Taking Care of Me

Over the last couple of years I have not put a high enough priority on looking after myself. Raising a toddler on your own is very demanding and it's easy to put your own needs last. It's very easy to make excuses but if I don't look after myself who will?

There are a number of ways that I have ignored my own needs but I'm looking foward to improving in this area. I have not taken care of my physical appearance or nutured my spirit.

I moved house about 15 months ago and have struggled to find a new hairdresser. I have finally found one that charges a reasonable price for a haircut. My hair grows quickly and goes from looking alright to needing a haircut overnight (or so it seems)! It has then ended up with me needing a haircut for weeks before I get around to it and me feeling awful until then. Now that I have finally found a good hairdresser things WILL be better. I got a cut this week and then booked in for my next appointment while I was there. As I now have an appointment it is scheduled and I can't say that I don't have the time or money (or both) this week. It will happen.

I also have not coloured my hair lately. My hair is a mousey brown colour and I used to get it coloured and then highlights put in. I now can no longer justify the expense or the time it takes. A 3.5 year old is occupied in the hairdressers for the time it takes to get a haircut but throw in a colour and you are just asking for disaster. Instead this week I purchased a colour kit to do at home. I did it on a day when the little fellow was at kinder and felt so much better.

I'm trying to institute a bit more of a beauty regime as well to look after my skin and body. It makes me feel better and can perk me up when I am feeling crap.

I'm also doing a lot more reading and crafting which are activities I really enjoy. (I'll do a whole other post on crafting!)

I also need to spend some time with God. I do pray often during the course of the day, however, I have not spent enough time just being or reading with God. This is another area in which I MUST improve.

These are all simple and reasonably cheap things I can do but should provide a huge benefit (I hope) on my self-esteem. Looking after myself is important for a number of reasons. First it makes me feel better about myself. In addition, me taking care of myself teaches my son that it is important to take care of yourself.

Bye-bye Nappies

Well it's time for me to say goodbye to nappies. B has been daytime trained for nearly 18 months and has not worn nappies at night for about 3 months (varying success here but I think we are there now). I have all of his nappies still. Don't ask me why. Maybe because I really enjoyed our cloth nappy journey so I wasn't quite ready to let them go and admit my little fella has grown up.

I was very committed to the idea of using cloth from the start. I had some wonderful friends who gave me cash and vouchers for a nappy wash service which was wonderful for the first few months. After that I launched headlong into the Modern Cloth Nappy world. Like a lot of people I did get a little carried away with the cute nappies.

Without wanting to sound too preachy it was a very easy journey. It was an extra load of washing every 2 days and when you have a baby there is so much washing so an extra one almost went unnoticed. I really enjoyed the sight of all my nappies drying on the clothesline. I know, a strange thing to make you happy but it did.

But I now have to let go of another part of babyhood. I have been endeavouring over the last few weeks to declutter my house and the nappies were a big part of the clutter here. I have started listing them on a used nappy site and hope to get a bit of extra cash from them.

Homemade Take-Away

Well tonight being Saturday I often don't like to put a huge effort into dinner. I have, however, come up with a few standby "take-away" meals.

There are a number of reasons for this. One is the cost of take-away food - it can cost nearly $20 for just the two of us. The second is I do like to know what is in my food. In addition, my son, B has a kidney/urinary condition. It is in no way serious and does not affect him at all on a daily basis, however, I am quite careful with his diet particulary in regards to his salt intake.

Our homemade list of take-away meals includes the following:

- fish and chips - chips made in the oven and the fish only shallow fried and then usually served with salad. Don't know about you but when I get take-away fish and chips I don't tend to serve a salad with it (I know - naughty)
- pizza - I make the dough in the breadmaker which is really easy. I can also make a wholemeal/white flour mix to make it a little healthier. Also as toddlers can be quite fussy but pizza is a great favourite you can put things on the pizza that will be eaten that would have no chance otherwise!
- chicken nuggets - I just cut up a chicken breast into nugget shapes then make up a breadcrumb mixture with garlic, lemon rind, parsley and pepper. These don't take any longer to make than it does to cook packaged ones in the oven.

And then tonight's dinner: tacos! I must admit I used a packaged seasoning mix but will be making my own in future. We also had salad and refried beans. The refried beans were homemade baked beans that I just pureed and they were really nice. Like pizza, food sneaks on that isn't normally eaten. Tonight B ate lettuce which he normally won't touch!

I will say that I am not perfect. We do sometimes get take-away food but it is a very rare thing as I find it cheaper to eat homemade food and the time isn't that much greater.

Well that's my musings for today. I've got lots of other things planned to say here but don't want to overload it too soon, hehe!!

Welcome

After thinking for quite a while I have finally decided to start a blog!

This blog will be an evolving thing. I am not quite sure where it will go and what it will do but I'd love for you to come on the journey with me.

I am a single parent of a gorgeous 3.5 year old son who is doing my best to live life simply but also provide a stimulating and enriching home environment.

This will hopefully be a record of our life, what we are trying to do to live simply, lessen our impact on the environment and travel this road. Hope you enjoy our journey!