Hello there! Hope you are all well. Today is the first day of Autumn, although it is still a rather warm sunny summery day. I don’t know about anyone else & I’m certainly no meteorological expert, but I really do think our Summer here doesn’t end until at least April. I feel like over the last few years the seasons have been slowly shifting & Summer gets longer while Autumn & Winter get shorter. I used to always be a summer girl & the heat never really bothered me. Boy has that changed! This year I have found the heat utterly exhausting & I can’t wait for the cooler weather of Autumn & Winter, to get rugged up & wear my boots again! I’m definitely starting to prefer Autumn & Spring now. The weather is so much milder & there are more opportunities to get in to the garden & get some landscaping done.
As one month ends & another begins I thought I’d write a bit about my reflections on the past month & what I have or have not achieved in my aim of developing a more mindful & balanced life.
I started a bullet journal which is something I have not tried before. I’m not really following any kind of specific formula, or template, just creating pages for things that I would like to keep track of & explore over the year. So far I have really enjoyed it & I try to create a new page every couple of days. I think it will be a really nice way to see what I’ve achieved & remember all the things that we did as a family at the end of the year. So far I have pages for Books I’ve read, Makes for Me, Makes for Tilly, Makes for Gifts & Makes for the home. I’ve also drawn up a Walking & Hiking Tracker to count how many kilometres I do on my morning walks or hikes I go on. I also have a sewing time & crochet time tracker to see how many hours over the course of a year these two activities take up. I have listed my two Make Nines as well as a page for this year’s word, Discovery, & my Mindful Living goals. I have pages for Adventures, Holidays, Garden Tasks & Home Renovations completed. A page to list the things I’m grateful for, New Crafts I’ve Tried & Tilly’s milestones.
As well as my bullet journal I’ve been working in my List Journal which was put out by the magazine Breathe. Some of the questions or lists have been really easy to fill out, but others are much harder & it’s really forced me to sit down & think about my thoughts & answers.
I have started going on a morning walk on Friday’s. I don’t work on this day, so I get up early & go for a walk before Tilly gets up & before my husband leaves for work. As I really want to get in to bushwalking or hiking, I thought this would be a good way to build my fitness levels back up. It’s also a nice way to clear my mind a bit after a week of being in the office & prepare myself for what the weekend will bring.
Native Gum Blossom found on my morning walk.
It’s been really hot here this past month so I haven’t really gotten out in to the garden to do much. We have a lot of hard landscaping & clearing that needs to be done & that’s a bit hard to do in 35-40 degree heat! I did get a bit done last week before the rain deluge, & Tim & I cut some trees down & took two loads of waste to the tip. I’d really like to plant some spring bulbs this year, so I need to get the front garden beds weeded & mulched soon so I can do that.
I’ve really enjoyed my making time this month. It’s been nice having the pressure to make items for my shop or markets taken off my shoulders. I’ve enjoyed working on things that I want to work on. I’ve nearly finished my Hexagon Flower Mini Quilt. I have loved working on this & it feels good to have nearly finished something I started ages ago.
I pulled out another project I started years ago in the past week to get done, a 1” hexagon quilt pattern that I drafted up around 6 years ago. It’s called the Flowers Floor Mat & I’m hoping to get it finished for Tilly for Christmas.
I’ve been crocheting a couple of things for my best friend who is having her first baby. She is due in April. I’ve been crocheting a ripple pram blanket & I’ve also made a bunny buddy for her. I have plans to make a fruit rattle as well. I also dyed up some yarn which my mum has then crocheted into a gorgeous cardigan. This past week I’ve also been making decorations for her baby shower which is this Sunday.
I have been reading much more, although I still do find that the only thing I really want to do in my downtime is sew. I find it hard to stop when I’m engrossed in a project. This month I finished A Garden in the Hills by Christine McCabe. To be honest I actually started this book last year but put it aside as I got really busy with my shop & markets. I didn’t have much to go so I thought I’d get it done so I could start something new. The book follows a year in the life of a Garden in the Adelaide Hills. I really enjoyed it & it was quite motivating. The only thing I found mildly disappointing is that even though it’s a novel, there were no photos of the garden that the book was about. And while the author painted a really good picture, it would have been nice to see some actual photos.
We went on a couple of outings in February. There was the daytrip I took with Tilly & my parents last weekend, which I wrote about in my previous post to Mittagong & Bowral. Tim, Tilly & I also went on a drive up the mountains to Blackheath to Evans Lookout & also up Blackheath Mountain. Every time we go exploring in our ‘backyard’ & I stand on the rocky outcrops looking over the vast valleys I feel such a sense of awe & littleness. It always leaves me feeling rejuvenated & with a great sense of hope & optimism for our future. It’s so nice getting back to nature. Even though the bush is so vast somehow it also feels so comforting. We’re going camping at Easter with friends out west again this year & I can’t wait! It’s going to be so much fun watching Tilly explore, & you just can’t beat sitting around the campfire with friends having a good old yarn!
The view from Evans Lookout
On top of Blackheath Mountain looking down in to the Megalong Valley
Tilly & I did some painting this month. It’s so fun watching here develop her creative side. She really enjoys drawing with crayons & painting. I bought some paper plates for her to paint. Because they are a bit stiffer than sheets of paper I thought they’d be a bit more robust & stand up to the paintbrush stabbing & all the wet paint. Paper gets quite soggy & tears really easy. I bought a couple of small canvases for her to paint on next. Tilly now goes to day care, or ‘School’ as we prefer to call it on Thursday’s. Her first day was fantastic & there were no tears when I dropped her. Subsequent weeks were not so good & there was a lot of crying & holding on to me for dear life when it was time for me to go. She always has a good day there & enjoys the activities. The drop off has gotten better & last week there was only a brief little cry when I went to leave. I know she will get better, & it’s so good for development. I’m amazed at how much she is learning & how quickly she is learning. She can now count to 10 & can also read & say all the letters of the alphabet, except for G, J & W. The other day whilst doing the grocery shopping she even recited the entire alphabet from A to Z without any help from me!!
This moth I also played around a bit more with my styling & photography, this time with a Valentine’s Theme. I’m still finding my feet with styling & photography & this is something I want to work on a lot more this year.
I hope this past month has been a good one for you. I hope the start of your year has been great & that you feel you’re on track for a year full of all the loveliest things in life. I know I’ve certainly started this year very positively & I have enjoyed discovering new things, new ways to look at my life & new things about myself.
Have a lovely weekend,
Miss Leela xo
