Resty things.

These are some really nice chicken and chorizo meatballs that R gave me. I ate them for lunch at work. So wonderful to have friends!

I continued to vary between flat and miserable last week, I felt very physically tired, had a breakout of coldsores, and just couldn’t make it to the end of the week. I took a couple of hours off on Tuesday afternoon, which I spent in a cafe with a sunny courtyard and lemon tart and The Cross of Christ. That was excellent. I also raked leaves, which is the winter version of mowing. Didn’t go to home group and felt so bad about that I cried. Housemate was lovely and hugged me.

 

I put some strategies in place to help me get through the week, and then get back to normal.

First: vitamins. Lysine for cold sores, Vitamin B for stress, as well as eating garlic.

Second: Control thoughts. Whenever I started thinking about something negative and digging myself into a pit of pity, I went to Pinterest and looked at recipes for tarts. Or read an article about Marie Kondo tidying up.

Third: I did a bit of tidying up. This was pretty calming. I tidied up random things like the big meeting table at work.

Finally: Rest. I was crying again on Thursday night and I decided I should just take Friday off and have 3 solid days of rest. Uggboot days. All I did was cook (a tart and a soup), tidy up my dressing table, hang out in the back yard getting vitamin D and listened to North and South from Audible, and go back to the cafe to read the book again.

Dressing table before and after. Used Kondo techniques: thinking about which things spark joy, thanking the junk before I threw it out, putting things in containers.

 This portuguese tart was chewy.

Over the weekend I spent a lot of time lying on a picnic blanket in the backyard. I admired my peas, this pot of mint which is an object that sparks joy, and the sheets on the line.

Going back to work on Monday onwards was so much better. Thought about crying at one point but didn’t. Thought of a roster I could remove myself from, thought of a better way to balance music ministry and said no to something I was asked to organise with that, basically I will try and maintain a 1 in 1 out thing with church from now on. I’ve just been added to more rosters and not taken off any. You’ve got to be in charge of your own Nos, really. It’s good to be asked to do something new, I wouldn’t want to be left out of opportunities, but that means it’s my responsibility to decide what not to do.

Anyway on reflection I think most of my depression has been tiredness. It's reinforced how much rest I need. I'm not the sort that can have something on every Saturday and Sunday, even if they are fun things.

Failday, Coldday, Craftday.

I had one of the most miserable days of my life on Wednesday. I woke up depressed. I got to work, and couldn’t log in to my computer. My iPad had also run out of credit. I got my colleague to find the name of my IT man and rang him and left a message. We worked on my mac until 2pm with a break for morning tea and lunch. Then the computer was still quite slow, and the internet was slow because it broke on the central coast or something. So I literally got nothing done. Cried in the car on the way home. When I drove over the flats it wasn’t raining as hard and there was an amazing sunset so I drove to my footbridge and stood in the rain with my umbrella and there was also a rainbow.

Then iSelect called me back and I finally got my health privately insured (one of my 2 goals for the week). Then R came over and we did Jillian, then I did cello even though I was really tired because I am always too tired and busy to do cello practice these days so it was only my second for the week. Then I had a shower and then I had another cry. Did a bit of a mind map or something. The outcome was that I wish it was 2 years ago when I was 29 and lived in Sydney. That’s not going to happen! Decided to tidy up a drawer in a minimalist way and that was very calming. Had dinner at 5.45 pm, and watched a taped Poirot, again, that was very calming. Lesson: if everything is awful, you can still be in control of a small drawer. Texted Mudgee friend to organise holiday (2nd goal for the week).

I was pretty glad in the end that even though I was sad and tired I pushed on and ended the day with 2 big achievements (private health and a holiday organised) as well as Jillian and cello. If I had procrastinated some more I would have felt worse.

The rest of the week I was pretty normal really, but still tired. Oh another thing that came out of my crying and thinking and also the bible study we did about Serving on Tuesday night was I decided I needed to say No to at least one thing, probably two. My iCal is pretty full until September. And I think the busyness of June has made me tired and unhappy.

Thursday and Friday were basically nice normal days! So I must be in a mood cycle where I crash on Tuesdays or something.

Saturday was men's con so left at 7 to get to Tahlee at 8. I knew it was going to be a long tedious day, made worse by the rain because I had been looking forward to sitting outside by the water reading and so on. I was unprepared for the cold. I can not describe the frozen hell that was the Tahlee hall. The most wonderful of mothers came along for the day to keep me company. The music team went to a warm cafe in tea gardens which ironically sold ice cream. That cheered me up. Then we went back for bin fire, dinner and the night session. More cold. Left at 9.30 pm. It was a camp that I think did end up being worthwhile, the talks were excellent. But the physical conditions were exhausting and I'm not good at concealing my grumpiness.

Sunday was a long planned craft day with heather! We decided to up cycle granny's old wool jumpers into a blanket for heather. My main goal is to take something of granny's and make it useful, heather really liked the craft. She might collect more jumpers in op shops and make more blankets. We got to the stage of all the squares ready to piece together.

Pea harvest, a day to Sydney.

And now normal programming resumes.

I went up to Singleton to visit The Blonde Sister, as she is known amongst people who have met Heather and I. It was very lovely, she took me to a park near her house and I didn’t take my phone to get a photo but there is a piece of play equipment for adults that needs 2 people, one to stand on one end and another to hang off the other end by their hands and run around, and so it’s a flying fox that spins in a circle and if you are on the standing end you just hang on while you spin and go up and down but if you’re on the end when you dangle by your arms you have to run half of it to keep it moving and then hang on while you get lifted off the ground and spun around the high half.

We ate home made pizza and watched the kids movie Spiderwick. Went to her church the next morning which was very good, small church with solid preaching and music, although it was cold in the hall and my feet froze. I didn’t stay around after that because I had to go back and swap my car for a work car and go to my church for music practice (again) for mens convention.

The MC is next Saturday which is good because I’ll be glad when all these practices are over. Really there is one person who needs all the practice, everybody else is pretty seasoned. But what can you do. It’s a test of my patience. Also, its the 3rd conference for the month, I’m pretty over them. I used to be curious about men's conventions because what do they do (same stuff as women but more golf) and are there any potential husbands there (no, there is no such thing as husbands) and come to think of it I cooked at a men's weekend away a few years ago so the novelty has definitely worn off. July is a bit of a month off, and then August has more conferences: Engage and night church weekend away and I think TWIST is on which I’d like to go to because Vaughn Roberts is there. I’m just really worn out now though. I was smart to not do Sunday of MC.

One little joy from the weekend is that I harvested my first snow peas! And they tasted a lot better than shop ones. So sweet!

I had half a batch of dough from the Tamworth weekend so I made Cinnamon Scrolls to share with Blonde Sister and Housemate.

Monday was an event I have been avoiding thinking about all week. I had to go to Sydney and back for the day, with a colleague, for some web content management training. The training was great, I particularly loved the office space. But it was a really early start to get there by 9. FUN SPONTANEOUS COMMUTING WITH ELSIE! The drive home was even worse with rain, a car accident at Mt White, and peak hour. 

The haul!

My aims this week are, lock in my July holiday (accommodation and leave request) and do the health insurance thing, cos I’m now 31, income has changed since I last investigated, blah blah blah. Also buy food. I’ve let that go for a while. I’m on to eating Maddie’s bread now.

Feelings.

I’m sometimes depressed in the mornings. It wears off as I get into my work. I’m not sure why. Maybe its winter SAD. I have had significant mood changes in winter before. I can remember living in Kingsford and going for long walks at lunchtime to get sunshine and often crying as I walked. Maybe its the rhythm of life, summer over, feeling busy, days are short and dark, everything is closing in on me. I didn’t have a great summer though, I was kind of depressed between the two funerals, so I’m probably going into winter without a full battery recharge. I’ve also got negative baggage about this guy that asked me out for coffee last year and then dropped off the planet this year. We didn’t really date, so we didn’t really break up, the cause was mutual caution, but the effect was enough of a dumping to hurt a bit. I just wish he’d left me alone. We had a study on bible-reading at home group, and had to share how we are going with it, and I haven’t had a habit since I left Sydney (I was reading at lunchtime at MM), and because I’ve tried so many times to start the habit and 9/10 times it fails (e.g. it was a new years resolution that didn’t survive January this year) I told my home group honestly that I’m not trying because I know I’ll fail and I don’t have the wherewithal to be a failure at it right now. My life isn't even that hard, I'm not a working parent or anything. It's just me. I will fail, that’s how it is, so what’s the point of adding unnecessary failure to my life. I’ll stick with things that work, like baking cinnamon scrolls.

I’m not down all the time, work is good, there’s lots I enjoy, anticipation is especially helpful, and all the nice stuff goes in my regular blog posts, but this is an update on the downside.

Various foods and Tamworth.

Sound at church. I think I've got it. I've done it under supervision for maybe 5 Sundays, every second week. I think I'll be able to do it by myself, so now I'm just going to be rostered once a month. I'm feeling good about it. I've learnt something technical. It's a way of serving church with my skills that isn't my MAIN strength, piano, but is kind of related, and I mostly enjoy it. I did it back at the cathedral but I burned out in tears after a couple of months and haven't done it since because it is THE most thankless job. I'm feeling postive about sustaining it this time.

I love going for a walk to the trainline at sunset. Because I miss walking home from work.

New dress. I'm pleased with a dress I bought at the markets because it a) matches my taste perfectly b) fits which is rare at markets and c) was $50!

Visited a chocolate cafe on Darby St with JK.

Decided to use this broken stool M brought home as a rack for hanging worn clothes on! It is in my wardrobe. I was so excited for about 48 hours.

Work social club organised a tour of the dairy with soup and damper.

I had a spontaneous bunch of flowers from Denise! And since I went away for the weekend I gave them to mum because there were beautiful proteas which she likes.

North West Bible Conference. I was really hoping to go to it, then I thought I couldn't, but then I had a place to stay with JK so I went!

I got my hair washed, cut and blowdried on Friday before I went away so I didn't have any hair maintenance while I was there. I should do that every conference. Except now I'm short I'll be growing hair out for the summer again. We got to Tamworth about 9pm on Friday night and had woodfired pizza at Pig and Tinderbox with some friends. 

I love conferences, not everybody does, and I'm a bit introverty, but I just love them anyway. I like getting bible teaching at a different level or in a different way to what I get at church, just the density of hearing a set of talks back to back and getting a big picture is something I love. Large singing is good too. I had nice people to hang out with there like JK and my sister and their staff team. And I was excited to go to Tamworth for the first time.

Hospitatily of the Tamworth church was so good, so much attention to detail. Quality music, not too overwhelming program. John Woodhouse preached on David and Bathsheba and Uriah. The food was good, like this sweet potato with pulled pork and coleslaw. Like gourmet street van food!

I made some cinnamon scrolls on the last morning for the girl we stayed with. They were a bit more labour intensive but better with some shaping so the butter didn't leak as much.

This is how I normally do them, cut into strips and twisted. The rose shape above is better I think.

Organised a fancy tea tasting high tea type thing at work with S + N.

I am enjoying all the Agatha Christie on GEM at the moment. 2 nights a week! Tuesday has back 2 back Poirot and Marple, and Wednesday has an old movie with like Angela Lansbury, David Niven, Lauren Bacall, Maggie Smith people in them.