Day 5 of the Happiness Challenge.

Today was supposed to be a day alone in the house while hubby took the two small children out for the day. Boy child did not want to leave the house so the day went a bit haywire from the beginning.

Remarkably I still managed to get through a significant amount of the housework catching up that I'd earmarked as today's jobs. My clean laundry is now sorted and put away, not a giant pile threatening to take over the laundry room! I made some interesting discoveries about how to clean stains from the toilet - gumption has shifted a lot of the marks, and Tea Tree Oil seemed to help lift some of the stubbornest areas.  The Tea Tree Oil was a bonus find, as I was simply trying to add a freshened-up smell to the room by pouring it into the bowl, and the chemical fizzy reaction was unexpected!  I managed to clear off the shelving surface in the entry, it is back to being functional, with only family photographs on top, not the flotsam of our lives!

On the downside I've made a spectacular mess by attempting late in the day to clean off the top of a bookshelf that was a dumping ground for all the children's craft - it now covers our kitchen table in a layer of unidentified muck, despite my having sorted and removed half of the pile already!

I was fairly grumpy by day's end, as I didn't exercise, or see my Dad today, both of which frustrates me. The intention was to do some Tai Chi tonight, but I fell asleep instead, so no exercise endorphins for me today.  And for some reason (let's blame winter) my diet seems to be firmly grounded in 'bad food' still, despite the threat of ear infection (I am prone to them if I eat too many grains), bread remains firmly at the centre of my dietary experience!

Am I grateful today? Very much so, grateful that I am making progress on the house project, grateful my children are so delightful and very grateful for the snippets of Bruce I managed to play today in the gaps between children's movies on the computer! 

Tomorrow morning I'll make seeing Dad the first stop of the day, and make sure to not only walk, but to get some peace through enjoying the beautiful surroundings I'm blessed to live near.  Yesterday evening waiting for the boys to see Despicable Me 2, I was blessed with this gorgeous riverfront dusk.