Part of the ongoing purge process has been facing some personal truths about what I would like to do (in theory!) versus what I will actually do — and one of those areas is cooking.

I spent quite a lot of time whipping up just the right this or that when my children were small. They were the focus of my life back then and I was less involved in artistic pursuits like writing or my currently non-stop photography. Perhaps as I got older I also just lost interest in the whole process — period — and I am now perfectly content to eat a quick stir-fry dinner or a salad and something on the side. It’s boring, but it IS fast and healthy!

I’d be willing to bet that I am representative of rather a lot of us who just swoon over some of the cooking shows on television and we long to whip those kinds of recipes up at the drop of the chef’s hat. But reality (or waning interest!) seeps in and many of us realise that we are in love with the IDEA of cooking gourmet meals, but we simply don’t have the time or energy to do that 99% of the time. So those gorgeous, glossy, heavy hardback books sit on the shelf and laugh at us when we never open them.

Deciding that I wanted to be very truthful about interests versus action, I have begun to load cookbook after cookbook onto Ebay along with the last of the unsold dvds which I will never watch again. And I had never imagined how liberating it would feel!

So yes — Nigella drove away. Her cookbook Forever Summer was the very first one to sell this morning and I am thrilled that some lovely people down in Melbourne will (hopefully!) soon be implementing some of the gorgeous recipes within that unused book. Bon Appetit!

The Cleanest Corner in the Whole Darned Building!

Truthfully, although there are some valid ‘excuses’ since I was heavily involved with getting my last 2 books launched into the world during all of those six months, I could have begun this process long before now.

I’m being very brave and posting photos so you can see what I am up against!

The Sea of STUFF to Sort Through!

Daunting — it was seriously, hyperventilatingly daunting to walk inside of that 54 square meter/580 square feet all-one-room building and see boxes stacked half-way up to the ceiling in places and opened boxes that had been partially unpacked and then shoved aside.

Many was the time that I had walked in there, taken a look around, and walked straight back out because i didn’t even know where to begin! Then I’d share that sensation with Mark and he would nod his head with widened eyes and say, “I know!”

So while Mark finishes the new diningroom/study addition on the back of the cottage, I have begun to take nibbles from the gargantuan task of sorting out and deciding what to keep, what to donate, what to give away to friends, and what to sell on ebay. I’m definitely in a less-is-more frame of mind because I feel that if I haven’t had any pressing need for those things over the last 3 years, I have probably forgotten well over half of what is in there and those items, for the most part, can now safely be ‘re-homed’ elsewhere.

Off to the studio to get dusty for awhile!