Will Santa deliver on time!??

This year for Christmas we are aiming to move into our newly built house!! I am flat-out busy at the moment (and getting pretty darn sick of all the phone-calls and house-related running around that has been going on for so long). I wonder if it will all get there in time??

And even if the house gets finished... how will 'Santa' cope with everything else that needs to be done for Christmas!!

Fortunately I have done most of my Christmas shopping (I think!??) - but I don't have any time or space to wrap things up and get them organised... they are just stashed and hidden in places, and I think I can't even find them again until we move!!

I hope we can actually get into the house at least 1 week before Christmas to give me some chance to... do something!!

Ha! Christmas decorations are in the storage shed, waiting patiently... I wonder if there will be time for them to see the light of day???? - I hope so.

Christmas cards are on my mind... I should be doing them about now... If I don't make it, I hope my friends nad family will understand...

This Christmas is bound to be great - but it's a pretty hectic and last-minute, unable to be planned and organised properly... hopefully the last of that kind for many years!

Getting hungry...

This past week baby Curtis has been waking up more frequently through the night - in order to get more feeds I guess. He is 4 months old now. Too early to introduce solids yet...

I am feeling pretty tired and shattered having had several nights being woken up every 2-3 hours... Looking forward to that changing again soon!

In the meantime, our house is progressing... down to the last 3 or 4 weeks probably, and really that is making the waiting so much harder! I am so HUNGRY for it to be finished, and so that we can start moving in and calling it HOME.

Won't be long... it's bound to be a pretty hectic Christmas time though!

Aaahhhh!

The new nanny (Donna) is here right now.

My natural tendancy is to feel flustered and rushed... Especially because I have a zillion things I want to do... plus I'm not even as organised as I inteded to be before she arrived. I had wanted to have the house in some order, and have a little folder with all the neccessary info (contact details, routines, instructions, activity suggestions, etc) ready and organised to give her... but that hasn't happened yet - I will try and get it completed whilst she is here.

In reality, the house was a mess and I hadn't even showered when she arrived.

Tilly started handing books to Donna and showing her all her toys, when I tackled my first agenda of hopping in the shower. Donna said with a smile: "Enjoy a long shower" - and I thought: Yay! I can!!

Now as my mind is swimming trying to think of which task and chore to do first - I am thinking: stuff it! Just enjoy having a lovely cup-of-tea... Do whatever I want, in whatever order suits me... and just RELAX. I really am such an overloaded/control-freak/stress-head most of the time who tries to do way too much - and make it look as though it's easy.

Donna is here to help me - and the best thing I can possibly do for myself is learn to SLOW DOWN and take things at a much more casual pace. Life is not a race.

If all I do is lie down for a nap and listen to my children happily playing and laughing outside - that is probably better than trying to do too many chores and feeling more worn out than ever..

Yay for Donna. Yay for the 'baby-bonus' that is paying for her at the moment! And yay to me, for realising that I really have to change the way I operate :)

Childcare decisions...

Recently I have been feeling rather stressed as I have been making decisions to change my current childcare situation...

No other decision could be more important to me.

There is no other issue that compares to the choices of who, how, when, where.. and how much? And it all leaves me feeling overwhelmed, confused, frustrated... and of course: guilty!

Aaaaahhhhhh!

Yes. The instant I look into my 'childcare' needs - I can feel like I am just an absolutley awful mum for wanting to have childcare at all!

But I need it. Oh yes I do. For my sanity. For the best needs for my children as well as for me.

I realised quite some time ago, that I am definately NOT cut out to be a 100% stay at home mum. I may have imagined that I would have been - but those 'dreams' have long been shattered. I also do NOT want to be a full-time working mum... The ideal for me is to find some sort of 'perfect' balance.. And Ha! That is not bloody easy!!! For starters - you need childcare before you can do anything at all! And instantly you are hit with the whole 'chicken and egg' scenario where you can't work or even try to look for work (or start up your own business - as happens to be my complicated goal) without having some time.. and of course you can't really afford it until you are earning some money... And then you don't want to work JUST to pay for childcare either!!

Talk about frustrating!

I'm not going to whinge about it any longer.. But I am at the hard point of trying to make some changes now, and it is very difficult for me to make these decisions...

I hope I am making the right decisions... I guess I just have to try it, and see what happens...

All I know is that I love my kids and I want the best for them always.

Who couldn't adore this gorgeous creature!?:

"A Little Creative"

Yay!! I successfully registered my new business name yesterday: "A Little Creative" - this is the name I wanted first and foremost but thought I couldn't have it becuase a NSW graphic design company already has the name... and unfortunately they have nabbed the .com.au website by that name too. But I am happy.

My business plans have been constantly evolving and changing over the past months... but the current plan is to open up my front house (once we vacate it when the new house is built) as an art studio-workspace in the new year.

A Little Creative studio will offer workshops and classes to small groups (max 6 or 8) in a variety of different mediums. I don't want to be working too much (and currently trying to sort out the right balance of child-care for my needs is seriously doing my head in!) - so my goal is to get other artisans involved to run most of the classes, and I do all the marketing and organisation and bookings side of things (more than enough to keep me busy!). I will teach a few classes that fit along my interest the most! Children's classes will no doubt be a part of the mix eventually, but I am not going to target those initially - as they can be quite time-consuming and demanding and would ultimately take up all my time, leaving me exhausted and no time for my own art..

So I have to avoid temptation to start the kids classes too soon, and try to make sure that my own art and interests come first! For me I am itching to do some painting again, so no doubt some canvas painting workshops will be the first offered, also collage and recycled art is my passion, plus printing... graphic design is a sure winner.. but I have to invest in some more computers first!

Gee can't wait!! It's frustrating times as I have so, so much on my plate and it's hard to know where to start and what to do first and how... But I need to have tunnel vision a bit, and get us all moved into the new house and settled in!

Stay tuned though: "A Little Creative" exists (on paper at least!) and will open its doors in 2011!

I did it!

These are the three words Tilly proudly says whenever she accomplishes something. Now I can say them too!

Today was a soggy, miserable day on the coast - and I had planned to go along to the first ever Kaleidoscope Market at Kawana (all products aimed at kids/families, etc.).. It was a bit out of my comfort zone as I had never been to the Kawana Community Events centre before, so didn't know the exact location or what the parking woudl be like etc. Plus I haven't really taken both Tilly and Curtis out to any difficult places on my own - just to playgroup and parks etc...

So with the constantly bucketing rain, plus an extra grizzly Tilly all morning - the odds were against me going... But, I did it!!

It was darn hard - we were saturated when we got there, and I felt quite laden down with coats for us all, pram, food bags, activity bag, nappy bag, etc. etc. But we did have a really good time - much better than staying in our tiny house!

I did buy a couple of things, and I have a few more ideas and contacts for my business... for whenever I get the time to do something for it!

Bye for now... Hopefully my next "I did it" accomplishment will be finally registering my new business name and submitting my blue-card form... without them, not too much can happen...