Disney Love

Have you all seen the outfits inspired by Disney characters that have been flying around? They've been all over Pinterest and I soooooo love them! They're from Disney Bound and I could spend hours and spend millions if I wasn't in the middle of my 'I've got no money because of Christmas and the Boxing Day sales' phase I seem to go through every year! These are my favourites (so far):

Aren't they fabulous?! I want to go shopping but my purse seems to be empty. Sigh.

Much Love Monday - A crisp, new page.

I love the feeling at the start of a New Year. That feeling of being able to start again. It seems to be a fairly common theme that 2011 pretty much sucked for a lot of people. Family, friends, fellow bloggers... I've seen and heard so many comments along the lines of 'Well, thank God THAT's over. Moving on!'. 2011 was a hard one for me and Baby Boo. A lot of sadness, a lot of upheaval, a lot of readjusting. I'm glad it's over but I won't forget what I learned from it. Here's to a fresh start and a crisp, new page.

Via

Happy New Year (Resolution Time).

Happy New Year (nearly) and a very Merry Christmas to everyone! Giddy goodness. I done it again. Huge gap in posts. Ah, well, nearly New Year is as good a time as any to get this wee baby up and running again and it's also resolution time. I'm pants at keeping them so this year I thought long and hard about how I could make things a bit easier for myself. None of this 'win the lottery' or 'build a house from egg boxes' for me. I can't cope with the pressure and then the failure. I thought about the things that annoy me about myself or things that I really wish I was better at and the things I love and came up with this list:

1.  I'm an avid crocheter but I am CRAP at finishing projects. I get half way through, lose interest and move on the the 'next big thing', which also gets abandoned half way through.

2. I would rather eat my own foot than have to turn the oven on. I live off cereal, pasta and pitta breads stuffed with cheese and salad.

3. I've been an Irish Dancer since long before the Riverdance made it fashionable. I started when I was about 7 and stopped at 15. Started again at 21 and stopped about a year and a half ago.

4. I have a massive aversion to getting out of bed in the morning, hit snooze a good 3 times and end up leaving myself with approximately 3 minutes and 28 seconds to wash, dress, eat and get to work.

5. I love this blog but feel so overwhelmed at the quality of all the other blogs I read that I abandon it on a regular basis, convinced I'm boring, crap, never going to match up blah blah.

So, to this end - here be my New Year's Resolutions. Ta-daaah!

1. Started something? Finish it. Stop thinking the next project will be waaaay better than the thing you're half way through. Imagine the pleasure of actually having a finished item that you made.

2. Ok, so you hate cooking. And you're not overly bothered about food to be honest. Start simple. A few ingredients, a small amount of prep and cooking time et voila! A meal that doesn't come out of a cereal box! Make it colourful. Everything looks more appealing when it looks like a big ole rainbow.

3. Dance. You love it, it makes you smile, keeps you fit and gives you knock out legs. Find a local class and get stuck back in.

4. Willpower. That's what is needed here. Think about how you feel in the morning when you are hopping round the room, one leg in your combats, toothbrush in mouth and trying to get your hair up and boots on all at the same time. It sucks. You feel stressed. Make time for a slow start to the day.

5. Sod everyone else. This is your blog. Stop worrying and comparing and just enjoy it. Get rid of the self-induced pressure and write what feels good. Who's going to die because your blog isn't the best in the world? Hmm?

You know what..... I actually think I can do this.... Hurrah for 2012!

Pinterest

Fear - We all have it.

The lovely Ashley over at Eisy Morgan has recently set up a wee blogging therapy group - a chance for us to all have a little chat about the things that cause us pain and worry and, maybe, to feel a little release after doing so. The prompt for today's session was 'Fear' and I felt an IMMEDIATE need to start clacking away at the keyboard. I'm not one for discussing anything vaguely emotional both in my life or on my blog and the main reason for this.... ? Fear. Fear of being judged, fear of saying too much, fear of making myself vulnerable. I was recently diagnosed with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and GAD (Generalised Anxiety Disorder) both of which have completely taken over my life. I worry ALL the time about EVERYTHING. I worry that I'm not a good enough Mum but I'm too scared to talk to anyone about it. I worry that I'm failing as a soldier, that I'm weak for not being able to cope with the things I've seen and experienced but to highlight these worries to my bosses? What if they think less of me? What if, what if, what if. My biggest fear? Failure.

Via

Over the last year I have become increasingly more isolated. I stopped eating, sleeping, socialising or leaving the house unless I absolutely had to. I worried people would stare at me in the shops, that I am constantly being judged and falling short. I worry that my blog is crap, that I talk crap and no one gives a shit about my crap. I worry that my clothes aren't up to scratch, that my hair will get laughed at, that if do make an effort people will think I've tried to hard. I worry that I'll never be as fit as I want to be, as slim as I want to be, that I'll never get to travel out of combats , that I may never get a full night's sleep again. I worry that I'll be single forever, that no one could possibly love me, that I am just too much like hard work. I worry. Constantly. And those worries turn in to fear that gnaws away at my stomach and stop me from enjoying just about anything.

I've recently started a long course of therapy and medication and I'm already much better than I was this time last year (when I was pretending everything was ok). And if there's one thing I've learnt it's that this fear has taken over my life. I'm being taught to ask myself 'What's the worst that can happen?' and this ranges from anything as trivial as 'if I wear a nice dress to the shops' to 'if I tell my boss when I'm having a really bad day'. This fear has stopped me from getting out and about with my wee one, from joining a climbing group, from going for the promotion I wanted. My therapist also makes me highlight the things I already CAN do even though I worry I'm not doing them well enough. For example I wear a UK size 10 and I'm 5ft 6. If I wore a smaller size I'd probably look ill so why do I think I need to be slimmer? I can outrun most of the boys I work with because I do phys every day. One because I like to work out and two because it stabilises my anxiety. So why did I think I need to be fitter? Who do I want to be fitter than? Everyone? No one.

The best thing I've learnt is to take each fear, problem and worry and break it down into bitesize chunks and then to deal with each little mouthful separately. And also to look at the bigger picture as highlighted above. I am slim, I am fit and my daughter is outgoing, happy, smiley and bright so I must be doing something right. It's just remembering to remind myself of this stuff EVERDAY so I don't lose focus. I still have much to work on but I'm gritting my teeth and getting stuck in. It's exhausting, painful and slow but I feel a little bit more like me each week so the struggle has GOT to be worth it.

Via

Wow. Did I ever need to get that out in the open. Thanks for listening.

Linking to....

Much Love Monday

What a funny old day. Both Baby Boo and I woke up this morning with the very definite feeling that we didn't want to get out of our pyjamas. So we didn't. We read books, made a mess with some paint, took silly photos, ate chocolate and drank sweet, milky tea.

Via

Sometimes you just need to recharge those batteries. Bliss.

And she's back!

Ok, so that was a bit of a break but I needed it. The whole negativity thing really got to me but I know I'm not alone in feeling this way so, today, I thought 'sod it!'. I'm just going to do my thing and let everybody else do theirs.

So, what have I up been up to? Lots of crafty stuff mainly. I'm currently in the process of working on my own version of this scarf after seeing it, dribbling, then bawking at the price. I mean, really?!

You can't really see it in the pictures but the black wool has little sparkly bits all the way through and I love it so much! I'm a sucker for glitter. There's a bit of a neon theme throughout too because I spotted some neon wool on eBay and just could. not. resist. despite promising I'd not buy any more yarny stuff until I'd worked my way through my current stash. Whoopsie.

Anyways, good to be back and I hope everyone is ok. Muchos hugs from this here girl.

I'm about to rant...

For the most part I love blogging and I super love reading blogs but sometimes I see things that make me go a bit red and misty. One of the things really gripping me at the moment is the constant argument over whether we should be able to share other pictures, tutorials, ideas from other people's blogs. I think this depends on the content. And the re-poster's intent. There's a fairly large divide between sharing a tutorial with your readers and, say posting up a tutorial and claiming it as your own. There's a definite right and wrong there and I think most of us have enough integrity and intelligence to know the difference. I'm well aware that there are some that don't but I do think they are in the minority. I rarely see pictures around the blogosphere that don't link back to the original source or at least give credit to the owner.

I recently saw a blog post from someone who is upset about someone 'taking' her pictures and pinning them to Pinterest despite the fact that they gave full credit and when you clicked on the pics they sent you straight back to her blog. I don't see how this is taking?! Pinterest for me in an online scrapbook and saves me hours of printing off, cutting and sticking but I'm wondering if going back to my old methods might be less agro. And what about if I see something I love and stick it on my desktop to show my Mum? Is that allowed? What makes me laugh is that the biggest culprits are often the ones that constantly hold giveaways, sell ad space and sponsorship and are constantly trying to draw in more readers. You'd think they'd be kind of pleased and flattered that people are promoting the good things they do at no cost to them, surely? Or am I totally wrong here?

I also have a big problem with people that write shitty posts and then use a bad day, week, month as the reason behind it. This, to me, is akin to texting when drunk. I have had some bloody awful days recently but did any of you lot know how awful? No, because I don't feel this is the place to air my dirty washing. I pick up the phone for a good whinge. I don't hit out at the lovely people that take the time and effort to read my rambling (that would be you gorgeous lot) so to drop a shit bomb every time I feel a bit crap.... not fair, really is it?

When I use images in my blog I credit them. If I can't, I put a shout out to anyone that might know the original source and I never claim them as my own. Same with tutorials. If I had to write and get permission from everyone whose pictures I use I'd never have time to blog.... or hoover.... or sew.... or crochet. It's all got a bit silly really. There's a severe case of Princess-itus going round if you ask me. Not that you did. Just saying.

End of rant.

Cartoon by Cox and Forkum