Treat yourself Tuesday

eyebrow tattooingWelcome, ladies and gentlemen, to ‘treat yourself’ Tuesday. I know it’s been gaining popularity over the last few months, but let’s be honest here, self-care never really goes out of style. But for all of you out there who are obsessed with putting the needs of others before yourself – I am here to help. It’s time to stop letting other people trample you into the ground, stand up for yourself! Tell the people who take you for granted that you are a person, and you have needs. Trust me, you’ll be amazed at the difference it can make to your quality of life.

If you’re unsure about all of this, then just take it slow. On a Tuesday (or any day of the week, really, just remember to do it nice and regularly) do something for you. Grab a massage, take yourself out for lunch, spend time on you.

One of my self-loving butterflies, Gloria, recently wrote in to tell me about her amazing self-care journey. She was feeling old and tired and one day, she finally snapped. She booked herself for a 4 o’clock session at a cosmetic surgeon’s office and walked out of there with the best lip fillers in Bendigo. Since that day, once a year, she’s done something momentous for herself. Something that she would be able to take with her forever, that would make life so much simpler and easier that she’d hardly recognise herself. Laser eye surgery, laser hair removal, eyebrow tattooing – Bendigo has no better champion of meeting your needs. In a way that never hurts or harms anyone, Gloria has become an expert at putting herself first, and honestly, we can all learn a valuable lesson from her. I know I certainly have – keep the good work up darling!

And of course, if any of you want to share your transformation with the world, please write in to me. I always love to hear about everything my precious readers are up to. Until next time!

Dreaming of a weekend in Lorne

Victoria conference venuesYou know when you’re anticipating something, and it’s so close, and then it just becomes unbearable in those last few minutes/hours/days or whatever? Like, you’re at a restaurant and you’ve just ordered after being hungry all day, and even though you know your food is just minutes away you somehow feel ravenous enough to eat the tablecloth. That’s how I feel now. I need a holiday so badly…like, so badly I feel like I should just pack my bags and pay obscene amounts just so I can fly away. I guess one of my more specific fantasies involved driving along a beach road with the top of the car down and my hair buffeting in the glorious wind. So yeah, I’m not actually quitting my job and moving to a tropical island, that’s off the table, but it’s fine. I like to look up holiday destination in my lunch break, especially when I’m feeling ultra-good. I saw this add for regional Victoria conference venues and got curious about the great ocean road hotels.

Unfortunately, no one wants to hear my travel plans, even though it’s some of the greatest destination on the planet. I did manage to plan myself a nice little escape to Lorne. But it’s still a few days away, and I’m wishing that I just hadn’t looked at photos of the beautiful beaches at all.
My current life is fine, it’s alright, but it has none of the excitement promised from my upcoming lorne luxury accommodation. I saw a video of the beaches and I almost passed out. That’s how I’ve been passing the time, by daydreaming of sun and surf. The luxury apartment has a giant bed AND a hot tub. The view…oh boy, the view is postcard perfect. It’s the kind of view you leave the windows open at night for. Two weeks? I can’t wait that long!

Moving further away

24 hour plumberFar out. How is that, even when you move interstate to escape your insane parents, they don’t get the message and just ring you for even the littlest thing? It seems completely unfair. It’s not like they don’t know how much I hate it, either. When I left home, it was because we’d had an enormous fight, but the second their air conditioning unit breaks down, they were on the phone to me, expecting me to drop everything and race over.

Sorry to break it to you, mum and dad, but that’s not really how things work anymore. Now I’m my own person, I left to get away from your tyranny, I don’t owe you any favours. Apparently, just moving out of home wasn’t enough to send a clear messages, so to push it a little further, I moved out of the state.

Okay, this decision wasn’t purely a result of overbearing parents, there were a lot of other factors at play, but their constant neediness definitely made moving that little bit more appealing. But as it happens, no.

No, moving away hasn’t meant that they stop trying to get me to solve their problems, it only means I have to do that remotely. Have you ever tried explaining to a Melbourne plumber that, although you live in Perth, your parents in Melbourne need their drain serviced? Because, apparently, neither one of them is capable of just picking up the phone themselves.

What’s even worse is that, because my parents have absolutely no boundaries and insist that I live at their beck and call, this whole conversation went on at three in the morning. To be honest, I feel sorry for the fantastic team of 24 hour plumbers in Melbourne that had to deal with me while I was that annoyed and sleep-deprived.

I love my parents, I do, but at this point, never speaking to them again would feel like a blessing.

Style tricks of the property trade

house styling companyA while ago my partner and I decided to sell up and move to Bali. We ended up getting major post holiday blues whenever we returned from trips there, so at the end of our last holiday we decided we had to make the move and turn our holiday destination into our home! The biggest thing for us to deal with was selling our house in Melbourne. As we would both be earning far less money in Bali we really wanted to maximize the value of our house before it went to auction. We actually decided to go with a property staging company as they send in interior stylists and totally transform the place to appeal to buyers. It’s crazy how having some trendy minimal furniture can add a few zeros to the selling price.

The best thing was we were able to put all our shabby second (aka seventh) hand furniture into storage while the interior designers brought in scandinavian inspired minimalist wares. We ultimately planned on selling everything, including all our furniture, our car, even most of our clothes. But we figured, we should sell our house first and to a different crowd that would be more interested in forking out for it than the crowd that would want to buy our second hand records. The house styling company in Melbourne was amazing. They worked with us to build on the space in our house and they even looked at the demographic of potential buyers in the area and modelled the house according to what they wanted to see. Our lounge room was transformed into a kid friendly entertainment space, and the spare bedroom we used to keep all our hiking gear became a perfect nursery for a baby! We managed to get nearly 10% over our asking price when it came to auction day!