Creating Space

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Posted on September 29, 2023

You could be excused for assuming that this post is about more of my decluttering efforts. However, it is not.

We arrived home a couple of days ago after a brief road trip to Sydney to attend a family wedding. The outfit I had made worked well and we had a delightful day. It was very special to be able to spend time with all of my siblings, children, niece and nephews as our family are ‘scattered to the four winds’. In fact, it was the first time that we had ever all been together.

The wedding was a significant event and the latter half of this year has been neatly divided, at least in my mind, to ‘before the wedding’ and ‘after the wedding’. This leads back to the title of the post.

Rehoming physical stuff is not the only type of decluttering. There is also digital decluttering which I have mentioned in the past. This link will take you to several posts on the topic. Then there is mental clutter.

I have found that ‘to do’ lists seem to get a bit of a bad rap recently. They are deemed to be everything from non-productive, inhibiting mindfulness and inducing guilt and sleeplessness. I guess it depends on personal use and expectation of any list, however, I have actually found the exact opposite. By writing things down/creating a list it releases the necessity for me to remember things.

As a retired person, I do not have the time-frames, constraints and expectations of being in a paid job and answerable to an employer. Everything I do is my own decision and choice, however, I do not choose to drift aimlessly through my retirement years. I am not driven by deadlines and certainly do not beat myself up if everything on the list is not finished by a certain time.

I enjoy the knowledge that I have recorded tasks/projects and I am not wasting mental energy on recalling or prioritising them. I add items as I think of them or they come up in conversation with GMan. It is nothing fancy – just a simple list in the notes section of my phone. I add and delete items almost every day. Some are extensive and long-term, others will be completed within the next 24 hours. But most importantly, I do not stress about tasks achieved (or not) nor let the list dictate my life.

Here is a sample of some of the items currently on my list.

Tidy sewing room
Clean fridge
Make marmalade
Make new cover for dog bed
Mend socks
Update Google calendar

Some of these have been on the list for well over a week and I am not losing any sleep over them not being completed. They will happen one day. Meanwhile, we are heading out this evening to listen to some live music at a small local bar.

Slow Living – March

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Posted on April 2, 2013

This year I have joined with Slow Living Essentials so here we are again with a review of March. This will be interesting as we spent 16 days on holidays. We took a road trip to NSW, Victoria and Canberra and enjoyed a relaxing time. If you want to know where we went and what we did you can see more here. Meanwhile, I will try to fill in the categories below.

Here are the Slow Living categories:

{Nourish} While it was not spectacularly interesting, we did manage to feed ourselves each and every day.

{Prepare} The first half of the month was spent preparing to go on holidays.

{Reduce} The contents of the refrigerator and freezer were reduced to almost zero before we headed off on our holiday.

{Green} We took our picnic set and our own food for lunches when we were travelling so no takeaways and no disposable containers.

{Grow} The seedlings which we planted towards the end of February continued to grow while we were away and we are now picking and eating the bok choy. We are also reaping the fruits of self-sown cucumbers. These came up from cucumbers that fell and rotted from the summer crop. This is the second year that we have had a follow-on crop of cucumbers. The great thing about growing them in autumn is that the cucumbers are not as prolific nor do they ripen as quickly so we are generally able to keep up with them.

We also harvested a pineapple and mangoes.

{Create} The holiday theme is evident again in this suit bag that I made to transport the suit that The Duke wore to a wedding while we were away.

{Discover} New places and new adventures.

Woodside Beach

River

{Enhance} Sadly, death was the catalyst to renew some friendships that had languished. We were reminded of the fragility of life and the importance of nurturing relationships. However, there was happiness as well.

The happy couple

{Enjoy} We did enjoy our travels and recharged our batteries so now it is time to get back to the things we do every day and I hope my slow-living round up for the end of April is a bit more interesting.

Til next month………..

Suit Yourself

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Posted on March 4, 2013

When we were in Melbourne last month, The Duke bought a new suit. Before we left the store it was packed onto hangers and placed in a suit bag.

These bags are fairly lightweight plastic and we now have at least 3 of them at home. They are convenient if you are taking a suit when flying interstate but I would never store clothes in them as the plastic does not allow any air to circulate and the clothes would be mouldy in no time.

We are going on holidays next week and will be travelling by car for a couple of weeks. The suit will be packed as we have a wedding to attend in the latter part of the trip so I decided I wanted something better than a plastic bag.

First, I removed the zipper to re-use in the new bag. Then I used the existing bag as a pattern. I made the new bag somewhat longer so that is able to hold a dress as well. Thanks to the generosity of a friend I have several metres of poly cotton fabric, some of which was perfect for my project.

Here is the suit in the finished bag.

All zipped up and ready to go.

We now have a breathable carry bag/dust cover for special occasion clothes and another piece of plastic has been eliminated from our home.

Slow Living – February

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Posted on March 3, 2013

This is my second month of joining in the monthly round-up at Slow Living Essentials and already I seem to be struggling with what to write. A couple of things seems to have conspired against me – it is a short month – is it really the end of the month already? and the weather! Since the dry spell broke on the Australia Day weekend (26th January) it has rained almost constantly which limits our activities somewhat

Here are the Slow Living categories:

{Nourish} With the onset of some cooler weather with the rain it was an ideal time to pull out the slow cooker.

I made a batch of pumpkin soup and and beef casserole.

{Prepare} We had an excellent crop of figs.

As well as eating lots of them fresh from the tree, I was able to dry some. This was very successful so I am hoping to have enough to do again next year.

{Reduce} This is always a hard one as we do this each and every day. I turned a singlet of mine that was too short into one for Miss O.

{Green} The weather has brought out the mould but I am keeping things clean and smelling fresh with the use of clove oil. You can read a previous post here.

{Grow} The warm, dry beginning to the summer meant that we had about 8 mangoes on our small tree. We planted it about 4 years ago and this is the first time it has fruited. I suspect that it is generally too cool for them here but this year’s crop has made it worthwhile. They are some of the best mangoes I have tasted and the flesh is as smooth as anything with no sign of stringiness.

Last weekend we had a rare fine day so we bought and planted some vegetable seedlings. They have more than doubled in size in a week.

{Create} Since my sewing machine has returned from being serviced I have got quite a bit of sewing done. I am working through my stash of fabric as well as some pieces I have been given. Here are some of the results.

Winter and summer pyjama bottoms.

A new lining in my skirt.

{Discover} I don’t think I have read anything this month but in a different vein I did discover some fabric to be used when I was sorting out my stash.

{Enhance} We gave away the used fencing wire via Freecycle. I also shared some of the many self-sown cucumber seedlings with neighbours, work colleagues, blogging friends and also on Freecycle.

It is a shame that I did not take some photos of them. Not so much for the seedlings but the innovative packaging. I used some excess egg cartons that I had been given and each seedling and its soil was packed in a space in the carton.

An internet friend sent me some fabric and I used some of it to make a dress suitable for an 18 month old. I will send it to her for her granddaughter who was born last week.

{Enjoy} We travelled to Melbourne and spent a weekend with our daughter who moved there recently. We saw her new home, sampled food at some local establishments and shopped.

I bought this dress to wear to a wedding in a few weeks. I just need to finalise accessories.

The slow living this month has been heavily weighted towards sewing and I guess that is not entirely unexpected with being stuck indoors due to the weather.

Now I am off to check out some of the slow living blogs.

Til next month………..