Beyond the Edge of Adventure

I don't like days like this. When you come home from school drop-offs to a few loads of wash to hang out and quite a few administrative tasks. You knock down all the jobs because the toddler goes for her nap early and the baby miraculously sleeps. You manage to co-ordinate the baby, the toddler and lunch so that you score a whole hour of down time. You feel good! Feeling confident, loving the hard work. You've done heaps of jobs and only have one thing left to do: prepare dinner. After weighing up your great arvo rest (during which you can't sleep, but do manage to lie still) against the trauma of trying to cook dinner with five children swinging around your house, you decide to risk cooking dinner whilst the children are at home rather than race to prepare it before you pick them up from school. Then it hits. You arrive at school, get the toddler and baby out and carefully lock the car - leaving the boot wide open. Not just any boot - a gigantic van boot *sigh*...

I can write about this now because I'm somewhat refreshed, thanks to my gorgeous husband who has sent me to bed early this week, made me a bath and has stepped in to help out around the house. I've been a bit tired lately - I usually cook myself fried rice or scrambled eggs with veggies/leftover meat for lunch each day as I'm sensitive to gluten and milk so I can't have sandwiches. This doesn't seem like a big thing, but when you do the school run, get a few loads of wash out, get the toddler to eat, put the toddler in his bed for a sleep and feed the baby - it's hard to fit in cooking a hot meal. So when I get tired, I don't really eat all that much. I've stopped eating conventional breakfast food recently. I'm a big breakfast fan and I believe if we all sat down to a HUGE breakky every day we'd hardly need to eat for the rest of the day. Well, it works in theory. The reality is that I'm so tired and busy in the mornings that I can barel...

We've had a lot of changes in our family lately which has been exciting! First of all, we have number of additions to our hobby farm: Jessie and Pinky are two Ingham Hisex chooks who live in Ben's home-made 'Taj Mah-Chook'. Ben spent about a month making it, all on his own....except for one Saturday when I helped him for a bit. Whilst it was mostly successful, I managed to slam the wire cutters shut on my thumb creating a huge blood blister! I gave up after that. Ben can make a chook cage for a month, but get me near tools for 30 mins and I injure myself! Sheesh! So, we're very excited to have the chookies and Jessie's started laying already! I lost my beloved Fendi sunglasses from Saks in New York, a special gift from my husband during our trip to the USA last year. They're probably now in someone else's handbag, been worn on someone else's face.....I know it seems like a stupid thing to be so upset about, but it's like losing a ring or sp...

I want Ben to go back to shift-work!! HA! If you'd asked me that question 4 1/2 years ago, I would have immediately chosen for Ben to work 9-5, Monday to Friday, with every weekend off. Now, I'm so tired just getting the children to school every day (violins, please) that I'm aching for the weekend. I don't know how 9-5ers do it! Ben's been in the QAS for 5 years now and although I HATED it at first and struggled to adjust to shift work (it took about a year for me to work out how it worked), I'm now in a routine with shift work. Huh? Routine? Shift work? How do they go together? Beats me. All I know is, two days off in a row is SO not enough (keep those violins going!!) and I can't wait for shift work to resume in a little over a week's time! So, my dear friends who are following my blog - you are the ones who are to hold me accountable - next time I complain about Ben working on the weekends, or doing a 12-hour shift + overtime: REMIN...