What’s in a name? Part one

Ever wonder why this is pretty little blog and not some other title? I started it back in 2006(ish) because I had started a little online business called Pretty Little Parcels. I was very excited about Pretty Little Parcels when I started it. It was a time when I was really starting to engage with the idea of being more actively online. I’d started reading Brocantehome which is the first blog I can recall reading and being excited about visiting daily. I think I was also quite into the idea of making part of my living online. Seduced by the glamour of the dot com.

Anyway inspiration struck and I began PLP. The basis concept of PLP was sending out boxes with a few delightful surprise items in them. A bit like a cracker. So there would be something to make you feel beautiful, something delicious, something fun and something to make you think. I started the blog partly as a way of promotion but soon realised that I liked being able to record my thoughts and write about life.

I’m shutting down Pretty Little Parcels, but keeping the blogging. PLP was a great learning experience and didn’t leave me at a loss financially. I’m just not willing to devote the time to marketing it. Also I have issues with what I’m putting in the parcels. I was just experimenting with veganism when I started it and had no problems buying products with milk in them to go in the parcels. Now it doesn’t feel right for me to do so. On a similar note I’ve also gotten into the habit of not buying things. I’m sure a lot of products that I bought for parcels were made in sweatshops.

One of the biggest problems with my life (and it’s a blessing really!) is that there are so many things that I am interested in. I have to face up and realise that I can’t do them all at once. It’s time to move on. To focus. We think nothing of decluttering our homes, our desks, our wardrobes and our fridges. We’re not so good at decluttering our lives. Doing less better rather then more in a haphazard not really committed manner.

It’s nearly September and time for life to move on.

Get ready for the second act!

Black and green

I've been wearing black and green (clothes not chocolate!) for the past three days. It's been too warm for jeans (not that I'm complaining) and it feels like the height of luxury and decadence to smooth body so fine on to make my legs look a little bit sparkly as they peek from my skirt.

I'm assuming that my move back to wearing green and black (my favourite colours) means that I'm feeling like me again! I've even painted my toenails green and have been wearing green bracelets.

I was interested to see this take on wearing green clothes. I've also been adding more green items to the collage on my study wall. All the different shades of green look so good together. Alas it's going to have to come down as Dear Heart and I are working on transforming my study into the perfect room for me to do my stuff in (that'll be sewing, writing, reading, yoga and feeling creative then). We took the carpet up last week. Chipped the plaster off the chimney breast to expose the brick underneath. Stripped the paint off the door to reveal the wood. Dear Heart is going to sort out the plaster on the walls, sand the floor boards and paint it all in a nice neutral shade. Except for one wall which is going to be covered in cork tiles so that I can use it as an inspiration wall.

I'm rather excited by this prospect. I've been taking a break from eBay but I have several boxes taking up floor space in my study that I just want to sell so that there is no clutter! Photographs will hopefully follow at some not to distant point!

the make-up diet

Yesterday I had an appointment at the Benefit counter in Boots. I was looking forward to half an hour of hearing about the latest products, oohing and aahing over colours and packaging and just generally feeling pampered. I've been watching my money with the thought of buying a few items.

Anyway I got there on time and both the assistants were engaged with other people. So I hung around and examined all the products. Then I examined the again. Both assistants were showing no sign of lifting their heads. So I wandered around a bit more. It was 20 minutes after my appointment was due to start by this point. I was feeling very self concious and thinking that even if they did finally acknowledge me I was going to be cutting things a bit fine to make my bus. So I left.

And as I walked away I felt a sense of relief and puzzlement. Why had buying expensive make-up been so important to me? I've got so much make-up and quite a bit of it is Benefit anyway. I really don't need anymore eyeshadow, foundation or lipstick. I wasn't going to be there to buy something I needed, I was there because I felt the need to find something to buy. So I decided no more make-up until I've used up what I have. If I want to be pampered I'll book in somewhere for a massage or a pedicure.

Here's to using what we have before buying more.

Use it up...quick

Every so often I am gripped by an urge to use up all the foods that are in the freezer and the pantry. I can see that at one point this probably prevented the cupboards from over flowing. I did have a tendency to pick up new and/or interesting looking products while wandering around the supermarket. I'd buy just in case the shop never ever had it in stock again (that's logic, right?).

However as I've moved away from shopping in supermarkets I tend to buy stuff as I plan to use it. I impulse buy less. The types of food I'm buying have also changed. The pantry is much more likely to be stuffed with dry goods than anything else.

However, I'm still feeling that I need to use up stuff. This ranges from the last spoonful in the jar to any unopened packets (why aren't they opened? I can't have needed to buy them that much). The freezer is quite full at the moment with frozen beans, blackberries and peas.

Then I spotted an item that I could use up and satisfy my urge (for the present anyway). I bought a load of bananas really cheaply at some distant point in the past. I prefer my bananas green instead of ripe so I froze the lot. I'd eaten most of them but there was half a box just waiting for me to get the urge to eat them. Trouble is where the weather wasn't too warm this summer the urge for frozen stuff wasn't too strong.

I put them to defrost and then made banana choc chip bars from one of the Sarah Kramer books. 4 minutes in the microwave and - yum!

Making it different in 2007

These are the things I want to start or change in 2007 following my observations during the first few weeks of 2007.

Use what I have
I have enough. I don’t need to buy more. I should enjoy the things I have (things I choose for myself in the first place). So I’m going to try and make this the year I buy as little as possible. The stuff I have (and have been taking with me every time I have moved house) is amazing and I need to use it up before I buy anything else. For example, I dug out last night some purple embroidery thread. I bought on a school trip to France in 1987! I’ve got stacks of postcards, writing paper and notepads. I’ve got enough clothes. I can take lunch to work every single day. Working towards this will be good for my purse and good for the planet. If I really need it (and can’t find a substitute) I’m going to get it second hand or make it before buying new.

Ebay/Freecycle at least one item a month
This is a kind of follow on from the above. I’ve got lots of things that I no longer really need but someone else might enjoy them. This is less about making a profit and more about clearing space.

Count my blessings
I’ve already been trying to do this. If I wake up before the alarm or can’t get to sleep I think about all the things I have to grateful for (a warm bed, fantastic boyfriend, my cute cat, and so on). If sleep right to the alarm then I count blessings while I shower (hot water, nice smelling shower gel, animal friendly shampoo). It proved an effective way of blocking my worries about work, life and the universe in general.

Be more mysterious
This might seem a strange thing to put on a blog, but in RL I’m certain that I go into too much detail and give people far more than they need. Let me restrain myself a little and let them wonder.

My monthly targets will begin in February and I’ll try to update regularly how I’m getting onwith making my life different.

Abstinence

January is proving so far to be a month where my mind is busy (the combined result of a new year and no booze). I just can’t stop thinking of lists I need to make, emails, letters and phone calls I should make, concepts that need to be put into action (or at least noted down for further attention) and cupboards and boxes that need clearing out.

However it is satisfying when I look around the room I rather grandly label my study to note that piles of stuff are moving. It’s also rather satisfying to note that a large number of tasks have been crossed off my job list.

It’s all a bit like clothes really. You think you have the perfect wardrobe and then what you see people wearing changes (so subtlety you don’t really notice) and then one day you decide that you have nothing to wear! Hence I thought my study was probably as sorted as it was going get and that various half started project would be completed one day and suddenly I am moving things around and putting up pictures. Clearly the day has come!

An important lesson is to remember that nothing lasts forever or is as sorted as expected. No doubt this burst of energy will die out and I’ll be back on the sofa with my nose stuck in a book soon. In the meantime I’m making the most of it!