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 |  is paved with good intentions... |
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** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Hi, I'm Elle. I'm based in Auckland, New Zealand. I'm the mother of two young adults, the wife of an entrepreneurial gamer and the Queen of Unfinished Projects. This blog will contain poems, short stories, possibly photos and book reviews if you're lucky, and my thoughts on a variety of topics. Hope you enjoy it. |
[Embed For Use By Upgraded+] There are all sorts of things that I should probably be worrying about and working on. My life is far from perfect. And yet, today I feel happy. Sickeningly optimistic. Cheerful. All those terribly upbeat words.  Tonight we have drinks after work. I have to pop out at some stage and buy nibbles (cheese, crackers, chips, etc.) at the boss's request. Tomorrow night we're going to Spooks and Sparks, which is an annual fireworks display for Guy Fawkes, where all the kids dress up for Halloween. Yep, we just combine the two. We've been going every year for a few years now (six years?) and we love it. The fireworks are the biggest display in NZ each year, and it's half an hour of non-stop epic fireworks and it's all set to music. One year it was Katy Perry, one year it was Queen, one year it was ACDC and Guns N Roses. Brilliant. And even better, everyone in my little family enjoys it, even Jayden. It's so rare to have anything that we all enjoy these days, so I make the most of it when I find something.On Sunday, hopefully, I'll be catching up with my mum and elder sister to do some photographing. Not sure if we'll go to Western Springs or not, but we'll go somewhere. That's the plan. We're going to try and get together for photography outings more often now that the weather has improved. I love summer.  Are we officially in summer now, or still in spring? Ah, who cares? The sun is shining, that's the main thing.I was typing up an 'index' to my WDC portfolio and realised I haven't written a short story since 2017.  I read back through some of my work though. I actually really enjoying reading my own short stories. If "Invalid Entry"  was a book, I'd have bought it already. I really wanna read that! But I haven't written it yet.  I should see if I can write some more of it. I literally have no idea about what happens next, it was just a scene, but I love it. I don't care whether anyone else thinks it's good or not, I really enjoyed re-reading it.We're making plans for Christmas. Our neighbours asked us whether we were hosting Christmas dinner again, so we checked in with family, and the answer is yes. So Christmas dinner at our place, with the neighbours, my dad and probably Steve's parents. Then on Boxing Day we'll spend the day at Steve's parents' house with his extended family and my mother and elder sister. Will be lovely. Last weekend my in-laws taught me how to play Canasta and Samba. We had such a great night. It was Steve and his mum versus me and his dad, and my team led for most of the night although if I remember rightly, they beat us right at the end. It was so fun. The wine may have helped, but still... We were just using regular playing cards and his mum was saying that they wanted to get a proper Samba deck and card-holders like her brother had. So I ordered the Samba deck, some card-holders and a battery operated automatic card shuffling machine. Christmas sorted! I said to Steve we should add some wine, cheese and crackers, and call it 'everything you need for a great night of Samba'. I can't think of anything else to throw in there.I thought of doing a gift basket/box for Jayden too. So far I have bought him some shirts (I think I bought six) and a novel. I thought about buying him a bunch of the grocery items that he really likes and making up a big box of food for him. He's supposed to be buying his own food now, so I thought he'd appreciate that. So far I've thought of adding:  fresh tomatoes (he loves these, but obviously I can't buy them too far in advance) fresh apples some meat pies (which will have to go in the freezer) some Coco Pops breakfast cereal tinned baked beans tinned spaghetti tinned tuna (sundried tomato flavour) tinned tomatoes (various flavours) tortellini (tomato and basil flavour) (these don't need refrigeration) canned pumpkin soup canned tomato soup Eclipse spearmint breath mints corn chips dried seaweed snacks Mother Earth baked oaty slices (afghan flavour)I've bought Caitie a plane ticket to go and stay with Steve's biological father and step-mother in Brisbane, Australia, which she doesn't know about yet. That's her main Christmas present. I may also get her some blank sketch books or sketch pads, and I'm thinking about buying her a new school bag. I'll have to be careful not to go overboard as her plane ticket will outweigh most of what I've got Jayden and I do try to keep it fairly even. I want to get Jayden some more books, but I have made the mistake before of buying him books he already owns.  I've asked him to let me know which ones he has where he needs the next one in the series, so hopefully I can get him some that he actually wants that way.I've bought Steve a Scanpan knife set, which he will LOVE. Caitie went halves with me. He also needs some more cologne but if I buy him both he'll tell me off for spending too much. Maybe the cologne can be a birthday present in March.I have some scorched almonds for my Dad for Christmas (I give him these for every birthday and Christmas, with or without an additional present) but that side of the family aren't exchanging gifts this year so nothing else for them. I did buy some stuff, but I'll just give it all to my elder sister for her birthday in November. She'll be happy with that, and I know Mum will end up making use of it too since they share everything. My little sister's birthday is in January and I don't have any ideas for her yet. Will have to get thinking!! And I still need to plan what I want to do for my 40th. I really just wanna put on an epic playlist and dance all night, but I'm not sure that will work at my house. And I'm not sure enough people would come (I really don't have that many IRL friends!) to bother having it somewhere else. I could have it at the pavilion near my mum's house. That's quite a reasonable rent (I think it's $150) and her neighbours would join in and make up numbers and have fun. It's an hour away from me though, and might put off the few friends who may have otherwise come. Hmm.. I need to make a decision soon. The more notice people have, the more likely I'll get some people coming along. I'm leaning towards doing it at the pavilion. Maybe I can talk more with Mum when I see her this weekend. Can we really turn the music up? I want it loud. I want it like we've gone to a nightclub where the DJ only plays Elle's favourite songs, and just dance. Doesn't that sound awesome? I need to start putting together a playlist. *rubs hands together with glee* Let's face it, making up the playlist is half the fun. |
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