Ramblings and some news

So first off, my son celebrated his 14th birthday a couple of weeks ago. He had two friends for a sleepover and LAN party. For those not in the know (or should I say for those of you who aren't giant geeks) a LAN party is when you bring all your computers to one location and connect them all via cable and game together. Well this was Hubby's element so the boys were in good hands. We also took them out for authentic Italian pizza and a gorgeous rich chocolate cake that I made. 

We are now officially the coolest parents. Ever. Oh and I LOVE his friends because they thought I was in my twenties... hehehe.. Hubby is mortified..the poor dear. :) (which reminds me, I will have to blog about my 40th. It was super special)

Now....
I FINALLY GOT THE CAR I WANTED!!! Yes.. I have a Subaru Forester. It's all silver and we got the windows re-tinted and I LOVE her! yes...it is a she, and her name is YUKI (pronounced yooki). It's Japanese meaning is happiness and good fortune. She's so pretty. We got a really good price for her and the previous owner had it serviced all the time. 

In other news.. Months ago we started seriously looking for a business to buy. Well we had one lined up. It was the sister company of the business Hubby was working at. An IT business that caters to the retail side, while the other company does business. To cut a long story short, the owner decided he didn't want to sell it, but now he has changed his mind again and we are now in a position to buy it. We are getting it for a really good price and at the moment it is very profitable, but with the things in mind we have for it, it could prove to be an extremely good investment. We are going to turn it into a kind a internet cafe place where people can come in, get their computers, phones, laptops fixed. Also we sell new, and we are going to offer How-to classes. As well as serving one hell of a good coffee. Did I tell you I am a qualified Barista now? I can't remember, anyway, I am and we are going to put a coffee machine in there. 

I can't really think of much else. Our plans for christmas have gone a little awry... Hubby may have to miss a day or two at the holiday house we have booked near my folks, because of the shop..but oh well.  

Oh.. I told you that Moby was living outside now (not in the shed at night) an while he has been very good, he did get in a fight the other night. Naughty kitty. He got a good smack in the face to. Not by me.. from the other cat. Anyway he is now sporting a badass cut on the side of his face. Don't worry, it's not bad and he is fine. He got a severe talking to from me though. Fighting at his age... 

Look what my local supermarket had!!! I nearly fell over myself when I saw them.. I have been wanting to try authentic S'mores for so long! Toasted them Aussie-style...over the BBQ.. heh. And yeah, they were worth it for the devineness that was them (and also because now I know how to make them with aussie products). We don't have Graham crackers here, but I will find something similar. The only thing I didn't like about this kit was the chocolate they provided wasn't quite right. Not thin enough and the squares weren't right. But I will do my own research and make Aussie S'mores if it's the last thing I do on this good earth!!! 


That's it for now. :)

Daily Planner.

So I haven't really had much time to be overly crafty lately. One project I am working on, however is a 2015 daily planner. I have spent a lot of time searching the Internet for the best way to set out my planner. What would be best to suit my needs and the closest one I found was the Erin Condrin Life Planner. Now I could have just ordered one of them (if I had a spare $50 - $70)..or I could do what I always do and just DIY it. 

I set out the planner to have the week spread out over two pages, laying flat. Each day is in columns and broken into three sections: Morning, Afternoon and Evening. I have a section for a WEEKLY TO DO list and Saturday and Sunday are halved into the one column.. to give me a bit more width for weekdays. I printed out these pages on nice Strathmore cream drawing paper and bound the seven signatures (Groups of four pages) with dental floss. (dental floss for the waxed coating and it wont break. I bound all seven signatures together and then covered the loose book with a nice thick patterned card stock. 

As for the cover I have gone for a hand made leather slip cover. I decided to make it a slip cover in case I wanted to make the same planner for the year after. It's a simple design. One long piece of leather, slightly higher than the book and then folded over and sewn to form the slip bits the book is held into place by.  

I haven't done the cover yet, but I am quite pleased how the actual planner has turned out. It's very sturdy and firm, meaning I bound it well. My book binding has gotten a lot better since I last tried it. Yes I will post pics when it is all done. 

Oh.. one thing I did work on a few months ago was this drawing. It's done with different black ink pens on the Strathmore Drawing paper... 

It's pretty detailed and took me quite a few days to do. That colour is not true.. it's actually on cream paper. 

And this is Moby unsuccessfully trying to be a sausage roll.

Sue the Subaru

I'm writing this while listening to my Husband and son bash away at a piece of our car. To clarify it's a car we bought from the wreckers and are trying to get it back to road worthy. It's not a bad little car. A Subaru Outback. When we bought it, it had a smoking engine and bald tires, rusty muffler and the driver's side guard has a sizable dent in it....which is what they are bashing at now..in the back yard. 

It was destined for the scrap yard. To be honest I have every confidence in my husband to getting this car back into shape, even the dent. He has done up a lot of cars in the past. So this one was no different. The engine was completely torn down and put back together. ....

So I just had to go outside and inspect their panel beating. They have done a pretty good job. This car project serves a duel purpose. Hubby is using it as a bonding experience with the son. They have had a few issues since son has hit that terrible teenage milestone and they both need to work on their relationship. They have good days and bad. Mostly when hubby gets frustrated a job takes twice as long to do and son storms off in a huff. Or son had plans to sit on his electronics and doesn't want to be under the bonnet of a car... It's a slow process but they are trying.

Another good thing that has come out of this is that Hubby now knows a Subaru engine back to front and is finally going to get me the one I actually wanted.. the 4x4 Forester. YAY!

A Cause close to my heart

I don't know how many of you have heard of Endometriosis, but it is a debilitating disease that 1 in 10 women in Australia and New Zealand suffer from. There is no cure and current treatments are downing various pain meds, radical surgery or hormone treatment.  The pain meds are shocking. You have to swallow tonnes of pills just to mask most of the pain only to feel like a walking zombie. The surgery is painful and is not a guarantee of a fix as the Endo grows back. Hormone treatment is totally out of the question for those who want to have children. 

Every month you wait with nervous tension as your period due date draws closer. Then suddenly..BAM! you are curled up in bed crying with the excruciating pain. You can't go to work, you can't look after your kids, keep up the housework, catch up with friends, even your partner sleeping next to you is too painful to bear. You swallow pain meds and lay there just waiting for the pain to subside so you can catch just a little bit of sleep.  Sometimes it lasts the entire period, sometimes just the first day. Sometimes it may even stop then start up again, getting a second wind, so to speak. In any case every 28 days, once a month this disease has you by the neck. 

You are constantly on edge, you feel like a failure, you feel like no-one understands what you are going through. All this is happening while you are expected to just carry on and accept it. 

How do I know? Because I have Endometriosis. My little sister has it to. 

The two of us, along with hundreds of other very brave Australian women are campaigning to get a drug company called Bayer to import a drug that they have developed long ago to specifically treat Endometriosis. The drug is called Visanne and it has actually been approved by the Government to be used in Australia back in 2010. Bayer just don't see it as "Viable". They don't think that 1 in 10 women is enough to give us a choice on how we treat this disease. 

They give a man Viagra to cure a limp penis but help hundreds of thousands of women deal with agony every month? A disease that rules our entire lives and that of out families! Bayer doesn't think we are worth it. 

There has been a petition created to hand over to the drug company and it currently has over 73000 signatures, but we need 100000! It's not that far away and we can do it if we keep trying and keep up the fight. Please help me in signing this petition. Your contribution will help thousands of women like my sister and I take our lives back into our own hands and not live like animals. 

PLEASE SIGN HERE!  


Thank you 

Whale Watching

Apart from my wedding day and the birth of my son, the day myself and my son and Mum went whale watching was one of the best days of my life. We headed out after lunch and the skies were grey and threatening. Going out into the bay we did get a bit of rain as we searched for whales. 

Our first wildlife encounter though was a couple of playful dolphins who sped along the boat and then jumped the bow waves. Before anyone could get over the excitement of that encounter we heard the call "Whales!" Over to the right was a group of two. Our boat and the dolphins went to investigate. While our boat kept a respectful distance, the dolphins however decided that the whales needed to be teased. We were pretty far away though and soon the whales dived. 

Throughout the day we encountered many small pods of whales. Most of them just lolling about on the surface until they dove again for deeper water. One whale in particular spent a good twenty minutes slapping his pectoral fin on the surface of the ocean. 

The highlight of the day was when a group of three grew inquisitive and decided to surround our boat, sliding underneath and down the sides, eyeing us all as we cheered from the decks. I don't think I said "Oh my god" more than that day. It was one of the most thrilling things to see. These beautiful, majestic animals. I am getting all choked up now just writing about it. As one Italian tourist aptly put it; "F**k YEAH!" 

I didn't get many good photos. It was just too exciting and I didn't want to be stuck behind a camera lens. I did get some really good videos which I can't post here. At the end of the day with the sun setting and the rain pelting down... I stood at the back of the boat looking out to sea. I was freezing cold and wet, but I didn't care. I was still riding that euphoric high having fulfilled one of my lifelong dreams to see the whales.  It is something I will never forget.

This morning I found.....

..... ET in my cereal. Go home ET...Go hoome.

Has it really been....

...that long since I last posted?

Well, time and real life does fly by when you are busy. I was prompted the other day by a good friend to maybe revisit this blog. But what do I write about? There is so much to say and yet, today I find myself not really wanting to say anything at all. I am in one on those moods. I guess I could be clinical and do a point by point on the happenings of the Sprite family.. I guess I could do it that way. But that's not really exciting isn't it? Anyway seems like, for now, until I get my "blogging" grove back, that is what you will have to contend with..or not.. 

ME: Well I have had a cancer scare (don't worry, all is well). But coming out of that I was FINALLY diagnosed with having Endometriosis. You have no idea what a relief it is to finally have a name to this terrible debilitating pain I experience every month. My little sister has it to and she even underwent the surgery. Not that it worked.. those little Endo buggers do like to grow back. I opted to go the less invasive route and am on a low dose of the pill, which delays my period so that I now only get it every three months. Four times a year. I am yet to see if the pill works in stopping the pain as I don't have a period due until November. Only time will tell. But hey, only having to deal with excruciating pain only four times a year? I don't really care if it works or not. 

I have registered my name/art business and will be making a web site soon. It's very exciting :)

My eye is still stupid. I have lost a bit of vision from it but at the moment it is stable. I just have to bombard it with steroids whenever it flares up.

HUBBY: is fine. He had his Defibrillator put in last year and it all seems to be working. He is now the proud owner of a Brown belt in Karate and is working hard to get to black. At the moment he is a happy chappy, doing up a second car for us. He is in his element under the hood of a car. 

SON: my teenage Aspie boy has had his ups and downs. We put him into normal school this year. At the beginning it was a little rough for him, as he didn't get the concept of homework and assignments being due when they are due. Time management was an issue. He made friends quickly though, which was good. He has settled down into school life now and rides to school every day. 

He is also a member of the AirForce Cadets here. He absolutely loves it and is considering a career. 

He is becoming more and more of a genius when it comes to anything technological, sometimes he even surpasses my Hubby, who has had many years in the IT industry. 

FAMILY: Well mostly no news when it comes to my family except for my Dad being diagnosed with Lung cancer. It was a bit of a shock for all of us. He has been having chemo and was not very well for a while, until the doctors found he also had a bad infection, caused by the cancer. That was treated and his health started to pick up. Then we had another set back and the doctors had said that his long term prognosis is not good. While the cancer is stable, it is no longer curable. In saying that, he is doing well at the moment and has even started up a few hobbies. He rang me excitedly today and told me about his new wood burning project. While we were all pretty much prepared for the prognosis, it is still scary. I mean, he's my Daddy. I'm sure you know what I mean. 

We almost bought a business. It was a cute little homewares store and Hubby and I were very excited about it. But then things started getting dodgy and the seller and her Solicitor got nasty and Hubby and I didn't like how it was going, so we terminated the contract. Unfortunately the seller does not wish to re-negotiate the contract and so that door has closed. Yeah, we were pissed off. 

But, we do have another little business we looked at before that we might buy. It's an antique/vintage/second hand shop and it's adorable. Really cheap and doable with the money we have. Considering Hubby and I set up our own company and family trust, then we have to do something.. otherwise we are this entity with no substance to it.. haha.. 

OO! I almost forgot, son and I went Whale watching...but that I will leave for next post :)