Home of Slightly Cracked Dreams

at www.kinshome.net

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Come on over and say hi! The more the merrier!

I should start with the reason I haven't been posting. I blame Hubby, although in this case I'm sure he'd be happy to accept blame. After another restless sleep on Wednesday night, I was sent by Hubby to the cute pharmacist to get something to help me sleep. Unfortunately the cute pharmacist was busy, but the other pharmacist, also good looking, was happy enough to help me out.

So now I've had 2 nights of almost solid sleep, I feel like a different person. Plus I'm not often awake at midnight or 2am to write posts. Which is of course where the problem comes in. So why am I up at midnight tonight? We've got visitors. So let me take you back to Thursday, when I find out the visitors are coming. I start panicing a bit, because the house was in a bit of a shambles. Then I knew I was going to be out all day Friday. Friday was busy. I was out of the house from 9am to 2pm. Then in and out from 4pm to 6pm. Firstly I had to deliver the kids to daycare. Then an appointment at the bank. In the carpark I ran into mother-in-law, so of course we had to have coffee. After I delivered some Tupperware. Then I went to the post office and posted my Christmas cards, the solicitor to drop off some paperwork. Then I got to start Christmas shopping. Hubby joined me for lunch and I finally got home at 2pm. I collapsed for a while, dozed a bit, then got up to sort the latest load of Tupperware that had arrived. Arranged delivery of that, wrapped presents, delivered Tupperware, wrapped more presents, picked up kids.

Got home and ordered pizza.

While I don't suggest these tablets knock me out for 8 hours solid, or anything like that (I'm taking a half dose), they do make it easier to go back to sleep when I wake up. Which I did, many, many times last night.

Thus, today, I was able to face the day with some measure of energy. After sending the kids off to swimming lessons with Hubby, I headed off to deliver more Tupperware, then went to the shops to finish the Christmas shopping. Which I did. Then I did the grocery shopping. Came home with the kids while Hubby finished his shopping (oooh, the suspense is huge in this house...).

With an hours notice our friends would be on our doorstep, we managed to get the spare bedroom, living areas and bathroom presentable and clean. They decided to take up our offer of a bed for the night, so we juggled everything around with the girls daycare party this afternoon and Hubby's work party tonight and we spent a lovely evening chatting and making lolly bags for tomorrow's party.

So I was a bit late taking my tablet, which is why you're getting me at nearly midnight. But it won't last much longer, so I'd better finish up before I stop making sense. Like now, you should have seen what I just wrote.

Be prepared for a party update either tomorrow night or Monday, and I hope your weekend is proving more restful than mine.

Once again, not much to update. Baby is right size, head down, and very active

Her heart rate is good, as is my blood pressure. Apparently I just need to try and rest more. Ha! Joke and a half.

I don't need to go back for 3 weeks now, which will be nice to have a bit of a break from driving to the next town over 3 times a week (twice for swimming lessons and once for dr, hospital etc).

On the agenda today is Christmas cards, and a few other bits and pieces, getting invites otu etc etc. Oh, and getting the SINK FIXED, that I've just noticed is leaking all through my cupboard and floor. Waiting to hear from my plumber now as to how many weeks I won't be able to do dishes for. Probably a slight exaggeration, but oh well.

But first I apparently need to find the sticky tape to make a Swiper Mask for the little people.

How long is your to-do list? Is it for today? This week? This month? Do you have more than one to-do list? One for work and one for home? Or one for your volunteering jobs? Or homeschooling?

The vast majority of the time, I find a single weekly or daily to do list enough to keep me focused. There are times, however, say, this time of year, when that doesn't quite cut it. And have you ever had that sinking feeling when you look at a list that's two, three, or even sixteen pages long?

What I've found is that not only prioritising those tasks, but separating them into different lists. I currently have 8 master to-do lists I'm running from. These change with the time of year, but they are currently (in no particular order):

1. Kiki's Birthday Party
2. House move
3. Blogging stuff
4. Baby/Pregnancy stuff
5. Our after Christmas party
6. Christmas
7. Tupperware
8. Tupperware Christmas party

Some of these lists only have a few items on them, some have more than a dozen. Each night I make a list from these lists of the highest priority tasks for the next day. For example, on my list today I have:

Order cake for Kiki's birthday party
Make appointment with bank manager
Register domain name for blog transfer
Hospital appointment
Print party invites for after Christmas party
Make list of Christmas presents I still need to get
Print Christmas letters to go in Christmas cards
Pay Tupperware bill
Post Tupperware Christmas Party invites

This is obviously on top of my regular Wednesday jobs, but rather than looking at a list of hundreds of items, I can choose one or two most important things from each list, and work through them today. I do keep the master lists handy during the day, so I can make additions and/or adjustments as necessary. At the end of today I'll sit down with my lists, mark off what I achieved for today, and make a list of priorities for tomorrow.

Another way I have worked it when I've been thoroughly pressed for time, is to compile separate lists as above, but then work out daily to-do lists for the time I have left. This allows me to spread out the jobs and make sure they're all done on time.

As it is, my current master lists have 3 columns, one with the item, one for a date if necessary (ie appointments/deliveries or deadlines) and one to tick when I've done it. Of course, since I only started these lists in the last few days, there aren't a great many ticks yet, but they are increasing every day, which is the most important thing.

How do you work your to-do lists when you have a lot on? Do you even have a to-do list?

Ok, I seem to be getting back into the swing of things. I've caught up on all my favourite blogs, so things should be getting back to normal for me in that department. There's a lot going on around here as well.

Hopefully sometime in the next week or so I'll be making the move to Wordpress, with Snoskred's help of course. This is assuming things go to plan, which I'm sure it won't. So if I disappear bear with me. I'll keep you updated on any progress.

While I was away a lot happened. I was tagged for a couple of meme's.

Firstly, I was tagged by the Homemaker of the 21st Century, who was tagged by Amanda at "All About The Green". She was tagged by Heather from Home With Heather and apparently the original tag came from Tamara Wilson of Tamara-Wilson.com.

So without further ado:

1. What did you accomplish this past week?
What a great question! Apart from sorting and packing $5000 worth of Tupperware? I'd have to say being able to cope with Hubby's pay not going through. I haven't blogged about it yet, but so close to Christmas it was a real challenge. It doesn't look like it will be fixed until Thursday either. Not a nice way to prepare for Christmas. I was supposed to be done by now.

2. Did anything not go as expected?
Ha! See above. Christmas is now all out of whack. Due to the lack of income, even things like postage stamps for Christmas cards have been postponed, so many of those will likely not make it in time for Christmas. Ah well, people should just be excited to get one from me. It's been 4 years since I sent any (about as long as I've had children).

3. What was the highlight of your week?
Oooh, tricky. Probably swimming lessons on Saturday when M&M was happy to show off her new swimming skills to all and sundry. Isn't it amazing how the simple things provide the greatest joy?

4. Did anything exciting happen that you did not expect?
EVERYTHING that happens to me is exciting, so I have a hard time with this one. Umm, oh, I've got one! Yesterday I went to the Big City with my mother-in-law, and apart from catching up a friend (albeit briefly) we went to the Baby Shop, and physically put the three carseats in my car that I wanted, and THEY FIT! It's been a bit of a saga, I was initially thinking I'd need a new car, but it turns out I don't - hooray! That was pretty exciting.

So there you have it, now for the linky love! 5 people hey? I tag:

1. Kez

2. Our Patch

3. Angus Made

4. Lightening Online (check our her new pretty site too!)

5. Cellobella at Sultana Blog

There, that's a nice variety of people.

While I was away Kez also tagged me for the 7 Random Things Meme.

Here are the meme rules:Rules:
1- Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
2- Share 7 random and or weird things about yourself.
3- Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
4- Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Ok, 7 random or weird things about me that I didn't cover in 100 Things About Kin? Here I go:

1. I couldn't float on my back until I was nearly 16

2. I am over organised in some aspects of my life, and really not in others. For example I have a complete travel set of toiletries ready to go at any point in time, but my bills? In a pile on my desk somewhere!

3. I loved lego as a kid. So much so that my Dad built me a tray on wheels that I could build a lego city on, and wheel out from under the bed whenever I wanted. I hope my kids enjoy things like that.

4. I have discovered recently that despite my age (27 remember?) I have a really really conservative risk profile when it comes to investing. At this point all I can do with my money is put it in a term deposit. Even buying a home is too risky for me. I might have to work on that.

5. I shouldn't be allowed to name children. After my cat Anna, our second pet was a dog called Dog. Really imaginative hey? It did suit him though.

6. When reading, I have to read a book to the end. There's only a couple of books I can think of I haven't finished. One is Far from the Madding Crowd, and the other is Lord of the Rings. Oh the shame. I'm a big fan of the story/movies though

7. Once upon a time I could recite the entire movie of The Princess Bride. In fact, I probably still could, given half a chance.

Right, now to tag 7 people(!!) who haven't already done it? Man. I don't think I know 7 people who haven't already done it. Let's see how I go:

1. Homemaker of the 21st Century

2. Angus Made

3. Kelley

4. Ali

Oh I don't know who else hasn't done it. If you haven't done it yet, I tag you, so get cracking!

Man, I've got so much more to write, but this post is long enough already. If you're lucky you might get another one out of me later today, after all it is washing day!

At Kin's Home! The trees (finally!) went up last night,, with a lot of help from the kids. This is the "main" tree in the lounge room, complete with presents underneath, than's to my parents and sister-in-law who sent me home with a pile of presents from our holiday.



This is our "second" tree (yes Kelley, I only have 2) in the dining room.


That's all I have today, I'm off to the Big Smoke today to deliver some Tupperware and go shopping with my mother-in-law. Course I have a tonne of stuff to do before I go, which means I should probably get up and do it....

So, I'm slowly getting organised with the photos from our holiday. First up is a veiw from the balcony shortly after sunrise:
This was the view from our balcony showing how close we were to the beach. It was pretty cool!


These are the photos of the planes I promised. They were very close and the girls got very excited every time one went over - which was a LOT

Well, personally I thought it looked like my kitchen, or garage, but apparently I don't quite have enough I don't think. Here's what my dining room looked like when I unpacked it all last night to check off the invoice:

And hit the ground running. I left this morning to travel home, and while I was incredibly relaxed after a week of six hands for two children, a plane trip home let me down. Then of course I didn't stop and am now almost as stressed as when I left.

The BIG news is that there is a contract on our house. See what happens when you leave town? Settlement is set down for the 14th of January, so I have a bit of time to organise myself, which is what I'm doing now. Making lists. I may share them with you at some point. Or I might not. They're quite scary.

What I have decided to do is keep running lists in each "category" of things I have to do, and then work on each of them each day.

For example three of the highest priorities at the moment are: Kiki's 3rd Birthday Party, Tupperware Xmas Sale and Packing & Delivering the 10 boxes of Tupperware currently adorning my dining room (pics to come).

So tomorrow I will focus on: getting invites out for Kiki's birthday party, collecting all stock for the xmas sale, and packing the orders and calling hosts to arrange delivery times. See how this works? Once I've done all that I'll look at other lists like: Moving House, and call and book the removalist.

It's a plan. I'll keep you updated on the progress.

In other news, our holiday was AMAZING, and I'll be posting pics as soon as I get myself sorted, and a bit more time up my sleeves (at this point probably next week). But by far the most exciting news of the holiday (apart from selling the house) is that M&M can SWIM! And Kiki is not far behind. I'm actually looking forward to swimming lessons this weekend so they can show off their new skills. M&M has been "practicing" all week to show her teacher, and yesterday she and Kiki both let me push them down to touch their hands to the bottom of the pool. Hundreds of times.

I also spent every night playing Jonola with my step-mother and the week actually ended in a draw. She normally beats me convincingly, and repeatedly.

That's about it from me. I noticed I've been tagged for a couple of meme's in the comments, so I'll try and get to those as soon as I can. I also have 375 unread posts in my reader, so I'll be ploughing through those as much as I can over the next few days, and catching up on all my bloggy friends.

And on that note, I'm off to my comfy bed, without Kiki. Ah, it's good to be home!

cause I literally have 7.5 minutes of internet time on the machine downtairs.

We spent most of the time in the water today, and M&M decided she could swim!! Exciting stuff. She and Berry were having races and they can both nearly swim the full width of the pool (about 10m). A very proud Mummy here - especially considering a week ago she wouldn't even put her nose in the water. She is also letting me push her down to touch the bottom. And Kiki's confidence is growing, to the point of jumping a couple of metres to get to the noodle and then kicking herself around the pool.

We're also in the flight path to Coolangatta airport, so I've got some great shots of planes coming in to land. I'll post those when we get home.

That'll do, still need to do a few other things in the remaining 5 minutes.

Enjoy what's left of your weekend!