Not so busy

I haven't been up to much but I'm sure that, me being me, I can come up with an entry of some substance. ;)

I've been getting back into exercising lately and have been busy moving more! I feel so much happier when I've been working out. I've really missed it. I'd really like to take a pilates class if they have one during the day so I think I'm going to check on that. It's been something I've been interested in for a while and would be keen to get into it. Most of the classes seem to be in the evenings though and I'm not really interested in doing that...I'll check it out. Read my other blog PlusSize2DreamSize to follow my progress if you'd like to!

We went into Sarina Beach on the weekend and caught up with Turtle and Ashleigh and Alexis and Phil, Turtle's sister and her husband. It was a lot of fun! We played board games and talked about how we're trying to build up the church and what they're doing their church and so on and they gave me lots to think about. It's such a breath of fresh air to just sit and laugh and learn from each other. I haven't caught up with friends in ages! I went out with Karen about a month ago for a quick morning tea which was fun in it's own right, but isn't the same as when you all get together after the babies are sleeping (Alexis and Ash both have little beebs. :) ) and we can all just....be. It's nice. :)

My calendar has filled out a little bit! We're having dinner with Rob and Talia on Saturday night and that will be the first time we've caught up with them in 3-4 months I think....gosh time flies. I'm really looking forward to Saturday though. I've also been getting to know Emily, who plays keyboard at our church, better lately and she's such a hoot! She's a teacher at the high school here in town and is about the same age as Kara I think. We had our first music rehearsal tonight where I sing and she plays the keyboard and, starting next week, Renee will be on the drums. Chris is fairly confident he could play some chords on the guitar as well if he needed to so we're filling out quite nicely! So we'll be doing that every Wednesday night from now on and then on Thursday nights I'm helping to chaperone the Debutante Ball dance rehearsals with Emily. YAY! I get to plan the decorations and I'm pretty excited about that. I'm thinking the budget is fairly small but we should be able to do something special either way. I love an excuse to get creative and this is the perfect one. :) The color the girls chose is a bright cherry red...interesting choice, but who am I to comment? haha It will be easy to find red stuff anyway.

We got a LOT of house supplies this weekend that we've been needing like a proper broom, vacuum cleaner, squeegee (for the big concrete floor downstairs, it used to be a car port and gets REALLY dirty...too dirty to mop) hedge trimmers, new flower seeds, striking hormone so we can get some cuttings from Debra and plant them in our garden (you dip the cuttings in the hormone before you plant and it helps them strike) and a dusting mop and orange oil for the hardwood. We have also picked the dishwasher we want and it's only $850 not including installation. This is WAY better than the $1200-1500 I'd been seeing on pricetags. It actually was marked $1200 and they marked it down for us if we can pay in cash or credit up front instead of laying away, so we'll be saving up for that. We need to get a plumber in to give us a quote and so we can figure out where we're going to put this thing. hahaha It *should* be under the sink and there's room there but that also means removing a good portion of the cabinetry and I don't know how much that is going to cost. Otherwise we have to put it on the opposite side of the kitchen from the sink, which really isn't that big a deal but it's not convenient.

I spent a good portion of yesterday trimming the hedges in the front of the fence in the front yard. WHAT a workout! Gosh! My arms are sooo sore today! haha Who knew...I'll be doing the ones on the side of the fence tomorrow, but want to keep them at about 7 ft tall (they're pushing 9 feet at the moment!!) so we still have the privacy since those are the hedges that line the finger-park and there's a lot of people who pass by in there in the afternoons (the finger park is a cleared space about the size of a single house-lot that allows for quicker foot traffic around town.) Then I'm going to plant my seedlings! I have a lot of rockery friendly flowers that I'm going to plant along the fence in the backyard (the one lining the neighbor's yard, not the finger-park.) I could plant them directly in soil, but I think they'll have a better chance if I look after them at first. There's an old green house in the backyard, believe it or not, because the original home-owner was a horticulturist. We even have an irrigation system hung up that we could time to spray our flowers and seedlings throughout the day if we wanted to...not that you'd need it with all this rain though! ha! It's just a concrete foundation about 4'x6' with a metal frame and green shade wrapped around the top of the frame, but it'll do nicely for my seedlings. There's old tables out there and everything. It should be nice. :) I know it's a rent house and so it may seem silly to invest so much time in the garden, but I really enjoy it so much that it doesn't matter! We've only spent maybe $100 on plants and flowers in all so we won't lose much if we end up having to move anyways. I just love to see things grow and see the change and know that it was because I helped it. :)

Okay, so much for not having much of substance to say!! hahaha

I LOVE our vacuum cleaner. I never really thought about getting one because we have wood floors, but BOY does it make a difference! I can use it to suck up all the cat hair on the couch and drapes and the molding on the floor and the dust bunnies in the corner. It's so hard to sweep everything and the broom doesn't really seem to ever get all of the dust bunnies up so this vacuum will be our saving grace. I know they use a LOT of energy though, so we'll have to look out. Between the new air conditioner, dishwasher, vacuum cleaner and hot water I shudder to think of our power bill. Hopefully not too painful!

We have an inspection on the 16th so it's that time again when I have to get everything in order. I know that they don't mind a little mess here and there so long as the house itself is clean and taken care of, but I like to leave a good impression every time which is why I make such an effort. I'm not going to stress this time, I'm going to get started now doing bits and peices so it's none of the up-all-night-the-night-before stuff again. We have admittedly NEVER used our wardrobe or chest of drawers for clothes. We just leave them hanging on the line downstairs or folded in baskets around the house and dig for what we need. I'm afraid there just wouldn't be space for all of it in the wardrobes and drawers but it couldn't hurt to actually try. It will give me something to do anyways.

I've also ordered a PDA on Ebay and got a REALLY sweet deal! I'm terribly disorganized and forget dates and appointments constantly and it's starting to get embarrassing and I'm afraid I'm getting a reputation...I don't want to be that flakey friend so it will be awesome to have everything all in one place. Of course my phone has a planner but it's just a beating to have to spell out every word using the key-pad and this PDA has a stylus screen that recognizes your handwriting and converts it to text which will be so much simpler. It's just a very basic PDA, no bells and whistles, nothing flashy, and there's reports of the screen resolution being really poor but all I need is a place where I can digitally compile my appointments, to-dos and addresses and it does that much which is awesome by me! One day I'll have an iPhone and it will do all the flashy things like internet and video and mp3 playing and, well, phone calls, and all will be right with the world. But, for right now, all I really need is an organizer and this sure beats lugging around a day-runner!


Palm Z22 Handheld