Another Week in Paradise?

Been a slow week this week.  As they all have been this year.  Not sure what is in the air at the moment but I have been feeling so tired, lethargic and unmotivated for the past few weeks.  But then when I talk to others they are saying the exact same thing!  I think it is the end of year blues where everyone has been working so hard all year and we are all ready to fall in a heap at the end of the year.  Bring on Christmas holidays!

I am very blessed in that my place of employment is closing its doors on the 20th December this year and we return on 2 January 2014.  That is quite a long break for us!  Also they give us the days we are closed for free in that the days don't come off our regular leave days and we still get paid for them so it is 5 "free" days we get.  It is their way of thanking us for all our hard work during the year.  So I am truly looking forward to the long break.  Hubby and I have decided on no gifts this year as we are saving for a holiday and for our new house we want to build next year.  All I really want is a day of great memories...friends, family, great food, great laughs and lots to drink!  (Although I am still banned from alcohol!)

As I type this now we are in the midst of a pretty nasty storm!  I went out for lunch just as it started to pour down rain so I have come back to work with soaking wet shoes!  So currently sitting barefoot here waiting for my shoes to dry enough to be able to stand putting them back on!  We have had a series of storms the past couple of days which has been nice as everything is so dry but in all honesty it has been barely enough to soak the ground.

Our biggest excitement at home this week was the sighting of a small snake which decided to pop out from under my car and say "hi" as I was getting in!  Needless to say I wasn't a very happy camper!  Hubby reckons he was more terrified of me than I of him but I don't care!  I HATE snakes!  I can deal with spiders but snakes?   Brrrrrrr!  Mind you he was only a wee little fellow and I lost sight of where he went in the midst of my shrieking and dancing the dance of the wild snake woman!  It's only the second snake I have seen in all the 15 years of living where we do.  I am rather amazed we haven't seen others considering we live right beside a bush area that is home to koalas, the odd wallaby, a family of scrub turkeys, bearded dragons and an echidna!

One of my lovely Facebook friends informed me last night that there was three more pays until Christmas! (We get paid fortnightly)  Boy did that take the wind out of my sails!  I haven't even thought about Christmas yet as I have 2 birthday parties to get through in the next 2 weekends.  Where on earth did the time go this year?  I had intended to hand make my Christmas cards this year (I was supposed to last year as well but ran out of time!) but chances are I will not make it again this year.  Even having 2 days of a week from work I still manage to have so much to do and not enough time to do everything.  I have decided I must be one of those terribly unorganised people!  I seem to have such grand plans and I make copious lists of things that MUST be done but only a small fraction of these tasks ever gets marked off!  *Sigh*

Anyway I guess I should make some effort here in the office to be productive so I leave you here with the following thought:

"One thought, one moment, can change the rest of your life.

 

Don't blink, you'll miss it! "

My life in 2013 in Review

Who would have thought that it’s been nearly 18 months since my last blog?  Why did I stop you ask?  I’m not really quite sure.  Life just seemed to be a blur with nothing much going on and I just didn’t think anybody would really be interested in my day-to-day ho-hum happenings.  2013 has just flown on by and even though I did have a couple of huge events occur it just never occurred to me blog them!

The most exciting thing to happen was the birth of my beautiful little great nephew, the first born of my niece Nicola and her partner David.  He was born in July on the same day as his Uncle Adam’s birthday, Nicola’s brother, which we all kind of hoped wouldn’t happen but he now has a birthday twin!  They have named him Ryder Jeff, the Jeff being his grandfather’s name (David’s dad).  He is now 4 months old and it is so hard to imagine life without him now.  His conception had caused quite a drama in the family as some of the family thought she was too young to have a baby (she was 20 when he was born!).  They didn’t have anywhere to live as they were still living at mum’s house part of the time and then at David’s parents’ house the other times.  Still living even now at mum’s although they moved in with me and my hubby at one stage with the baby as they weren’t getting on with mum.  So yeah, it’s been a struggle for them as they shift between homes and try to find a home of their own.

In March, my daughter Libbee married her man Daniel.  Such a simple and beautiful wedding and the wedding she always wanted.  It was very low key and very low budget which she is extremely proud of.  I bought the wedding dress for her online.  It was a copy of an original designer dress worth $2,500 to buy the original and it cost $350 online for an exact replica.  We worried at the time at what we would end up with as it was made in Hong Kong and the colours would be slightly different but when we got it, it was the perfect fit (we worried our measurements might be out!) and it was as beautiful as the real one she had tried on in the bridal shop.  So she got her dream dress for a fraction of the original price and even after wearing it all day until 6am the next day it still looks as good as it did when we got it!  It got dry cleaned and now hangs proudly in her closet.   

In August Libbee and Daniel had to move as their rental house was being sold so Libbee has been living with us and Daniel is living with his mum on the Gold Coast as that is where he is currently working.  Libbee lives with us as she is working near us.  So, sadly, they only see each other once a week while they struggle to save for their own place again.  Not an ideal situation for a newly married couple who have yet to take their honeymoon but for the moment it’s the best they can do.

Health wise things are finally looking up after 5 years of constant specialists, tests, biopsies, blood tests etc.  I still have monthly blood tests to ascertain liver function and am on a cocktail of meds probably for the rest of my life but things are finally starting to level out and the drugs are finally working.  My last specialist visit a couple of weeks ago showed my liver function is getting better with only 3 numbers showing in the red.  One of the numbers has gone way down and is well in the normal range now and the numbers in red have halved so the new drug I am on is actually working.   This means now if the numbers stabilise with this drug I won’t need a liver transplant and things aren’t quite as dire as originally thought.  It also confirms that I have PBC which Primary Biliary Cirrhosis.  What this means is my bile ducts are kaput which is what is causing my liver to deteriorate.  The bile ducts can never be repaired so the life time drugs will keep on doing what the bile ducts should be doing.  And if we can manage that then the liver will be sparred further damage.  Maybe one day down the track there will be something they can do but for now I am happy to keep popping the pills as it sure beats the alternative.  I don’t go back now until end of January so I am hoping my next blood test will have positive results.

Anyway that is my year in a nut shell.  Here's hoping for a better 2014!