I have Ebay listings for all of the furniture now, have (thankfully!) already sold several pieces, and tonight the ride-on tractor went to a very nice man who was the first person who viewed it. Note to self — take the flyer back OUT of the Notice Board in front of the newsagent tomorrow! Replace that flyer with another one with oh-so-pretty pictures of furniture!

Still have the cars to list, the refrigerator and washer, and then lots of office electronics like the fax machine, a desktop computer and printer, and then there is all of the night-time entertainment items like television and dvd-player and so forth. That’s at LEAST another 20 listings to write! And in the middle of everything, we are having a Garage Sale the 2nd to last weekend here. Whew! Anything that doesn’t sell will just have to get donated to charity because we are getting a tiny storage unit for the books and tools we are actually keeping.

Can’t believe how much I am looking forward to getting off to Sydney on the train because we have adorable friends who have offered us their apartments to stay in during the Christmas holiday while they are out of town. How good is that? If all goes to plan, we should have 10-14 days of wind-down time with NO hotel bills. And we’ll have another one of those quiet just-us-two holidays in an urban setting like we did in the loft apartment in Melbourne that I booked last year. We’re both going to need it by then!

We depart Australia on the 29th of December — but that’s a story for another time.

More in a few days. It might be after midnight, but I might just get ONE more ebay listing written up.

My readers will know that I have been a bit mono-focused (and the handsome hubby would retort, “A bit?”) for the last 6 months while I spruced up a previous book and launched it as a 3rd Edition, created a Smashwords e-book of that one, wrangled the NEXT book to completion, got that onto Smashwords, and am now ready (in 2 days!) to announce the launch of the all new PRINT book.

To say that I have not paid much attention to such uninteresting tasks as housekeeping or cooking is a severe understatement. So I turned my attention to that for awhile today.

Amongst those less than thrilling chores, I inserted some time for bill paying and that always instills in my brain a sense of sweeping things clean. Ahhh! But then as I prepared to file away those bills, it occurred to me to stop, pay attention, and to note the emotion that I was feeling at that moment.

I found myself saying aloud, “We really are so blessed!”

Blessing #1 – We’ve had some ‘interesting’ bumps in the road this year with health hiccups and one period in the hospital for each of us. But we have each bounced back, we’ve reassessed our approach to daily life, and now we are fine-tuning several aspects and progressing toward a better life-long state of health.

Blessing #2 – After far too many construction delays, we managed to move successfully into our little eco-cottage in the country in June and although we are still a work-in-progress out here, we are safely ensconced in a lovely new space.

Blessing #3 – The global financial downturn has, amazingly, had much less impact on Australia than we had expected. Some of my husband’s clients (he’s in the building trades) were momentarily panicked and they tightened their belts on new construction projects or remodeling, but that too passed and we weathered those nervous moments of questioning whether he was still in the right industry. Suddenly his planning diary is full of new commissions once again.

Blessing #4 – We have the most wonderful circle of family and friends around the world that nurture our hearts and minds.

Blessing #5 – I feel blessed by my own successful writing work this year and the joy that I derived in the process.

About a month ago, I was reading someone else’s blog and she mentioned a website that was dear to her heart since it enabled her to feel that she was making a positive impact on the world. I bookmarked the website with the intention of returning to it once I had the time to read it thoroughly and find out how I felt about participating.

I’m a strong believer in messages from the Universe, and today I received another one. I was reading an email from Christine Gilbert at AlmostFearless.com and she mentioned several sites for making the world a better place — and one of them was my previously bookmarked one.

Sharing the blessings. My own personal philosophy has always been that if we have wonderful lives and a roof over our heads, food on the table, the love of family and friends, financial security on any level, and we’re living in a state of peace and not a war-torn country, then why not consider sharing the blessings.

KIVA is a site that provides micro-finance loans — just the tiniest amounts compared to what we in the developed world would call a loan — and those loans change lives by allowing new businesses to thrive, existing businesses to expand, homes to be built, and much more. The sense of pride in their self-reliance is tangible as you read their stories and note the well over 90% payback rate.

I have most happily become one of their patrons today. And that felt like yet another blessing — not like a chore.