Okay. New developments…

It’s been a week (okay, just over!) since my last post. A lot has happened:

– KRidwyn.com has been launched – and that’ll be the place where this blog will move to. So yes – this will be my last post from this address (and I’ll have to work out how to re-direct traffic from here to there automatically. Chalk up yet another job to the ever-growing list, huh?) but I’m pretty excited about getting my *own* real estate online, as it were. So hopefully, dear readers, you’ll join me over there?

– in the move from this URL to that one, we discovered that it’s impossible to just hit ‘export’ and get all the site content moved across to the new place. Sure, it’ll move all the text, but bad luck if you had images that you wanted on there. So unfortunately, KRidwyn.com is devoid of pretty pictures. At the moment. (And another job to do…)

–GoodOldTalk, the website I run for Seniors, finally was able to make it back online after being offline for over seven weeks. Which was a HUGE relief, but now leaves me with a lot of stuff to clean up…

– I was able to get the countertop material for BOTH my kitchen and my bathroom and my ensuite (which hasn’t even been built yet) for a HUGE discount; so I’m majorly stoked about that one!

– Miss 8 was finally diagnosed with dyslexia (which I *knew* she had! but no-one believed me…) and she was also diagnosed with Irlen Syndrome as well – so that was pretty cool. Once the diagnosis is made, you can do something about it, huh?!

– Miss 5 decided that she didn’t know how to ‘do things properly’ so she’s been asking us all week “how” to do the simplest of things, like brush her teeth etc etc etc! She wants to learn how to do them better, I guess… and…

– Mr 4 decided that not only could he sit on the toilet – but he could also tell me when he needed to go!!!!! This caused a HUGE celebration!!! 🙂

Well, now it’s time to head into what is shaping up into another huge one. And it’s got me thinking: maybe I should just accept that fact that this life *is* the new ‘normal’ – and just get on with it all?

What do you think?

(Oh, and feel free to leave any comments you may have, here…!)

Not happy.

Miss 5 has now learned to ride her bike without training wheels. I have taken a video of same, and I wanted to share it here with you, dear readers, just as in the past I have shared videos of my youngest chreub at the Talara ECDP, and so on.

But WordPress, it would now seem, is asking $99 for a ‘Video Upgrade’ through WordPress. Or it looks like I can embed a video if it’s on YouTube on similar. The bumma is, I didn’t want to upload it to another website first! That takes time that I don’t have at the moment!

So. Not happy.

Oh well. At least I’ve blogged for BloxhamMarketing already this morning – and that’s something that I haven’t been able to do for weeks now! 🙂

have a great day, dear readers!

xx

C

Entranced?

Hubby and I went to see “Trance” the other day. It cost $40 (with the popcorn… and as Hubby said “If that’s a small popcorn, I’d hate to see the large!) and I must admit, I left disappointed. It was a pretty good plot idea, but in my opinion it could have been executed far batter. The twists towards the end were a little predictable and too try-hard-ish. For $40, I could have microwaved multiple bags of popcorn & saved the rest for the probably one day forthcoming Season 3 of Game of Thrones.

ho hum.

Home sweet home

It’s a rare occasion that I’m not with my kids. When I’m not teaching, I’ll either be with Mr 4 (yes, he had a birthday during my absence from Hmmm…) or with all three of them. It’s an even stranger experience to get time with Hubby and with no kids… but that’s what I’ve had over the past two days.

It’s been heavenly! We left Thursday morning, headed down the Gold Coast for a break away from kids, from work, from commitments at home – and it’s only now, Saturday afternoon, that we’re heading home.

I’ve missed my kids. I’ve missed my little shoebox of a house. It’s been awesome reconnecting with Hubby again… but I’ll be glad to be home again. Squeeze my kids. Watch their faces as they open presents. You know. Be home again. And hear that word. “Mummy?”

ahhh.

Today…

Today I feel alive. Today I feel renewed. Today, I feel as though I *may* actually be able to say “I am back” with some semblance of confidence! “I am back” to being ‘me’ again. “I am back” in the world of normal people who eat and breathe and sleep and who talk, laugh, and interact with one another, both IRL and online.

It feels like ages. It feels as though I’m just beginning to emerge again. It feels as though I’ve been in a state of ‘exist and survive’ for the last several weeks – where to eat, to sleep – even to breathe – has had to happen on autopilot because I’ve been just *that* darn busy! I can honestly say that I’ve been at my limits – and that’s pretty far, because if you know me, you know that I’m a pretty intense kinda person, a ‘burn the candles at both ends’ kinda gal. I’d prefer to ‘squeeze everything I can’ out of life, because I don’t believe in reincarnation and I know that I’ll be 39 in just a few months, and life don’t go backwards! 🙂

Yes, life’s been busy this last little while. But I can honestly pray, like I heard that the Israelites do, “Thank you, God, for sustaining me to reach this season…” because I know that without His protection, without His seeing me through, I wouldn’t have made it through to today without the measure of sanity that I still have. Which is, surprisingly, quite a bit, considering.

So. It’s 6.34am and I’m off to charge into my day. It promises to be full of laughter and happiness, so I’m keen to get started.

Have a great day yourselves, dear readers!!!

xxx

C

YAY!!!!!

After what feels like a week of being locked out of my own blog (but was probably only 4 days or so) I’m back in!!!

It’s been a trying last fews days, truth be told. I spilt blackcurrant juice over the lower part of the keyboard on my MacBook Pro last Friday, and have been feeling pretty devastated by the results. Yes – it still seems to be working – mostly… but the trackpad often just decides to do things all by itself, making working on it a MUCH longer (and MUCH MUCH MUCH more frustrating) process than I am used to!

So I’m tossing up options of what to do. It’s been packed in rice to absorb as much as possible – but I think to get it back to anything near resembling what it was, it’ll need to go away and be looked at. And I’m not sure that it’s worth it. Thoughts, anyone?

Also on Friday, I was cooking sausages for my kids dinner, lifted the lid of the saucepan just to check they were done, and one of the sausages ‘spat’ boiling oil up at me. Most landed on my clothes (completely wrecking one of my favourites tops. Sigh) but the worst of it was that some got the upper part of my face. I now have a black eye, that’s NOT caused through lack of sleep!!! And I feel stupid. And sore. And today’s a school day, so I’m pretty certain that large numbers of children in my two Grade 2 classes and three Grade 1 classes will be asking me ‘what happened to your face?’. Double sigh.

Oh well. Here goes. I need to get into my day; because it won’t wait for me, right?! So. Up & at ’em, I guess. Here’s to today, dear readers – and I hope that you have great days too!

Memories… Times two!

I was reading with Miss 8 tonight before my weekly violin teaching. She’d read her school reader earlier this afternoon, so we’d pulled out a book that I’d read when *I* was learning to read, a few decades ago. “The Hermit’s Purple Shirts”. I liked it, and so does Miss 8.
It was strange, to be listening to her read I book I’d read, so many years ago. The memories of then, combining with the memories that were created tonight… So precious.
Here’s hoping that you also had a great day, dear readers!
— Ceridwyn

The weekend that was…

It’s Sunday. 10pm. Hubby & I are partway through the second episode inSeason 2 of Games of Thrones. We’re taking ‘Intermission’ while Hubby gets a milo.
It’s an enjoyable end to the weekend. A weekend full of blinding head / neck aches, feverish children, (being vomited on near-midnight last night not particularly a highlight) but also laughter, playing with my children, housework & gardening in between the showers. All in all, not too bad of a weekend. See you tomorrow, dear readers!

Things I learned in BatteryWorld

As most of my readers would know by now, I’m a mum with three young children. And as the type of person who always thinks long-term – well, when my eldest was just a few months old, I decided to go down the “rechargeable battery” journey.
So I splurged on a good quality recharger and a number of packets of green ‘Varta’ batteries, AA and AAA size.
Fast forward several years, and I’m still buying packets of rechargeable batteries whenever I see them on special while grocery shopping. I use them for everything; and now that we’ve finally joined the ranks of being Wii owners, we’re using batteries more than ever! Which is fine.
I was pretty stoked last week. I scored not one but two packets of 4 AA batteries (silver cases, not the green ones which I prefer) for only $4 each! I was a little bummed though, that when I got home and tried charging them, they wouldn’t charge. Hence my trip to BatteryWorld this week. And this is what I learned:
Varta batteries are made in both Germany and Malaysia. BatteryWorld don’t stock them anymore, because they couldn’t get the German-made ones.
The AA batteries I had bought last week should have held about a 1.2 charge. They were holding a charge of around 0.6 – which is pretty crappy, really. No wonder they weren’t charging!
I told the guy at the counter that when I charged a newly bought, silver cased Varta battery with one of my older, green cased Varta ones, they’d charge. When I tried charging two of the silver ones together, they wouldn’t.
His advice:
– charge batteries that you buy together, together. Don’t mix and match battery charging; as in, don’t charge batteries that you bought at different times, together, because they’ll have been manufactured in different places with different metals. They’ll have different levels of charge.
– When you charge batteries, they’ll both only charge to the lowest level of charge. So if you charge a good battery with a dud one, the good battery will only be charged to the level of the dud one. You weaken the good battery; and it’s very very very difficult to get the charge up again.

I also bought a new brand of batteries, on his recommendation. Eneloop. Write it down. Because not only were they bright, sparkly and multi-coloured (yes, I’m writing this with my tongue in my cheek here) but their 8 pack of AA batteries also had the BEST packaging I’ve ever seen on batteries (and no, I’m not being silly now – as as marketer, I was impressed with how customer-friendly their product packaging was) but what had me over-the-top impressed was the 2 D-size batteries I also tried to buy.

Because I didn’t end up buying D batteries. Instead, I bought D cases. Which fit AA-sized batteries.

Yes – that’s right. How incredibly AMAZING is this idea! You buy a D sized case, and slot a AA battery inside! When it runs out, just click it out and put a new AA sized battery in. How AWESOME!!!!!

So. I’m sold. Just thought I’d let you know!

 

Have a great day, dear readers!!!

— Ceridwyn

Wednesday’s words

So I thought I might try something new – just do some random scribbling every Wednesday. Playing with words. Playing with the feelings that words create. And not worrying if they form sentences, or rhyme, or make a whole lot of sense. Just cos!!! So here goes…

 

Whoops.

I knew it the instant I’d done it, that I’d overdone it this time. Strained my voice just that *little* too much. I could physically *feel* my throat start its aching. And it’s the type of ache in the throat where you just know. Know exactly what’s coming next. Know because you’ve been there before.

Ache. Soreness. Discomfort. The beginnings of pain.

Loss. The temptation to whisper, knowing that whispering will just make matters worse.

Knowing that it will prolong the recovery time.

Knowing, and feeling helpless.

Powerless.

Useless.

I like to think that I have a large, intense personality, barely contained within my small physical frame. The surprising amount of volume that I can muster, from said physical frame, forms a huge part of this personality. the kind of volume that has been developed with decades of singing, decades of teaching.

My volume, and my ability to use it when needed, gives me confidence. Strength.

The ability to communicate, to have input into the lives of those around me just by opening my mouth, gives me… well… power.

Without it, I feel less.

Inadequate. Stripped.

Defenseless.

 

Moral of story: STOP!!!!!

Next time, preferably, *before* you get to that ‘whoops’ moment, Ceridwyn!!!