Sunday - Mother's Day!!!

I have had a busy couple of days!!! 

I stayed home from work on Friday because I felt unwell in the morning – I have a bit of a “thick head” and felt like I was coming down with a cold.  So – I stayed longer in bed, and that was probably the best thing I could ever have done.   Felt a bit better on Saturday, but today I have a vague cough – need to stay on the watch out for that darned Bronchitis!

I pottered around on Friday afternoon and did some more sorting of stuff.  I got rid of a pile of important papers – you know, the kind that you really can’t throw out, but you don’t want to keep either?  I kept them.  Ken asked if they were the kind that you throw out in 7 years like your tax and I said I didn’t know – maybe I won’t ever throw these out.  Yeah, those kind of papers.

Anyway, the dining room looks a lot better now than it did, and I have moved the table back a bit so that it looks more like a room.  I have some more things in the “give away” box, and I have a box now for “throw out” which makes chucking STUFF so much easier!  I also have some shredding to take to work and post in the big white shredding bin!

While I was cleaning up all the paperwork in the dining room, I filed all my tax paperwork into a big rollaway tub and put the lid on.  It’s so easy to get a paperwork system going – why do we make it any harder than it absolutely has to?  Here’s how I keep on top of mine (most of the time – as long as I USE it!!!)

Open all your incoming mail.  I then have two hooks on the wall above my desk.  One says SHAZ, and one says HOUSE.  On the bulldog clip I put my personal bills – for SHAZ and on the HOUSE bulldog clip I put the bills for the house.  In date order, with the soonest to pay on top.  Each week, I sit down and look at what is to be paid that week, and pay them.  My budgeting makes sure that I have the money in our account to pay a bill when it comes, so that’s not an issue.  I’ll write more about how I budget later – with investment properties and all sorts of other things; it needs to be set up properly, which it is.  I don’t really have to think about it too much. 

Once the bill is paid, I staple the receipt to it and put the paid bill into an “in tray”.  There it stays till the end of the financial year, where I sort through the pile (by then it’s about a foot high – I only do it yearly because I’m lazy…) and I pull out the papers that I need for tax, and I file everything else.  Again, that’s simple.  Bills paid go into a folder “bills paid”.  They go into last year’s bills paid folder, and last year’s bills get shredded.  Superannuation stuff into a super folder, shares stuff into a shares folder.  The simpler the better here – you don’t want 5000 folders to have to sort into, just put them all in together.  Really, what’s the worst that can happen if you don’t sort them into date order?  You have to flick through a pile of papers to find what you want?  I figure that’s worth doing for the number of times I’ve ever had to go back to my paperwork pile!!!

For things other than bills (which is not very often!!!) I just put it on the side of my desk till I’ve dealt with it, then it too goes into the large “to file” pile.  If the pile begins to offend you, you can file more than once a year.  File every week if you must.  I hate it so I don’t….

If you go away for a week or two and come home to a large pile, this method also works well for the overwhelming task of opening it.  I open one day, sort the next, and then the third day sort into date order & pay what needs to be paid.  Remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day and nor should we try and get everything done in 5 minutes either!!!

As long as you have that budget worked out, there will not be any issue with having money available when you need it to pay bills.  Promise!  That will be a topic for another day – a topic I’m very passionate about actually!!!

Last night I used the Tajine again.  Gosh I love what you can create in those things, although I reckon it'd be just as easy in a slow cooker, casserole dish or large sauce/stock pan on the stove.  We had Lamb Tajine with Dates, Almonds & Pistachio's.  Mmmmm!!! 

So – today was also Mother’s day, and the kittens have bought me two new table runners.  They’re great – a green bamboo one, and a brown one with kind of sticks in it.  I love them both – the green one is on the table already.  I kind of like this mother’s day thing!!!

Friday night the kittens were all cuddly and lovey dovey - doesn't happen all the time, but when it does, it's gorgeous... check this out!

Hmmm... can't see which one is which.  Bad mummy!  Oh well, one's Spot and one's Stripe...

We have also repaired (kind of) Stripe's duck. What actually happened is that we went to a pet store and bought her a new one. Ken then worked out it fitted exactly inside the old one. How wonderful!!! We get a new duck while we still have the old one!!! The new beak even fitted out the hole left by the nibbled off bit of the old beak!!!

The yellow in the blue chest is the new duck.  If you look closely, you can see that the new duck has an orange beak, whereas old duck had (and still has the remains of) a yellow beak....

So – this afternoon I’m going to finish off this blog first, then I think I’m going to go and do some crocheting.  It’s a fairly dull outside, but I’ve just checked the Radar and there’s no rain around to speak of, so I’ll hang out the load of washing that’s in the machine, put another on and also bring the load on the line in.   I need to find myself something to eat for lunch too – I’m a bit peckish!  Ken’s gone now to his friends’ house out at Stanthorpe – he’ll arrive there late this afternoon.  He’s staying all week to help pull out the maze and if they get far enough advanced, start putting in the timber maze.  It’ll be very quiet all by myself but I’m really looking forward to getting a few things done, uninterrupted!!