It really has only been two days since I posted but we’ve got a schedule so I will stick to it!

Tuesday – early morning run to the Post Office to post off 8 packages. That is the most I ever did in one hit. The post office guy seemed a little out of countenance and asked me if I had a business account. I did but never had the need to use it before, and I didn’t have the time or energy to work out the online system over Easter.

But once I got home two more postal orders came in and I gave it a try. It is super easy! I’m doing future posting online now instead and taking it direct to the local distribution centre – less people there anyway, easy to park, it is drop off and they scan it. I print my own labels at home.

One of the things that has annoyed me about posting for a while – they put a postage sticker on which shows one price but to add tracking or signature required or send a registered letter is an extra cost and nowhere do they put that extra cost on the label. This way there is no price on the label. And it looks far more professional too.

Was a less busy day for me thankfully but I had to keep running out to the mancave to print our trays. It is one every 18 minutes, so I set a clock timer and run out to take the printed tray out and put in a new piece of wood.

The other half went to work and he had a lovely chilled out day. Everyone else is working from home, he is the only one there. He can play his music. Also parking is a lot easier now.

Dinner was fish burgers on brioche buns. Yummy, kind of like a home made filet o’ fish and far far cheaper than a filet o’ fish. You seen the price of those babies lately? I think it is over $6 now. Insane!

Wednesday – up super early in the hope that packages would arrive today. Nothing on the app. Nothing arrived – sometimes he just rocks up and the app has not updated yet. Out to the mancave to print, glue and spray the trays I printed yesterday, then check everything off for deliveries we were doing today.

The app updated at 9:19am to say package on board. Well now we can’t go and do deliveries because what if it comes while we’re not here? We decide to wait until 10am and then head off, I will watch the cameras as we go. This is the first day I have felt angry about the postal situation. This package on board today was in Sydney on Friday April 3rd. WTF was it doing for over a week?

The first delivery we need to do is only about 15 minutes drive away. Part way there The Other Half has a great idea and something we’ve been meaning to do for a while – lets get a Ring doorbell. That way we can tell the driver to take the package around the back if we’re not here. A very quick dash to Bunnings, and a quick trip home to install it, and we’re back on our way. No sign of the package yet though.

This is great. We will never miss another doorbell ring again – it calls to your phone and you can also set it to record any movement within a certain area, it will take a photo and send it to you. You can dial in and watch it live too.

We had to drive through some areas which experienced the bushfires on our way to Ulladulla. I find this very hard. Even though the trees have started to sprout new growth, it is the memory of the collective trauma we all went through. There are huge sections of burned out trees, and the enormity of it.. some sections you can see it was far hotter than in others and in those areas a lot of the trees are not recovering at all. They will not return.

I was expecting todays package to be quite a big one. I was wrong. It was so small the postie had it on board. She left it on the doorstep. We’ve talked about this before. :( I had to call Dad and ask him to drop around and grab it.

We had to get milk on the way home, so while talking to them I asked did they need anything.. he said yes, Eskimo Pies. Apparently Dad claims that my mother is using these as one of her major food groups at the moment. Mother begs to differ. I think the mystery of who is actually eating the Eskimo Pies will not be solved without video evidence.

We had two deliveries at Ulladulla and then we stopped in at Hayden’s pies to replace our pie inventory. There was only one left in the freezer. I got the parents some Salted Caramel Cheesecake and some for us as well. I noticed the bakery zombies appear unable to follow social distancing rules, they just walk right up to the cabinet regardless.

We grabbed a couple of pies to eat for a late lunch, so late neither of us felt like dinner. We just had a (cut in half) slice of cheesecake each about 8:30pm and it was delicious.

Dropped the Eskimo Pies to the parents, picked up my package, returned home. Had a nice chilled out evening.

I’m really going to try and take it easy the next couple of days. We have a delivery run on Saturday and we may attempt a click and collect at IKEA on the way through to get some organising shelves.

I hope you are all doing well! No goal update today because the answer is zip, zilch, nada.

Catch up with these other folks blogging about our new normal. :)

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn
Sean at Assholes Watching Movies
Zazzy
EssexHebridean
SilverTiger
Joanne @ Cup On The Bus
gigihawaii
anexactinglife

Should your blog be listed here? Leave me a comment and it will be next time. :)

Is it just me, or are the days going by so fast now?

So much happening with the business, very little time for myself. Where did I leave you last?

Thursday –

Many customers to the studio in the morning. Delivery run to Shellharbour in the afternoon. Dropped into Warrawong to get potatoes – purchased 15kg will be set for a while. They were $5.98 a 5kg bag which is a bargain here at the moment. Dropped one bag into parents. Picked up our Empanada kit the farmers market was absolutely packed. Returned here to more customers

In the evening we had our ZOOM chat – no Silvertiger, I was not aware of the security issues. I only use it to run chats and don’t give it email addresses,I don’t use Apple so I think it will be ok. But I’ll have the other half investigate further. By the time this chat was over, I was so tired I went right to bed.

Friday – Easter Friday. We were open, had a few customers. I made a large vat of vegetable soup. Friday afternoon I worked on sorting through all my work related photos and putting all the inventory photos into one folder all together, listed by price and product name. I finished this by the end of the afternoon and DAYUM it feels great to have that organised finally.

Whatever happens we will be a much better organised business at the end of COVID-19.

Saturday – On this day we were delivered some Hot Cross Bun doughnuts from a local business. They were amazing. We then made empanadas for dinner. Also amazing. I couldn’t really say what else I did, everything is blurring together now. Lesson learned, write these days daily into this post! :)

Sunday – Leftover empanadas for lunch, long day of business related works started off by a home delivery to a customer at 8:50am then organising a delivery run for Easter Monday. Home made pizza for dinner.

Monday – 5 home deliveries done before 10am, back home to open the shop, work work work, leftover pizza for dinner. And here I sit while it cooks writing this post.

Goal Posts Moving

New goals kind of overtook the goals I had already set.

The photo sorting was the start of a bigger job. This is a part of getting our Square system ready for integration into a new business website. The next task involved going through each individual item of inventory, adding photos and a description and a category, and deleting anything no longer needed. I’m getting there. One more 25 minute pomodoro and I think I will have this finished.

So these goals still remain –

2. Dust my bookshelf – personal – Still not achieved.

3. Sort out the studio shelves – business – Still not achieved.

Bonus goal –

4. Have one uninterrupted afternoon coffee – personal/business – YAY I did this. :)

Catch up with these other bloggers too! :)

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn
Sean at Assholes Watching Movies
Zazzy
EssexHebridean
SilverTiger
Joanne @ Cup On The Bus
gigihawaii
anexactinglife

I would love to say I’ve put myself on a no-news diet but the truth is, I simply don’t have the time for watching any news at the moment. I’m only managing a maximum of an hour and a half, sometimes two hours, of television a day and I prefer it to be quality viewing.

A big surprise delivery on Monday of work stock plus a couple of runs to the post office cancelled out most of Monday.

Tuesday was meant to be a stay at home day but suddenly I had three packages that needed to be posted. I got my home delivery of food this day but they forgot a couple of things.

Why yes, that is a 5 KILO bag of pasta. We will not run out anytime soon.

There was also a moment on Tuesday that had me bolt out of my chair like a horse scared by a snake and literally run to get my credit card. I got this email –

The lady in the store had told me to order it quickly and I took her quite literally. Turns out I could have taken my time because I checked again at the end of the day and they still had 55 rolls left in stock.

I ordered 4 rolls for us and 4 rolls for them. I thought I was maybe pushing the limits there and I didn’t know if they had an amount you were allowed to order but to be fair these 4 rolls would last us about a month so I thought that was a good amount. When I went to pick up the rolls, the person before me had TWO BOXES of 18 rolls. Dude, you’re part of the problem.

So this morning I had to run to the delivery store to get my missing items and then to Centaur to get the TEEPEE then drop half of that to the parents then back here where I discover more people want things posted so I make that happen then back to the post office again, then return here to await customers.

Tomorrow we do another delivery run and also grab our Empanadas on our way home. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday HAPPY DAYS WE GO NOWHERE. I am quite determined.

Pretty much an epic fail on the goals front. I achieved just one of the goals though it is the one I think will make the most difference at the moment –

The desktop is clear. Yay! My mind feels better.

So these goals remain –

2. Dust my bookshelf – personal

3. Sort out the studio shelves – business

Bonus goal –

4. Have one uninterrupted afternoon coffee – personal/business – Still not achieved.

I’ll check in on Sunday, hope you are all doing well. :)

You can check in with some other folks blogging through Corona at –

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn
Sean at Assholes Watching Movies
Zazzy
EssexHebridean
SilverTiger
Joanne @ Cup On The Bus
gigihawaii
anexactinglife

Should your blog be listed here? Leave me a comment and it will be next time. :)

I’m so excited about this Empanada box. Even Mitchell could make these. :) I ordered two as soon as I saw it because I like the traditional beef but it has olives in there, The Other Half will not like those. He got pulled pork. This will be a tasty dinner for us next week plus there is enough there for me to take the parents half the batch.

This is smart thinking – Ola Chola tend to do a lot of food markets many of which are now cancelled but this way their customers can make their food at home. I wish a lot more food stalls would do this.. it would be awesome.

My parents are a bit cuckoo also. Dad called me Thursday morning and said hey, the reject shop are advertising toilet rolls for $7.50 for a 24 pack. It starts today, he said. Can you go and see if they have any? Well I did need to go to the post office so I said I would do a loop of the shops just to see if they had any. I asked one of the staff – did the toilet rolls come in? Yes, they were here at 8:30 and gone by 8:31. Don’t know if we are getting any more.

I did the full loop of all the supermarkets, I did not find any toilet roll. Insert Fail Whale here.

I had to do a second run to the post office late Thursday, we had to take the parents car to be serviced on Friday, Saturday we went nowhere at all for an entire day and it was sheer bliss except for the fact that I spent the entire day doing business admin work plus uploading photos to our website and listing products.

Sunday we had to do some deliveries for my business which turned out to be a 4 hour round trip with multiple stops along the way but not a single toilet stop yay me! On the way home I called the parents, they needed juice and bread so I dropped the other half home – he is finishing a Uni assignment – and I ran off to get those things.

I think now is a good time to do some goal setting. I’m making use of to-do lists for business admin related things but Saturday marked the last of those tasks at least for the time being, so it is a good time to set some personal and also business goals. We will check in on these on Wednesday!

1. Clean up my computer desktop – personal

Clearly this job needs doing, I am a couple of files from having no space left!

2. Dust my bookshelf – personal

No photo maybe once it is dusted because it really needs it!

3. Sort out the studio shelves – business

Also no photo and boy does this job need doing as a matter of urgency. If everything has a home it is much easier to put it back home each time.

That is three tasks for three days, I think fair to keep it small to begin with. Plus I do not know – I have some stock that has landed in Sydney and if that rocks up here it could eat into my time somewhat, plus customers. But let me add a bonus goal –

4. Have one uninterrupted afternoon coffee – personal/business

This past week we’ve not had one afternoon coffee time that was sacred. People called or popped in or suddenly ordered something which needed to be packed and posted – that was Thursday because one lesson I have learned – never post something on a Friday or Saturday.

In coming weeks I would like to –

Clean & sort the store room – business

Clean the bathrooms & toilets – part business part personal – the business has a toilet and bathroom, we have one just for us.

Reorganise the wardrobes

Empty the drawers out to rescue my earrings that fell down the back & clean off the top of the drawers.

Hang the acrylic pourings (this is an Other Half task)

Put up a picture rail in the studio (also an Other Half task)

If you want to set some goals on your blog I will be excited to read them and encourage you to reach for them. :)

You can check in with some other folks blogging through Corona at –

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn
Sean at Assholes Watching Movies
Zazzy
EssexHebridean
SilverTiger
Joanne @ Cup On The Bus
gigihawaii
anexactinglife

Should your blog be listed here? Leave me a comment and it will be next time. :)

Seems Scomo can’t go a day without saying something quite stupid but in this case he really put my cat among the chickens.. what I sell are not puzzles but they are pretty dang close. This has been our busiest week ever. I now sit here with paper and a pen so I can write down what people are ordering then go and put everything ordered aside once an hour or so, otherwise I’m just up and down all day and I don’t get much actual work done.

Plus I have been waiting on stock which comes from China, so all of that is thoroughly sprayed with anti bac spray once it arrives here. Not much of it has been, because there are not a lot of planes flying at the moment. I did get a big delivery in yesterday and much of it is already gone. Great for the business, great for the people being kept amused, it is keeping me very busy and I need to make sure I take actual breaks. People can just message me, arrive in my driveway, I’ll bring their stuff out, they tap their card and away they go.

I actually hit tilt today though.. There is only one of me and only so many trains I can keep running on the tracks at any one moment. I’m going to get an early night and start again tomorrow. I might need to aim for a day off and a day out soon, too.

The parents needed some items today plus I had to go post some things to customers so armed with my trusty facemask, hand sanitiser and anti-bac spray, I was off. The only thing I could not get was sultana cake mix – the shops here have completely sold out of cake mix.

I found toilet rolls! My parents think I am a superhero lol. I was just lucky to be in the right place at the right time, but I know there are folks doing a loop of the local shops several times a day – they go to Aldi, little Woolworths, Big Woolworths, Coles, IGA, and then they do it all over again.

We have everything we need here already – though I did grab some extra milk and green capsicum enough for 3 weeks of pizza today – but it was a lot of hard work to make it so, and who knows how much risk was involved in that.

For some idiotic reason the supermarkets here turned off online shopping very early on when online shopping could actually be the answer to this whole problem – stop the people endlessly going to stores, stop those who are bulk buying toilet paper because you only deliver once a week to each address, and stop the risk of having to go out in the world among the other people. Protect the supermarket staff from all the germs, remove the cash from the equation..

But I guess the big brains in charge aren’t thinking outside the box.. :)

I do not have to leave the house again until Friday morning when I have to drop the parents car off to be serviced, but then it will be back here pretty quickly until we have to go and collect it later that day. I will update you again on the weekend!

You can check in with some other folks blogging through Corona at –

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn
Sean at Assholes Watching Movies
Zazzy
EssexHebridean
SilverTiger
Joanne @ Cup On The Bus
gigihawaii
anexactinglife

Did I miss you, should your blog be listed here? Leave me a comment and I will make it so. :)

This week I focused on the pantry, fridge and freezer. First we did a stocktake of these places on Tuesday..

Tuesday night Scomo (our useless-in-my-opinion Prime Minister) announced that nail salons would close midnight Wednesday. I immediately messaged my nail lady and booked in for first thing the next morning. Look, there are very few things I do for myself when it comes to health and beauty and nails is the top of my list. I don’t do them for other people, I do them for me. I love to look down and see good healthy strong nails with a nice manicure. It is good for my mental health.

BUUUUT The Other Half was very unhappy that I was going to the nail salon. Every time he has been past there people are packed in like sardines. The only way he would agree that I could go was if I would wear a mask. I did already have fabric masks on order from a lady I know who does Markets – Besgrove Embroidery – they were due to arrive on Wednesday but it was only Tuesday. You can still order them via her Facebook page if you want one.

She had put a post up late last week and boy did the keyboard warriors give her a scolding. So much so she took the post down, but I had already ordered mine and also told everyone I knew, some of whom wanted to order them. We ended up doing one package to me and I gave them out to the folks when they got here. We’ve added some copper wire to ours to keep them in place over the nose.

But my Mother had told me, she had some old not used surgical masks from when Dad was unwell in 2011, and I figured those would still work just fine. So I dropped over to pick one up first thing Wednesday.

It turned out three of the five people in the nail bar were people I am in regular contact with through my business and I had spent two and a half hours in their company on Monday night, so that certainly eased his mind somewhat. I also had brought along spare masks for them to keep and use in the coming days, at least until our fabric ones arrived.

I already had a haircut booked in for Wednesday- my normal “chop it all off before it begins to get too cold and I have to use the hairdryer” appointment. My hairdresser and her daughter are both customers of my business and they were also here on Monday night. They were the only other people in the salon, which eased The Other Half’s mind a little. I was in and out of there in 45 minutes.

While I was sitting there I realised.. The Other Half isn’t going to let me back out to do anything else, so I better run all the errands I can before I go back home. I went to one supermarket for milk, bread and potatoes. Milk was limited to 2×2 litres. I went to a cash and carry bulk buy place for beef mince, chicken breast, more milk and calamari. I managed to get eggs there too. Then I dropped all of these groceries at my front door for The Other Half to de-germ, while I headed out to one last supermarket.

All three of the supermarkets I went to, there were other people wearing masks, some of them quite elaborate and fancy and in one case like a genuine wartime gas mask.

You cannot smile at others while wearing a mask, because they cannot see your mouth. You have to learn to SMIZE as Tyra Banks would say. Smile with your eyes.

When I got to the final supermarket a fellow mask wearer congratulated me on my wearing a mask – finally another sane person she said. Is it sane? I’m not sure, but I’m not taking any chances here. I will err on the side of caution. I will sanitize and disinfect and take off all my clothes and wash them right away in the laundry – which I did as soon as I got back from the final supermarket. I will not go to Bunnings on the weekend unless it is a true hardware emergency. I will only go to the supermarket if I must.

Speaking of supermarket musts, that same Wednesday at 6pm the pair of us headed to Aldi for one final shop. There wasn’t much left in the way of meat but we did manage to get almost everything we wanted with the exception of tissues and green capsicum (peppers) – they did have some but they were Not Great.. I think we are good here for at least two possibly four weeks now.

We did use the hand sanitizer a lot, and I am lucky because I love Bath and Body Works so much, I have a very good supply of that and hand wash here at home. I stocked up on our last visit.

Thursday, I had to post something to a customer, so while I was out I sourced tissues and also grabbed bread and milk for the parents. I dropped that in to them plus a “mighty roll” of paper towel.

Thursday afternoon I went to the Berry Farmers Market. It was like a big chess game, with boxes drawn on the ground and you could move to the next box when it was empty. I got more eggs, some more mince meat and steaks, and then some incredible veggies, really enormous carrots and scored some brussel sprouts yay. Here is a photo from the Kiama one which was set out the same –

The fridge is now completely full. The freezer has a little space left but not much.

Friday was a day at home. Saturday we had deliveries to do, and these went from here all the way to Campbelltown. The one rule I made for myself at the start of this – NO public toilets at all. I will not go into one. And while we were out for almost 5 hours, I did manage to adhere to this rule. That brings us to today, another stay at home day..

So anyway since I wrote the above there have been developments. We are now supposed to stay at home.

Now all the days will be stay at home days. In many ways this is a good thing. I guess we’ll see what happens next. But we certainly were prepared for this announcement. Do I think it will stop the folks endlessly traipsing from shop to shop looking for toilet paper? No, I don’t.

You can check in with some other folks blogging through Corona at –

Moving With Mitchell
Dkzody’s Weblog
High Riser
Stargazer
Dawn

If you would like to be added to this list, just leave a comment on this post with a link to your blog.