Have you joined the KonMari movement yet? I am now one of “those” people who Origami’s their undies and who goes around patting their belongings looking for a spark of joy (or at least not rampant disgust). Next season’s fashions at our local Vinnies boutique will...

I remember my first experience with lipstick. I was 3 and my best friend, Alison, and I had been left alone for a few minutes in my bathroom. We spotted my mother’s beautiful Helena Rubenstein’s Waterproof True Red in its gloriously shiny ribbed gold tube on our pink...

It was late 1998: The type of summer’s day when the song of cicadas are the loudest noises on the planet, and the heat makes every in-breath akin to gulping over-heated coffee. My tiny baby was asleep in the house, and I was using the few hours of her sleep to hit the...

Fifteen years ago, on the 1st of December 2003, I opened the doors to my fledgling small business.  Running a small business wasn’t something I grew up dreaming I would be doing. It isn’t something I discussed with my career counsellor (in my case an ancient nun with...

The first 20 years of my career, I spent wearing corporate suits with super large shoulder pads, in a variety of corner offices with the title Human Resource/Employee Relations Director stencilled on the door. A number of times each year, a manager with their hair...

I shakily raised my arm to push the hostess call button above my airline seat. My face flamed with embarrassment as I squeaked out, “Could I please have a seatbelt extender.” I had spent 10 minutes struggling to get my lap band seatbelt connected, wriggling every...

My ancient lawnmower grumpily skulked in my garden shed. It hated the sunshine and being removed from the cool dark cave. It hated, even more, being forced to start and did everything in its ageing power not to do any work. First, it was spark plugs, and then the...

I was not always a small business copywriter and web designer. My first role out of uni was as a Personnel Officer with 500 staff in freshly built retail store in Bateau Bay on the NSW central coast. In that role, I had the dubious honour of sacking Santa the week...

Tears were pricking at the back of my eyes. I was gripping the car’s steering wheel so tightly that it left indentations on my fingers. Waves of panic were threatening to crash dump over my head and force any remaining calmness into the sand. I was a single mum with...

Normally Boxing Day is spent eating leftovers, visiting relatives and watching cricket on the TV. Not this Boxing Day! This Boxing Day was the start of "The Renovation Project." This project had been 10 years in the dreaming, but had always been pushed aside for other...

"You know you don't have to do this mum," said my youngest daughter with her arms around me. "I know .... I want to do this for you," I said with a sad, half-smile as I turned away to begin my long practiced routine. Turn on the iron. Fill it with water. Turn the dial...

This week I have been sick. Not the kind of "sick" snarled by a teenager wearing trousers that show more of their undies than a Victoria's Secret model, but the curled up in a ball and quietly rocking in a ball of misery sick. I mean, who gets the flu in November? It...