Something I have been pondering for a while

I filled our tarago up today. It cost me $92 people. $92 bloody dollars. The car payment for the bloody thing is only $95 a week! A full tank of fuel will be lucky to last me a week, and I wouldn't say I do any excess driving. I drive to work and back (25kms each way) up to 4 times a week, and to netball training (40kms each way) and netball (40-50kms each way) a week. Every now and then we might make a trip to visit a friend or go to the city (200 kms return trip)

So with that said, I am wondering if we should be seriously considering moving to the town we work in (20 minutes away) to reduce fuel costs and car costs. We HAVE to have one car, Craig drives for a living so there is no avoiding that. But having two lots of car costs is shaping up to a VERY expensive gig. I would estimate it costs us anywhere between $150-200 a week to run both cars (maitenance included) luckily we do have an allowance for Craigs car but to keep a long story short and as uncomplicated as possible, we would have more $$ if we had less running costs.

But we have a small 72K mortgage. Our house needs work, and lots of it, and we live in an area where you could overcapitalise pretty easily, but if we had 30-40K to spend on the place we would probably get our money back.

So my dilemma is this. Do we move to the town we work in? But increase our mortgage by double at least or double and a bit? But then we both work in the same town, cut out commuting time, and travelling costs (would still have to travel to netball) But at least then we could walk anywhere in the town we needed too. Doctors, chemist, playgroups, kinder, etc? I have access to playgroup in the town I live in, and that's about it. We have a pub, a post office, a butcher, and a shop, and a school(primary only), oh and believe it or not, an art gallery LOL!

Do we do it now before fuel prices absolutely sky rocket AND before houses skyrocket more than they already have?
We have lived in this town before and we were a little unhappy, although I think that was because of the house we were living in, and the landlords we had. If it was our own house maybe it would have been different?

Has anyone got any suggestions to help poor indecisive me out? Please?

Building a garden with a purpose?

So today we got in and dug up the weed patch. Yes it was a veggie patch at some point, and we do still have yellow zucchinis growing in there, AND some pumpkins!.

Now we just need to get some seedlings to plan. I really want to get some of the diggers seedlings, the heirloom variety. I am so not interested in buying the ones that have been modified so that they only can grow once, and you can't save any seeds, what a joke!

Also in Tassie, this time of year you can't grow a hell of a lot. It seems we can plant onions, broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage. We already have more silverbeet than you can poke a stick at, but I really don't know what to do with it all? We worked so hard I have blister on my hand. (Either I'm overworked, or I'm precious, I tend to think the latter!)

I only have to work 15 hours this week, so I should be able to get out in the garden a fair bit and turn it into something special. See we have never had a garden. And to be honest I'm not really into 'pretty' gardens, they have to have a purpose, I don't see the point in having a heap of pretty roses, when all they do is please your aesthetics, I need a garden that will feed us, will nourish us. There are a few plants I am going to have to grow. Boronia and Jasmine for a start, they just have the nicest scents, and make me feel all happy and hippy when I smell them.

So if anyone has any idea of how to plant a garden (not veggie garden) that serves a purpose, AND looks nice, I'd be greatful to hear about it.

Commit to 3 things

Discussions on peak pil and food shortages have had me thinking for the last few days. When will it happen? Will it just creep up on us or will be see it coming? Will our everyday food items become so expensive that they will be out of our reach and not within our budget? Will we begin to see staples like potato as a necessary to fill our empty bellies?
As each day passes I feel more and more committed to doing something longterm both for my family and the environment. So I am going to set myself 3 goals

1) Buy second hand more, and where possible. Pretty self explanatory really, you can ofton pick up great bargains when you shop around second hand.

2) Grow more of our own food. Again self explanatory. It's not that hard to whack a few seeds in the ground and water them.

3) Put more thought into purchases, both big and small. Large purchases I will endeavour to make them as environmentally friendly as possible. Smaller ones I will aim to make them second hand. I will think twice about spending money on what could otherwise be thought of as a 'live saving gadget' (You know, they type you JUST HAVE TO HAVE!)

So I challenge you, set your own 3 goals in an effort to preserve the environment. They don't have to be something major, just small things, but by bit, if we all commit it WILL make a difference :O)

Chemical Pregnancy

I'm not pregnant, it was a chemical pregnancy.

I'm devastated, I felt pregnant, I hate TWO fucking tests tell me I was pregnant. i couldn't keep a secret and told people I was pregnant, and now I have to go and untell people. I feel like such a fucking dumbarse.
If I ever get pregnant again, I'm not telling anyone until I have a baby coming out of my vagina. Truth be told, I don't know if I can keep doing this. One early loss is devastating, I don't know if I could handle any more.

I'm so sad, and I am so numbing that pain with alcohol tonight,

Reflections of the last week

Things I can reflect on from the last week without a computer.

-Keep computer closed, son climbing on computer and wee'ing on it, is a very expensive $175 exercise. One that I do NOT want to participate in again.

-Getting a positive pregnancy test brought the biggest smile to my face for a whole week. Fancy being so blessed to fall pregnant within two months when you have PCOS.

-Starting to bleed Wednesday night. I never would have thought having an early miscarriage could be so fucking devastating. I feel fiercely protective of my baby, I want to keep you dammit, and heaven help anyone who calls it a foetus. It's in MY body therefore I'll call it what I want, and I reserve the right to break your nose if you call it otherwise.

-Waiting for HCG results sucks. Fancy having to wait two freakin days to find out if your pregnancy is still viable. Fuck I hate that word its so clinical and cold. I get the first results today, not that they will tell me much.

-Feeling like your gut feeling was right. Since before I got pregnant I had a bad feeling about this pregnancy, I didn't feel like it would have a positive outcome. I'm not holding onto much hope at the moment I must admit.

-Life without the computer for a week was pretty damn good. Can you believe I had withdrawels? I read a couple of good books (yes in a WEEK!) and feel all inspired and shit to do something with my life.

-Discovering (sort of) what peak oil is all about. Can we say HOLY SHIT BATMAN. I had never considered that oil was in so many of our everyday items. How are we going to cope without it? And why the hell are major coroporations allowed to rape our environment of its natural resources? Why why why do people take the ostrich approach? Why the heck aren't people interested in growing their own food and preserving the environment. Yes I am a hypocrite because we don't grow a lot, so fucking shoot me. I'm working on it.

-Remembering what it's like for me to be so indecisive. Two weeks ago we looked at a block up the bush, 16 acres of rainforest, with 2 cleared acres for offers over 50K. Sounded great until we realised we could only borrow 120K to build with. I don't think 120K is going to build us much, especially when the land needs to be levelled and yadda yadda.
Then not a week later we are looking at a house in 'the city' (far from it, but the cloest to the city out here) and we put in an offer that got rejected. The idea was that with fuel prices rising, it owuld be a good idea to be close to work, and all other amenities.
And well, now I have no bloody idea what I want to do. I change my mind daily, sometimes hourly, and always come up with these great plans, until I realise for some reason why they won't work out.

What the heck do I do next?

Things I have realised

Things that I have learnt or realised this week.

(Today) I am missing out on my kids life. Something has to give, at the moment it's study. I'm deferring on Monday.

(Earlier this week) Just because spawn of the devil is 18 months old doesn't mean he will sleep through the night. And don't think that clinging onto age milestones helps. It doesn't.

That you learn to function on broken sleep, you don't get used to it.

That I am damn proud of me and Craig for not having killed each other due to the stress devil spawn has put on our relationship.

That stacking grocery shelves really sucks and is a mental drain on my few remaining brain cells.

That being a parent isn't as fun as it looks in the movies.

That money sucks, and as soon as we get our shit together I'm not working OR studying. I am going to be a SAHM and enjoy my kids before they are boisterous teenagers and I cannot remember a single thing about their childhood.

ALthough I do realise being a SAHM will bore me to tears, but it will be nice to have play dates, and be able to go to playgroup, and do some cooking and have some actual leisure time. My life feels like it's ALWAYS on fast forward and that sucks.

That I LOVE my new front loader Miele. Yes I paid $2000 for a washing machine, but the thing it so awesome I could breed with it! It uses like 52 litres of water instead of the 122 my old one uses. Can we say WOW. Can you imagine the difference that is going to make to our water usage?

That living in the fast lane isn't for me. I need to knock my life back to simple. Those changes are starting now. They will be small, so small an outsider wouldn't notice them, but I think they will make me happy.