Iberian Adventure - Part One

Day 1 & 2
We made it! Two long flights and 2 short ones, and we are in Madrid. Simon managed to sleep a little on the flights, and I managed maybe 2 hours at most... seems that I prefer lying down when I sleep. Our 6 hour stay in the Singapore airport was pretty cool. There is a beautiful little butterfly garden... so cool, er rather hot and humid, but really pretty, and some carnivorous plants.
Once we got to Madrid we jumped on the Subway and made it to our hostel... a little bit of a feat, our instructions only said that it was a 3 min walk from the station... but no clues for direction. (Turned on the data roaming for this... sorry Dad!) After a little nap, we headed  out in search of food which was an awesome little experience, very friendly service... the opposite of what we were told to expect from the Spanish. Delicious food, and even better Sangria. Free shots when we paid too, tasty bonus.

Butterfly garden

Butterfly garden at Changi Airport, Singapore

Day 3
A nice early start after a strange sleep, the room was hot, and there was continuous noise out the window, Spanish people apparently party in the streets all night.  They were just quietening down as we got up, at 6:30am!!
We jumped on the bus for a short 2 hour drive from Madrid to Cordoba and I immediately felt sick, worst motion sickness I can remember having... and I get it a lot. I had forgotten to move my anti-nausea meds from my pack to my carry on bag... not good. I tried moving up to the front of the bus, and took some anti-naus another girl gave me... worked a gem, woke up from a short nap feeling so much better.
We had a gorgeous little walk about in Cordoba, hunted for an ATM and finally found one that wanted to give us Euros. We also visited an amazing building, the Mezquita, which was originally a mosque, but the Christians deconstructed the guts of the building and built a cathedral inside of the mosque. The only building that is both a mosque and a cathedral.
Then we travelled onto Seville, a pretty city with a lot of history.  After a quick dip in the rooftop pool of the hostel we went on a guided walking tour of the central city. Really cool, a real eclectic mix of so many cultures, from a span of several periods. Thankfully it was later in the day, and was cooler because of the breeze at about 35C, apparently the group the week before were doing it in 42C heat!
Later on we ventured out (around the corner) to a tapas bar where we enjoyed Dogfish, Bull tail and pork fillet.  Then cheap drinks at a bar a few doors further down.

Cordoba cathedral pillars and arches

Bridge into Cordoba

Seville building of many different architectural styles

Cordoba cathedral ceiling

Day 4
We woke up from a good sleep, and headed out to check out the inside of the Cathedral (free entry on Sunday for mass) we were a little late... accidentally turned the wrong way, but still got in for a look around, Some parts were cordoned off, so we couldn't get close to Christopher Colombus' tomb -very impressive from the vantage point we had, but not good to get a photo, sadly.
Then back on the bus to head to Portugal. We are now in Lagos, after a little stop in a town called Silvas where there is a beautiful little castle, the last remaining in the Moorish style. The place we are staying at in Portugal is amazing, it's an apartment being rented out. We have our own room and ensuite, and the place has a pool in the back yard. There are 6 others from our tour group staying in the house too.

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Seville Cathedral

Lagos - Salmon for dinner

Out on the town in Lagos... party central

More stories to come!!

<3 Anita and Simon

Learning to be

Psalm 46:10
He says, “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.” 

These last few weeks have been a time of learning. Learning that there are times for different states of being. 
Learning that it is OK to take time, and just be. 
There are times to be busy, times to be still, times to be happy and times to be thankful. There are also times it's OK to have times of stress and being overwhelmed, and times for healing. Each moment is precious and to do nothing with a moment is OK, as that is a time of restoration and healing.

I now have a direction for this blog. I've been wanting for this to have cohesion, a link between each post.  It will now be about what has been, what I am being and what is going to be. I didn't want it to be aimless, and it felt that way til now. 

Tired

I know that tired is normal sometimes. Not enough sleep, working to hard, stress-filled lives. 
I know a lot of tired people. 
I am not normal tired. 
Mum says I always needed a bit more sleep than my brothers. In 2007 I had a week off placement with what at the time myself and my doctor thought was influenza. I felt really sick, so incredibly tired, and essentially a week long migraine. I didn't feel like myself the next week, but figured I wasn't contagious any more, and the doc had given me 5 days off with a med cert. So back to placement I went, plus work in the weekends. I felt so tired still, but was still functioning, I had to.
That's how it kept going until I finished my degree. That was tough. I just thought I wasn't good at studying, that I wasn't very focused. But I managed to finish. I passed that end exam. I qualified. I was plagued with headaches the whole time, panadol was a great friend.
Then I started working, doing a New Graduate programme. That was full time employment, 40 hours a week, plus study... oh yeah, and that's shift work.

That went OK for a little while. A few months. I was so tired. The headaches continued. I wasn't happy, I retreated from social life... and became a bit of a shell of myself. For those who know me, I can be a little quiet to begin with, but really I'm a very social creature. I thrive on social interaction, being around people energises me. I had my boyfriend, who then became my fiancé, and he was and still is fantastic. I had some tough personal stuff to deal with then, and it took a while to get through it. I also was struggling at work, not with work itself, that I was good with, my patients and their families were easy to deal with, I was learning tonnes, but some of the people in my work environment were making it a miserable place to be. I don't know what was going on for them, but it seemed to all be directed at me, and I was already weak. I  did not have the strength in my soul to deal with that at the time too.
I sought help, I saw a counsellor for a while, it helped me get some of my thoughts straightened out, and easier to see and cope with. I also cut back on my work hours to 32 hours a week. My days off I did nothing. The occasional coffee with a friend. Some wedding planning. Mostly I stayed in bed, slept a lot, and watched a LOT of Gilmore Girls. All of it in about 3 months.
I also saw an osteopath for the headaches, a bit of help there was amazing. The low grade headaches faded.
Slowly things got easier as I had our wedding to look forward to, I tried to focus on the good days at work. Started looking for the next job. There was other things to face along the way, but I got there. At the end of the New Graduate programme I eventually found a new position on another ward. They gave me a fresh start, another chance to prove myself. I'm still on that ward, and I'm good. I'm learning all the time. I'm a good nurse. I love going to work. I am friends with my colleagues. I'm still tired, but I am managing more. 
It has taken me a long time to accept that I am not well. Turns out that influenza isn't what I had. I had glandular fever (for those overseas, that's mono). A return visit to the doctor about the tiredness lead to a blood test for IgG, showing I had had the infection.
To add to that, I have always had bowels and a bladder that misbehave. There has been specialist, changes in diet, multitudes of different medicines, and not a whole lot of improvement. Another thing glandular fever gave me, is an increased intolerance to many normal foods. Symptoms became worse, and it was worse, but I didn't realise immediately. Last year I sought out help from a digestive health specialist, and am now avoiding foods that make it all worse (there are a lot), and trying to eat what won't exacerbate the problems (thankfully there is still a lot I can eat). I have what gets classed as IBS-C. It's a broad umbrella term, that encompasses the group of symptoms that aren't able to be identified by disorders such as Coeliacs and Crohns.
I am tired, and that it is OK. I don't totally accept it. I want to be able to do everything everyone else is doing. I don't want to miss out. I don't want to spend half my time sleeping. I will get my energy back, it won't happen overnight, and I do need to take care of myself.
I am trying to listen to my body more. Relax when I need to. Lately that has meant a nap in the afternoon/early evening for the last couple of weeks. The days I skip that I get overtired and grumpy, because there are things to be done, like cooking and dishes... and it drains my energy until I feel like I can barely get up off the couch.

 I try not to whinge and complain about this too much, in fact, I don't think a lot of my friends know this is something I struggle with. Things are getting better. I think. I hope.
I want to move forward, I want children some time in the next few years. I don't want this to hold me back. I don't want this is impact on my ability to be a mum either. The future is never certain, I know that, but it's still all a bit scary, but we'll tackle that when we get there.

I'll leave you with a few pictures of what's been happening in the last few weeks.

Drive home after night shift

Nails :)

Painted nails

Tea with a friend

Breakfast out, before going to the movies

New nephew Bede

<3 Anita

Feeling Guilty

I often feel guilty. For not being who I think I should be, not doing what I think I should do.
I feel like if I don't update the blog enough, or if dinner turns out inedible, or if the things I create people don't like and don't buy  I'm letting myself down, that I'm not good enough. It's a tricky trap. I think you need to want to better yourself, but I find myself constantly telling myself that even if I try, it still won't be good enough. I know it's silly and I should cut myself a bit of slack, I mean really, what's all the fuss? So what if nobody has bought anything from my store? I had fun making the stuff! I have a great life, a loving husband, a fantastic job, an awesome family, including a brand new nephew! I need to relax and enjoy it.
I don't know who reads my blog, if anyone, I can tell that a few people do by the page views (yay, go you!!), but I don't want to give you a boring blog that is all talk and no pictures. Then I think I should take more pictures (that's a tricky one when you aren't used to snapping pictures of everything, or the people around you aren't so keen on it either). I have to remember why I started blogging, I just want to record what I do, things I like, things happening around me, and there has been some pretty big stuff. So that's what I'm going to try to do. Just record. Blab a bit. And record what is happening in my little world.
In an attempt to cut myself some slack I have been trying to cut back on the blogs I read, and unsubscribing to the ones that I don't mind not reading. There are several that I absolutely love to catch up on (the links are at the end), but the rest are great, but I need to be selective, so my brain doesn't explode. I am also trying to cut back on the other self-imposed "necessities" I've thrown on my task list.
For now, what I need to do is go to bed, but I do have more to share, let's see if I manage to before work tomorrow. 

Anita xoxoxo

The blogs I love: SillyGrrl, Key to my Tart, Anna Saccone, The Golden Adventures of a Very Dark Horse, Bower Power

PicMonkey

Who else has played with PicMonkey? It's awesome!!

It's a brand new kid on the block. Some of the geniuses who were behind Picnik and a few others have banded together to bring us something even more awesome than Picnik. Sadly I never really used Picnik (I hadn't realised how good it was) until very recently, only to discover it was being discontinued, and some of it's features were moving across to Google+. Maybe this was Google's way of trying to get the general population over to Google+, but I don't see that happening. I also tried using the editing available through Google+'s (can you even use an apostrophe with a word that includes a symbol?) Creative Kit. I immediately hated it. It was not at all intuitive to use. It felt awkward to find, and some of the basic things I wanted to do, I just couldn't. Like save the image back to my computer. Not to say it wasn't possible, but I would have thought it should have been an easy find.
Anyway... getting back to PicMonkey, I'm sure you can already tell that I LOVE it! It's not hard. It is aesthetically wonderful. Intuitive to use. It has so many great features already, and they are adding (they added several new effects the other day, P.S. they rock!)

Here is a little show for you a few of the things you can do with PicMonkey:

Have fun playing! 
<3 Anita

The Hunger Games

Hurrah! I finished the book (and bet Simon to the end!). Now I'm really looking forward to watching the movie! Time for an outing.

I managed to do a big clean up of my wardrobe! Gave away a big bag full of clothes to my sister-in-law, the gorgeous thing. Another bag or two to be given away still. It was a whole suitcase full! That's only going through the drawers. Oh my. I had to do something, we are downsizing on space, we have had Simon's brother move in, good for our savings, good for the company... but steals a room full of space.

Also really need to start boxing/organising my crafting supplies. I'm tempted to photograph my progress and keep you updated. I am a little torn with this idea, because that would be showing off the total disarray that it is all currently in! Dear, oh dear.

<3 Anita

A Historic Home and a book

This last week was busy, but it's been good. Started off with a weekend day outing to Antonio Hall. I've been going through all my photos, and I have to say, on the whole, I'm pretty happy with them. I'm in the baby step stage of getting to know my camera. Trying to get my head around what setting will give me what look. Also now playing with PicMonkey, it's fantastic in my opinion. I started off in Photoshop for my intro to photo editing, but that was for restoration and small tweaks in a Photo Lab (pretty awesome job for a student, really).  But really, PhotoShop in all it's wonder is, well, a little overwhelming... and so is the price tag. So for a completely free, very easy to use service, PicMonkey rocks. It's from the same wonderful people who brought us Picnik, which is no longer available (as of the 19 of this month). 

Also, who's seen The Hunger Games? I haven't yet, but I will, as soon as I've read the book. I've just bought it. Paper Plus were doing a deal for March where you could get $5 off books for that month, I made the most of that, and bought one book! I don't read nearly as much as I used to.
<3 Anita

Some deep thinking... o.O

Over the last little while I have been thinking, if I wasn't a nurse, what would I be doing? I have joked about running away to join the circus... I mean, how awesome would it be to be able to do aerial ninja-ing like Sarah of the Weird Sisters? Or would I be like my mum and teach littlies? Or would I be completely clueless and not know what I wanted to do? I really haven't a clue. I do know that what ever I decided to do, I would want to be happy doing it.

I want to be a good wife. A good friend. When the time comes I want to be a good mum too. Scratch that, I want to be awesome at all of those.

Sometimes I don't feel like I'm doing a good job of either being a wife or a friend. I feel like I don't see my friends enough, and aren't available enough. But how do you quantify that? I always want to do better, and they say (don't you love They?) that there is always room for improvement, always room for better.

At the moment I am striving for better, in that I am trying to take better care of myself, get myself enough sleep, eat the foods that agree with me and avoid the ones that don't (sadly that seems like a big list at times).
I also want to have more gratitude. I take so much for granted.

What are you aiming for? Are you who you want to be? What's holding you back?

<3 Anita

Pinterest Challenge and a Ramble!!

I know we don't yet have many people following our little blog here, but maybe there are more lurking than I know about.
I do want to start doing a little challenge. The Pinterest Challenge set by the lovely Katie at Bower Power one of the great, inspiring blogs I follow. 

To be honest, I have had myself wondering who is going to read this. Who really wants to know all the nutso things that cross the mind of one person with no qualifications other than a Bachelor of Nursing? No photography quals, or a job as a make-up artist, hair stylist, interior designer. Not a mum, or a pet owner/lover. Just a young adult, newly married, with a few OCD tendencies, a knack for buying pretty things, a obsession with shoes and handbags. A girl who starts projects that seem like a great idea... but don't always finish them (read often not finished much to the dismay of her loved ones) A big user and lover of the internet and all the awesome it has to offer. So that has me wondering what to blog about. Sometimes I have ideas, then think that people don't want to read about that, or that another blog has done so much of a better job of it. Or what I have done isn't as big an flash as what other internetters have shown off. But now is the start of me not worrying (or rather trying not to) as this is my blog, my place to say my thing about anything. So that's what is coming up. Me. Rambling. Hehe.

To be honest, there are some exciting things coming up in the life of Anita. I am going on a big trip to Europe with Simon (that's my awesome husband), and that adventure will be blogged. I will give you photos, thoughts, and awesome tidbits of that joyride. Before that I will be attempting to get to know my beautiful camera intimately, so that I can be more confident with my photo snapping while we adventure. Plus so much more.

The shop over on Felt is an exciting thing too for me, and the friends I share that with. While as  yet I haven't sold anything I have crafted through that site, I wait hopeful that it will start to take off a little. I plan to (and really better) add more items to the store to entice people to peruse. 

I guess for now, this is a way to save Simon a little from my rambling, but a chance to challenge myself to do something new, try new thing... like the Pinterest Challenge, and keep a record of what is going on in my life. I never was too good at the diary idea, but I think that this is much more like me rambling to a friend (sometimes people reply!).

Hope a few people will join me along the way :D

For now I will be sharing things I have created, big and small, inspired or not by things seen, or pinned on Pinterest, or just by crazy ideas I've dreamed up. I'll share with you any major revelations about photography I learn. Whatever takes my fancy really. I will not always post pictures, I know they make posts more enticing for me to read, but not always. 

So this is what I am doing:

from the Bower Power Blog

Yeah, I know it's not winter here, but we will forgive those who live in the other hemisphere.

<3 Anita

Rainy Days

I LOVE rainy days! Even more when I am not working. Today is one of those glorious days. 

Don't read that wrong, I'm not particularly fond of being either wet or cold, and a really dislike a day that taunts me with drizzle (that's not at all fair to my hair). What do I love about a rainy, grey day? This:

Tights

Boots

The whole ensemble

Just delightful. I love this style.

<3 Anita

All photos sourced from Pinterest