I don’t make resolutions, I feel like a failure when I steer off track or when resolutions aren’t accomplished. I sort of have general guide lines on what I want to concentrate on. But the start of this year for me has been completely daunting and generally filled with negativity.

(Loading Artist)

So what’s weighing heavily on my mind?

My casual retail job at the hardware store pretty much sucks. The income is nice and I have been using it for good (paying off debt, putting it into savings and purchased my car in cash) but the environment there is toxic and breeds stress. I know, every job has awful managers and customers but this place has got to be one of the most unorganised places I’ve ever worked for, and I’ve had a few retail jobs in my time. They are forever mucking up my pay, rostering me on for a shift and not telling me about said shift (after I have checked my roster) so I accidentally don’t show up and then get into trouble for it. There are too many power-tripping managers and not enough workers. It’s a very depressing place to work for. I have made a few friends whom I adore, but my anxiety has been through the roof since working there. I had my first panic attack in nearly a year because of that place.

All I want to do is quit, but then I will feel like a failure (again). I fantasise being Ari Gold the day I throw in the towel and paint-ball certain people before I leave.

For now, I am continuing to work there, as much as I hate it because I know it’s helping financially. I am looking for another job, but then that just brings up a whole new area of emotions and feelings (26, still working retail, not really having a clear career path etc).

My father-in-law in very ill. He was admitted to hospital over the weekend as his cancer is back. It’s eating through his bones at the moment. I feel like I’m reliving the episode of my Nan’s cancer again. I don’t really want to go into too much detail about this as it’s still fresh and I’m still deciding how I’m going to cope with this.

Our property has had loads of enquiries but it looks like we may sell below the original amount we were after. That place holds so much emotional baggage and I just want to get rid of it. I know once it sells it will free Jesse and I up financially as it is a huge money sink but a part of me still lives there. It was our first home together.

I feel like I’m coping a bit better now with all of this than I would have two years ago, but most days I just feel numb.

Because I get annoyed at how unrealistic and fake some photos seem on other blogs, here’s a selfie of me taken about a year or so ago. Completely lost.

Looking at the photo above, I really miss photography. When I get into these down periods I have zero motivation. It’s hard enough to get myself out of bed in the morning but to take photo’s is something else. I’ve never really thought of myself as a “photographer” but it’s something I’ve always been interested in. Since I haven’t really done anything with any art form since I was 18 and in high school I think this is something I should keep doing, as it seems to be a positive outlet for me.

I have been going to a gym regularly for the past few weeks now and I’m really enjoying it. I have goals and would like to eventually work up to lifting free weights. I usually spend an hour three times a week doing interval cardio work and strength/core exercises on the machines. Once a week I’ve been attending a Yoga class. After my first Yoga class, I felt muscles that I never knew existed. I’ll keep you all updated with this progress as I’m finding it extremely positive so far.

I’ve been contemplating starting up the eBay shop again. I’ve started selling a few second-hand clothes that I don’t like/don’t fit but I really miss op-shopping. Out of everything I’ve tried in my life, selling online has always been a source of happiness for me and I think I will continue this in my spare time. It’s my dream to be a self-sustaining individual and to have something I can call mine would just be everything I could I ever want. Really.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend, I apologise for such a dreary blog post but I just needed to get it out somewhere.

Christmas day was spent between houses, my Pop’s house and our house here with Jesse’s parents. We ate, ate some more and ate again. Then we opened gifts.

I was expecting my Christmas day to feel like a sweltering hot bowl of chilli fries like it is every year in Australia. Picture this paradise:

(Tropical Wallpapers)

Yeah, it’s beautiful isn’t it. But that’s not what my part of Australia looked like Christmas day. It looked like this:

It just rained and rained and rained some more. My in-laws were adamant about eating outside which led to hundreds of mosquito bites. I’m still scratching them weeks later. But it wasn’t all rain and gloom. We did have ham. Mmmmmmmm, ham.

And some salmon, eggs and other fancy shmancy breakfasty goods.

Jesse’s Nan, brother and girlfriend made the trip over and we all opened gifts in the living room. Good times.

Jesse surprised me with a new gaming headset.

My bestie Shannon knows exactly what I love; an Avengers photo frame with us being geeks.

She also got me this wonderfully blasphemous Christmas card which I completely adore!

I bought myself some beautiful stud earrings from an Etsy shop, Misty Aurora and my good  friend Manda made me some bracelets (you can buy your own via her Facebook page: By Amanda).

I got to see my sister on Boxing day which I enjoyed, although I was still hung over from an extremely intense food coma.

My New Years Eve was spent drinking way too many mojitos and enjoying the company of friends. I realised I was getting too old when I started to fall asleep by 11:45pm.

I’m not the type of person to make New Years Resolutions because I just don’t do them. I get overwhelmed and start feeling like a failure if I’m not accomplishing them, but I have general goals that I’d like to keep truckin’ along to. I did however accomplish a fair bit in 2012; I got my license, purchased a second hand car, paid off some debt, started photographing a bit more and talked more openly about living with depression and anxiety. They were all milestones for me progressively since I spent 2011 in limbo (I had quit work/university and was at the peak of my depression).

I think this year I just want to keep personally progressing; I want to take more photos and express myself a bit more, I want to enjoy a healthier lifestyle and exercise routinely and I want to continue having fun and enjoying new experiences.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Years!

She was a 26th birthday present from Jesse, his parents and my parents. I was quite flabbergasted when they suggested a bike for my birthday. I had been looking around on eBay for a bike but there seemed to be none that I liked or they were too far away from me. I had always wanted a vintage-style bike but the thought of spending $500+ always deterred me. I know they’re trendy but jeez.

After much researching I found a great Australian bicycle shop called Reid Cycles that I originally stumbled upon on eBay. They sell all types of bikes, including the vintage styled ones for reasonable prices and they ship.

I went with a black 6-speed vintage bike for $260 and it came with a free bike kit which included a lock, a pump, a light and something else (cannot remember off the top of my head). It came in a box which was already partially assembled.

It was a -little- difficult to put together as it didn’t come with instructions and Jesse and I are total newbs when it comes to building bikes. But we got there in the end. After taking her for a test ride, I ended up having to take the mud-flaps off from the front and rear tyres as every time I went over a bump the whole thing sounded like it was about to fall apart underneath me.

I have no idea why I look so unimpressed in this photo. I should be looking totally happy that I have a new bike.

And this is me WEARING MY HELMET because it seems every photo on the internet is of a girl riding her bike without a helmet. (seriously, my helmet was only $35 and it looks pretty bangin’)

If you live in Australia and are looking for affordable bikes I can’t recommend Reid Cycles enough. Great price, delivered really quickly and a free bike kit. I love me some free stuffs.

So far I’ve taken her on a few trips, usually 30 minutes at a time around my neighbourhood. There are a few bike tracks around here that I’d love to try (although my fitness level at the moment is dreading them).

Most kick ass present ever. And here’s a kick ass song that I played for about a week when I got her. Have a super duper weekend guys.

I wasn’t paid or perked to promote this business. They don’t even know who I am :P I’m just generally happy with my birthday present and thought I’d share the word of a  great company.

Growing up, Christmas was always something I looked forward to. My family never had much money, but every Christmas my sister and I would always receive one major gift, or sometimes one major gift to share between us. Looking back financially, it would have taken my Mum and Dad most of the year to save or pay for those gifts. In ’98 my sister and I were lucky enough to receive a Playstation 1 and Spyro the Dragon. I vividly remember Emma and I meeting up in the living room at around 4am, quietly picking up our wrapped gifts and trying to wait patiently for Mum and Dad to wake up. By 4:30am we had woken them up, unwrapped our gifts and asked Dad to set up the Playstation. By 5am they were back in bed, and Emma and I played Playstation all morning. It was the best thing ever.

Man, that Santa sure does look a bit grumpy in the first photo, doesn’t he? Emma always hated Santa, she was completely frightened by him. In ’95 we had to pretend Santa was leaving so Emma would calm down and have her photo taken in his chair. What she didn’t know was that he crept back in and photo bombed. She wasn’t impressed.

Because of all this Christmas nostalgia, I wanted to put together a list of toys I received growing up. These were the stand out things for me, the things I waited for all year or the things that gave me countless hours of fun!

Plastic Dinosaurs (or plastic anything, really)

(Culpitt)

They still sell these plastic dinosaurs/farm animals/soldiers. Seriously, they are like $10 for a set of 200 pieces! I remember getting 2 – 3 every so often to add to my dinosaur collection. I would spend HOURS in my bedroom marrying Mr Stegosaurus to Miss Triceratops. My Nan even let me dig a hole in her garden so I could use it as a “watering hole” for them (the garden was their jungle). Most inexpensive things ever, yet a whole world of imaginative possibilities.

Game Boy Black & White

(Retrospektive)

When I opened this my parents forgot the batteries. I remember them frantically running around the house looking for some. After what seemed an ETERNITY we found some and I seriously played all day. Pokemon Yellow was my first game and pretty much the only game I ever played. This was hands down one of the best gifts I ever received. I adored Pokemon and being able to be a trainer and collect cute Pokemon wherever I wanted was just too amazing.
And just for the lol’s, here’s the original 8-bit music that’s ingrained into my mind for all of time.

Spice Girls Merchandise

(L – El Nico Po R – Pop Culture Perversion)

COLOURS OF THE WORLD! SPICE UP YA LIFE! EVERY BOY AND EVERY GIRL! SPICE UP YA LIFE!
Ok, no more caps. I was completely involved with the Spice Girls (I think everyone was at some stage) and opening up not only a Spice Doll (Sporty to be exact) BUT Spice World the movie on VHS too? I remember thinking I never needed anything else in my life. Before I had the movie on VHS, I would hire it nearly every weekend from the video shop. My Nan would give me $2, I’d hire it for 3 days, watch it over and over and over then return it before school started the following week. My Nan and I could recite every single line from the movie. Obsessed isn’t a strong enough word for this.
I still watch Spice World the movie. I love it. I’m also listening to the Spice Girls right now. ~no shame~

Tamagotchi

(Pop2k)

How hi-tech were these things? I thought they were the absolute bee’s knees way back then. I think I started off with receiving a rip-off “My Dinosaur” (the dinosaur obsession continues) for Christmas one year. I ended up letting my friend “baby-sit” it, she lost it and I got another for Christmas the following year. These were eventually banned at school because every few minutes one of the many 30 or so Tamagotchi’s in class would start beeping for food or to be played with or for their poop to be cleaned up and I think most teacher’s just wanted to throw them out the window. I remember teaching my Mum and Nan to look after mine for me while I was at school. Suffice to say, I always came home to unhappy and/or dead virtual pets.

Whatever This 90′s Art Supply Case Is Called

(The 90s Life)

Every year, Santa would always leave me a few gifts that would benefit me in the next school year. Socks, underwear, school books, and sometimes pretty awesome art supplies. This was one of those pretty awesome art supplies. I have an insanely strong memory of receiving this. I was so excited by this monster art supply book that I accidentally stapled my thumb. Yeah, I have no idea. It was about 5am in the morning (I’m starting to realise Emma and I never let our parents sleep in on Christmas Day) and it was still a bit dark, I was fiddling around with everything and I somehow managed to staple my thumb. Mum had to dig it out with a knife. Good times.

Gak aka The Messiest Shit You Could Ever Buy A Kid

(Masshole Mommy)

I’m fairly sure my Dad used to make this at the factory he worked at when I was a kid, I’m not 100% sure though. All I remember is getting tonnes of this stuff for Christmas. It was gooey, it was slimy and it was so. much. fun. I had a habit of mixing all the colours together as I thought I could create beautiful, rainbow Gak but it always turned out to be a nasty brown mess. My parents ended up having to put my Gak up high out of reach as it conveniently seemed to always be underneath me (on carpet) when I threw one of these bad boys:

Sea Monkies

(The Nostalgia Kick)

I think this was one of those really anti-climatic gifts. I’m also fairly certain I wanted fish but my parents weren’t too keen on that idea so they got me the next best thing; Sea Monkies. I was happy either way, but I was looking forward to big dreams of instant pets from a sachet growing into monstrous creatures. Those dreams fell short when they only grew to a few millimetres. As much as I looked after my little sea monkies, they didn’t last that long. My younger self had no idea that leaving their plastic enclosure on a window sill during a blazing hot 40°C day would boil them. R.I.P. sea monkies.

Goosebumps Books

(You Remember That)

Nearly every year I received Goosebumps books to add to my growing collection.  I loved these books so much, I read and re-read them and read them again. I remember not being scared of the books, but the TV Series they made freaked me out a little in some episodes. These books were some of my best memories, gifts that just kept on giving.
On a side note, I’ve been looking at buying the original Goosebumps again from eBay and second hand shops. I’m not sure if now is the best time to do that though, since I have barely enough space here as it is.

Because it is absolutely necessary to take a photo with my phone and show the world how much of a hipster I am shopping.
I didn’t actually buy this Rex toy (okay, so I’m thinking I might not be over this dinosaur obsession?) but I’m sure my inner-child would have loved it.

I always immensely appreciated anything I ever received growing up. Money was always tight back then, but for one day a year my sister, my parents and my grandparents all got together and really enjoyed ourselves, regardless of what was happening in their lives. Christmas Day was spent getting and giving, eating and cleaning up, laughing and sleeping (after the 4am, 5am, 6am wake-up’s my parents had with us, who can blame them for napping through the day? love ya Mum and Dad) and watching Christmas specials on TV.

Can you remember any stand out gifts you received for Christmas when you were a kid?

Look at that sexy car in all its glory. Yes friends, this is my bangin’ new car. I’m 26 years old and only just purchased my first car. It’s been a long, exhausting and emotional journey to getting my license and I was lucky enough to find this car only a week after getting my license.

Jesse saw someone selling this Mitsubishi Magna on the side of the road near our house. He was selling it for $2,500 and wanted it gone asap as he just bought his wife a new car. There is nothing majorly wrong with it, except for the extensive hail damage.

Yeah, he’s a bit on the ugly side but it never even crossed my mind. He fit perfectly into my budget, he works and he’s safe to drive. I have plenty of room on the inside too, and it comes with modern comforts such as air conditioning (which I have used A TONNE since Australia has had ridiculous heat waves lately), power steering and central locking.

We ended up taking him (it’s a he, I’ve named him Ronald) for a test drive and ended up offering the seller $2,000 in cash that day. He took it and the car was mine!

Since I purchased it I’ve bought 4 new tyres for him, got new brake pads, a wheel alignment and fixed a minor oil leak and installed a cheapy CD player that I can plug my iPod into. He came with registration until July next year too, so that was also a bonus!

My original budget for a car of my own was between $2,000 – $3,000, in cash. I wanted to own in out right, no car loan or debt. This is the break down of expenses for Ronald:

$2,000 – Car (talked down from $2,500)
$352 – Four new tyres (Jesse’s parents gifted me $180 as an early Christmas present to go towards 2 tyres)
$60 – Stamp duty and changing ownership of the car with the RTA
$450 – New brake pads, wheel alignment and fixing a minor oil leak
$280 – Third Party insurance for one year
$157 – Join NRMA road side assistance ($55 once off joining fee, $102 renewal every year)
$148 – CD player & installation
~ $3,447 total amount spent

So it’s all good to go until I have to pay for registration next July.

I’ve already mounted a curb with Ronald (oops) but I’m slowly getting used to him and driving in general. I’m happy that I have a newish-oldish car to continue to learn in. The last thing I wanted was a shiny, brand new car that I might potentially ding up and mount more curbs in. It gets me to work and home safely, and I get to zip around to the store and back, and I’m happy with that.