Sunday, February 6, 2011

A week gone by and another to come

Firstly I must apologise for the dot point update, its been hot and I've avoided extra PC time.


Miss P turned 3
Its hard to believe its been three years since the smallest (though not youngest) memeber of our family popped out into my waiting hands. While her 1 year old sister isn't far off sharing her clothes she is the bigest personality of our crew by a long shot (not to mention the loudest) We had a quiet gathering with her grand parents and she got some different pressies including a doctors kit that has been a big hit.

Shoes
I finally got a decent enough break in to go to my fave little specialist shoe shop for some new clod hoppers, In the form of some snazzy boots for work and a second pair for walking around town.

Man Bag
I managed another equally extended lunch break to pick up a man bag for all manner of things I like to cart around. While the brief was simple it had to:
-Fit an iPad
-Have ample internal pockets for headphones keys and coins & phones
-Be waterproof
-Be small enough to be worn on a crowded train
-Have velcro and a clip for security
I scoured the interwebs for all manner of man bag but unfortunately didn't like anything I saw. I remembered where there was a factory outlet for crumpler and while nothing on their website met my needs I decided to have a look in the hope of getting an older model that may tick my boxes. I did in the form of "the soupandsalad son-o" yeah I don't get the names either. (I got the blue/yellow one)
Sickness
Mamma Bear was ill, in 6 children she has only had mastitis twice and this time was pretty hard on her, mixed in with a few high 30 degree days and plenty of humidity saw her pretty wasted. I felt crap that I couldn't do more for her. She never loses her cool with the children but I could see the combination of being crook and the heat and half a dozen shadows wore her down. Its frustrating seeing people with 1 or 2 children who get multitudes of help all the time, people dont offer to "take 5 off your hands" for an afternoon so mum can rest so we make do. I tried to have all the washing done before mondays return to work as well as taking care of the meals but with a 1 year old you are challenged thats for sure. Heres to no more sickness and a paid babysitter so maybe we can have our first date in well over 3 years

Incense for mosquito's
Living in the sticks means bugs and if you're unfortunate to be a mosquito magnet like some in our family are they can be an annoyances. Its not ideal to close up the house when we get such nice breezes and mossie candles stink so we decided to try some sandelwood incense. I have to say I love the smell and each night I've had a stick burn I've sat next to an open window and haven't had any bites.

Work
Work has continued to be awesome, I'm really getting into working for the government and can really see good in the work people in my department do and indirectly the systems I work on.

Lack of two wheeled action
Its been almost 2 months since I've been for a motorcycle ride, I'm not craving it but am missing it. I'll probably take the Duc for a spin just to give it a run this weekend but wont do any long rides for a few more months. Life is a little busy at the moment for selfish passtimes

Hiking
The eldest boys and I went for a hike up one of the local mountains yesterday, despite torrential rain we wore ponchos, it was challenging, steep, slippery and the track was more overgrown than I expected, we also encountered several leeches I had alf a dozen on one leg. I think I might invest in a water resistant camera for capturing some of the more active and messy activities we do as there were some awesome photo ops.





And the week ahead?

One of the great things about home schooling (there are so many I could bang on all day about them) is the fact that you're no bound to standard school hours or calendars. Lets face it if you go to a family destination be it the zoo, the beach or even the movies it kind of blows during school holidays. Don't get me wrong I love children (well certainly my own) but when an attraction is swarming with families its not as enjoyable.

Enter home Education, forget the crazy 8:30am traffic as parents flock to their childrens school drop off zones, forget about the panda enclosure that you queued at for 90 minutes, or the noisy movie theater. Its awesome when everything is quiet-er.

Monday we have the annual "Not-back-to-school" meet where by many Home Educators take their broods to a water park down the coast for a day of water slides and aqua cycling and much more. Monday is "Not-back-to-school" day and I cant wait.

The change in jobs and switching to consulting (no paid leave) means that our 2011 wont be as active as 2010 was in terms of me taking days off work for activities so I hope to get the most out of Mondays water fun.

Until next time

EDIT - I should add that by help I meant taking the children of MB's hands for an afternoon. She did receive help via our ever so handy Doula who delivered some herbs and potatoe compress to ease the mastitis.

1 comment:

  1. The herbs and Potato worked a treat :) Very thankful for our doula and wonderful friend.

    ReplyDelete