Merry Christmas!

Hope you all had a fantastic day x

Life is good.

A few months ago I had a bit of a breakdown. Not a serious breakdown, but just a particular day when I felt overwhelmed with life.
I had just finished a month of 'monitoring' at the fertility clinic where they had tested my hormone levels almost every single day and told me exactly when I ovulated. I was sure that this was going to be the month. The month I finally fell pregnant, but when half a dozen tests showed negative at the end of the month I was feeling pretty low. And just like every other week, I had about 3 close friends tell me they were pregnant. I felt like it was never going to be my turn and I cried.

Tom, as usual, gave me a big hug and (in his usual motivation speech kind-of-way) said "Baby, it will be your turn soon.. you just have to be patient" then continued "Life is going to be good. No.. life is good. We will find a nice house, we will fill it with babies. We have so much to look forward to in our lives.. We will do nice things, read good books, eat good food, travel the world. Get some chickens" and went on to paint a picture of the life we will create.

I nodded my head. He was right as always. Things were going to be good. Things were ALREADY good.
As Tom walked off I quickly scribbled down what he had said, kind of like a reminder for me when I felt down.
So for Christmas a few months ago, with the help of Tom's architect sister (who has access to a large printer) I made this poster for Tom.

Tom's sisters gave me so much shit for this poster, but Tom thought it was great.. although when I asked him if he would actually hang it up in our new home he said "Um, yeah, maybe in the study" (Where no one can see it)!



P.s I have decided to close comments on this post. I have never had to do this before but I am not strong enough to deal with negative comments at the moment. I will leave it open for a few more days in case anyone wants to add anything. And remember.. please be nice.

P.p.s Joanna Goddard (A cup of Jo) wrote a wonderful post about depression the other day. Please head over and have a read.

Lovely Christmas things..

These are a few of the cool presents I got for Christmas.. Being married to a guy with 2 sets of parents (dad/step-mum and mum/step-dad) plus 5 sisters means that I get spoilt rotten every year.

This year I got lots of cool things including a lovely Gorman top, a necklace from Pigeonhole, a ring and candles from Mr.Sparrow, an embroidery book, the milk jug and a very pretty dress.. plus loads of other things that I still have to photograph. (I can't wait to show you the dress that one of Tom's sisters made me!)

What lovely things did you get? Please share..

Christmas etc.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. We had a lovely Christmas in sunny ol' Perth.

Christmas in the Porter family is filled with traditions that have been going since Tom was a kid..
The night before includes reading 'the night before Christmas' as a whole family before leaving milk, cookies and carrots out for santa and his reindeer. The next morning everyone draws a name out of a hat to take turns in opening presents while we have tea and croissants. (This takes about 2 hours as the are so many people and soo many presents).
Afterwards everyone heads to the beach for a swim before coming home and getting busy in the kitchen.
The rest of the family arrive at about 3pm and there is another hour or so of opening presents before we all sit down to a late lunch/ early dinner that goes well into the night.

I can't wait to share some of the lovely things I got with you..

Secret Santa

Last month Chantelle from Fat Mum Slim organised a 'social media secret santa'. It was such a great idea and I got the best gift ever.. a Rob Ryan plate that I had been dreaming about for some time.. I could not believe it when I saw it!
So thanks for organising Chantelle and thanks to my secret santa.

You can find the same lovely plate for sale at Lark.

Homemade Christmas

Last Christmas we made every single gift that we gave to family and friends. We made marmalade, lemon cordial, roasted muesli and I made clothes for all the kids. This year I had the same intentions.. we were going to make chutneys and pestos and all sorts of things, but we have been so busy that we never got around to it.

I made up for it though, by buying everything from lovely little shops in my local area like this one and this one, that sell handmade (and often Australian) products. It was actually nice to choose thoughtful little gifts, and I know that Tom's little sisters will be happy to get something other than muesli! (Do you really think that a 19 year old uni student wants lemon cordial for Christmas?! Especially since before Tom met me (and had a lovely disposable income) he would spend about $200 on each sister every Christmas (remember he has FIVE little sisters)! Of course, none of them would ever complain about getting a bottle of homemade cordial after they are use to getting a new MimCo wallet (they are all lovely, down-to-earth girls), but I think they will be happy to get something non-edible this year!!)

Did you do a homemade Christmas? Any suggestions for things I can make next year?

Only 4 more sleeps..