Restoring the Old Girl

A whole new world
Our life is usually pretty calm. We have a routine that is so down pat that I often find myself saying the exact same words at exactly the same time each day; 'dinner's ready', 'time to put your jammies on', 'sleep tight kitty kats'.
To be honest, at the moment, we are in absolute chaos. We know the builder wants us out soon, but we're not exactly sure when, just 'soon'. I'm busy packing for an indeterminate deadline, while simultaneously ebaying countless items.
One of my children has just started school and I'm still trying to navigate that. Apparently lunch is no longer called 'lunch'. It's called 'first break' although technically it's the second break, but I'm told the first break isn't counted because it's eaten in class. Why it's not called morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea I'm yet to find out.
Meanwhile we have friends staying with us for the weekend, and this is what their room looks like at the moment...

.....that's a bed under there.

Added to this I'm flying to Melbourne for the weekend at the end of next week. When I booked, this was thought to be the best time, before things got too hectic. Everything that is happening now was expected to be happening closer to Easter.
My husband is about to start a new job. We're not too sure wheré we'll be moving to until Easter. After Easter I can have the use of my mother's house while she goes up north. Wherever we move to I'm sure we won't be able to take Teddy the kitten, so I'll have to find temporary accommodation for him too.
Our furniture keeps getting sold, so now we have many things we still use daily stored in open boxes. This is what we're dealing with.

I've heard that just after you've had a baby a natural drug rushes through your system and makes you forget all the pain you've just experienced. This is our fourth renovation, our second with children, and at this stage, I'm thinking there must be a similar drug that affects you post reno. Why have we done this to ourselves?

Self pity aside, I was clearing out a little timber medicine cabinet today. It had been lined with an old newspaper from 1975. This is by no means the oldest newspaper we've found, in fact it's the most recent by a long way, but it was of particular interest to me. I was three in 1975, and I clearly remember weekly shopping trips to Woolworths with my mother. I remember everything had a price stamped on it. There was a person who worked in the fruit and vegetable section who would weigh and price your produce. The checkout person would manually type in the prices from each product, and presumably my mother added up these prices in her head and prayed she had enough money in her purse so she wouldn't have to put anything back.

This parcticular piece of newspaper had an advertisement for Coles New World.

This will either be of tremendous interest to you, or I may cause you to nod off, but these are the grocery prices on December 10, 1975:

Frankfurts 88c/kg

Coca Cola 35c/litre

Jatz 38c packet

Rib Roast $1.08/kg

Side of Lamb 79c/kg

Lamb Chops $1.29/kg

Frozen Cheesecake 98c each

Wing Dings 27c

Roast Port $2.16/kg

Chicken $1.82/kg

375g Kingaroy Peanuts 60c

Shortbread 225g 99c

If you click on the photo of the newspaper you'll be able to see an enlarged version you can read.

Hmm, I must remember to get myself some new interests when this renovation is done.