Back in the saddle with 7 things about me.

I have been a bit absent from this blog for a while, we have had illness and hospitalisation of my elderly in laws and my Father In law passed away. So my attentions have been elsewhere. I just haven't had it in me to spruke about the good things I have going on.

Then my online blogging friend
Adrienne from The Rich Life on a Budget.
sent me an award challenge.

Just the thing to get me back in the blogging saddle.

Plus I know that Mez from
 domesticdivinity
Sent me a challenge earlier on in the year,
just when things started to get crazy and I haven't yet done it!

I am ready.

I am not sure which one to display the picture for (Adrienne combined the 2) 

I like the look of this one.

Here are the instructions for accepting the award:

~Thank the person who nominated you and link back to them in your post.

~Share 7 things about yourself.

~Nominate 7 bloggers you admire. (I've only gone for 5)
My mate Sarah at wintonhousebowral
Sharon at the quiet life
A Farmer's Wife at mylifeinthecountrytoday
The farmer's wife, from The Farmer has a Wife at bushmumma
Willow Or Lotus at redphoenixstyle



~Leave a comment on each of the blogs letting them know they've been nominated.

Here are seven things you probably would not know about me:

1. I was desperate as a child to become a vet.

I spent every school holidays working at a vet's a couple of suburbs away.  My mother knew the vet and used to drop me off and pick me up of an afternoon. I had the job of cleaning out the cages and brushing and grooming the pets and also feeding them. It was filthy work, but I loved it. My mother and I also bred pedigree burmese cats. I remember one night awakening to the cat having its kittens in the bed with me. That wasn't so good, and we quickly learned to have them contained soon to their delivery dates. I now meet this animal loving/breeding need by occassionally breeding Cairn Terriers with the help of a good friend Jude. She arranges all the pedigrees, line breeding and matings, and I just get the fun and gorgeous job of whelping and raising beautiful little Cairn babies in my home. At the moment I have 4 Cairn Terriers (3 bitches and one dog- which is a bit tricky when the bitches are in season!) and 2 German Shepherds. I miss my lovely old Labrador who we had to put down in February - she was 13 years old and such a beautiful old girl. Who doesn't love a Labrador?



Nice Butt shot!



2. I am a Full Time Teacher Librarian in a Public High School.

I have been teaching for 23 years and have been in this particular role for 13 years. My site is part of a collegiate and we cater for Years 7-9 (12- 15 years old boys and girls) We have a very high Indigenous population at our school. I have wonderful experiences through my employment and I like to think that I have made a real difference to lots of children's lives through inspiring them to learn and achieve their dreams, no matter what their background. I don't really talk about my job on this blog as I am very conscious that I am bound in the conditions of my employment by a code of conduct and I am not a good enough writer to be able to not have anything misconstrued and taken the wrong way. So better to not really talk about that part of my life. It has, as most jobs do, ups and downs, but it is a really good and rewarding career, with (most of the time) fantastic conditions and benefits.

3. I am surrounded by high achievers!

My husband is a bit of a workaholic, he is a partner in a private Stock and Station Agency, which he started with another fellow in 2000 and then took on another partner a few years later. We also have our own farming business which we do after hours- well he pretty much does the lot! I am the Cook and Laundry lady so don't seem to get myself out there as much as I probably should. My children also have a pretty big drive to achieve well. 2 of my children have Australian titles in whipcracking, something that they work really hard at practising and learning new things with. This  sport gets us travelling all around the countryside competing. My daughter holds the title for her age in NSW, VIC, TAS and QLD as well as the Aussie one. My youngest holds the title in NSW and Victoria and has moved up the age group to compete against his sister.

4. I am a dreadful housekeeper and have a mild amount of clutter.

I just have too much else going on, FUN stuff. I have learned not to be such a perfectionist with my housekeeping. I gave up a few years ago, when I realised that there are plenty of families out there who had one parent stay at home 'keeping house' that was their full time job, and even then, some of them couldn't keep up with the generation of laundry and untidiness from their families. Now it is only about once a week that I go berserk and carry on about the 'Stuff' that needs to be put away. There is no way that I can put all of it away and work out of the home. I struggle putting my own gear away. And there in lays the problem, I am a poor example for the kids to follow. I am sad, really sad, that unless I am a ranting nutter about it or we have visitors coming, my family don't put much away after themselves. So I am really trying to keep on it.  I am ok with the laundry as I have a big drying rod, like a closet rod in there and I have 4, yes 4, washing machines. 2 of them are 10 kg washer dryers and have made an unbelievable difference in the laundry stress around here. But then I pay the price with a power bill of $2500 every quarter. My main drama now is getting the children to put their baskets and hanging laundry away to make room for the next loads. I used to have a housekeeper/nanny look after the children while I went to work, and I often wonder if that is the reason we struggle with this- the nanny did it all! I also had a housecleaner (who passed away 3 years ago) and I know that her coming used to make me have the joint all tidied up ready for her to clean each week, so it never became an absolutely huge task. I don't have the heart to get another one, I miss her dreadfully too. I also think it is about time we learned to take care of these things ourselves.

5. I just love to cook and eat cakes and sweet things.

 Much more than the main part of the meal, in fact I think I would most of the time rather have the dessert than the main. This is most definately why I am overweight. I have worked really hard on losing weight this year and have lost 16 kgs (35 pounds) so far, another 10-15 would make me really happy, but the progress seems to have slowed up. Hmmn exercise seems to now be the hurdle. I have a treadmill, elliptical machine and a vibration platform, but rarely use them. What is that? I have even tried all sorts of motivations to get me on them, I have them facing the television and things like playing scrabble like Oprah. I think I just hate getting hot and sweaty (my face prickles!) so that is my deterrent!



Babymac's lemon syrup cake, 'cept I used very ripe limes!



anything with Lemons is all good with me



6. I hate snakes!

Unbelievable hatred! I will actively hunt them down if I spot one! I should live in Ireland. I think I would be happy there. In our part of Australia we have incredibly venomous snakes and I would like to be rid of them permanently, but that will never be so. I spend a great amount of time teaching and educating my children and dogs not to go anywhere near them. I won't post my methods as someone would take offence, but touch wood it has worked so far for me. I yell snake, snake and the dogs run to the back verandah where I lock them up and then attend to the removal of the slitherer. The children are now old enough to do the same, except the removal bit.

7. I am a security Nazi.

It gives me peace to sleep at night. We live in a town where there are a lot of break and enters. Thankfully we only have the rare murder and assault, unlike other areas and towns where there are heaps. I am pedantic about locking up and my big dogs give me lots of peace too. I grew up in Sydney in my teenage and young adult years with my single mother, who taught me a lot about staying safe. I don't care about people stealing stuff as much as I care about my family's personal safety. 7 years ago we had a really rough time including a friend murdered on a remote property and an attempted break in here at this house a couple of weeks later (it was the little Cairn Terrier who alerted us to the robbers- before we had the German Shepherds), this made me much more conscious about locking up and having heaps of dogs to protect and alert me to intruders on our property. Just seeing my German Shepherds deters lots of people from even getting out of their cars or entering our yard! They are quite protective and seem to sense before we get there what's going on and if people should be here. They do their job well.

I rarely get worried anymore.



And one last thing- I know why I have so much trouble blogging. Either my computer or my Internet is not allowing me to easily load photos. I have just waited over an hour for a picture to FAIL in loading> Hhhhmn. frustration plus!!!