Having been forced to go to a conference with my boss because someone obviously more senior than me dropped out, I actually suprised myself and really enjoyed the conference, taking everything to heart.

The conference was on sustainability - this year's biggest trend! I know that some people don't agree that climate change is under our influence, but it has really made me think about how I could do my little bit, just in case.

I have succeeded in getting into the habit of turning off the TV so it isn't left on standby and switching light off when I leave the room etc. But this has really got my thinking about how we seem to have more and more packaging, because we are losing the skills to make the things for ourselves that would not have been routinely purchased 40 or 50 years ago.

With this in mind I have decided that I an going to make all the new blinds for my house! I had thought about curtains, (and my dear friend who is a design teacher in a secondary school offered to help me), but I have decided that blinds would be more cost effective, and surely easier as they will be smaller??

Will let you know how I get on!

Also on my "holiday" yesterday, I did some work in what could be loosely termed a garden. The Sunday Mirror "Homes & Holdays" magazine, had tempted me that an hour or so's pottering would reward me with a glorious mediteranean style patio.

That was the theory anyway.

3 hours later, I was still in a scruffy mess, but my clothes were covered in a light coating of dead leaves, snail poo, earwigs, and an army of off spiders, angry that I had filled their hidy holes and painted their homely, (but dirty) habitat in brilliant white masonary paint!

All I have succeeded in doing is make the rest of the house look even more scruffy than it was in contrast to the stark white.

Maybe I should set my sights lower.

But I ask myself: Is there anywhere lower than the Sunday Mirror???

I had a days holiday from work yesterday, to do some painting and decorating. But whilst hard at work, I started thinking about how cost affective this really is.

Seriously, it would have cost me £65 for a local decorator to do it (would have taken half the time of my amateurish efforts too). This is less than I get paid in a day.

So, am I really fooling myself? having a full days holiday. Does it really work out that cost effective?