Is it Time or is it Inclination?

More often than not, it's easy to cry the excuse "I would, but I just don't have the time." I know I've used it plenty of times. I can even back it up with the facts I work full time in retail with hours starting at 6am and hours sometimes finishing at 930pm, depending on the shift. Then I can throw in my family with 4 kids ranging in ages from 15yrs to 2yrs. Those 2 things alone give me reason to say, I just don't have the time.

But I ask you, is it time or inclination? I'm often woken at 630am to the lovely squawk of Mr T (2 year old son) yelling "Mum!! Mum!!" from his cot. So we get up, I grab him breakfast, then I sit on the laptop reading, drinking my coffee trying to wake up for the day. This can take somewhere from 30min to an hour. I often have shifts that have me home by 4pm. I usually have an hour before I need to start getting tea ready. So that leaves me and hour of time. Somehow it ends up disappearing without anything being acheived except me re-living how good/boring/busy/sucky my day was and catching up with the kids and my husband on their day was. Usually this is done whilst sitting on my butt.

There I've shown almost 2 hours in my day that go towards not doing much. Could I still catch up with my family while stirring a bowl of yummy treats? Could we do it hanging out the washing, leaving that time free for more fun things? Do I just put my hand up and say "Yes! I've got the time, I just can't be bothered?" Ofcourse there's a balance, but you get my piont.

My challenge is to be more proactive about my time. Why do we make feeling alert and awake more important for a working day, than we do our personal time?
So this morning I gave myself that kick up the butt and got a few things done before I started to get ready for work. You will quickly learn I love cooking from scratch, but find "time" is my enemy to doing as much as I'd like. This morning I made some delicious Apple & Cinnamon Muffins and whipped up a batch of home made Sweetened Condensed Milk to use later in the week.

Apple Cinnamon Muffins

3 cups Plain Flour

1 tbs Baking Powder

3/4 Brown Sugar

1 tbb Cinnamon

125gm Melted Butter

2 Eggs

1 cup Milk

1 cup Tinned Pie Apples, chopped

1. Sift flour and baking powder together in a large bowl. Add sugar and Cinnamon

2. Combine all wet ingredients in a seperate bowl.

3. Mix wet and dry ingredients together until just combined.

4. Gently stir through apple pieces.

5. Spray 12 hole muffin tin with oil. Place spoonfuls into your tin until about 3/4 full. the pop into a 180C

pre-heated oven for 20-25mins.

Sweetened Condensed Milk

1/2 cup warm/hot water

1 cup of sugar

1 cup powdered milk

3 tbsp butter

Place all ingredients in the blender and let it blend for a full two minutes.

How easy!! Why go to the shops, waste money, waste time, put nasty chemicals in your body when I had all the ingredients home and these 2 things took me only 30 mins to make. A much better use of my time than sitting around feeling tired. Plus I've now got  yummy afternoon tea for work.

Have a great day everyone. It's back to reality of work after a glorious 4 day weekend