What a crap evening

I suppose I really shouldn’t moan, because there are bigger things in life, but really, I had a crap evening.
The order of the general crappiness:

1. Went for my weigh-in… Only lost 0.4kg’s… That’s 400 grams!
2. The chick at the clinic jabbed me so hard with the needle that I actually cried.
3. Then I had to compose myself for a meeting with the guy from Sanlam to discuss (of all things) an endowment policy.
4. By the time I get home I am ready to cry again because I’m so hungry… only to discover that we have no electricity.
5. No electricity equates to no dinner
6. We went to Woolies and bought a chicken, got home, made salad and chicken rolls by candlelight.
7. Sit down to eat, the lights come back on. CURSE YOU MURPHY!

I hope next Tuesday goes better. I’ve been working so hard on my diet that getting on the scale and seeing that I’ve only lost 0.4kg’s is unbelievably disheartening. I feel defeated.

Venting

I need to vent and unfortunately you, dear reader, are the person I’m directing my vent at.
This has been a crap, crap day. Please can you tell me why, when I’m feeling at my lowest, someone comes along and shits on my shoes? I’m talking figuratively, not literally, of course.

I woke up tired this morning and never really kicked into gear, although I did seem to have an extremely productive day. This could also possibly be because I’ve just got so much work to get through that killing piles of it seems productive.

Anyways, work isn’t the cause of my vent at this point. The cause is the fact that someone is going to look at our flat on Wednesday. That someone is a potential buyer. If that someone decides they would like to buy our flat we are stuck, yet again, without a home. This time the move isn’t as simple as picking ourselves up and moving. This time we have a grandfather and a cat to worry about. It’s all just too much for me at this point, so much so that I’m actually on the verge of tears.

Anyways, I’ve got work to finish up and had best get on with it if I’m going to get out of this office by 7:30pm.

ZZZzzzZZZzzzZZZzzzZZZ

I'm dead on my feet this morning! I don't know why I'm so tired,  but I woke up tired and haven't managed to perk up as yet. Even my morning cuppa Joe hasn't really helped. That could also be because it's decaf, but still, it usually works.

Ugh, Monday. Well... best I try kick my brain into function mode and get going with it. The sooner I get stuck in, the sooner it will be over.

On the upside, I did manage to get a painting (albeit a small one) done over the weekend. I need to varnish it and then once it's dry I'll take a photo to show you.

Anyways, have a great day!

DoD Update!

Ok, so tonight was weigh-in night... and I have lost... in one week...

*drum roll please*

...................
...................
...................
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1.8 Kilograms!

I am TOTALLY stoked :D

Meh...

I have a headache for some bizarre reason... and Katia and I may at some point go do... uh... mashy golf? This could be somewhat challenging, and more of a giggle than anything else.

We really do end up having very random conversations at work sometimes... :P

Diet of Doom (DoD)

It's weigh-in day!
Will let you know later how it all went :)x

New Jewellery

I made myself a pair of quite chunky earrings to wear to Pat's wedding. I also made Ros a pair of earrings for her bridal shower / pamper party.

These are mine:

These are for Ros:

The weekend

The weekend was busy, but good. Mom and I had a nice day out on Sunday. We found my birthday present! A pair of Oakley Polarized Straight Jacket® sunglasses. They’re gorgeous, but unfortunately I’m only getting them in November, when my birthday rolls around.

Other than that it was a weekend of arts and crafts and clothes shopping… Grandpa went to Susan on Sunday, because he hates going to clothes shopping with us.

Products for my online shop are coming along nicely. I’ll post some samples when I get a chance.
Anyways, I best get motivated.

Have a super day!

P.S. The diet of doom is coming along nicely. I think I've lost my kilogram for this week. I've been really good and sticking to the diet like glue. I've also been drinking the correct quantities of water every day (and have turned into a pee-pot). I can't say that it's easy, because my house is always full of biscuits and junk food thanks to my grandfather, but I'm going strong and am DETERMINED to lose the 15 kilos to get to my goal weight :)

Me, myself and I

Mom and I went shopping at Pav today, and I found a shirt for Pat's wedding!!! I'm so stoked. I've been worrying about what to wear. Now all it needs is a belt, which I'm going to make with leather cord and sliders, and some gorgeous chunky earrings and a bracelet. I'm not going to go the necklace route, because the neckline is quite high already.

What do you think?

This is a random photie I took this morning... I decided to take a photo from a different point of view :P

Arts & Crafts

I had a superb morning painting with Maxine at Yours Forever Craft Studio. Katherine, the shop owner and teacher, is wonderful. A little dilly, but so wonderful. She is so creative and artistic and she always inspires me. She helped me put together an awesome (or at least I think it’s awesome) 3 piece abstract painting.

Let me know what you think!

The diary updated

July 17: Crafts with Maxine at Yours Forever
July 17: Ros' bridal shower at Bot Gardens
July 24: Blood tests - The diet of doom requires me to go get...
July 31: Hair appointment! I will finally start looking like a human again and not the Tazmanian Devil
August 08: Pat & Ros wedding down the south coast
August 14: Bead making class in PMB
August 28: Shoot Gina's dad's wedding (definite)
September 24-26: Weekend away in the Midlands with Jay

My weekends are filling up again. I think after the craziness of the next few months I'm going to take a break from life and just chill at home, making jewellery.

A little bit of everything...

The diet of doom has commenced.
I’m going to try and not let this take over my life, but as we all know, weight is no laughing matter. On the upside, I’ve lost 0.6 of a kilo since my last weigh-in, 7 months ago, at the clinic. So at least I’ve maintained the weight-loss. Now to just get down to 65!

I’m missing the Fluff and her motivation. I used to pop over to her place on the odd day and have lunch with her. It was fantastic because she kept me motivated, especially when I was feeling miserable about taking the medicine and eating salads almost every day. My mother and grandfather are no motivation. Grandpa made pudding for him and mom this evening. I didn’t have any, but still… it’s difficult. Food is my demon. For me, it’s the equivalent of alcoholism or a cocaine addiction. I love food, especially pies, pastries and pastas. There is never a point during the day that I don’t think about food, so when I’m on diet it’s like being in a rehab clinic, with all the anxiety and stress and unhappiness that goes along with it. There are even times when I feel physically sick at the thought of not eating something delicious and fattening, the result of which leaves me bad-tempered and sometimes rather unpleasant to work with. Anyways, let me stop complaining. I hate the sound of my own misery more than I hate being on diet.

It was Pat’s birthday today… Thank goodness for Facebook! FB reminded me and as a result I ended up being the good friend I like to think I am by calling him on his b-day. I’m going to see him on Thursday for coffee and to discuss my website. He’s such a great bean. I’m going to miss him when he moves to Ballito. I know married men shouldn’t have female friends, but he’s like a brother to me!

Gosh, Saturday is going to be manic. I’m actually a little stressed out about it. It started out as a nice day out with Maxine, but it’s slowly turning into a hectic, clock-watching event. I got an sms from Chilo (Ros’ bridesmaid) telling me that the bridal shower is on Saturday at 2pm. Art class with Max at Yours Forever is from 9:30 until about 1-ish… So that means leaving Hillcrest at 1pm, racing back to Winkle to drop Max off and then racing back to Bot Gardens in town. I think I’m only going to get there at about 2:30pm, but there’s nothing I can do about that at this point. Wish me luck…

Sunday should be less manic at least.

Well, I guess that’s me for now.
Have a great week.
x

An update on the Shoppe of Little Things design

Ok, I know I said I wasn't going to work on the design until I had spoken to Pat, but I couldn't help myself. Here's the updated design. I nabbed some design ideas, and the background pattern off the web. I prefer this because it's got more colour, and it feels more "artsy/craftsy/homey."

The weekend thus far

It’s been a relatively relaxing one so far. Yesterday I made corn fritters which came out quite nice. You can pick up the recipe for them here, at my Taste Magazine blog.

Mom and I went to the shops in the morning. We bought wool, and a few other bits and pieces. I’m starting the diet of doom again because I’ve picked up 4 kilos and I’m starting to feel it in my clothes. I still have those 15 kilos to lose, so I guess now is as good a time as any to get rid of them.

I haven’t really made any further progress on my online shop, because I need to meet with Pat first to discuss the product catalogue, and how it will all work. Once I’ve got a better understanding of that, I’ll continue with the design. In the meantime I’m making pieces of jewellery and pricing them.

In other arts and crafts news, I’m working on the mosaic snail, who thanks to Jay, I’m calling Juju. He’s coming along nicely, but I’m going to need to get another pack of the one set of tiles. I can see that I’m going to run out.

I also started my 44 Liqueur yesterday. I think it’s going to be fantastic when it’s done, but we shall wait and see. Getting the coffee beans into the orange is more difficult than it looks! But it was quite quick to put together once I got into the swing of it. I’m going to make some surprise muffins today for lunch, I think.

I have so much work to do, at work that I may go in a little later to try and get through some of my admin. Big things are happening at work that I can’t talk about at this point, but they’re all good.

Anyways, that’s me for now. Have a great Sunday and a great week!

Furbie was having a snooze on the carpet

Wow

This has been one hell of a week. You know your home life is stressful when you’re wishing it were Monday instead of Friday. That said, I am truly exhausted. My everything is aching from my ears to my toes.

I managed to semi-graze my knee this morning, but it still hurts like hell, when I went falling down the driveway. I was simply wearing the wrong shoes at the wrong time, and put my foot in the wrong place. As a result my knee is stiff, bruised and all-round sore.

On the upside, I do have a snail to mosaic this weekend. I’m calling him Juju, thanks to Jay’s suggestion. I’ll post some pics of the in-progress and the finished result. I just need to remember to get some bonding agent for the grout.

I’m also going back on my diet from Tuesday. I’ve put on 4kg’s and I’m not happy. Look, I still have another 15 (now 19) to lose, so now is a good time to get back on it. I’m not looking forward to the revolting medicine, but I am looking forward to losing the weight. Hopefully by this time next year I will be at my goal weight. I also need to get into a gym. I need to find a woman’s gym that caters for my insane schedule. I don’t like gyms where there are men around.

Ok, my emails have been sent, so I’m heading home. Enjoy the weekend!

My Diary

The weekends are really starting to fill up.

July 17: Crafts with Maxine at Yours Forever
August 08: Pat & Ros wedding down the south coast
August 14: Bead making class in PMB
August 28: Shoot Gina's dad's wedding (maybe, not sure yet)
September 24-26: Weekend away in the Midlands with Jay

Who would have thought that my weekends would be filling up?

Mentally Tired

It was another early East Coast Radio and electric razor morning this morning. When I wake up listening to the radio, my heart actually sinks. It’s not even so much that it’s the radio, but that it’s East Coast Radio… The station for old people, that plays old music. I just hate it. I’ve started looking around for places to stay and pricing furniture and appliances. I think it’s time that I move out of house and home, because home isn’t home anymore… It’s just a space that I unhappily exist in.

The problem is that it affects how I feel at work, and that is not on. I have too much work and enjoy my job too much to jeopardise it because my headspace is bad due to living with my grandfather.

BACK TO THE FUTURE!

Oh the awesomeness!
Today is the day that Marty McFly arrived in the future after hitting 88mph in a pimped out Delorean in 1985, in the original Back to the Future movie.

Harry Enfield - Gay Nazis

I laughed so hard at this.

Stick a fork in me, I am done

I can’t do it… I just can’t do it anymore. We’re in the process of changing our DSTV subscription (long story), so at the moment we don’t have TV at home. As a result, my grandfather is putting the radio on at 4:30am. I shit you not. The problem is, because his hearing isn’t good he turns it up, not exceptionally loud, but just above acceptable level. I’m not a morning person at the best of times, and if I could, I would ensure that there was no sound at all in my house from the time I get up to the time that I walk out of the door. I need peace in the mornings. There is no peace in my house anymore. It’s not just that though… we are just from two very different worlds. We had to listen to Rod Stewart last night. Shoot me, please. I was in my room so I wasn’t watching the dvd, but I could still hear ooooold Rod belting it out like there was no tomorrow.

I can’t do it anymore! I have nothing but anger in my heart towards him at this point. He squandered his life and his money, left my gran to go diddle whatever woman he could find in whatever dodgy pub he came across and now instead of retiring in a nice old-age home or immigrating to Canada, he's invading our home. I know you probably think I'm a terrible person, but at this point I don't care.

Sunday Busy Sunday…

It’s been another busy day and another busy weekend all-round. I went down the South Coast today with Pat and Ros to check out Cracker Bay and talk about the wedding photos. I have to say, I’m not any more confident about the photography than I was when I got into the car. It’s going to be an interesting one hey, but I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I’m just going to have to go with the flow and wing it on the day.

It’s a nice venue, although the furniture in the B&B is a little… er… eclectic. They seem to have collected items from every era of the past century and kinda mixed and (not really all that successfully) matched pieces to get a kind of hotelly (Ya, I know it’s not a word) environment. That said, I think that their wedding is going to be lovely.

On the way to Cracker Bay we stopped for lunch at a place called Jaxx. Actually, Jaxx was a little further on from Cracker Bay, but still close. Lunch was awesome, and if you ever find yourself driving down the coast be sure to stop there. Ros had the line fish, Pat had prawns and I had the Camembert Chicken. Gosh it was delicious. Cooked perfectly and served with just the right amount of perfectly cooked vegetables and chips (French fries).

After a long, but good day, I got home and quickly popped to the shops with mom to buy a few more mushrooms and parmesan cheese. I made mushroom risotto for supper. It’s the first time that I’ve made risotto and feel that I had got it right. Normally my risottos end up being gloopy, blobby messes of grossness, but today I just seemed to get the combination of everything right and it was creamy and delicious.

And that, as they say, is that.
Hope everyone else had a good weekend too!

Ballito Prawn and Jazz Festival

Saturday turned out to be a little different to what I had originally planned, but I can’t complain. I did get to Ceramic Craft Studio to pick up the ceramic snails that Katia and I want to mosaic, but I didn’t get to the I Heart Market.

These are some of the tiles I'm going to mosaic him with.

At the festival I bought a heart blank to mosaic, to see how it's going to come out.

Mom, grandpa and I took a drive out to Ballito for the Prawn and Jazz Festival, which was held at Collisheen Estate.

It was great, there was so much to look at including guys flying through the air on dirt bikes, a big flea market, arts, crafts, food galore, a farmers market, a 4x4 track, rock climbing walls and even a funfair. We had lunch at the SPAR tent and although the queue was a mile long, it went by quickly. All of us had the prawn and chicken bunny chow. They were nice, but could have done with a few more prawns. I bought a few small things, and found a few more things that I would have like to have bought, but didn’t. I bought a heart made out of wood (pic below) because I think I’d like to make these and sell them in my (soon to be) online shop. Let me know what you think and if you think that it’s a good idea that I include them. We were blessed to have perfect Durban winter weather, sunshine and no rain. I didn’t need a jersey at all, but I certainly do need to get myself a pair of sunglasses. My Oakleys are so old that they’ve actually perished, poor things.

These boys (the one was only 17!) were literally FLYING through the air!

We bought two mixed mushroom kebabs. I think I'm going to use the shrooms to make a mushroom risotto tomorrow.

Pics of the heart that I want to attempt to make and sell. What do you think? This cost me R80, and I know that it didn't cost that much to make.

 

After the festival we popped to the Lifestyle Centre in Ballito. It’s such a nice centre, but we didn’t stay long because we’d been walking for hours around the festival and were tired. I even started dozing off in the car on the way home! We left the house this morning at around 10ish, but only got home just before 5pm! So it’s been a long day, but a good one.

I was using mom’s point-and-shoot so I couldn’t zoom in as far as I would have liked with the bike pics.

The Rebound

Oh gosh, I’ve just finished watching The Rebound and I’m in tears! Good tears though. What a great movie. It was funny, entertaining, happy in the right places and sad in the right places. It was also uplifting, especially for someone like me who is never really sure if happy endings have a place in the world anymore. I think I’m going to buy this one on DVD.

Little Shoppe of Things Website

During lunch I thought I'd start putting together a layout for my shop of things.
What do you think of the name and the design?

Click on the image to view the full design :)

Remember that it's still a shell at this point!

Thank Goodness for Fridays

I am tired and actually, I don’t really know why either. I haven’t had an exceptionally late-night week, but what I think could be contributed to my state of exhaustion is my sinus, or rather, my sinus issues. I need to go back to the doctor for testing, but haven’t really got the time at this point in my life.

At least it’s Friday and although I’m not really going to get the chance to sleep in tomorrow, I don’t have to get up at 5:30am.

I’ve decided I’m going to start making and selling jewellery. However, in order to do this I need to get my ducks in a row. At the moment I’m buying beads and findings and not working out how much each piece costs to make, because I’m making for myself and for friends. I’m now going to have to price everything, as I did with photography. I’m also going to have to get a website sorted out. But I still want to do photography, but not weddings. I’m going to take the wildlife pictures that I already have and get them printed onto canvas. Mom also makes the most beautiful knitted scarves, and I’m going to get her to make hats and bedsocks too, which I can sell online. So, basically I want to open an online “goodie” shop where anyone can buy reasonably priced gifts for their friends and family. There won’t be any custom-made things, only “what you see is what you buy” kind of stuff.

What do you think? Am I totally nuts and being a dreamer again?

Oh LOL! Never a dull moment in the office

I heard wild screaming coming from downstairs, and so went charging down the stairs to see what was happening. Faith was outside and the baby monkeys were descending on her. They didn’t actually attack her, but I think that if she had stayed outside they would have been on her, looking for something to eat or steal!

Faith is now a nervous wreck. Ha ha, shame, poor thing.

Woolworths Soya Yoghurt

I’ve discovered Woolworth’s range of soya yoghurts. My initial reaction was “yuck” as I’m not at all a fan of soya products, but these are really nice. Today is the first time that I am eating the smooth soya yoghurt as I have only bought the fruity ones to date, however, I have to say that it is rather nice. The flavour that I have today is the black cherry. I still prefer the fruity ones to the smooth ones though.

It’s Thursday!

The week is almost over and I still have so much to do! Next week the bosses are going to be back in the office, so we’re going to hit the ground running. Don’t expect too much from me in the line of communication.

The drive home last night was a bit of a challenging one. I left work around 17:10, but only got home at about 18:45. There was a hectic accident on the N2 heading south, just before Edwin Swales turn-off. Whilst stopped in the traffic five ambulances came flying past me in the emergency lane, about three police vehicles, an emergency rescue services vehicle, the fire truck and a hazardous materials vehicle also made their way past me en route to the accident. When I eventually did get to the site of the accident it was quite horrific. I’m assuming (I’m not sure as I was driving and was focusing on the road, rather than on the scene of the accident) that a car or another truck had collided with a tanker. The tanker itself was buckled and bent in places, but seemed intact. Thereafter for about half of a kilometer was debris, bodies (I’m sure I saw two) in black body bags and crunched vehicles in the road. Police officers were attempting to divert the traffic (four lanes worth) into one lane to get past the accident. The traffic on both sides of the freeway had come to a stop.

I hate road accidents, but they always remind me of the fact that I am lucky to never have been in one *touch wood*

Ok, well… let my crazy day begin!
Have a great one all :)