Made my own floor lamp!

Hi everyone,

Had a wonderful day yesterday. Woke early and thought I'd try my hand at making a floor lamp. (Yeah, the weird things that float into my head sometimes...). My ceiling lights are those halogen lights where one switch turns on about 3 or 4 of them. Not good for lessening my electricity consumption!! Luckily, I love lamps.

Anyway, I thought I'd make the floor lamp by finding things around the house. So using fabric, a plant holder and some lights, I made this:

Not sure if I like it (maybe I should've used printed fabric?) but the kids and I had fun making it. Cost was $0 and as usual, the materials used were all sourced 2nd hand to begin with.

I hope you are all having a good start to the Easter holiday!

Happy Fairtrade Easter!

Hello everyone!

Today I have a day off work. (yay!) I am so looking forward to this long weekend and spending time hanging out with my kids.

As many of you know, this Easter, so many people will be giving chocolate Easter eggs.

To this day, one of my most popular posts here is my list of slave-free chocolates. That list once again needs updating but I am finding it really hard to find the time to do my research all over again at the moment. (Anyone care to do it for me?) Having said that, I can assure you that the use of child-slaves in the chocolate and cocoa industry still exists. See this recent news article: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/04/20/3196325.htm

Long-term readers here will know that I always strive to consume according to my values. I can not support child-slavery (nor do I believe that it is necessary for local economies). To give my children chocolate that used beans harvested by child slaves is, to me, well....just wrong. And to give those eggs to mark an event that is supposed to celebrate life??

Here is the video that changed the way I bought chocolates. I've put it up here before but thought I'd put up again - as a little reminder to myself more than anything as to why this is so important to me:

Video made by Cody Maasen who was a highschool student at the time - shown here with permission from Cody)

I believe that the best way to stop child-slavery is to stop participating in it.

I wish you all a safe and happy Easter.

Overwhelmed

Hello everyone!

Phew, I've just come out of a very intense couple of weeks at work, involving the launch of 2 projects and associated work travel. This is in addition to my son being sick and the many end of term activities for my children.

Coming out of such an intense period is probably a great time for me to answer Laurie Graves' question in my last post about work. She asked me: "How do you deal with the feeling of being overwhelmed?"

Firstly, I think that feeling overwhelmed from time to time is normal. (Yes, I know I'm weird.) Feeling overwhelmed is something that happens when things are intense. I don't know anyone who doesn't feel overwhelmed from time to time. Sometimes feeling overwhelmed can even help. I know that when I'm feeling overwhelmed I also become hyper vigilant - which often means I am better at attending to details. I have learned that emotions that feel "yuk" doesn't mean that its "bad". Another example of this are labour pains - they are "yuk" but they're certainly not "bad"!

But I digress...

So you can probably see that one of my coping mechanisms for feeling overwhelmed is by rationalising it as above. I also try to remember that intense periods are just that - small chunks of time that will pass and eventually settle down to a slower pace. I also try to maintain confidence in my strength, in my skills and in my ability to learn during those intense periods. I know that the times when my feeling of being overwhelmed turns to a negative anxiety, are also the times when I believe I do not have what it it takes to cope with it.

But enough of the psyche (psycho?) aspects of how I cope with feeling overwhelmed. I also have very practical coping mechanisms. In order of importance:

1. Fresh air and exercise. I know - everyone hates hearing this. After all, who has time to exercise? Well, I've learned that the more I am outdoors and doing something active the more energy I have. In the last 2 weeks, I have made it a point to take at least 30 mins out of my day to go for a walk, a run or a bike ride. Sometimes that activity happened at 6am in the morning - sometimes its right in the middle of the day. But I still did it. I also made it a point to go to taekwondo training (2 hours) at least once a week.

2. I do something creative. Yep, the more stressed I am, the more I need to create or do something beautiful. In this case of the last 2 weeks, I played my piano and I sewed. Its actually the first time I sewed since I moved into this house. And oh my goodness, how good did I feel to do it!

Bag that I made last weekend. Materials are op-shopped fabric and handles I rescued from a broken laundry basket.

Okay, I know, I know... you're probably asking me "how do you find the time to do this?" Well...I guess I just make the time. I make the time because I know they're important coping mechanisms....And I also had less sleep. That's because I can cope with less sleep but I NEED to do exercise and I NEED to do something creative.

Matching card carrier (the part on the right side is large enough to hold billls and my mobile phone, as well as a matching coin purse.

I guess I'm lucky, I know now (after much trial and error) what energises me and helps me cope with intensely busy periods.

But I'm interested on what other people do to cope with feeling overwhelmed! After all, what suits me now may not suit me later and having an arsenal of ideas would be great.

So what do YOU do when you're feeling overwhelmed?