I Made Some Sales and Talked About Being Green and Frugal

Hello,

It's been a long time since I've last blogged and I've had so much to talk about...

On Friday I received a call from the Happy Yess Moles telling me that there was a groovy concert with 20 bands playing and a small bazaar on Saturday. If I wanted a stall all I had to do was pay the $25 concert fee. Never to miss local talent, fun times and save/make a buck in the process I said "Yes Please!"

I had already spent my $25 stock budget for the month but since this was a special event I headed out early and hit 3 op shops in 3 hours. I bought clothes, jewellery and accessories for a mixed concert going crowd and spent $51.

Then raced home, cleaned some of it and priced it all, loaded the car and arrived at The Happy Yess venue in time for the 3pm start. My mum kindly picked up Dolly at 6pm for a sleep over as the concert had a 1am finish. I was in for the long haul and all the fun.

My 1st sale of the evening was to this amazing musician.

I had a really good time meeting old friends, making new friends and chatting to lots of people about how I personally action being frugal and eco. People were interested, which is very cool.

There were only 5 stalls (including me)! One was a illustrator Click here to see her amazing work :-) Another was a jewellery maker creating cool stuff out of plumber rings and ionised aluminium. Another sold reggae T-shirts and the last sold vintage clothing. And then there was me selling a mixture of vintage and modern trash and treasure. I think we were a good small mixed group.

3 stalls side by side in one of the 3 concert areas.

So how did I go with the selling of my lovely second hand finds, you ask.....

I came home with $140.50. But after taking out my costs of 76$ Stock & 25$ Entry fee, I was left with a profit of $39.50, sure nothing to quit my job over, but I was super happy never-the-less as I really enjoyed myself and didn't dig into my early retirement savings for the concert. Plus I still have plenty of stock for the regular market next week. I'll purchase another $25 of lovelies this week as I am back down to 0$ stock costs.

I'm putting my small profits into plants for my garden plot and the fruits of my labour will grow interest with lovely sustainable fruit & veggies ;-)

Have you sold anything or enjoyed a event without digging into your savings lately?

Tantrums and Crying

Dolly had a tantrum and tears last night and again this morning. For very silly reasons. She was angry and frustrated and I could feel her mounting tension. So this morning I told Dolly we would have a quick dinner and I would spend some quality time with her. After work with my aim of quick dinner I purchased a roast chicken from the supermarket and asparagus (on special). Once home I made a large salad with lettuce, tomato, feta cheese and asparagus. Cut up the roast chicken and plated it all up in a jiffy.

After dinner while Dolly brushed teeth and got into pyjamas, I cleared the table and washed the dishes while our returnee Helpx Jiri dried the dishes. He then headed off to my plot to water it while I spent a quality hour of playing with Dolly with her Play Dough she purchased with some of her birthday money a few weeks back. She was so happy and so was I. When we went to bed for story time I could feel the difference in her. She was calm and joyful.

Birthday Money Wisely Spent.

I find frugal life can be crazy and hectic when working full time. We currently get home between 5:30 and 5:45 pm most days. We aim to get dinner (prepared and eaten), dishes washed, teeth brushed and Pj's on, stories read and garden watered, all before 7pm (bed time for Dolly). No wonder she's frustrated as we push and proddle for her to have a hurried life. She doesn't care about saving for retirement. She doesn't care about a college fund. She doesn't care about buying a house. She just wants us to play with her and cuddle her. So we played for over and hour at making "pizza" Hers had base, tomato paste, cheese and green beans. Mine at her encouragement had base, tomato paste, cheese, eggplant, ham, green beans and... blue berries!

Playing Cooking

I need to slow down and give my daughter much craved quality attention. How about you? Do you feel time poor, rushed and short of breath?

Cultivating Sustainability Workshop

Today I went to the Cultivating Sustainability Workshop. It was so good to meet like minded people and bounce ideas about making changes in our lives and most importantly in our work places.

I gained new knowledge on how to Action Changes. One of my lightbulb moments was learning what a person values and link the action to the value(s).

A personal example:

• Have Solar Panels Installed. 
• Expensive short term, inexpensive long term, uses renewable energy, is a drag to get organised but is less wasteful.
• Links with my values of thrift, environment, love (my daughter and her future), respect (for walking the talk), self pride and courage.

Linking it to values gives me personal encouragement to Take Action.

Hope I made some sense. I'm not good a relaying information I have learnt very well.

AWAKE Presenter with a few Values.

On a side note; I didn't make or eat my sandwiches today as I was in another area of the city for the workshop. I took left overs from home but since everyone was heading to a local cafe for their lunch I headed there too. I really didn't want to miss out on having extra time with active people who care about the environment and sustainability. My lunch cost me $11.50-AUS. The choice was not frugal however it was worth hanging with a bunch of inspiring people. Also after the sustainability motivation I walked the 40 minutes home :-)

Have you been acting Green lately or been to any interesting workshops? 

Working Mum Eats Lunch

My decluttering post received a few comments - it seems to be a popular topic and something a lot of us struggle with. When we are successful in decluttering (even a little) we all enjoy the fruits of our labour and have a wonderful moral boosting sense of achievement.

For all of you out there in other countries not understanding some of my lingo or Australian terms let me know. Op Shops are thrift stores / charity shops. The "Op" stands for Opportunity, as in Opportunity Shops, but no one really calls them that anymore. The are just Op Shops or even Oppies.

Last night I had a visit from friends who are very careful with their money and do everything they can to maximise it and live frugally. I make my lunch with left overs or purchase something inexpensive in my break, from the supermarket such as salad ingredients or bread and sandwich feelings. Well Gary who also works full time goes to the supermarket on Mondays and buys his food for the weeks 5 lunches including drink and makes them up each day at work. His spends roughly $11. And I think this as a inexpensive option that also frees up time and I want to give it a go.

My lunch break is 1 hour long if our phones are not running off the hook. I really want to use that 1 "child free" hour I have more wisely, either with sanity time for myself or getting bills paid and educational books read to grow my mind. I also want it to be nourishing, filling and healthy food wise. Anyway... today I descended to the supermarket and bought a weeks worth of food to replicate Gary's example and see if it works for me.

I spent $11.27 and this is what I purchased to make myself 5 office lunches (minus drinks as I mainly drink water).

• 1 loaf of quality bread $3.00 (on special)
• 10 fruits $2.61 (I selected fruits on special which usually means the fruits are in season - therefor more ecologically sustainable, unfortunately they are not local produce)
• 5 slices of honey ham from the Service Deli section $1.99 (on special)
• 1 jar of marinated feta $1.00 (on special)
• 2 tomato's $1.86 (normal price)
• 1 cucumber .81 cents (normal price)

Weeks Worth of Lunch

I think this is a great idea however it's a bit bread heavy and not enough salad for me - but maybe on some Mondays I could purchase salad fillings only. For now I'm experimenting and will see how I go. This is what I made today and will have for the remaining 4 work days.

Quick filling (notice without butter as I try to be healthier)

My $2.26 Lunch! Bon Appetit!!!

You will notice I had to accept a plastic bag for my shopping as I had forgotten my shopping bag at my desk. This is something I need to change as I have been finding difficult to remember my bags much too often lately. Hangs head in shame :-(

What is your lunch like? Do you take your bags to the shops with you?

Decluttered a Little

I told my family this morning "Before we do any of the fun stuff we are going to spend an hour tiding and cleaning the lounge room for 1 hour". We were too slow and didn't get as much done as I wanted. The lounge room is one of our main dumping grounds for our busy lives and is pile high with stuff on all available surfaces most of the time.

However we did prepared 9 bags for different people and did a day of visiting friends and drop offs.

1. Dolly's school got candles, stickers and desk calendar.
2. Merle and Stephen got a bag of candles and slightly ripped clothing made with lovely fabric for repurposing.
3. Kelly got a bag of preloved magazines - mostly home decorating ones.
4. Little L (Dolly's friend) got stickers and 3 sample mobile phones to play grown ups.
5. Super R (Dolly's friend) got stickers and one of the lovely 2011 calendars from the op shop as they are just too pretty to cut up this year.
6. Maleluca Refugee Centre got 5 booklets from my uni days on refugee issues.

We ran out of time and we still had:

1. A return for Bunnings - gardening stuff that was not suitable/wrong size.
2. A bag for the op shop.
3. A few items for the Botanical gardens permaculture group office (In trays and making submission guides).

This will be done in the next few days. The lounge room is still cluttered however it's looking much better and I feel much more motivated. Isn't it amazing the amount of "stuff" that comes into our lives cheap or free. And it takes up valuable real estate in our home and fills up our brain. I stand here guilty as one of the worst offenders of accumulating STUFF.

You may enjoy watching this HERE.

Did you do any decluttering or are you always on top of it?

Mothers Day 2011

The day before Mothers Day I purchased croissant for Dolly to bring me breakfast in bed. She told I wouldn't be allowed out of bed because her teacher told her so and that I would have to drink a cup of tea. So before the event I told her that I would just stay in bed for breakfast and that I don't really enjoy tea so she could just bring me water. She was agreeable to this.

On Mothers Day morning Dolly proudly brought me croissant in bed and gave me a gift she made at school - lovely chocolate and coconut balls. The Rambling Expat gave me a new cooking knife. I wondered to myself when did it change from gifts for pleasure, to gifts for chores. But I realised I preferred a useful gift that was not wasted money after all.

We then headed out to a FREE Mothers Day Family event at the Waterfront. There were lots of FREE activities for kids and a craft fair for mums to browse around. We had a lovely relaxing time.

There were 2 Free Jumping Castles and No Long Queues!

Free Beading for Children to Make Jewels for Mums!

Free Face Painting by Chantal the Fairy

And something super exciting happened!!! I heard my name and when I turned around there was Melissa from Clothwork - a blogger who I had communicated with in the past but never met. I think my attention seeking eye wear makes me recognisable:-)
It was so great to meet her and I'm sure we will all catch up with her again!!!

After all the activities The Rambling Expat, Dolly and I headed to lunch at a Irish Pub/Restaurant at the waterfront where we ordered burgers and fish & chips. That cost us a whopping $39.00. Not frugal at all - But hey I'm a mum and deserve to be officially celebrated once a year!

Our Lunch

We ended the day with chores and gardening. The Rambling Expat then put Dolly to bed while I went out! Melissa from Clothwork was given (or won) a 2 for 1 movie ticket for the Deck Chair Cinema that night at 7:30pm. She lives far from town so gave it to me. At 7:10pm I decided to take myself out with my 2 for 1 ticket. I offered a total stranger in the car park of the cinema that we split the 2 for 1 ticket so that the cost would be $7.50 each instead of $15 each. The stranger was thrilled as she was short on cash, but insisted she pay $10 (who am I to say no?). So I got into the movies for only $5.00. The Deck Chair Cinema is under the stars near the sea. Not only do you get a movie but you also get possums, flying foxes and the sea breeze.

Thanks Melissa!

Have you had Mothers Day in your country this year yet? If you did, how was your Mothers Day this year?

Treasures at the Op Shop within Budget

I have been working on my budget. I'll post it up latter today or this week. I'm super behind in my posts as the 3 times I tried to post this week I was unable to do so, due to Blogger ongoing maintenance and issues.

Last Saturday I went out and bought some "stuff" that is "allowed" in my new budget.

For Market Stall:
I have now given myself a budget of $25 per month for my market stall. This way I don't stop myself from buying some great goodies for the market, but I also don't go overboard. Anything I make over $25 at the next market will be my gravy money - and put towards various family projects without dipping into our savings that are pigeonholed for other projects such as home renovations, emergency fund, body corp fees and so forth.

Here is what I got for $7.50

• 1 Camera Bag (These cost about $45 new - in great condition!) $3.00 
• 1 Wide Brim Green Hat $2.00
• 3 Books (.50cents each) $1.50
• 1 Polka Dot Dress for 1 yr old $1.00

Mix of Goodies

Polka Dot for Market, Beautiful White Dress for Dolly.

For my own Fun money I have given myself a Budget of $15 a week. It's a lot but that includes any junk food I get myself for lunch in moments of weakness, any purchases that are not "needs", hairdresser, clothing, books, gifts and so forth. This part of the budget is a work in progress and will need to be tweaked.

Out of my Fun Budget I purchased these items for $7.50

• 1 Gorgeous cotton white dress for Dolly (About $25 new).
• 5 x 2011 Calenders to Use as calenders and for Dolly to cut (these were marked at $20-$25 new! No way would I spend that on a calender each year!) I gifted 1 calender to a work colleague with a teenage daughter who is a Twilight fan.
• 1 Fiction Book for easy reading when I'm super tired.
• Dolly purchased 1 new toy in package for a friends 7 week baby (he's a bit young for it but Dolly saw the opportunity and grabbed it - they sell for $11 new).

Calenders and Book

Little People

One of the calenders I bought twice, because the package contained really good value for money lovelies.

Very Pretty!

The package has: 1 Desk Calender, 4 post cards, 1 Reminder Dated Note Book and the calender for Dolly to cut out all the very pretty vintage images for her crafting.

I'm within budget and am making sure that our Budget does have Fun Money included - which it didn't in past years, but was spent anyway. As I said my new budget is a work in progress as I keep thinking of other things to add to it unfortunately.

How's yours? How is it created/thought out? I'd love to know what you do.

Thanks Miss Piggy Bank

Miss Piggy Bank awarded me a Liebster Blog Award :-) She's a Blogger I follow as we have similar aspirations and actions. I search out those that can inspire me and push me along my path.

The Award is for Bloggers with less then 300 Followers that the nominator enjoys - And lucky me.. Miss Piggy Bank selected little ole me, a small Blogger rambling about her money adventures & misadventures and trying to be more eco along the way.

What a very cool surprise!!! Thank you Miss Piggy Bank!

Stats wise; Frugal Down Under receives roughly 80 page views per day, from countries as diverse as the US, England, Israel, China, India, Malaysia, Switzerland, Indonesia, France, Russia, New Zealand and my home country Australia. (These are just a few of the countries - so please don't be offended if I missed your lovely country).

It's interesting to know wherever we are from, many of us have some of the same goals; be it save some of our money for the future, try and live a little more sustainably and have as much fun with our families as possible without blowing the budget. We come from different backgrounds and have different economic situations and yet support each other with cheers, encouragement, tips and tough love. Maybe politicians could learn something from the Blogger community?

In turn I award the Liebster Blog Award to Money In the Garage, because he teaches me you can practically sell anything on Ebay and he does it with such great story telling humour that he gets a chuckle out of me every time.

Turning Paper Clutter into $$$

I have let paper pile up and I fell behind with major money issues. I'm very red faced here; I have not completed my tax return for 2010 and I have not claimed my 2009-2010 child care rebate (a long confusing process). This is all lost money as it could be in my bank account earning interest for me as I type.

So I tackled paper work in my 30 minute block as per my calender. I was amazed at how much sorting and purging I was able to do in 30 minutes. Bank statements, home maintenance, warranties and work references all filed where they should have been. The pile is still high but I got through a huge chunk making it motivating to continue. Best of all I found papers relating to my 2010 tax claim and 2009-2010 childcare rebate which I clipped aside. I aim to have these both claimed for by the 13 of May 2011, so that I can tackle my Superannuation and Will next.

Taxes, Child Care Rebates and Superannuation Fund

I discovered an invitation to an upcoming Superannuation talk for over 40's from my Superannuation Fund. I entered it in my diary and will definitely go as it's my money and my opportunity to learn more on how to save it from disappearing and make it work harder. I also need to see what is the best Super Fund for me.

Is your paper file neatly filed away, easy to grab when needed? Or just one big clutter pile causing stress and unhappiness? You could be loosing money if disorganised...

Taking Stock of my $$$

I decided enough was enough and put 30 minutes aside each night to sort out my finances, get my 2011 budget finalised and complete all pending items to do with $$$. I entered the most important jobs in my calendar as to do them in small blocks of time. This way I aim to reach my own goals and those that the Financial Coach encouraged in my FREE 1 hour one on one meeting.

I have a great Japanese Budget Diary I purchased in Paris earlier this year - but have not used it to it's full capacity. So I pulled it out of my handbag along with my wallet and got busy.

My 5 year old wallet and 2011 Diary

I went through all my dockets, entered amounts into my diary and placed them straight into the rubbish bin when completed. My wallet in now manageable and I feel such a relief after putting this boring job on hold for so long - and actually it was not boring, it was surprising pleasant and freeing.

Updating my spendings and up coming events.

I then entered all the fun free activities and other events that are happening around my town so as to keep on top of all opportunities.

I've found spreadsheets and electronic diaries don't really work for me. However I love note books and hard copy diaries. What about you, what works for you? How do you keep track of your finances? Do you budget, use jars, keep tabs, have envelopes?

Wednesday Night's Dinner

A put a little olive oil, soy sauce, garlic, ginger and raw peanuts in my wok. I sliced up a left over cooked lamb chop and mixed it in. Added left over broccoli, cauliflower and Brussels sprouts. From the garden I added purple spinach (still don't know it real name) and some Rosella (Hibiscus Sabdariffa) leaves (which I recently learnt I can eat - And I LOVE them!)

Woked it all Up

Plated up for the 3 of us, with a cup of rice and garnished with eatable Rosella flowers that are full of vitamins.

Dolly's Mini Portion.

I'm happy when the left overs are used up and the fridge looks tidy. Less waste is so much better for our environment and my purse is much happier too! 


How have you been going with your left overs?

Tuesday Blues are Green - Back at Work

Today I went back to work after 11 Days Off. It's hard getting back into the swing of things - I feel like the new girl on the block, a bit tired and a few blanks in the memory bank.

I work in a Government Department in Information Services. Basically I work on a IT - Help Desk assisting people with their databases and test database upgrades. The Government Department is creating a new Green Team to plan and implement Eco and Sustainable business practices as to minimise ecological unsound practices. An invitation was sent out to Government workers to become part of the team, 1 person per division. I asked my manager if I could apply and she said "yes".

So now I'll be part of a Green Team and will be able to learn about and encourage ecologically sustainable practices in my division. This is very exciting for me and gives me a boost to my personal ethics as I may be able to implement some of them into my workplace.

On the floor I work on someone out of the norm, has placed a bookshelf with FREE books in the tea room - and to start off my knowledge I found a real goodie, just there waiting for me; "Sustainable Growth".

I Found a Free Eco Book

It's ecological practices for small businesses however I'm sure many ideas are transferable into a large Government organisation.

I find being careful with resources to prevent ecological unsound wastage means less wastage with money too. Does your work place (paid or unpaid) implement Green Initiatives? Does anyone have ideas to share with me or others who work in offices?

I Made a Glorious Error

Monday was a public holiday that I miscalculated. So I had 11 days off!!! Not just a lousy 10. Happy Dance....

I didn't do too much, as I wanted to do things at home and get ready for the work week. What a waste! It's not like I had to write a report for work or balance the books. Why did I waste my precious minutes on a little cleaning, some cooking, some sorting, some nagging, some more cleaning, more nagging and some more cooking.

Amongst all the boring activities I dropped off our Helpx Jiri at the airport as he was heading to Vietnam for 2 weeks. I gave him 2 magazines (that I picked up for FREE) for a friend in Vietnam who is a village girl working in the big smoke as a domestic aid and learning English in night classes. So ecologically the magazines are having a nice long life. They were read by a person(s), then donated to an op shop, then picked up for free by my mum, then given to me, then Jiri read them on the trip, then given in Vietnam where a whole lot of other people will read them. What a great long life instead of read once and binned.

Dolly and I also went for our weekly grocery shop. My fun girl always wants to come with me.

Playing Facial Games.

I bought some "wasted money" items:

• A Eco magazine (Because I wanted to see what it was all about)
• A bottle of cordial (which dropped and smashed as we got it out of the car).
• A manual egg beater (I could have waited to find one in an op shop).

But... I also purchased 2 toothbrushes on special for $4.88 which scanned wrong at $5.76 so I got them for free. Yeah!!! Love the FREE stuff.

I purchased 3 bottles of laundry liquid as it was a discontinued line and reduced from $8 to $4. So I stocked up.

Groceries shopping not yet completed.

My groceries total was $86.95AUS - my aim is for groceries to stay under $100 a week. I still have a few shopping items to buy at latter in the week, which may take me over.

How did you do with your groceries? Within budget? Out of budget? Smashed all your eggs and bottles?

10 Days Off - Day 10 Sunday 01/05

Today was my fun fun fun Happy Yess Market Day!!!

It was a slow day with not many customers or visitors. I think too many things were on in Darwin on the same day. Also because of the long weekend many of them were probably camping or travelling too.

But I made a small profit of $46, spent $4 on cold drinks leaving me $42 which I am placing in our Borneo Holiday fund.

Hey Hey... Scary Market Matron.

Sorry about the photo. (Thanks Rambling Expat.) I look life I'm scowling (I have the sun in my eyes). I also presented my stall much better then in this shot, by hanging all my cutest clothing against the window screens. And what's with the stomach pushed out? I could have stood up straight and held it in somewhat. I'm wearing my floaty silky $2 scarf-dress, my $6 sandals, $1 cardi, $4 chunky turquoise necklace, $1 headband and expensive glasses. I look like a scary matron...

Anyway lets move on... Dolly sold a pair of outgrown shoes for $4 and a toy for $1. With her $5 she purchased herself a wand... as all happy fairies do.

But latter in the afternoon everything became dramatic as Dolly stepped on sharp plastic with her bare foot, she screamed and bled. I ran to her pushing everyone out of my way as all crazy mums do. Thankfully one of the market visitors was a nurse and patched her up with a 1st Aid kit. The Rambling Expat then took Dolly to the hospital where they cleaned the wound of dirt embedded deep and patched the wound with "magic purple glitter" glue and strips instead of stitches. Her foot is bandaged up and now she needs to not walk on it for a few days.

I'm giving a Shout Out to my friend Kelly who has lent us a stroller to get Dolly from A to B. And a Big Thank You to the wonderful nurse who saved the day. To Merle for helping me pack up my stall. And another Thank You to all my amazing neighbours who always pitch in and help when disaster strikes. Great support always makes things easier, happier and frugalistic!

The hospital services were free so all I spent for the day was $4 for the cold drinks at the market as I just couldn't quench my thirst. But I do have my eye on some gorgeous locally made jewellery, paper dolls and prints. It's local and I want to support local instead of global mass produced stuff.

Have you been selling any of your clutter or thrifty finds this year?

10 Days Off - Day 9 Saturday 30/4

This was a day of busyness. We went to see a free movie at the local university. It was a kids movie in German and then there was a adult movie in French but I had gardening I wanted to get done at my plot so didn't stay for the 2nd movie and now regret it. Boohoo.

The event was totally free, which included movies, delicious Indonesian finger food and soft drinks. They also had giveaways of German Flags, Pens, Pins with the Australian & German flag together and key lanyards.

Why do kids love flags so much and collect them everywhere they go?

And yet only about 15 people turned up! I don't get it???? Many times I've turned up at free events like this and there are hardly any people. When you have to pay $$$ to attend a International Film Festival there a queues of people.

I felt bad for the organisers. They had an article in the NT News, they advertised on the NT Department of Education Website and had posters up around Darwin.

This once happened to me at university roughly 10 years ago. I was the Women's Officer for my Campus in Melbourne, with the unpaid job came a bucket of money $2000 for spending on women centred activities. One evening I showed a current movie called; Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; it cost over $300 to show the movie to a public audience. I advertised on campus and handed hundreds of leaflets for the free screening with lots of positive feedback. Only 3 people turned up :-(  It was highly embarrassing and disappointing. It made me disheartened to organise any other "free" activities.

Today was a Spend Free Day. Yay for me!

Any interesting Free Activities in you area? Do you go to them or do you think they're not worth your time? Love to hear your views.

10 Days Off - Day 8 Friday 29/4

Dolly and I went off super early to the Wildlife Park. We hit the road at 7:20am to pick up our ex Helpx's Merle & Steven as we were dropping them off at Berry Springs, which is next to the park.

Being locals we are lucky that we purchase the entry fee once and we an go as many times as we like for the rest of the year. I purchased the $26 entry fee for myself in November 2010 - so I was free and Dolly is free because she's not yet 5.

We arrived at 8:55am and headed straight to the Pelican Feeding where Dolly was able to throw fish at the Pelicans.

Pelican - One of Dolly's favourites.

We then went to the Aquarium by the free shuttle train to look at the fish, turtles and crocodile. Followed by Whip Ray & Archer Fish watching,

Fresh Water Whip Rays.

and then my favourite; the Bird Show. I love the Bird Show. It's always a bit different so I never get bored with it.

White Cockatoo

Dolly loves holding birds, snakes, lizards, marsupials and so on.

Dolly was Holding the Rufous Owl.

We had lunch in the cafe because I was too disorganised to make lunch in the morning and then we wasted time backtracking our steps to find Dolly's lost hat and sunglasses. I tell myself that we are "holidays" to cover the guilt of buying cafe food.

We did plenty of walking on the paths winding through the bush, drank water from our drink bottles and enjoyed each others company. We found a snake skin on the path for Dolly's school "Show and Share" session.

On our return home Dolly got straight into her cutting and pasting again and I exhaustedly completed chores and cooked dinner. But mums always have jobs to do... It's like a bottomless cup... It never ends.

How did you go? Any parks or beach walks this week?