day 48-60 (february photo-a-day day 16-29) or how did I get so far behind?!?

It doesn't take much for the house of cards to come tumbling down does it? Even when it is something you love doing it can still fall to pieces. A couple of school evening commitments, a busy week at work followed by a work trip away and next thing you know I am 13 days behind in sharing my Fat Mum Slim February photo-a-day pics with you. For some of these days I had planned a bit more of a story to go with them but as things have turned out I think that would be a little excessive, so I will save those stories and extra pics for a different day and for now I apologise for taking so long and giving you so many pics to look at in one go...

Day 60 (february day 29) - something I'm listening to

It's raining it's pouring, the old man is snoring. Well not really, but it is wet and windy and I am feeling annoyed about it. I have just gotten home from five fabulous days in Sydney, where we (Intrinsic) were exhibiting at the Home and Giving Trade Fair. I ate and drank way too much and am now feeling very podgy! I arrived home late last night and have the day off today. After sleeping a little too late this morning I optioned up on one of Andrea at Fox-in-flats' tips for the school run and threw on my gym gear. I did actually plan to go for a run, but I had a princess moment and the rain put me off. Instead I am sitting here on the computer listening to the rain and hoping it will ease off enough for me to actually run.

Day 59 (february day 28) - money

Money... or lack thereof (it's been a big weekend!)

Day 58 (february day 27) - something I ate

What and amazing Lebanese feast at El-Phoenician restaurant in Parramatta! The food was so good, the waiting staff were super friendly and the company was perfect. The only down side was the contribution this made to my current podgy feeling!! (But I still say totally worth it!)

Day 57 (february day 26) - night

Not sure that I nailed this one! It is the view from my lovely hotel room at the Pullman Hotel in Olympic Park with the room reflected in the window. Hmmm.

Day 56 (february day 25) - green

First day of the fair and when I sat down to have some lunch and flick through Instagram I realised that the theme was green and my spinach quiche and spinach and cous cous salad seemed like it would be my best option for the day. 

Day 55 (february day 24) - inside your bathroom cabinet

I left home for the airport at 5:30am so the last thing on my mind was taking photos. By the time I was thinking about the photo-a-day challenge my bathroom cabinet was inside my daggy old toilet bag that I have had for getting close to 20 years!

Day 54 (february day 23) - shoes

I do love shoes, but continuing my time poor theme of the last week, there was no time for staging some gorgeous shot. Instead these are one of my favourite pairs of shoes and are perfect for powering my ride to work.

Day 53 (february day 22) - where I work

My paid work is at the most gorgeous Intrinsic. We create beautiful greeting cards, gifts and stationery to inspire the world. The Intrinsic studios are located off the charming vine covered Chesser Street in Adelaide.

Day 52 (february day 21) - a fave photo of me

A photo of a photo, I want to say how very post-modern. But I know that just dates me as being old enough to remember a world where photos existed only in albums or in frames. And to get a copy meant taking the negative to the photo processing shop. Anyway this is one of my favourite photos of Miss M and me. It was taken by my lovely sister at Pt Vincent, my favourite place. I did have a couple of runners up for fave photo, but I asked Miss M to help me choose, so of course she chose the one of her looking super cute.

Day 51 (february day 20) - handwriting

My hand-writing on top and I think my Nanna's hand-writing on the bottom. I found the recipe tucked inside a very old edition of the Green & Gold Cookbook. I'm glad that I do have some handwritten recipes. I hope that my grandchildren enjoy reading them, like I enjoy reading old family recipes. I'm pretty sure they won't be pouring through my collection of pins on Pinterest, or looking through my bookmarks on my computer filled with nostalgia. There really is something about handwriting that evokes the presence of that person. 

Day 50 (february day 19) - something I hate to do

I hate tidying. This is the dumping ground that is my office. When we have people coming round I do an emergency surfaces tidy and everything lands in the office. I spent day 19 sucking it up and tidying this disaster zone. By the end it was looking pretty good. Not perfect, but a really good start.

Day 49 (february day 18) - drink

It looks like I spend a lot of time sitting around drinking coffee. And maybe I do! Day 18 saw me back in my favourite Saturday spot with a cafe latte and about to make a very late jump onto The Slap bandwagon.

Day 48 (february day 17) - time

It was time to clear this c**p out of my life. I was inspired by Sarah at A Beach Cottage to just get stuck in and do it. She issued a de-clutter challenge and I put up my virtual hand and said I'm in. Unfortunately, my good intentions were also derailed by my busy week. And I am a beach cottage de-clutter fail whale. But that's okay. I did make a good start and got rid of some stuff that had been hanging around for ages. And I even got $16 for the bottles! What I did do on day 17 that was awesome and I am going to continue was to set the timer for one hour and put as much as I could fit in the car boot and then took it straight to the Salvos. And that felt fantastic.

Phew! That was long. Well done and thank you if you're still reading! How has your February? Did you have good intentions de-railed by other commitments?   

day 42-46 (or february day 11-15)

day 46 (or feb day 15) - phone
I wanted to do something interesting. I really do love my iPhone but I couldn't work out how to take a photo of it. Then I started to see the pictures coming up on Instagram of reflection shots. (I don't know why I didn't think of that!) Some were quite clever, like reflections in sunnies and rear-view mirrors. Not just bathroom mirrors. My sub-concious was pondering away on what to do today, and I remembered these earrings. When I was in high school I went on exchange to Chile. I got my ears pierced when I was over there. Mum and Dad would never let me! I then went on an earring purchasing frenzy! Which included these telephone earrings. I think that I used to have them in red and white as well as black. All I could find was this one.

 day 45 (or feb day 14) - heart
We don't celebrate Valentine's Day. I think it comes from a bad first experience in the early days of our relationship. Mr G ordered flowers to be sent to my work, and was expecting to get an excited thank you phone call, or at least some sort of acknowledgement. But the florist stuffed up and forgot to pack the order!! He thought the reason I didn't say thank you was because I was seeing someone else and wasn't sure who the flowers were from! But I just thought he didn't get me anything. Not good!
Clearly we moved past this early hiccup, but we haven't bothered with Valentine's gifts since then.

I got a bit excited in the morning and decided to make the girl a Valentine's themed lunchbox with pink and red food and love heart sandwiches. I also wrote a little Valentine's note for in her lunchbox (like I said I got a bit excited!) Anyway, I picked her up from school, almost bursting with my fabulousness, and as soon as we got in the car I was asking "how was your lunch today?" Her answer a deadpan "good". Hmmm I tried again with, "but was anything especially good?" "Yeah, it was all good" Anyway this went on for a while before I burst and had to ask "What about the love heart bread and the note!!" Finally she remembered and said that she thought it was nice. NICE! Just NICE! I went to all that trouble and the best she could come up with was NICE!

We talked about it again later in the evening, (I wasn't quite ready to let it go!) And it turned out that she did actually really like it all, I was just too eager bugging her with questions as soon as we got in the car. (Note to self: hold back and don't' get too excited about stuff, try to act cool with the girl)

With a theme of hearts there had to be something from Intrinsic. And my kisii stone that I keep on my desk. To round out the heart theme, Miss M got changed out of here school uniform and came out wearing her Melbourne Heart soccer top. Perfect choice and I didn't even ask her to do it. She wasn't happy to be photographed today, so logo only. It's an inexact science with getting permission to use her photo.

day 44 (or feb day 13) - blue

I was full of indecision today. I tried taking the blue sky, which was very exciting to see after the un-summer like weather of last week. But it didn't really say blue to me. I kept looking at the blue foam on the trampoline nets and thinking that I wanted to capture that feeling. Lucky for me Miss M was feeling co-operative and agreed to dress in blue and jump on the trampoline. 

day 43 (or feb day 12) - in my closet

I took a big deep breath and decided to tell it like it is. My real life looks nothing like my Pinterest boards. I am a slob! I have a lovely bid walk-in-robe and I don't even keep it looking nice. With my new Instagram addiction I have found a new blog A Beach Cottage. Sarah is doing a massive declutter at the moment and has called for others to join in. In a moment of craziness I accepted her challenge, so I look forward to this being a before photo in an awesome closet blitz!

day 42 (or feb day 11) - makes me happy
Miss M has a new Saturday morning activity that gives me a blissful hour to waste on The Parade, Norwood. It is conveniently close to the delightful Mary Martin's Bookshop with its lovely little cafe. I sat there this morning loving the peace and quiet. I had brought along a bag of recipe books to read through. I was looking for a vegetarian recipe to make for dinner that night. I found a recipe for mushroom and leek pie that gave me then inspiration to do my own version. It was so yummy. And I had an awesome evening with a people I like a lot and don't see enough of.

day 41 - self portrait (or feb day 10)

Here I am, back in my bathroom photo booth! It is the best spot in the house for me to take a self-portrait. I love Friday, pretty sure that I have already explained why my day off is so awesome here. Anyway, I don't have any school obligations today (YAY!!!!!!!) so I dropped the girl at school and before I came home I took a quick detour to the fabulous Taylor Blend for one of their oh so good coffees. Surprisingly I didn't see anyone I knew there. It tends to be a bit of a after-the-school-drop-off Mum hang out.

Hmmm.... coffee....

Anyway I suspect it is things like buying coffee that explains why I don't have money, rather than the Feng Shui I tried blaming it on yesterday!

So you love coffee so much? Where do you like to get yours from?

day 35 - a stranger (or feb day 4)

I had a lovely 45 minutes to waste by myself on Saturday morning on the Parade Norwood, the perfect place to go was Mary Martin's Bookshop for a coffee and to soak up the beautiful books.

I was feeling a bit anxious about today's challenge (a stranger). I don't talk to strangers. I'm too shy. I discussed it with my daughter and she backed me up by saying that if I did talk to a stranger, then they wouldn't be a stranger anymore and then it would be breaking the rules. So I was completely out of my comfort zone today. As I was waiting in line for my latte I switched my phone to silent, so that it wouldn't make the clicking noise and pretended to text while I was actually taking total stalker photo of the young boy serving.

When have you felt out of your comfort zone? What did you to do cope?