Live, Life. Love

Hello my friends,

How are you all?

I seem to loose track of time lately

and a week manages to go by before I get around to posting again!

We are already in the last week of the school holidays and boy did the time fly! 

January is always a good month for stepping back abit and

reassessing your life and your goals!

I didn't do a New Year's Resolution post

because I am not really good at keeping resolutions like loosing weight etc ...

I do like to have goals and I do like to have an idea of how my year ahead will look

Together with WH we decide what we want to achieve for us personally,

what we want for our family,

what things we want to be involved in,

what we want for the business,

what we want to get done around the house

We discuss if our wants are reasonable,

can we achieve them in a year?

what do we need to do in order to achieve them?

For us personally we are improving our lifestyle

we need to get out and exercise more,

go for walks,

ride bikes,

just move more in general.

We also want to grow stonger in our marriage

and in our faith so we aim to spend time together daily

in devotions and prayer

Those of you who have been around for a while

will know that we would like to increase our family

and we like to spend time with both of our families as much as possible

We would like our business to grow

and be at a point where it could be our sole source of income.

We would like to continue our invovlement with school and church

From all of our discussions and plans

we decided that in order for us to keep our life balanced

and achieve what we want for us,

our family and our business

that it was a good idea for me to reduce my working hours at the Bank.

So I am very excited to say that as of next week

I will only be working a 60 hour fortnight at the Bank

This will allow me to go home when Nicholas finishes school and spend time with him

as well as help out more with some invoicing for the business etc.

I will now have every Friday off!

I am so excited....

imagine all of the things I can do with a whole day off every week!

 The house might get cleaned a bit more often!

How are you going?

Did you make any resolutions or goals for this year?

Now that we are almost one month in, are you still on track?

xx

all of the images were on my USB in a folder that I had been adding to over the years

so I am sorry but I didn't keep any references for them.

The Beauty in Creation

 When you stop to look around it is amazing how much beauty you can find.

In all of God's creation there is so much to be grateful for

Jemima is our cat, she is beautiful

and when I stop long enough to observe her she is full of wonders

I find that most of the time I am always rushing around trying to fit in so much

I don't often stop to appreciate all of the blessings around me

With all of the devastation caused by the flooding around us

I find that I am more and more thankful for what I have

I am thankful for all of the beauty in the world around me

including my beautiful new nephew that I met on the weekend.

I was able to stop and enjoy the beauty in him

He is all of 6 days old

the cute munchkin in the back is also my nephew and my Godson.

He is also very special to me.

I hope you had a great weekend

and that you were reminded in some way of the blessings you have in your life.

We also stopped in Ikea while we were in Sydney after having Yum Cha at Rhodes I am very grateful that I can visit and shop and then I can leave the hustle and bustle of the city and come home to my relatively quiet city of Orange.

What are you grateful for?

xx

Mini house makeover

 Boss is sad

His house is all weathered and worn.

 It is looking a bit tired

I wonder what is going on over there?

Hmmm, I'm not too sure about this!

Perhaps it was just the smell of the fresh paint

but I am sure Boss likes his house makeover!

I know I do!

My prayers are with all of the people

who are affected by the flooding throughout our country!

I pray for the families who are are missing family members

I pray for the people who have lost so much

I pray for all of the people invovled in the rescue efforts

I pray for all of the people who will be involved in the huge clean up

and I pray for all of the people who are donating so generously to the relief effort.

If you would like to donate money please visit HERE

Courtyard

I hope you have all had a lovely weekend!

We had a somewhat relaxed weekend and worked on a few things in the yard

That is after we slept on until 9.30am on Saturday morning

and only managed to get out of bed in time to get to church on Sunday morning!

After our late rise on Saturday

we further indulged by having breakfast outside and reading the paper until 11am!!!!!

That's ok, what is the point of working hard if you don't get to enjoy it!

When we bought our house (2 years ago)

we decided that we would have french doors one day

from our bedroom into a little courtyard outside

So when we started work on the yard we planned for our little courtyard

We dug

and we built retaining walls

and we rendered them

and we levelled and

we barrowed in crushed limestone

then with my birthday money we bought a table setting

just for the two of us!

now all we need is to get the french doors!!!!!

I wish you all a wonderful week!

xx

Dreaming of Tahiti

I have only been back at work for a week and already I am dreaming of better times

Well....

a better time....

3 years ago to be honest with you.......

when we were honeymooning in Tahiti

Hubby wanted to go to the Maldives but me being the thrifty person that I am said

"there are over water bungalows in Tahiti and it is so much closer to us than the Maldives! Surely we will save money!"

so being the wonderfully caring person that he is, he agreed,

just to make me happy

and the tickets were booked......

We would start with 3 nights on the main island in the capital, Papeete,

where we would see in the New Year of 2008.

From there we would fly to a smaller island and

stay in an over water bungalow for 6 nights all inclusive.

After this luxuriously restful break

we would cruise around the Tahitian and Cook Islands for 10 nights,

followed by one more night on the mainland

and a further week in Sydney with our son Nicholas in order to bond as a family

and get used to sharing space together

 in a neutral environment.

Tahiti was lovely but.................

Oh my goodness it was horrendously expensive!!!!

In the manic lead up to the wedding,

which involved moving house and Christmas,

end of school year and birthdays I totally,

didn't even think about checking exchange rates

or even researching anything further than

it was closer to us than the Maldives... so surely it must be cheaper!!!

So when we arrived at our Sheraton Resort and

ordered a club sandwich as a late night snack from room service

we weren't expecting it to cost close to $50!?!?!?!?

Oh dear!

My WH took it all in his stride and didn't get all flustered

(unlike someone else that was there), he just shrugged and said

"Just enjoy it Gorgeous, we are only having one honeymoon so just relax!"

So we did

It was amazing

We had a wonderful time

Tahiti wasn't what I expected it to be

but it was still wonderful

It was very similar to Bali and Fiji in the way that the locals seemed to be very under privileged and were living in poor conditions.

However the Tahitians seemed to have an arrogance about them and they really didn't seem to welcome the tourists.

The resorts were fantastic and my favourite for relaxation was definitely the over water bungalow

It was so private and the water was amazing,

 it is the first and only time that I have skinny dipped....

We were able to jump into the water straight off our balcony and it was so warm,

 we had a platform to climb back onto with a shower to rinse off under.

Even snorkeling around the bungalows was amazing,

so much to see and we didn't have to go far at all.

The cruise was also a big hit! We both loved it,

it was a smaller ship and therefore had a more intimate feel,

 we got to know the people on board and felt very special.

It was lovely to stop by the piano lounge to have a cocktail after dinner

and have a song sung especially for us!

 I swum with Sting rays and though it doesn't sound like a big deal

 it was not long after we lost Aussie icon Steve Irwin

 to a sting ray incident so I felt quite brave to be hopping in the water with them.

I would definitely recommend going on a cruise, we hope to do it again soon!

 I love holidays!

I love planning them

and I love taking them!

My favourite ones include warm weather and beaches!

What about you?

What are you dreaming about right now?

xx

Happy 2011

Welcome to 2011,

 I pray that the year is full of wonderful blessings for you!

I hope that you all have had a fantastic festive season full of love and laughter

December is always a very busy time of the year for us

We finish off the end of the school year and the working year

with a nice holiday, just the three of us.......

This year we spent a lovely 7 nights at Diamond Beach, NSW

and we were blessed with gorgeous weather

We celebrate my birthday, along with my mum's and my Brother in laws,

We celebrate Christmas with both of our families,

this year it meant 4 days of celebration

with two of those days hosted by us,

we just love Christmas!

we celebrate our anniversary,

on the 29th December 2010 we were married for 3 years

and every day it just gets better and better

Then we celebrate the end of one year and the beginning of a new one!

Happy New Years!

xx

We were married in the botanic gardens by Nick's minister and serenaded with live music by family, friends and a rendition of Amazing Grace on the bag pipes.

Young Nicholas gave me away and was also involved in the ceremony by reading a passage from the bible.

We had family photos in the Gardens and then we had our bridal party photo shoot at Mayfield Vineyard. The Vineyard has a restaurant and this is where Nick proposed to me.

Nick's brother worked there as an apprentice chef at the time and it was our favourite restaurant. Nick arranged for a special dessert with the proposal written in chocolate on a plate that held the engagement ring.

Nick did drop to one knee to propose and our song played in the background,

I was so surprised that I don't remember if I said yes or not!

I am so blessed to have such a thoughtful and loving husband

and I am looking forward to spending many many more years together

and celebrating many many more anniversaries.