I’m going to have a few days off to recharge. While it would be nice to be in the picture on holiday, just a sleep in would be wonderful this week!

I’m pretty busy at the moment and I get through a lot over the course of the week. I’m teaching MYOB as a volunteer again, so busy lesson planning; our hot water heater has just about given up the ghost, so I need to get it replaced; our house needs a little TLC and of course there is the little fella to look after. He is certainly growing up to be a handful, already he just wants to get going – he does a lot of moving backwards though . Apart from that, the doc thought he had a hernia (turns out it’s ‘just’ fluid in the family jewels) and now we’re trying lactose-free formula and hoping it will help with his eczema (very mild) and ‘reflux’ like symptoms.

Time management and being organised is something that I’m continually working on, but I think it’s one of my strengths (more on time management in the next few weeks). Having said that, there is one thing that I’m failing to do and that’s prioritising some time out, me time, time to relax and otherwise recharge. All work and no play makes mummy not much fun to be around. So this week (and maybe next week) I will be silent here (but not quite absent) while I take some time to gather the troops.

Hope that you have a wonderful week and that you take some time out also to relax and recharge.

Sleep deprivation is getting the better of me. I’ve finally taken my husband’s advice and for the next few months, I’ll be posting articles on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays only.

I have a lot I want to do with this website: a resources page as I’ve mentioned before, an eBook or two, some videos and more in-depth, useful and (I hope) interesting articles and newsletters, but I’m struggling with time to get everything done and to stay sane at the same time. Also, next month I’m going to start teaching again, an evening or two a week, so until I get a bit more organised and on top of everything, I’ll be posting a little bit less often. I hope you understand.

Don’t forget, there’s a link at the top of the page to subscribe via email or RSS to make reading easier. If there is anything in particular that you would like me to write about, leave a comment or drop me a line.

I read this on Frugal For Life (an American frugal blog) and thought it noteworthy and amusing enough to share. Head on over and have a read of Dawn’s blog, it’s well worth the visit.

It’s a slow day in a little Lancashire town. The sun is beating down, and the streets are deserted. Times are tough, everybody is in debt, and everybody lives on credit.

On this particular day a rich tourist from down south is driving through town. He stops at the motel and lays a £100 in cash on the desk saying he wants to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one to spend the night.

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You probably know that I’m working on an eBook about saving money on the groceries and eating healthy food on a budget. The finish deadline keeps getting pushed back further and further – I had planned on launching it May.

I’m pretty excited by what I have so far, I’ve developed a few resources like excel spreadsheets, as part of the eBook and there is lots and lots of information. And therein lies my problem. I have way too much to write about.

So I’m hoping that you will help me tailor the eBook so that it is a really helpful resource for you. I have made up a really quick survey over at Survey monkey and I would love it if you could take a minute or two to fill it out. I know you’re time is valuable, so there are only 10 questions and the survey is anonymous.

To take the survey, please click here.

Thanks in advance for your time and responses.

I started making a new shopping bag (right) when I went into labour. I got as far as the final French seam at the bottom on that day and had to focus on other things , but I’ve finally found a moment to finish it.

I found the pattern for this bag when writing the bag roundup and you can find the pattern here. I used an old sheet that was already in the rag bag, I just cut around the pilling and the tear in the centre. So the cost to make this was only a few cents for the thread. The sheet was poly-cotton and it seemed a bit thin a flimsy, but because the bag is lined, it ends up being quite sturdy. The pocket on the front is so that it can fold down and be carried easily in a handbag.

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Happy Easter to all the readers of the Frugal and Thriving Blog. I hope that you have a great holiday celebrating this time with family and lots of chocolate!

I’ll be taking the next few days off to celebrate Easter as a new family! We all have our own family holiday traditions, and I’ll be looking forward to creating our family Easter traditions.

I’m looking forward (in a few years) to Easter egg hunts. As a kid, I grew up in central NSW during the mice plagues, so rather than the ubiquitous egg hunt, our Easter eggs came firmly sealed in recycled ice cream containers in order to keep the scavengers out.

However you celebrate Easter, if you’re travelling to visit family, have a safe journey and a relaxing holiday. 

I had planned an Easter craft roundup for today’s post, but with everything going on, I just haven’t had time to sit down and write it. Instead, I thought I would share a few links to some good websites; a few old favourites and a few I’ve come across lately.

1. If you’re looking for inspiration for reinventing old things and creating beautiful new ones, The How-To Gal is a good place to start. One of my favourites is this art from toilet rolls.
2. I have a bias for homemaker and women’s blogs and recently I came across Mommy’s Blessing. As she recently had a newborn also, it’s nice to read how others are coping – a lot better than I am at the moment!
3. Simple Green Frugal Co-op has been a favourite for quite some time now. It is a blog written by several people so there is a variety of points of view and experience.
4. Another food blog that I’ve recently come across is Fig and Cherry, a Sydney based blog with gorgeous photography (which is important for a food blog)!
5. And for more craft Obsessively Stitching is a new sewing site that I’ve subscribed to.

My feed reader just keeps growing, however, there are so many unread posts at the moment it keeps asking me to ‘hit the panic button’. If only there was one of those for life!

I can’t believe it, but I started this blog a year ago. It wasn’t much longer than a year ago that I didn’t even know what a blog was. I had quit my job as an accountant, the GFC hit, I got pregnant, had a miscarriage and got pregnant again and I thought that I would do some work from home (hoping to one day earn an income from it), writing about a topic that I’m passionate about: being frugal and conserving resources.

Some general statistics that I found regarding blogging:

• Around 175,000 blogs are started each day
• 60% of blogs are abandoned within a month
• The average lifespan of a blog is four months

I thought that I would share some statistics of Frugal and Thriving over the last year:

• As of last night there have been 59,946 visits to the blog
• Visitors have come from 139 countries
• 242 articles have been published
• The most frequently Googled search term that has delivered visitors to Frugal and Thriving is ‘savoury pumpkin pie’.

The top five most popular articles are:

• 45 Awesome Free Bag Making Tutorials
• 48 Free Skirt Tutorials
• Homemade Laundry Detergent
• 35 of the Best Craft Websites across the Net
• Free Printable Household Expense Sheets to Download

Beyond the blogging world, we’ve had a few more dramas in our life. My father passed away last week, which obviously I’m quite upset about. He had just visited a couple of days beforehand and met his grandson, and I’m thankful for that. We had to drive down to central NSW for the funeral and the car broke down at the end of day one, before we even got to the QLD border, so we got towed back home and started again. It is when things like this happen that I’m glad I had saved up an emergency fund. The two day trip took four very long days. Bub had pretty bad nappy rash and thrush, so we had to have a quick stop off at the doctor, and my milk dried up completely with everything that was going on, so we are totally formula feeding. I realise that there was nothing else we could have done, but I’m really shattered about how things turned out with his feeding. I hope that now things will settle down and we can get into some kind of ‘routine’.

I want to thank all the readers of Frugal and Thriving for dropping by and visiting and to thank those that leave a comment. With everything going on, I haven’t had a chance to reply but I love reading all the comments. I hope that you enjoy the website in the year to come.

As promised, some baby snaps.

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This month is a big month for me. Our first baby is due to arrive in this world around the 20th. So if I’m not around to answer emails or comments, you will know what I’ll be doing!

And if you’re interested, this proud mama will be putting up some baby snap shots (I won’t be able to help myself!)

However, I’ve been working hard over the last month or so writing articles so there will still be plenty of new content each day to read on the Frugal and Thriving website while I’m having a little internet hiatus.

Speaking of content, I get a few emails every now and then about guest posts. I’m always happy to accept guest post submissions. If you’re interested in submitting a guest post, please check out the guidelines here.

I have lots of plans for developing and improving the website this year, but I’m not sure just how realistic it will be getting them all done, so I won’t make any promises .

Thanks to all the readers of Frugal and Thriving. You make this all worth while.