Five Minute Friday= prompt word, five minutes, just write.
No overthinking, no over complicating.
This weeks prompt word: WAY
No way !!!!
Yes way
The first two words shout out big and bossy like they know all there is to know. Like they’ve decided and that’s all there is to it.
The second two are whispered but they’re determined, not easily put off, resilient, resourceful and they just might have a secret weapon up there sleeve.
I spend lot of my life trying to figure out a way to get a thing or two done around here. See when it comes to home projects it’s alway ALWAYS!! been a juggle of limitations of one or another. I’ll have plenty of one thing (ideas and hair brained schemes mostly) and a scarcity of another (money, time, expertise, teams of able bodied tradesmen). The size and shape of the limitation/s changes randomly. At the moment it’s mainly time. Now that I work full time I never seem to be home and being a homebody with a capitol H it presents all sorts of frustrations to my “have to have a project in the works” self. Seeing a few things done, making progress, keeping things fresh and moving adds enormously to my sense of well being. So not having a lot of time to do these things small or large, presents an ongoing challenge.
but I do like a challenge.
And there’s always a way.
There has to be a way.
(My five minutes ran out about here).
One way I’ve worked out to keep things moving along is to simply do smaller projects that don’t take much time. And when I say small, sometimes they’re minuscule. Ten minutes sometimes. Half an hour to an hour at most other times. Works the same way. Small project done = enormous satisfaction = sanity saved.
Here’s a sample.
I also worked out long ago that a good way to get something done, especially something big is to break it down into smaller parts. Twenty minutes concentrated effort on one thing in succession is my favourite.
But
I think I might have taken this idea to the next level just lately. You’ve heard of “death by a thousand cuts”. Well this is finished project by a thousand tiny goes at it.
I have a lovely set of French doors leading out to my back deck. Photos below you can see them in the background.
They were given us for free by a client in Kens painting days. They’ve been installed here now a good long while. They’re solid and beautiful but they need a really good sand and oil to make them sing. Famous last words those and who in their right mind wants to or has the time available to sand down a set of double French doors. I do apparently. I decided I couldn’t bare looking at the water stains, the rough edges and greasy finger marks any darn longer.
The only way I could think of that was remotely within my capabilities is to do one teeny tiny section at a time, and because sanding is horrid I decided five to ten minutes a day is the most I was prepared to do it. I’m up to day number five – it’s my weekday project – (the back fence is my weekend project). Just before I leave for work, I put a cloth down, sand for five to ten minutes, wash my hands and go to work.
I have accomplices. Other like minded people egging me on.
I’ll let you know how it turns out.
To read what other people have done with there five minutes click here.
I’d had the 31st of May fixed in my head for a couple of reasons. Olivia had an inter school soccer tournament on that day and I’d been wondering if I should take the day off to go and cheer her on. And having been plodding away writing this post through most of May in the cracks and crevices of my days – during my lunch break, in the car after work before the drive home, I’d set myself a 31st of May deadline to get it done already and published.
A few weeks along I’ve thought much about how quickly she went. The thought that keeps coming to mind is what an incredible kindness. She kept trying to stay, a little bit afraid of death, not wanting to leave us, still trying to do things and this epitomised her life – she was always always one to have a go, to keep at it, to do something, anything – even in this last little while when everything was failing her, her hands, her mind and her energy – she was still trying. This last year she often said to me “What am I still here for” with such frustration. And I’d say the one thing I could think of which was ” Well I’m glad your still here, and if your still here God has a reason.” I wonder now if it was that she didn’t know how to let go, how to stop trying, how to stop mothering and I wonder too if it was that we weren’t ready to let her go. And in the end we don’t decide, God does. Decision made for all of us. And what a kindness to her, what a relief not to have to stare death in the face and give in to the going but to just step through that flimsy veil and be gone to Him. These words I think He might have beckoned her with keep coming to me “Come on, its enough, lets be done with it”.
It’s been nice to write some words about her particularly today. Today is the 26th of June which would have been her 91st birthday.
Now I’ve always kept a diary of one sort or another to keep track of appointments and where we need to be but as I’ve flicked through diaries from years past there’s great expanses of blank pages with a few Doctors appointments, play dates and birthday parties scribbled in. But these days weren’t blank. They were full of our lives and kids growing and raging around my house and a million things done and my memory fades so fast on the little stuff and unfortunately on the the big stuff too. Thank God for iPhone photos and Facebook!! Well never remember it all, maybe we’re not meant to but enough with the blank pages.
Yes that old fashioned concept where you take a photo and end up with a real photograph you can hold in your hand. All those digital photos on my iPhone and computer and in the “cloud” thingy wherever that is and I wonder what I’ll do if one day any or all of it goes kaput. So no fancy photo books at this stage, I just go down the road to Big W and print a few of my favourites off every few weeks. Costs next to nothing. They end up in frames and on the fridge and stuck in my diary.
Things like change of seasons, the end of the school term, something scary overcome, a milestone reached, the end of a hard week. Anything really. Acknowledging something, marking it as an occasion or event even with simple words does something. It dog ears the moment and provides a hook we can hang our memories on. It acknowledges the time passing and our part in it. It’s an opportunity for joy and a bit of fun that can otherwise pass by just too easy without noticing. I’ll often make little announcements like “heres to the end of a big week” or “heres to the start of the school holidays”. “First day of summer – time for – – – – ” . Yes they roll their eyes sometimes but if its accompanied by food or something fun they’re all good. This year I made a bit of a fuss of the start (and end) of the summer holidays with a start/end of summer hoorah – packing in the activities and fun and just making a thing of it. You can’t do it all the time with everything – but it’s a great way of taking notice.
This one I’m still learning and probably always will be. The idea and I know it sounds like a cliche is to be fully present where you are and with what your doing at that particular moment – even if that’s watching a movie with the kids – without stressing about what I’m not doing or what I should be doing next. I feel like I enjoy that time more and that adds to the sense of having immersed myself in the day rather than being a passer through on the way to somewhere else.
They couldn’t go up until I painted the walls and the difference that a) taking the lined curtains I’ve had there for years down b) painting the walls and trim Antique White USA has been nothing less than revolutionary. The sense of space and light in the room now is monumental. It feels so much bigger and brighter and it’s doing me all sorts of good. And even though I’ve got some brightly coloured frames in the works and a new gallery wall in the planning my inkling for right now except for one small painting next to the window is to leave it completely blank.
