A total eclipse of the heart

Well ok not a total eclipse of the heart but a total eclipse of the sun is happening today if you happen to be in the right places in the world and of course Karl and some of his friends are you get to have quite a unique experience. They are in Side, Turkey preparing for fantastic time, which I can’t wait to see his photos from.

A couple of years ago I remember getting a fantastic book out of the library called Eclipse!: The What, Where, When, Why, and How Guide to Watching Solar and Lunar Eclipses, which listed all the solar and lunar eclipses that were going to happen till I think round 2020, great book for planning future holidays 🙂

In other news, Griffth (my uni) did exceptionally well at the recent Commonwealth Games, in fact if we were a country we would have finished fifth on the medal talley, which I think is quite cool 🙂

I’m not doing anything as exciting, just sitting in a computer lab at Uni, working on an essay, waiting for news to break on news.google.com.au and typing some more. I want to be in Turkey.

one desk, many purposes

First off, I want to thank you all for your comments on my last post, and I know there are many more blog birthdays coming up soon, so I want to see some more celebrations.

helen's desk

This is where I work, bludge, create, procrastinate, study, you know the usual.

If you click on the photo to view it at Flickr you can see all the little notes I have added to the picture.

This desk and shelves was a present from my ex-boyfriend for Christmas 2004, it allowed me to open up my room to have more space in as I previously had a desk and the old kitchen table in my room just to give me the workspace I wanted, it was cramped to say the least.

This is one big desk it is 2.6 long and 0.9m deep, computer gear at one end, creative space down the other end and uni stuff bang in the middle.

Due to the length, I can sit at the creative end whilst Mum is using the computer or I can sit on the desk and crochet whilst dangling my legs over the side. I love my desk.

The main feature are the two units designed for 8.5×11 paper and 12×12 paper respectively, they each have shelves that can be pulled out and re-arranged as needed. Like many scrapbookers, how I store my paper is a big factor in dictating how I use the paper, storing by company has never really worked for me as it never made sense, colour on the other hand is a much more Helen friendly method.

Arrangement 1 – cardstock on a shelf by colour in the 8.5×11 unit and paper on the neighbouring shelf in the 12×12 unit, with the extra shelves housing stickers, rub-ons etc. This was nice however it was difficult to flick through the shelves and I was collecting more 12×12 cardstock, which had no where to live.

Arrangement 2 – Pull out almost all the shelves in the 8.5×11 unit and arrange the cardstock (8.5×11 and 12×12) by colour standing vertically. Since I don’t have 9″ worth of cardstock the extra space was filled with my favourite idea books. This was much better except I wasn’t using much patterned paper now.

Arrangement 3 – Need to use more patterned paper, so pull all the patterned paper off their shelves and insert beside cardstock in 8.5×11 unit, much nicer and easier to deal with. Helen is now happy, but what about that space where the 12×12 paper used to be? Now filled up the idea books from the 8.5×11 unit, binder of UM stamps, box of paper scraps, photos etc. So much more practical.

Just a little insight into a portion of the 10.8m2 space which I like to call my room.

slightly big, possibly exciting

www.helenthura.com is a year old today and to me at least that is big and exciting 🙂 I mean the response when some asks for your email address and you say helenAThelenthuraDOTcom is classic.
Strictly speaking the birth date is March 21 but it didn’t resolve till March 24. Sort of like a three day labour you could say. As a handful of you know my blog is actually slightly older than the domain as I started over at Typepad on March 8 with the title Randomness in Brisvegas, which was also the name of this blog for a while before I changed it me, my camera and my life.

Typepad was nice and fills a demand in the market but I was not in that market, I wanted control! To have as much control as they will give you at Typepad it would be US$15 a month versus the US$5 or so this costs me each month and I have total control over everything 🙂 I played with a few different blog applications before I settled on WordPress and in the early days had numerous times of frustration as I learnt how PHP and CSS worked, sure I still have them now but no where near as often. 🙂

I thought it would be nice to have a year in review of the blogs that I feel best show to you and to me part of the journey I have taken in the last year. I want to thank you all for taking part in the ride that is the first year, whether you have been around since the early days or have only recently started reading me, you are all special 🙂

March 29, 2005 – Helen leaves the banana yellow walls and pink ceiling behind and to embrace the serenity of white.

April 1, 2005 – My first recipe post 🙂 The wonderful Skonsur, nothing in the world like ham and cheese on warm Skonsur.

April 18, 2005 – The reason why I do something that I hate 4 times a year (giving blood).

April 19, 2005 – My sweet thing arrived, my Canon 350D that is!

April 30, 2005 – The plans of the eternal traveler and the dreams I have of the world.

May 19, 2005 – Brisbane gets hit with a freak Hailstorm.

June 1, 2005 – The book arrived, that was a great project to work on.

June 16, 2005 – Time to feature my Mum with her divine chocolate cake recipe.

June 20, 2005 – Is scrapbooking all that it cracked up to be? One of the most important posts I think I have made not only to me in realigning myself creatively but also giving others some food for thought.

June 28, 2005 – The utter happiness of arriving back in Iceland.

July 22, 2005 – My account of what it was like to be in a town when a mini-terrorist attack happens.

August 3, 2005 – Helen gets magic worked on her hair.

August 18, 2005 – I revert back to a life of singledom.

September 11, 2005 – I rock out at the Moun tain Goats, turn 20 and then almost die by eating too much chocolate mousse.

September 26, 2005 – Mum and I spend a gorgeous weekend exploring northern NSW

October 10, 2005 – The music that people have shared with me and how it has influenced me.

October 26, 2005 – Helen gets a real fake tooth denture and is now well on her way to getting blue rinses in her hair and lining up at the bank to collect her pension.

November 7, 2005 – How fruity are your friends? Ali (& Liam) and I have a blast at the Whitlams.

November 28, 2005 – Bring on the Ben Lee! Two of my best friends, a cute guy and sweet music.

December 14, 2005 – I get the coolest shower cap, in turn making me the coolest kid on the block.

Decmeber 25, 2005 – Last night was Christmas and what a sweet night it was

December 29, 2005 – After 3 days on the road and high seas Mum and I arrive in Tasmania.

January 14, 2006 – Some of the sweet goodies I picked up on the road trip that Mum and I took to Tasmania.

January 29, 2006 – Tracy releases her Helen digital scrapbooking kit.

Febuary 2, 2006 – There is only two colours in the world – Pink and not pink.

Febuary 13, 2006 – Happy shoes, shoes that I can wear all day long with no pain.

Febuary 19, 2006 – Helen’s best ever biscuits, which I need to make again very soon.

Well that was the last year, what will this year bring? For starters more crafty and creative goodness, more concerts, more cooking, more fun at uni, the joy of trying to find a gradute job in a limited market place, adventures with family and friends and all round fun and goodness. I hope you continue to enjoy the driver’s seat view of the life of Helen Thura Palsson, a 20 year old uni student from Brisbane, Australia.

I leave you with many thanks for your comments and support over the last year.

round up, round up, round up

Another day and another birthday in the Pálsson troop 🙂

Today my third eldest brother, Hafþór Ingi turns the big 38! Out of my half-siblings, Hafþór is the only one I actually grew up around, as he moved to Australia with my parents in 1980 and moved back to Iceland in 1993 so for the first eight years of my life he was a big part of it.

This photo is of me when I was a wee little Snuffleupagus of just 4 weeks been held by the aforementioned brother who in this photo is 17! Don’t you just love the flags of the world outfit? Perhaps I was destined to be doing International Studies?

hafthor and helen
But this isn’t my birthday so bringing the attention back to the birthday boy. I don’t really have any funny moments but I am sure he does of me. There are some things that I do know, this man is a musical genius in all aspects from singing, to playing to writing, he is a wonderful father with two gorgeous kids, an incredible wealth of knowledge and an all round super cool person and big brother 🙂 Here is a more recent photo – taken last July at the family moot in Iceland, in his entire element with his guitar and perhaps it is the ever adoring younger sister in me, but I reckon he looks like Chris Martin of Coldplay and has a better voice too 🙂

hafthor-at-the-moot

Ok, that was a little longer than I planned on it been so back to the topic as the title of this post suggested – round up.

The Commonwealth Games are on at the moment and Australia of course is on fire! I always enjoy the Commonwealth Games more than the Olympics; they just seem a whole lot more friendlier, because they are the “Friendly Games” 🙂 It’s just great to see things like this, and many other countries getting their first Gold, Silver or Bronze medals, just great stuff! and Ben Lee is going to be playing at the closing ceremony, top stuff!

But to put some family spin on the Commonwealth Games, big kudos to my second cousin Nathan Eglington who is on fire in the Kookaburras (Australian Men’s Hockey team) with a hat-trick in a 5-1 win against England. Should be another Gold Medal for Australia there.

Uni is still uni, but I have now done my first piece of assessment so it really feels like the semester is underway now – it is week 4 of 13 after all.

Go check out some of the designs Tracy is pumping out at the moment, that girl is on fire I tell you.

Big Cheers for EK Success and Jacob getting engaged – so happy 🙂

The Parcel man brought me five (5) new crafty books from Amazon.co.jp the other day – will post more about them soon 🙂

I made the most yummy blueberry muffins last night – total heaven. I used this recipe – Blueberry Muffins from Elsie.com all I changed was that I used buttermilk instead of plain yoghurt and didn’t add the lemon zest because I had no lemons and WHOA total heaven, very, very nice muffins!

I think that was all I wanted to round up for the moment but I leave you with this note, something “big” and “special” is coming a few days time 😀

Matthew turns 19

Today is the day that 19 years ago, I was no longer the youngest child in the Pálsson troop with the birth of my little brother Matthew Símon, I became his older sister by 18 mths, something which does not give me much clout anymore.

He is now quite a few cm’s taller than me, no longer looks like Bert Newton Jnr with his moon face, seems to know everyone and talks some of the cutest bullshit I have ever heard. I would love to record some of the bullshit he talks, it is classic stuff.

We used to have petty arguments as kids where he would say he was older because his birthday was the 20th whereas mine was only the 11th, didn’t we all have arguments like that with our siblings?

I think now days he possibly has a larger influence on my life than I on his as he introduces me to new music and computer games that I never have time to play and well in his view most of the stuff I listen to should be deleted from my computer.

This photo is from a May 2005, when I was actually able to get a photo of him and not be given his spiel on how I was stealing his soul or invading his privacy or some other crap.
matthew 19
The other day, we were discussing plans for his birthday, birthdays in our house are a pretty relaxed fair, presents are almost always gotten at a later date when you trade in the birthday card, this year though Matthew asked to trade his whole birthday in; presents and dinner for a time when he wants them. Though he then had the bright idea of wondering how much money he could get if he sold his birthday rights on Ebay which include AU$100 in a gift and your choice of meal or restaurant for a celebration meal. Any Takers?

Happy Birthday Little Brother.

some more road trip layouts

These a couple of layouts I have been working on recently in breaks from study/uni, which is what I am doing at the moment – finishing off a presentation for class tomorrow on “ownership and management issues in state owned enterprises in China” which will also be the topic of my semester essay. How Fun!!
Seal Lake

Melbourne

Tarraleah