’s reflection questions.

Every year for the last 8 years, on the eve of a new year, I have a ritual which has become a necessity to the ending of a year and the beginning of a new one. I find a place of quiet and rest, a place with some lovely coffee, tea and cake and I write. I muse. I think. I prepare. I repent. I find myself in the midst of the Christmas Chaos and I launch myself into the potential of a blank diary that promises the earth.

I find it hard to come across someone, even the most depressed that doesn’t embark upon a new season, a new year without some sense of hope. I remember the eve of a new school, a new school bag, new stationary set, lunch box and ironed uniform and it always promised me so much. Or that night before a new job, so full of tension and also expectation, the last days of a pregnancy where there is fear and trepidation, combined with a crazy amount of hormones and happiness.

Wherever you find yourself at the moment, a time of reflection and the opportunity to ask yourself some big questions is an opportunity awaiting…I’m not a big fan of New year’s resolutions because I often disappoint myself, but I am the hugest advocate of reflection, questioning and writing down the possibilities, which if left un-authored can never be realised.

Here are my questions, they have morphed and changed with the seasons, but mostly have provided a consistency and opportunity for growth and change in my very normal, but hopefully domestically radical existence.

What’s been a particularly positive experience?
Who’s been a person I’ve got to know better?
What am I especially thankful for?
What am I determined to do differently next year?
Where have I grown in the last year?
What am I prepared to change in my schedule to make growth a non-negotiable next year?
What is my character?
What is my contribution?
What is my personal culture?
Who is my community?
Key scripture verse for last year?
High point?
Low point?
Lesson learned?
A quote that sums up the year?
One word that expresses the year?

Light a candle, pour a glass of wine (or water in my case), crank up some atmospheric tunes, find a new journal or start a new computer file, open a blog, take time essentially and focus on the important rather than the urgent. Even better find a friend and encourage and share your reflections.

Guaranteed hope will arise.

Mrs V

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364

Place: car yard

Poison: hot chocolate

Favourite things: our crumpler baby bag

I’m sitting awaiting the pick up of our new (used) car which is another part of the journey towards motherhood.

A safe car big enough for a pram, baby seat and of course the precious cargo.

We tried to be really conservative in our selection so that we don’t finish the season of two incomes with debt.

The life of finances and motherhood is not an easy traverse, as everything within you wants the best of the best, however that is not necessarily the wisest position to place your family in.

 

What makes us think that having the most expensive things will make our children happy

Why do  we follow a culture that says the more expensive, the better the quality?

I think we easily believe the lie, the more money and possessions we own the happier we will be.

I truly believe our child will be happiest, when we are happiest, which for me personally is when I am centered by my faith and the promises of God

Imagine  what the world would look like if we consumed less and reflected more? If we spent less and created more? If we spoke less and listened more?

That’s what the next generation are hungering for, a society that is engaged more in the moment rather than blindly working overtime to provide for the future.

Working hard and storing up a inheritance for the future is imperative, but at what cost

For another car, boat, holiday or to pay off the credit card that is already maxed.if we consumed less and recycled more, if we spent less and re-used more, if we dreamed of time as a family rather than a new toy to purchase…I’m not sure but maybe life might be a little kinder to us all.

Finding wisdom in our finances is not something that is encouraged or popular

I want to live counter culturally however.

How about you?

Mrs V