It's Over. It's Really Over.

Today I got an email from my course lecturer informing me that not only did I pass The Last Ever Assignment (a portfolio of autism pieces), but I'd earned myself a DISTINCTION.

Squeeeeeee!

Even though I posted the assignment off a week ago, I didn't feel as though I could celebrate finishing up until I got these last results back. And now I have. And also - yay!

For the last four years I have been simultaneously juggling (and not very well, most of the time) home, husband, children and studying and I would be lying if I didn't honestly wonder if this day would EVER come. Some of you reading may even remember me posting on an old Yahoo Group about the logistics of beginning the course all those years ago. More times than I could count these last four years I've regretted continuing. But I kept going. And now I'm done!

Sorry folks, I'm just a teensy bit excited.

When I first started the course I had a 5 year old, a 3 ½ year old and a 2 year old - the first time in my husband and my relationship that we didn't have a newborn. And remember, we started early. Master J still wasn't even toilet trained back then.

After high school I had studied for a little while and within a year I was pregnant. And then pregnant again. And then pregnant a third time. Somewhere in between Thing 2 and Thing 3 I just stopped trying to juggle it all and put away study for several years. And then Miss Moo got a little older, and I started to have my familiar niggly feelings about 'doing more', but at the same time understanding that it was fairly impossible with three small children.

And then this particular course popped up. In an area - professional writing - that I was passionate about. The school was/is highly respected, the lecturers are all published authors (the story goes that one of the hardest teachers I ever had interviewed JFK once) and best of all, I could study part time from home - the only way possible I was able to do it. The whole shebang fit me like a glove. It was heaven on a stick for the first year. The second year was enjoyable too, but I was 'seasoned' and starting to look on the deadlines as a curse. The third year was rough. My mother passed away that May and I found it very, very hard to get my mojo back, so I treaded-writing-water for the rest of the year. And then this last year was torture. The last six months especially, as I was madly tying up loose ends I'd neglected for the previous 12 months.

But I'm done.

And I'm still alive.

And it feels soooooo good.

And I even managed, somehow, amazingly, to get half-decent marks for most of my (*counts in head*) approx 120 assignments over those four years. I will finish with a solid 'credit' (B) mark, which completely flies in the face of what I deserve, considering how I've dragged my feet these last 18 months or so.

It's mine. Alllll mine.

And I'm so glad it's over!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Where I Get All Serious For A Change

I like to consider myself pretty open-minded. It's been a long time since I've been truly shocked at anything I've seen or read about on the web. However, every so often I come across a news story or a clip that blows my naive mind waaaay open.

There's a YouTube video doing the rounds today entitled "Heath in H*ll". There's absoLUTEly no way I'm going to link to that disturbing video here, but if you feel inclined, you can do a little legwork on YouTube to find it.

The basic gist of it was that a particular church in the United States is so incensed at the thought of Ledger 'promoting' the gay lifestyle (by being associated with Brokeback Mountain) that they are saying they will picket his funeral if it is held anywhere other than England or Australia - and let's just say Fred Phelps (I presume he is the pastor at this particular church) has less-than-complementary words to describe both of those countries - my country! Whether you agree or disagree with Ledger's artistic choices - and they are artistic, not personal - I think you'd agree that Phelps has taken a flying-leap off the edge of reason with this kind of unwarranted venom.

There are many, many things I find disturbing about this clip. Too many to list. But I will say one thing.

Religion doesn't factor as prominently in our national identity as, say, the United States. We have a vibrant Christian community if you look in the right places, but we don't wear our religious affiliation on our sleeves and there is no such thing as the Australian Bible Belt. I would hazard a guess and say that non-believers down here probably already think Christians are a little cuckoo. People who believe things 'without evidence'.

Folks who begin to have questions about Christianity are left with two options. One, they can source the Australian pastors and their multimedia on the web (and there are some great ones, but nothing like the level in the States) or ask their local pastors, or they're left with what they see portrayed by American evangelists.

A genuinely-interested person wanting to know more about God, is instead getting Fred Phelps. Hardly the best advertisement for the Christian faith, is it?

We're more laid back in general in Australia. We take things as we see them. So when we're continuously seeing Christianity portrayed by the very non-Christian-behaving 'hate-monger pastors', it makes us want to run far, far away. Friends and family who are not on the same faith journey already have this jaded picture of Christianity in their minds, making it all the harder for new believers to wade through all the muck that is new-found faith. If we say we are now Christian, and the only image of Christianity our relatives have in their minds is of the enigmatic and very hard-spoken 'mega church' evangelists, then they're going to think we are completely and utterly crazy. Like call-the-white-coat-people insane.

So yes, this clip upsets me. Because I know that it is not all like that. I regularly access some great Australian resources in this area and just to prove that I'm not anti-US on this matter (LOL), there's a great little podcast called Wrestling With The Basics that I listen to which suits me just fine - these guys don't take themselves too seriously :) And that's not even counting the hundreds of wonderful blogs out there, the majority of which are American :)

It would be nice to silence the Phelps' of this world though. They're doing more damage than good.

Note: Before you go in search of Phelps' poisonous clip, let me just say, it's pretty full-on in its language, and probably not safe for young readers/viewers. And there's been such a backlash on YouTube over this that there are several 'rebuttals', some of whom are very open in what they themselves believe. I personally claim NEITHER side of the fence, but it should be pointed out that I have not watched any of these rebuttals and so I can't testify as to their contents - they could be pretty vile in language and could be out of alignment in what you personally believe. But let's play fair folks :)

Cheers,
Lizzie

And The 20,000th Visitor Is...

If you visited Lizzie's Home today and you happen to live in Merina Del Rey, USA (near Santa Monica), you're my 20,000th visitor!

Please email me at the address listed in the top left sidebar - there's a small bonus giveaway prize to be claimed! You'll need to provide me with your IP address so that I can match it with my stat counter records. If you don't know what your IP address is, check here. Once I receive confirmation I'll ask for your postage details via email and your prize will be shipped when I mail off the Bloggy Giveaways' winners items on Monday 4th February.

As it is also highly likely you have entered the giveaway(s), please let me know so I can come on by your site/giveaway to say hi!

20,000 visitors...woah :)

Cheers,
Lizzie

(Graphics © Cute Colors)

Bloggy Giveaway ~ Update

Okay, that's it. I'm sold. Sign me up for the next Bloggy Giveaways carnival NOW.

No, I didn't get a lot of sleep last night. But the awesome thing is, I have nigh on six HUNDRED blogs to peruse. Thank goodness the kids started back at school today, because I'm not getting much else done! I'm finding a fairly good percentage of the giveaways are even open to those outside of the US - sincere thanks, by the way!

As of about five minutes ago, I was *this* close to getting my 20,000th visitor. Later on tonight I'll swing by my stat counter and work out who this is. If you've visited today (Monday/Tuesday, depending on where in the world you are) as part of the Bloggy Giveaways carnival, keep an eye out for your name - there might just be a little bonus giveaway for the lucky 20,000th :)

Good grief though - what a lot of comments! By FAR the most popular giveaway has been the scrapbooking supplies (*mental note for next time*). If you've entered for the homeschooling book, your odds are great, LOL - at last count there were only eight of you. Scrapbookers, your chances are a little slimmer :P This is so much fun!

I think one of the coolest aspects of a carnival is that you get to discover brand new blogs - I'm only up to no. 16 on Shannon's list and I've already set aside four or five new blogs to have a look at. Fantastic!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Lizzie's Link Love ~ January 29

Good morning internet lovelies!

Okay, I am fibbing just a smidgeon. As I'm writing this, it is Monday evening my time and I'm waiting (im)patiently for Shannon to post the Mr Linky for the Bloggy Carnival. Darn international time zones! You guys might be waking up fresh and reaching for the coffee as you log on to post your links, but I'm in a mad dash to ready the Lizzie's Home household for the beginning of the new school year tomorrow. And by the time many of you read this, I'll be packing the newly haircutted kids off to school. And collapsing in a heap because it's very, very likely that I won't be going to sleep until very late tonight. Purely my own fault of course. And maybe Shannon's, just a teeny bit - I worked out the Mr Linky will be up around 12:30 am my time. I could wait until tomorrow morning to link up but the probability of me still being up and completing #412 on a long list of school readiness-related tasks is high regardless :P I kind of want to be quick off the mark because ten minutes after Shannon goes live with the post there'll be about 632 links already and there's only so many giveaway posts readers will want to read through.

And is it weird that this bothers me?

Yes. Yes it is.

Okay, so since I'm sitting down and taking my last sip of hot tea before having to get up and bake (because I couldn't be organised enough to do that this afternoon, no sirree...), I thought I'd get a head start (for a change) on Lizzie's Link Love. Not many this week. Everyone will be too busy signing up for giveaways anyway. Probably a bumper edition next week to make up for it. You know, when Bloggityville has calmed down again.

Amanda of Free To Live, my new bloggy BFF (and very accomodating and willing guinea pig) wrote a great post on perfection this week, or more specifically, why the pursuit of it is irrational. I interviewed Amanda last week as part of My Last Ever Assignment (a portfolio of autism pieces) and then wrote a little piece about her story. Zane's Story is currently in the hands of my lecturers and I'm currently awaiting the results. In the end I was literally still writing two minutes before walking out the door to post it, that's how close I came to my deadline. Amanda has given me permission to post it in some form here on Lizzie's Home but as I didn't have the chance to swing it by Amanda before submitting it, that will come first (once I have my results - don't want to jinx it!). I have a new level of respect for my fellow 'autism sister' after peeking into her life :)

I have no doubt most of you read Scribbit, so you've probably already come across her post today about the Quiet Family, but I have to link to this for the stragglers. I love this idea! I only wish I'd thought of it when my kids were young enough to need it!

When trying to add four and subtract twelve to the power of 5 to figure out when (in my time) Shannon was going live with the Bloggy Giveaways Mr Linky, I came across this nifty site for calculating the time differences between two points on the globe. I'll use this all the time - when most of your readers and fellow bloggers are American/Canadian, it kind of becomes necessary, LOL.

And the final link should appeal to the geek within - it certainly placated mine :) I found a nifty application called Crawler Notes. Crawler has a few different products, but this one appealed to me because I'm always on the computer and always jotting down various reminders on slips of paper which get lost. If you click on 'take a tour' in the above link, it will give you a basic demo. I haven't yet worked out the Crawler Organizer thing yet (where it opens up in a browser window as opposed to something you steer from your desktop) as I'm happy just to potter around putting sticky notes up on my desktop - but others might find it useful. When I downloaded it I was not required to sign up for their email account but you could run into a prompt for that so here's another source: Download.com. I usually more inclined to download apps from sites such as this one anyway - you can't be too careful. Crawler Notes is freeware, with no ads. Here's an example of how I have mine set up at the moment:


Now you can set it to load up when you computer boots, but for some reason mine needs to be manually opened from the Start menu. You can 'hide' all the notes when you don't need to look at them and then 'show all notes' when you do. If you want to write yourself a new note, you click on that little yellow pad you see down in the bottom right hand corner and then 'new note'. New notes open up yellow but you can set the new notes to open up with different default settings (make the new ones pink, or blue, or with a different font, or....) I left mine yellow and then there's a little spanner image at the top of each one where you can manually change the colours of individual notes.

So that's what I did. Cause I'm crazy (geeky) like that. Blue is 'don't forget', yellow is 'daily to do lists', green is 'additional household tasks', purple is 'blog related stuff' and red was 'school related'. The sight of so many neat little cyber sticky notes is enough to warm the cockles of my heart. Or you know, remind me of all the things I haven't yet done. Either way.

And so with that happy thought, I'm off to go and complete some of my red notes.

Because I suspect having the Piglets turn up to school without their lunches on the first day might be pushing it a bit.

That's a 'second week' mistake.

(I'm setting this to auto-post on Tuesday morning my time (Monday evening US time). By the time this post actually pops up, I'll be neck-deep in sleepy, almost-school-ready children. Oh, the things I'll be able to get done now that school has returned!)

Cheers,
Lizzie

Free Stuff! Free Stuff! Free Stuff!

It's giveaway time! It's giveaway time! Woohoo!

Alright, down to the good stuff. After much, much deliberation, I've decided to hold THREE separate giveaways - one for my international readers, one for my Aussie readers, and one that covers everyone. The reasons for this will become pretty apparent as you read through this post.

First up, the International Only giveaway:

I'll be completely honest - this is a second-hand copy of The Unofficial Guide to Homeschooling, published in 2000 by Kathy Ishizuka. It was discovered on my local library's 'for sale' shelf for just 20 cents - but consequently it has a barcode on the back and a couple of very unobtrusive stamps on the inside back cover. I picked it up knowing I would eventually host a giveaway for it on Lizzie's Home. Now, while a lot of the information could be applicable to both Aussie and international readers, I think it's best suited to US-readers as it contains specifics about homeschooling practices and legislation that may not occur anywhere else. Some of the chapters include Making The Decision, Homeschooling Children With Special Needs, The Financial Picture, State and Local Homeschooling Requirements, Homeschooling Methods, Homeschooling Teens, and tons of other good stuff. It's approximately 450 pages, in pretty good nick (I have flicked through it and there doesn't appear to be any missing pages however one page has been taped together - not by me though!), and it's quite a hefty chunk of a book so the postage will sting a little but I did want to make sure it went to the most appropriate person and in this case it would be a US reader (or other international reader, if they want to have a go at the giveaway). It's probably quite well suited to those just starting out or considering homeschooling and you can enter on behalf of someone you know and pass it on :) You can read some more about the book (and peek inside it), here.

I had worried that because it was 8 years old now it could be out of date, but it's still going for almost $US16 on Amazon so the way I figure it, you're getting a book completely free, so that kind of negates the second hand thing :)

Next up, the Australian Only giveaway:

This is a large, full-colour cookbook compiled of recipes which first featured in Super Food Ideas magazine. It was published in 2000 so it's a little old but recipes live forever, so that's not a concern, is it? LOL. The reason I'm restricting this one to Aussie-only is party because of postage and partly because all the brands will be familiar and the measurements are metric. There's some really good stuff in here. It's approx 125 pages, and used (I have since copied all my favourites) but in really good shape - no missing or taped-together pages.

And lastly, the Open-To-All giveaway:


This is a selection of scrapbooking supplies, all un-opened. There are fourteen small packets of PaperScissorsRock brand 'puffy' stickers (some small borders, small 'button' style stickers), two Crystal brand sticker packs - one with some back to school style sayings and one 'boyish' alphabet letters - both of which are also 'puffy'. There's also a bonus small sheet of metallic (flat) stickers. All are labelled acid-free and the Crystal stickers are also labelled lignin-free. I was going to be discreet and remove the price stickers on the backs, LOL, but that's too much work - I paid around 50 cents to a dollar per pack so the value of this giveaway is about $10.

To win ANY of the giveaways:

1. Just leave a comment, but please indicate which of the three giveaways you are entering.

2. If you are entering both the 'Open To All' and either the 'Aussie Only' or 'International Only' giveaways, please leave separate comments for each giveaway. It just makes it easier for me to pick the winner later :) There should be a maximum of two entries per person (ONE per giveaway) using this approach.

3. Please include a valid email address as part of your comment. I'm not sure how my comments settings will show up and whether the absence of a Blogger blog will mean your email/profile won't be visible. Some people also choose to have their Blogger profile set to private so I may not be able to chase up the emails that way. Just type your email at the bottom of your comment :)

The competitions close midday Saturday (Adelaide time...that's Friday 7:30pm CST (United States) I think) and I will notify each of the three winners by email. I'll also put up a post with the names of the winners and sign the Mr Linky on the Bloggy Giveaways site on that day so that everyone can see :) Please don't put your postal address in the comments section! I'll ask for it when I contact the winners.

Ooooh, I'm so excited!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Looking Mighty Fine for Two Hundred And Twenty

Australia turns 220 years old today! And what a better way to celebrate it than to hit publish on my 300th post :P

Although, strangely, the 26th January 1788 was not the date on which Australia was discovered by the outside world. The Dutch first clapped eyes on Aussie shores way back in 1603, but it was the British who claimed the eastern half of the country in 1770. I know, the math doesn't add up there, either. Australia Day is celebrated on the anniversary of the first European settlement of Australia, spearheaded by Capt James Cook. This landing in New South Wales was initially made up of really, really naughty Englishmen who happened to get themselves caught doing a whole manner of crimes back in the King's country and found themselves shackled to the next boat out to the colony. Criminals were shipped out to various places around the country until convict transportation ended in 1868 (a necessary side-post: Indigenous Australians have been calling our country home for more than forty THOUSAND years...we just tacked ourselves onto the end of it :P)

I might pause here to explain that my state, South Australia, was first settled in 1836 - the first free settlement (non-convict) in the country. Most South Australians proclaim this with a certain degree of pride. No riff-raff here, you see! LOL. We were also the first Australian state to grant suffrage for women.

And so, for my 300th post and in honour of Australia Day, I thought I'd take you on a little tour of my city and South Australia's capital, Adelaide.

For most of you, the first place you'll see when you arrive is the airport.


Go on, have a coffee. It's a long way from...well, from most places in the world. We'll wait. Slurp.

After you've checked into your hotel, you'll want to go visit the strange brass pigs in the CBD.


And marvel at our giant-sized Chinese medicine balls:


And visit a pirate-ship (it's a restaurant - you'll be hungry):


And then, if you're still hungry, much down on this:

If you happen to call in at Christmastime, you'll want to go here to see this guy:


Or here, to see these:


And then, when you're good and tired, you can spend your last night catching a sunset here:

And then of course, before you leave, you have to come over to my place for some of this, LOL:



Happy Australia Day Bloggityville!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Healthy Recipe Call-Out

Okay, wise and loving citizens of Bloggityville...I need your help.

I'm in the process of compiling a 'cheat sheet' of healthy meals for those weeks when all I have the time to do is plug meals into my menu template without my usual will-this-side-dish-work-with-that-main-and-what-is-the-calorie-content-of-this-anyway contemplations.

And I'm drawing a blank. Sort of.

I do have some meals on my list, most of which are adaptations of regular family meals (you know, bolognaise sauce with a pathetic mouthful of pasta as opposed to the mountain I sincerely long for), but I need new stuff.

So I'm asking you dear folk to bring forth your favourite healthy recipes in order that I might update my regular menu rotation and (hopefully) erase part of the results of the genetic influence I like to call Big Hips Syndrome. Recipe website recommendations very much appreciated also, especially those that are specifically geared toward healthy meals and have lots of entries on them. Because I like options my friends.

My hips and I thank you.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Tackle It Tuesday ~ January 22

I think I've participated in one, maybe two of these in the last year? Clearly, procrastination is one of my vices!

Today's tackle is really very simple. We have a fourth bedroom currently being used as a storage room. We have been telling our poor 7yo son for at least a year that he'll be going into that fourth bedroom 'soon' - at the moment he shares with his 6yo sister, an arrangement that is fast wearing thin for both of them, LOL. The room they share is girly to the point of purple sparkly paint. And I won't lie - I'm desperate for the day when we can separate those bunk beds and I don't have to kill myself changing the sheets on the top bunk!

But that spare room is amazingly cluttered. I'm talking wall to wall STUFF. It needs a thorough cleaning and cobweb eradication. And we have to offload a perfectly-fine-but-rarely-used home gym which takes up half the floor space. It's a case of never having enough time to tackle a job which we know won't be finished in just a few hours so we keep putting it off...and putting it off...and here we are 12mo later and the room still looks like a bomb site.

Today, I'm simply going to remove all the bagged up goods I've been stowing in there for our next charity run. There are at least ten trash-can sized bags of clothes, household goods and various knick knacks just sitting in there taking up space. Even if I have to stack them in an embarrassingly prominent location in the house (like, right in front of the television, LOL) in order to remind ourselves to take them to the thrift store, then so be it. Something's got to be done!

This will very much be a 'stages' tackle. This week, the donated goods. Next week, probably stored papers and wedding memorabilia. Engraved shot glasses anyone? LOL.

P.S. Forgive the lack of before and after shots - honestly, after spending thirty minutes in there hauling white plastic trash bags out, there's not a whole lot of difference. I'll post the before and after shots when I'm done! LOL.

For more Tackle It Tuesday participants, call in at 5 Minutes For Mom.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Lizzie's Link Love ~ January 22

Gosh, I'm on a roll. I'm absolutely certain I won't be able to sustain this level of posting (two or three posts per day) once school starts again next week. Until then, store up your Lizzie-o-Rama because I can't guarantee I'll be this forthcoming in February!

It's been a few weeks since I've done a Link Love post too, so here it is. Enjoy.

Want to know how to do cool things like ©, ®, Â, µ, ƒ, £, æ, †, É, c, ♀, ♣, ♪ and ╥? (Oh, that was so much fun, LOL) Then check out these links to ALT Code 'cheat sheets'. There's this one and this one. Use the number pad on the right hand side of your keyboard.

Wanna drool your way through a home tour? Check out HGTV's Dream Home 2008. Last year's, the Colorado ski lodge - oh my word, how I longed to pack up my family and you know, get a green card, then move over there and somehow become a US citizen just so I could enter that competition, LOL. I must have taken the online tour three times! I don't get HGTV where I am (though our pay TV (cable) stations might - we don't have pay TV at home though) so I only get to drool onto my keyboard and not onto the floor in front of the TV :) Must admit, I like last year's home better. Apart from that fact that I don't, you know, ski, every single other thing about that home was exactly as I'd have it if I had a bajillion bucks and was building my own. Every single thing! Swoon.

SAHMmy Says put out a list of 100 Tips To Clean And Organize Your Home earlier this month. My kids particularly need to take to heart numbers 8, 16 and 67, while I need to concentrate on number 29 (ahem!) and number 41. Good stuff.

Aussie Bloggers Forum and Aussie Bloggers Blog. Go check them out, even if you aren't Aussie - I've already asked about eleventy-four really dumb questions and they've all be answered. And so darn quickly, too! What do you blogging admin people do for fun? LOL.

I'm also going to re-recommend dropping into Frugal Abundance site, the Frugal Abundance Blog and the new version of Hillbilly Housewife. Love these sites.

That's it for this week - have some clickety fun!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Menu Plan Monday ~ January 21

It's about time I joined back in!

I was pleased with myself last week - I moved to a cash only system for groceries and even with an additional couple of trips to the grocery store, I still managed to come in under budget. And there were lots of convenience and snack foods included in that, so I'm certain I can do better this week.

As part of this week's menu, I'd like to highlight a couple of sites. They're old favourites and most of you will probably know them already, but I've found them invaluable for 'basics' cooking.

Hillbilly Housewife has a new caretaker. Susanne has taken over from Maggie, and while the home page looks a little different, I'm thrilled to find my beloved Fudge Brownies recipe is still there in all its glory, LOL.

Meanwhile, Maggie has moved on to new digs. Frugal Abundance is a reworking of her healthy and cheap eating ethos and there's loads of good stuff there, including a link to her new Frugal Abundance Blog.

We all know Tammy's Recipes by now, right? A continual inspiration. One of these days I'm going to attempt these. They look scary.

I've linked to Steph's Country Kitchen Goodness before, but it's worth another look-see.

And finally, for the Aussies/Other Metric Folk (and the Internationals, if they want to use this nifty site for cooking conversions), Taste.com.au is an awesome resource, especially if you remember seeing a recipe in a cooking magazine but have since thrown it out. I'm not sure if every single recipe from the magazines listed make it onto the website, but I think the vast majority do. You can search by collection (budget, barbecue, diabetes-friendly, low-fat, low-carb, low-kilojoule, highest-rated, kid-friendly - the list goes on) and heaps of other good info, like articles, a glossary, and forums. I love this site :)

On to the menu!

Monday ~ Spaghetti Bolognaise (garlic bread, salad)
Tuesday ~ Marinated Chicken Steaks (potato bake, salad)
Wednesday ~ Soup & Sandwiches (Tomato & Vegetable, toasted Ham & Cheese)
Thursday ~ Corned Beef (potatoes, carrots, broccoli, white sauce)
Friday ~ Fridge & Freezer Fare (leftovers)
Saturday ~ Gyros (made with beef strips instead of lamb) with Tzatziki (those scary homemade pitas again!)
Sunday ~ Homemade Pizza (homemade dippers with sauce, salad)

Weekend Baking (to stock the freezer for the brand new school year on Tuesday 29th!)

Cheesymite Scrolls (kind of like these types of recipes, but with cheese and Vegemite), Fudge Brownies (because they really are that awesome), and an incarnation of breadsticks that involve twisting the dough and adding herbs (kind of like these, but nicer, LOL).

Happy cooking everyone!

For more Menu Plan Monday participants, knock on I'm An Organizing Junkie 's door :)

Cheers,
Lizzie

I'm Nothing If Not Diplomatic

At this rate I'd better slow down or I'm going to shoot right past the '300th post on the 28th' thing, LOL. But I just wanted to pop in and say that I've decided that my giveaway on that date will be open to ALL participants, international or Australian, but that those outside of the US (Canadians included) will be able to enter twice to even things up a bit. And honestly, the only reason for this will be because so many of the giveaways that will be going on that week will be US-shipping only, which leaves the rest of us with only a fraction we can enter.

There, did that sufficiently straddle the diplomatic fence? I should be in politics (*guffaw*)

Cheers,
Lizzie

I'd Do It All For Free

Today, I'm reminded of why I crave the buzz of a well-written article :)

I have the distinct privilege this week of interviewing Amanda of Free To Live. Amanda hasn't been blogging for all that long - she just started in December - but the way she expresses herself is simply amazing. She's so raw and honest about her experiences with autism, something I can only hope to emulate. I highly recommend, whether you have had autism touch your lives or not, to drop in and say hi. This is a woman of great faith.

And so I was thrilled when she agreed to be interviewed as part of my Very Final Assignment Ever (yes, that is what I'm calling it, LOL), a portfolio of autism articles and blog posts I've written over the years. Unfortunately for Bloggityville, the article I'm writing based on my interview with her will probably never be blog-fodder (smile) but I wanted to publicly thank Amanda for having the guts to be so courageous over at her blog.

As well as emailing Amanda with a list of questions tonight, I've also collected (from various places about the internet and in the bowels of the computer) the pieces I need for my portfolio. I realised I never did re-link to The Journey (the piece I wrote about Master J's diagnosis) when I switched to the new page design. So for those who are interested, that's up again in the left sidebar. I'm about due to do another update, probably around April or so. It's appropriate to update then, as April is the month J was originally diagnosed in 2002 (coming up to 6 years now...) and the month I wrote the piece in the first place, in 2004. It's like one of those Christmas letters where you update everyone on the key events of the year, LOL - although in our case, the steps forward J has walked (or leaped!)

This last year he began learning Spanish at school - this same child who was not talking fluently until he started school at age five, is participating in the Spanish lessons with his buddy class! Okay, so most of what he's got down pat so far - all of five words, all said and done - probably came from Dora, LOL, but he's the only kid from his special ed class who takes Spanish and I'm so darn proud of him! This is also the kid who needed basic PECS (Picture Exchange Communication System) to help him understand the routines of kindergarten, and here he is, taking a SECOND language!

*POP!*

That was my heart exploding :)

You know, life is pretty good in general. The things we worry about? They really don't need our attention. What we should be focussing on are the blessings in our everyday lives. Those itty-bitty, almost imperceptible flutterings of good fortune and joy. Finding the exact money you need for an emergency milk-and-bread run stuffed down the back of the sofa the day before payday. Freshly washed hair of children - your own, obviously! - to snuggle into when tucking them in at night. A good book. A great DVD. People to hold and love, and if you can't be near those related to you, then hold and love on someone else in the community who is in the same boat as you.

When I get bogged down, discouraged upon thinking of J's future, or just general 'blech-ness' over my inability to find peace with situaton or person A, B or C, I just have to remember that there was a time when a simple 'duce' (juice), after four years of non-verbal parenting, made my heart sing.

And that this same imp of a child regularly 'sings' Madagascar's "I Like To Move It" with the Spanish voiceover, just for fun.

And gets most of the words right.

Adios,
Lizzie

Hands Up If You're a Tightwad Gazette Fan!

I love the internet. And I love blogs who put links to other blogs into their actual posts instead of just in their sidebars, because then they show up on Google Reader for time-pressed folks like me :)

Frugal Hacks posted about new members to the Frugal Blogroll this week, one of whom is The Green 3. Green3 is hosting a giveaway on her site for a copy of The Tightwad Gazette. Leave a comment at the above link to go into the draw, but quick-sticks, because she's announcing the winner Monday evening (meaning Tuesday morning, Aussie time). And if you post a link on your own blog about the giveaway, you go into the draw twice.

Yeah, I need the book, LOL.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Smart Habits Saturday ~ January 19

So I'm a tad behind with my Smart Habits of late - to the tune of 4 ½ months! (*sheepish grin*) Fact of the matter is, none of my habits have been particularly smart during that time.

My Smart Habit this week reverts back to the perenial favourite, weight loss. Christmas was not a kind holiday to me - heck, who am I kidding? The whole year was pretty terrible, weight-wise. But I'm so sick and tired of making plans to eat better, getting motivated to exercise and everything else that could possibly pertain to the healthy lifestyle merry-go-round that all I'm going to commit to doing this week are the following:

* Find three new healthy recipes
* Get my head on straight (sucking motivation out of every available source, LOL!) for a brand new start on January 28th.
* Re-read (over and over and over, if need be) the book containing the plan I'll be following (and before anyone asks, yes, the plan is very realistic, plenty of protein, vegies, moderate carbs, 2pcs fruit and 3 serves dairy every day - including one small 'indulgence food'). I'll be paying particular attention to the exercise section.
* Get some tickers up in the sidebar for weight loss and exercise tracking (done!) to keep me accountable.

Why start on the 28th? Well, the new school year begins that week, so there'll be lots more time available for walks and non-embarrassing exercise DVD participation at home, LOL. And it gives me the next 9 or so days to psych myself up, find recipes and just generally PLAN a whole lot better than I've been doing in the past. And The Biggest Loser (Aussie version) begins on Feb 2 so watching that daily will certainly help with the motivation. Wish me luck!

For more Smart Habits Saturday participants, pop into The Lazy Organizer :)

Cheers,
Lizzie

Free Stuff! And Other Stuff!

On Monday 28th, I'll be participating in my first giveaway carnival! Yay!

This is post number 291, so by my calculations, if I post once a day until then, the 28th's post will also be my 300th :) So I'm dreaming up something to give away. I have a few good ideas (*wink*) but I'll keep them to myself until the 28th :)

I'm also unsure about opening it up for international entries. In case nobody has picked up on it yet, Australia is a looooong way from most other places (LOL) and shipping for all but the lightest of packages can be a little painful. Which may or may not be an issue if I manage to secure the giveaway I'm hoping to secure! But I've noticed that most of the giveaways Shannon hosts, and I suspect a lot of the other folk who will particpate in the carnival will be the same, are US-only shipping. Which leaves us Aussies (and many other OS readers) out in the dark, unless, of course, lots of other Aussies decide to participate in the carnival also. Even if I open it to all readers, then Aussies will have to 'compete' with the lovely US ladies, when to be honest, there are far more giveaways already open to them. Did that make sense? LOL.

Anyhoo, so I'm tossing up between international entry or Aussie-only. Hopefully I'll get my hands on the goods I want and then shipping won't be much of an issue either way (and I really would love to open up the competition to every one of my readers). If you're Aussie and reading this, would you consider hosting your own giveaway? You know, to make up for some of the (literally) hundreds of US bloggers who'll stick with US-only shipping?

On to other matters...

Hubs is back at work today after four weeks annual leave and before that, four weeks of a training course. So right this second I suspect he is plowing through hundreds of internal emails. Poor guy.

Master J has a friend over this afternoon. It's a long story but I almost feel as though I'm being used as a babysitter while the mum gets some errands done. I'm trying not to think too much into it because the other lad is from his classroom and also autistic, and I understand what that particular life nugget is like, but still.

I need to get some laundry done.

My absolute-no-more-extensions study deadline is on Tuesday. The very last ever. Then I'm no longer (officially) a student. Until, you know, the urge hits again sometime in March.

We still haven't cleaned out the spare room/Boofah's new room. Now that Hubs is back at work it looks like that job will fall to me, sigh.

We're only ten sleeps away from the new school year. Woohoo! Master J goes into Grade 4 (gosh, I remember his first (loud) day of 'big school' like it was yesterday, sigh) and Boofah is in Grade 3. Miss Moo brings up the rear as my Grade 1 Girl. *Sniff*

And that's pretty much it. Although, I do have a strong and unrelenting urge to watch Sense & Sensibility for the 1362nd time. Be still my beating heart, Mr Ferrars...

Cheers,
Lizzie

Lizzie's Home Printables ~ Update

Those that have been anxiously awaiting the update of my Printables section for the last - oh - eleventy-two years (and I'm sure there are literally hundreds...right? Hello?) will notice a few things are missing today.

The ones that are currently up are all PDFs, so you can freely (and much more easily) view and print them. The old Excel files are on my To-Do List to convert over this weekend. Or you know, at least this month anyway. The converting itself is as easy as choosing an alternative 'printer' from the menu, but then there's the uploading to the file host, and re-linking them back to here and let's face it, somewhere in amongst that process someone usually gets hungry, breaks something, or comes to me bleeding. So no promises, LOL. But I'm getting there!

Also, don't you just love the groovy button? That's a Hubs' original photo :) - there are some benefits to never having to pay for stock photos, LOL. He's gearing up for his photography exhibition as I type. We just ordered our raw materials for our cards and I hope to have them available for sale online sometime around Easter. Or a little before that if I can get my katookuss going. All bets could be off once school returns on the 29th of this month! I think initially we'll sell them in themed sets of five or six (all flowers, animals, seascapes, mixed sets and so on).

Ahh, the washing machine beckons...

Cheers,
Lizzie

Confused Aussie: US Elections?

Okay, I'm confused.

As an Australian, I'm watching the updates on the presidential primaries from the US, completely and utterly bewildered.

The only connection I can put to the term 'caucus' is this:

“What is a Caucus-race?” said Alice; not that she much wanted to know,
but the Dodo had paused as if it thought that somebody ought to speak, and no
one else seemed inclined to say anything.

“Why,” said the Dodo, “the best way to explain it is to do it.” (And,
as you might like to try the thing yourself, some winter day, I will tell you
how the Dodo managed it.)

First it marked out a race-course, in a sort of circle ("the exact
shape doesn’t matter,” it said), and then all the party were placed along the
course, here and there.

There was no “One, two, three, and away!” but they began running when
they liked, and left off when they liked, so that it was not easy to know when
the race was over. However, when they had been running half an hour or so, and
were quite dry again, the Dodo suddenly called out "The race is over!” and they
all crowded round it, panting, and asking, “But who has won?”

(Source: Authorama Public Domain Books: Alice in Wonderland)

*Giggle!*.

In Australia, it seems so much more simple. The major political parties pick someone as their leader, and over-18s vote (it's compulsory) for the party (and therefore Prime Minister, by default) they want to run the country. It takes one day. We just elected a new PM last November. The last guy was in for almost 12 years (he won three elections). Election dates are traditionally only called 6 weeks before the day. Six week campaigns. Although, granted, it's always obvious which years are election years and we all know voting comes in November, so the party leaders campaign unofficially months beforehand, but the official stuff only gets going within 6 weeks of Election Day. The posters aren't even allowed up on the power poles before that.

Which is why primaries and caucuses and multiple candidates per party and all that jazz make my head spin. I don't know if it's because Australia seems to be a bit more laid back with politics, and I'm certain that our only-21-ish million population makes for a simpler system than the US, but I have no idea what any of the US stuff means! It's rare to find an Australian willing to proudly proclaim their affiliation with either of the two major political parties! We might have opinions on who is going to do a better job and there is the usual mud-slinging, but nothing like the Americans. I take it the American folk are a lot more passionate about politics in general though?

Can anyone give this bemused Aussie an idea of what the primaries actually mean? I'm genuinely curious. How do you guys elect a President? In layman's terms please!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Master J Totally Wants Wayne Brady's Job

My son thinks this man is a hero.

Don't Forget The Lyrics premiered on Australan TV a couple of months ago and it became a favourite with Master J even before the first song opened. He clearly has a deep and abiding love for game shows, with Who Wants To Be a Millionaire, 1 vs 100, and Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? on the top of his must-watch list whenever they're on TV.

So much is his love for the show that we just held our first ever family Lyrics competition this morning. Hubs and I took turns finding songs on our computers the kids were familiar with and pausing them in the appropriate spots. The verdict?

J is now the proud owner of a virtual $50,000. And the biggest grin this side of the equator, LOL.

Cheers,
Lizzie

(photo courtesy of Google Image Search)

*Sob!* iPod Woes (Help!)

My right arm, my permanently-attached-to-sides-of-head iPod Nano has died.

The click wheel just stopped working. The screen is frozen on the second menu (the one that has Playlists, Artists, Albums etc). I am hyperventilating. This happened once before and I managed to solve it by plugging into iTunes and resetting it. This time, despite being plugged in, iTunes isn't even loading (it usually does this automatically). So I can't even reset it that way. Whatever the Hold button (at the top) is meant to do, that isn't working either (at this stage I'm pressing everything and praying).

Does anyone have any advice? There's ZIP response. I have 600 odd songs (and many podcasts I'm yet to listen to) on that thing and it is the only thing that makes housework bearable...

Help. Me. Please.

Edited to add: (*Blush*) I followed the first link listed on a Google search entitled 'panic, iPod, frozen, help!' (okay, not really, it was just 'iPod frozen' but I was calling out 'HELP!' and I was panicking, so it was almost the same thing...) and a few tense moments later, Mini Me was revived. I didn't even need to re-sync. Phew. And yes, I am that attached to my iPod...LOL

Cheers,
Lizzie

Convenience vs Saving Money?

I've been thinking about groceries today.

Specifically, the 'necessities' vs the 'extras'. What do you consider an extra? Any food which is already baked/assembled/portioned out? When I really started thinking about it, I realised a seriously large part of my grocery budget revolves around certain convenience items. Not always ready-made meals either, although they've dug themselves out a little niche in my cart over time too. I'm talking about things like pastry, muesli bars (granola bars), crackers, icy-poles (popsicles), anything pre-crumbed, spaghetti sauce, microwave popcorn, pretzels, pre-cooked deli chickens, even - gasp! - bread. The list goes on and on...

Now, sometimes it makes perfect sense to steer clear of the convenience foods. You can instantly see that jug of pancake shaker mix is going to be more expensive than mixing up your own batter from scratch. But other things are a lot more 'grey'. For example, I buy pasta sauce (500g/17 ½ oz) on sale for $2 a jar, about what I need to make a spaghetti bolognaise dinner for 4 adults or 2 adults, 3 kids. I could buy tomatoes and puree them, but tomato prices are significant enough at the moment that this might actually be more expensive. I could buy canned tomato puree and add my own spices and onion, but the price works out almost the same. And we like our brand of pasta sauce. So I'll continue to buy it, but I'll buy it smartly, often buying 8 or 10 jars at a time at the sale price (it usually retails close to $3 a jar, so I'm saving $8-$10 each time I buy multiple jars - and pasta sauce is something we always use). And as for bread, I can make my own slightly cheaper than the store-baked stuff, but I can never achieve the same number of slices. So I have to make twice the bread at home, for twice the work, for a price that is on par with the store - so it begins to make far less sense.

So my question to you all is two-fold.

* Which convenience items do you buy regularly, and why? Are these items cheap in your area? In Australia, coupons are non-existent, but we have weekly grocery sales, making certain items at least reasonable in cost.

* Which convenience items would you NOT spend good money for? What alternatives do you use?

Pipe up lurkers!

Cheers,
Lizzie

Baggies ~ Not Just For Freezing Stuff

Starting today, I'm reverting back to my old system of Baggie Budgeting. I know, everyone and his dog does their household budget this way, but when we moved into this house a couple of years ago, we switched to a predominantly credit-based system, so there was very little 'real' cash put aside for regular expenses. In a nutshell, by keeping as much money as we can, for the longest time possible, in our transaction account - which is linked to our homeloan - we pay less interest on our home loan. So most major expenses (groceries, bills and so on) are put onto our credit card and then we pay that off in full at the end of the month. It does make for some interesting looks at the supermarket sometimes though. The best looks are the ones when I pay for just $10 or $15 worth of groceries by whipping out the Visa, LOL (we could use our debit card - same card actually, but with both accounts linked to it - but that takes money out of our account immediately, which negates the whole 'leaving money in account as long as possible' thing). But there really does still tend to be a bit of a stigma associated with putting groceries on credit. I wish I could explain to the people behind me in line our whole ethos on budgeting, but alas, I can't :P

One of the biggest problems with a virtual budget like this is that it is very, very easy to overspend. It's not a debt-creating problem, even though we do put most purchases on the credit card, because no matter what the balance, we pay it off in full each month. But over the last few months we've seen our average monthly credit card bill rise (and seeing a whole month's worth of expenses on your card is scary enough!) and, once paid off, our regular transaction account drop. Everything's going in the wrong direction!

So, we're back to Baggie Budgeting.

Some might argue that the same system could be set up in a virtual way - still putting bills on the card but then deducting the amounts from a spreadsheet in order to stick to budget. In my experience this can work, but it takes a lot more discipline than a hands-on approach. With physical money to sort and 'pay' to each baggie, there's a concrete example right in front of your face. In order to purchase this house (we moved in 2 ½ years ago) we went through an intensive saving period, and managed to put away $14k in around 14 months, on an income probably only two-thirds of what it is now. The reason we succeeded then is, in part, due to Baggie Budgeting. And, you know, the promise of our very own home, LOL.

I wrote an article on Baggie Budgeting which appeared on The Dollar Stretcher website during the midst of this 14 month savings period. I've been meaning to edit it to put up here for a while now, so keep an eye out for that. But the basic premise is no-brainer simple. Label some baggies. Put money in baggies. Take out only the money in the baggies. And begin again next pay day. And though most parts of my budget will remain credit-based by necessity (it really does make a big difference to how much interest we pay on our home loan), I thought I'd go 'back to basics' for my housekeeping money.

More to come soon...

Cheers,
Lizzie

Saturdays Are Designed For Chores, Right?

I feel really old tonight. Ever have one of those days when you just feel the weight of the world on your shoulders? I haven't slept well in the past couple of nights and I can really feel it.

This is what's on my to-do list for tomorrow, in no particular order:

* Cycle my way through 3 or 4 loads of laundry. Always a joy.

* Make a start on clearing out the spare room, which we've been trying to find the time to do for months now - it will eventually be Boofah's room. I'd like to get it cleared right out by the time school goes back on January 29.

* Put the finishing touches on an interview I'm conducting with Amanda from Free To Live. Amanda is a fellow autism mama and I'm really interested in her journey, which I imagine goes against the politically-correct consensus of today. This is a 'real life only' endeavour though (no publication online). Amanda has very kindly agreed to be fodder to round out a portfolio of autism pieces I'm putting together for my Very Last Submitted Work Ever for my writing course. This coming week will therefore be reminiscent of the last crazy deadline schedule in late November, but after that, stick a fork in me, I'm done :P

* Do a pantry and freezer inventory. Menu plan for the following week accordingly.

* Work out a cash budget for groceries. I used to be super-good at working to a grocery budget, sigh. February might have to be another 'track finances' month too.

* Write a list of items needed for the new school year. We're in the midst of back-to-school sales at the moment and though we'll be getting off quite easy this year, I do need to purchase a few items for the kids' uniforms. Plus there are always the 1c notebook deals :) I usually stock up on those (for the kids to scribble in/write stories) and reams of cheap printer paper (good for, surprisingly enough, the printer, but also as a cheap source of kids' drawing paper - I can pick up 500 sheets for $4, but a 'drawing pad' from the dollar store costs $2 and may only have 50 sheets. No brainer). I also have to take the kids school-shoe shopping, probably early next week, which is always lots of fun (*insert sarcastic groan here*)

* I'm sure eating chocolate will factor in somewhere...

* Make a fabulously delicious meal for dinner. I have no idea WHAT exactly, but I'm sure the Cooking Fairy will sprinkle some magic dust on me while I sleep tonight.

* Take down the Christmas tree. New record this year!

* Take Miss Moo to a birthday party (this is actually going to happen first thing in the morning). This is her second party in two days. Another couple of weeks and the 'rush' will have finished until about August, phew. I'm very thankful I have half a drawer full of 'extra' toys I picked up during the Christmas sales for large percentages off.

Now I'm off to the land of Nod.. zzzzzzzzzzzz

Cheers,
Lizzie

(Picture Credit: Toronja Azul, Creative Commons Attribution Licence, via Flickr. Hat tip to Lynnae at From Under The Clutter for mentioning this post at Skelliewag.org)

I Have Feedburned

So I'm probably the last person on earth to sign up for Feedburner, but I've done it. You'll notice I removed the separate Google Reader and Bloglines subscribe buttons. Clicking the new button will take you to the feed sign up page where you can choose your own, plus there's an option for email subscriptions. I'm still playing with all of Feedburner's 'toys' tonight but I'll be back to good ol' Lizzie's Home content in the next day or two.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Full Or Partial Feeds? - That Is The Question

Okay, I was all set to switch to a partial feed. If you happened to drop into your feed reader of choice during the last two hours, you would have noticed that I was on partials. Then, in reference to my earlier post on feed readers and stat counters, Kin left a comment which had me turning on my heels.

Kin pointed me in the direction of this post back in November by Meg at Dipping Into The Blogpond. From that one post, I followed a Bloggy Brick Road and arrived at my current conclusion which I'll elaborate on in a minute. But first, I highly suggest you swing by Meg's site and follow the links she gives. Be especially sure to read through the comments. I had no idea people felt as strongly about this as they do. I mean, I knew you were one or the other - kind of like (in Aussie terms) being a Holden or a Ford fan, LOL. But there's a whole underground 'thing' going on regarding full vs partial feeds.

Okay, my observations. I liked Meg's post, but even though I agree with her in principle and read her post with a grin (gotta love the cranky attitude, I've been that way myself today...*grin*), I do want to share my opinions on a few points she raised. By the way Meg, if you happen to click through to Lizzie's Home, I've just discovered your blog and love it. Please don't blacklist me, LOL.

Meg asks this question of anyone who burns partial feeds: Why do you do it? The following points are some of the reasons she theorizes about.

1. So I'd click through on your advertising?

Advertising, for some bloggers, is BIG. If you're well known enough (and I can list six big name American bloggers - we all know them! - who'd fit into this category, three of whom would be considered the cream of the crop) then you command attention simply because of your fans. Now I'm not saying being 'famous' in Bloggityville is necessarily a bad thing - these same five blogs (and scores of others) are ones I personally subscribe to because I get a kick out of reading them. They're funny. I can relate to them. But every single one of these six blogs have partial feeds. And not surprisingly, every single one of them has advertising. It makes sense, therefore, that their feeds would be set up this way. I'm not privy to their stats but I wouldn't hesitate to assume we're talking big numbers. Any revenue they gain from ads would be significant. Horrendous assumption? Maybe. But I'm confident enough to stick by that assumption nonetheless. BUT...

Even the bloggers who burn partial feeds in order to maximise visits to their sites and therefore money in their own pockets, are generally not doing it to annoy readers. Because at least for me, blog advertising and the associated brouhaha pales in comparison to a non-engaging writing style and jarring design. I think it's a teeny bit unfair to automatically cut someone off your subscription list simply for publishing a partial feed. Which brings me to my next point - advertising does not factor into Lizzie's Home and isn't likely to in the foreseeable future. Advertising/earning money from blogging was not the reason I began and certainly isn't going to be the driving force hereafter. And there are plenty of well-written, engaging, funny bloggers out there that fall into this category. Sure, it takes an extra click to visit our sites directly, but if advertising isn't on our page (therefore I guess cutting back on the lagging load times I kept reading about tonight) then this point becomes moot.

2. So I'd leave a comment?

I love, love, love comments. Most bloggers are secretly thrilled to get each and every one of them - kind of like when you were a kid and you found a letter addressed specifically to YOU in the mailbox. People who leave comments have been affected in some way (good or bad) by what you've written, and that's powerful stuff to a blogger. But publishing a partial feed doesn't have to always mean a solicitation for a comment. If the general anti-partial-feed movement is anything to go by, that's the last thing it will do. If I am affected by what someone else has written, I'll be moved to comment, regardless of whether they publish partial or full feeds. Of course if someone publishes a partial feed then the headline and first two lines of the post itself need to be totally eye-catching - more so than a full-feeder. This could lead to An! Over-use! Of! Punctuation! And! Excitement! When! It! Isn't! Actually! Warranted! which is equally as annoying as the partial feed itself, LOL. One of my favourite bloggers bounces around like this all the time and it always gets me laughing because even though she's a gal I always imagine her like a perpetual four year old boy, LOL.

3. So I'd increase your Alexa rank?

Okay, so before about three hours ago, I had never even heard of an Alexa rank, which shows how concerned I am by it! But you can sub in any other 'popularity measurer' you like - Technorati, stat counters, you name it. And this is the one that cuts closest to home for me. I don't have advertising, pay-per-post drives me absolutely bonkers, and while I squeal with excitement when I get a new comment, I don't think it has much to do with the fact I've published one particular feed option over another so far. But stat counters? Therein lies my undoing, LOL. Just like comments, most bloggers I know enjoy seeing their stat counters rise. And though becoming obsessed with rankings and stats can be counter-productive, I predominantly use mine to track where my readers are coming from and what they're viewing, not necessarily to watch my popularity soar. Because honestly? I'm like one weeny scale on the itty-bittiest fish in the great big Blogging Ocean. I have like 14 whole subscribers. I still get a kick out of a new comment because I feel like I know all the commenters personally, LOL. I wonder how much of that is lost for the Big Six Bloggers? There would have to be a point where they just cannot read each and every comment and that alone would kind of make me not want to comment in the first place, if you know what I mean. I don't recall ever commenting on any of the Big Six, mostly for this very reason.

So, after doing all this reading this afternoon, I came to these conclusions.

* If I'm not doing it for click-through advertising revenue reasons, how important is a partial feed to me anyway? Why not cut the reader some slack and stick with the full feed?

And second,

* If I am doing it for a more accurate picture of how 'popular' I am in Bloggityville, well, there are plenty of things wrong with that picture.

And third,

* While I'd love to get more hits to Lizzie's Home and therefore gauge better which posts have resonated the most (I'm finding that the majority of folks still don't comment, even if they've really liked a post) in order to produce more of that kind of writing in the future, really, does it matter? Wasn't the original reason I started blogging just to 'get out there'? When did all this other stuff become important?

Okay, so the irony of what I'm about to say isn't escaping me, LOL, but if you have any thoughts on this issue, please, please, please de-lurk! And if you have any tips on how to increase comments, I'm all ears (or eyes, as the case may be). I know that when I participate in blog carnivals I get by far the most comments but the vast majority of those are one-liner 'your menu looks great!' type things. The weeks that I haven't had time to participate my stats drop dramatically. I don't want to have the pressure of writing The Most Profound Blog Post Ever every single week, LOL.

Best comment wins a cyber Tim Tam... :P

Cheers,
Lizzie

I'm Half The Size I Was Yesterday!

Some of you will notice that I've shortened my 'viewable' thingamy in your feed readers. If you subscribe to Lizzie's Home in a feed reader, I'd love to get your thoughts and comments about the whole partial vs full feed debate.

I hope those that 'love and sub' Lizzie's Home won't find the extra click too inconvenient :) While I absolutely love Google Reader just for the simplicity of doing the rounds of my own favourite blogs, I personally don't have a problem with clicking through to a person's 'real blog'. Having said that, there does seem to be two very distinct camps on this issue. Chillihead and Shannon from Blogging Basics 101 covered this topic back in August. They made a good point - they consider partial feeds to be a kind of 'Hey, I've put something new up! Come on by!' I agree with this. It's almost like receiving an invitation in your mailbox to an afternoon tea with a whole bunch of your closest friends :) But I'm also keenly aware that not everyone follows my way of thinking, so I thought I'd open it up for discussion.

Do you have a preference, within whatever feed reader you personally use, for partial or full feeds, or don't you mind either way? I'd love to hear your opinions.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Weight Loss...Take 3145

Well. Nothing like a quick burn on a BMI calculator to make you feel horrid!

I'm now about 20kg or around 44lbs overweight. Somewhere around 3kg/6.5lbs ago I officially moved up from the 'overweight' to the 'obese' category for my height on the BMI scale. Yeah I know, BMI isn't the best indicator for progress - yada yada. But obese? I knew I was gaining weight again but now I just feel as though I've been run over by a train :(

I've gone on and on about my plans to lose weight before - just see the 'Weight Loss' label in the archives box. No need to recount reasons A, B or C for why I need to lose weight or how hard it is to lose weight or why my family history dictates I should lose weight. It's all been said before. But sheesh!

I need to think some more on this. Every other time I've joined a weight loss challenge online, or posted my grand diet plans here, or inserted purdy little weight loss progress boxes, I've failed. So the itty bitty ticker in the 'Meet Lizzie' section is about all the frills and whistles I'll bother putting up this time around. Small enough not to be intrusive and large enough to remind me not to blog with a bar of chocolate beside me. I am, however, considering joining the Live Well Wednesday gals, if for no other reason than because I like the CWO column anyway, LOL.

Gosh I wish I was born with oodles of willpower, sigh.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Where I Admit My Ignorance

Quick question for my more technologically-savvy blogging counterparts - can someone give me the heads-up about stat counters and feed readers? At the moment I have my Google Reader account set to display my posts in their entirety right in the reader - do people viewing my posts this way still count as a 'hit' to my stat counter? Or do they only count if they actually visit http://lizzieshome.blogspot.com directly? Does it make a difference if you set your preferences within the reader to only display the first few lines of each post?

Any help on this would be much appreciated!

Cheers,
Lizzie

But she'll Look SO Different!

My baby, my adorable Miss Moo, is having her first 'real' haircut tomorrow morning. At newly-6-years-old, all her lovely, loooooong hair is being cut off. I'll hold off posting the 'before' photo because I can guarantee it will seem so much more dramatic when I post it next to the 'after' shot. Sigh.

Moo has visited the hairdresser only once before, for a simple trim. Most of the time I've neatened up the ends myself and I've been trimming her fringe (bangs?) since she was old enough to have one. But her hair is now at that length where people comment on it - it has become her defining characteristic. She can sit on it. So why are we getting it cut?

It wasn't a conscious decision to keep it long - it just sort of happened. When it started to get nice and pretty we liked it so much we just never considered cutting it. When she was younger, she had this gorgeous golden streaking through the sides of her hair from where it was pulled back in a ponytail (her hair is mostly light brown). Then when she started school at the beginning of 2007 it was fantastic to be able to pull it back in a plait (braid) each day. But it takes so long to get ready in the mornings and though I'd happily put up with the extra work - I love long hair on little girls - she has been asking for some time now to have it cut up near her shoulders. In other words, the kind of dramatic change that will turn heads for other reasons when school goes back at the end of this month after 6 weeks of holiday.

When she first started to talk about The Cut, I subtly steered the conversation away and that worked okay for a few months. But lately she's been more insistent and I'm finally at the point where I've just decided to let her make the decision. I will miss her long hair terribly, but I'm happy to cut my morning 'get ready' time as well, so we'll see.

So at 10:45 tomorrow, I'll be sitting in our local salon with my little-but-suddenly-a-lot-more-grown-up daughter, asking her if she really wants to cut her hair for about the ten billionth time in the last week. I hope we don't end up with a horrible cut - I'll be devastated. I'd probably cry! We're going simple - just a bob, but we have no idea how it will behave once the length is taken out of it as she's never had that style before. The poor mite could be cursed with her mother's hair, which inevitably kinks out on one side rendering a bob rather frustrating. Once it's cut, it's gone forever, probably never to reach that length again. I did debate within myself about telling her straight out no to getting it done, but much as I love her long hair now, at some point I'm going to have to let things like this go. Better her hair at age 6 than body piercings at age 14. Or tattoos at 16. *Shudder*

Update tomorrow...sob.

Cheers,
Lizzie

Impossible Standards?

(© Mary's Little Lamb)

I've been thinking about my homekeeping skills lately.

I really wish I was one of those uber-organized Mums who zoom through the house righting all that is cluttered and wrong, but I'm not. I struggle. I have routines, sure, but the fact of the matter is, they're only as good as the person doing them and, well, plenty of time I skip right over them.

I've been a Flybaby in the past. It took me two years to discover that a woman shouldn't need multiple daily email reminders to keep house! Flylady is great for the community aspect - I was part of a great Yahoo Group for Aussie Flybabies for at least a couple of years - but for the last several months of that I was not even subscribed to the Flylady site itself, just hanging on to the group because of the friends I made there. And to be honest, three-quarters of what we discussed wasn't in any way connected to keeping the home! People have asked why I left that group and I've been telling them that it really stopped serving my needs, that's really all it was. I still have friends I 'met' there who email me and that's okay! I will say one thing about Flylady though - she's a motivation powerhouse, LOL. Her enthusiam is kind of catching, but at some point I believe one of the coolest aspects to learning how to declutter by her system is to learn how to declutter HER. There's no shame in unsubscribing girls!

Of course, I took other things away from my Flylady experience. I learned how to make daily routines and even though - ahem - I'm not all that great at executing them sometimes, I do recognise the value in having them. And I picked up a weird attraction to acronyms and started making my own, LOL.

Fast forward a year or so, and I discovered blogging - the writing and the reading. I fell upon blog after Christian homemaking blog and while I enjoyed reading them, I couldn't help but wonder why I wasn't blessed with the gene which would naturally steer me toward the kitchen sink, or the mop bucket or - gasp! - the toilet bowl. I've always been interested in organization, decluttering and just making things pretty, but I don' t seem to have that bit of DNA which connects the 'wanting to do' to the 'doing the do'. It's so frustrating! I want to make bread by hand! And I want to line-dry my clothes each and every single day and if it's raining, I want to WANT to use a string underneath the verandah instead of my natural inclination to load up the dryer. I want to love ironing! I want to be consistent and fabulously good at menu planning and cooking. I want to go to bed each night knowing there's not a single dish left on the sink. I want to wash windows (well okay, not that much, but...) I want to get up 'while it is still dark' and get the appliances humming before the rest of the family wakes. I want to have time to do all these things, the motivation to do them, the energy - oh gosh, the ENERGY - to do them. And I want to do it all with a smile on my face and cookies in the oven.

Oh good grief - I think I just hit on my problem right there. I want to do it all. Because 'some' women do. Why do we do that to ourselves? Why do we set ourselves up for what usually pans out to be failure? There's nothing wrong with standards - and sure, mine are probably lower than most, I'm the first to admit that - but why are we in constant competition with our mothers, our mother-in-laws, fake TV mums, ourselves - or even Miss Suzie Blogging Homemaker? Why do we do it?

I had a whole set of resolutions set up for 2008. I also tend to micro-manage, in case you haven't yet picked that up, LOL. This morning, I'm throwing them in the bin.

The only people I need to please is my own family.

There's a great quote I bring up from time to time - gleaned from an article called "A Practical and Money-Saving Approach to Grocery Shopping" by Mrs Mabyn Clark, which I originally saw on the LAF website.

"What are the cornerstones to running an efficient household? I
would have to say they are clean laundry, a clean kitchen (especially clean dishes), and three square meals a day. Without a vigilant attitude towards these things, we can hinder any other efforts we make in our homes."

I always loved this quote because when I first read it, I'd taken a break from organizing some peripheral closet or some such thing, and was having a cup of tea and catching up on my favourite sites on the Net. I looked up from my seat to see dishes littering multiple surfaces in the kitchen, two or three full (and dirty!) laundry baskets and (at 4 or 5 o'clock) nothing organized for dinner. It hit me like a brick. And not one of those itty bitty ones either - we're talking the big ones they use to make retaining walls, LOL. Perhaps part of my problem is that I look for homemaking tasks that give me the biggest visual 'payoff'. A cleared-out shelf or cupboard is obvious. Menu-planning, not so obvious. You would think that a clean kitchen and full bellies would give you the same kickback, and it does, but because you're doing it everyday, there's a tendency to forget that the mundane things can often give the biggest rewards. I know I have :)

Lady Lydia wrote a blog post almost three years ago called Organizing For Success which I've permanently linked to here on Lizzie's Home for a long time. In it she describes an attitude of just doing 'one thing' at a time if you're feeling overwhelmed. I'd go a step further and say that Mrs Clark's example above - The Golden Rule of Three, if you like - is the absolute bare minimum one should aim for in any given day. I know that I myself have to pare back to basics in order to build back up to the level I know I need to be at. Just three things - meals, a clean kitchen and clean laundry.

Seems easy, doesn't it? So now, I'm off to put on a load of laundry...(LOL)

Cheers,
Lizzie