A Lesson in Patience

Days 5-8

Saturday was another sultry day.  The four of us walked into Bellingen and wandered around.  I had been struck down with my first full on hayfever since before I got pregnant with Jack.  To combat this I tried everything herbal and pharmaceutical on the market.  Nothing seemed to be keeping it at bay.  There was some question as to whether it is hayfever at all but I had all the symptoms, red runny eyes, sneezing, and the ever present drippy nose.

Luckily I managed to stay pretty chilled out about it and then every so often (about once every 2-3 hours) I would loose my cool and have a little whinge to myself until I felt better again.

Saturday night is party night, everyone seemed to be partying late.  I woke up a few time and once I heard a sound coming from directly outside our tent I sat up and looked and saw two young guys in the dark trying to get into our esky.  I was right above them and I said " Oi get out!" He was obviously drunk/stoned because he took a moment then jumped back like a cat that caught a fright screamed and ran off into the night.  AB woke with a fright thinking that it was me that had screamed.  They got the beer, but we got a good giggle so it was almost a trade off.

Sunday the rain came.  It rained for 24 hours straight. Keeping two boys occupied in a soggy camp site was a new thing to add to the;
+ List of parenting trials that I don't need to do again, but happily survived.

The boys are doing fabulously, they haven't asked to go home again since the first day. They haven't asked for television or showers. They are mostly playing happily together, with the occasional play with our friends kids to break up the monotony.  They have slept in their own beds all night and stayed asleep until around 6am each morning.  I'm actually quiet surprised and relieved.

One of the best bits about the campsite is the impromptu jam sessions.  We were all hanging out and a group next to us started a drum and percussion jam. One of our friends started playing the saxophone.  Hamish was dancing up a storm, a few people commented on his wicked hip movements and rhythm.  Jack was struck by the saxophone player.  Once he was finished playing Jack walked over to me with a glisten in his eye and said
"Mummy, can we find one of those for a four years boy to play?"
He was so taken by the 10 minute jam that it is the top of his list of thing he liked about the festival.

It stopped raining just in time for the light-up lantern festival.  This year I was determined to take the boys to make a lantern but neither of them were interested.  It became a new thing to add to the;
+ List of things you want for your children and then realise that you are living vicariously through them.

But we joined the parade and walked around with Arieal and her lantern, watching the huge glowing men, fish, pigs, ants and other lanterns bobbing and gliding around us.  The parade stopped at the concert stage and they had the fire lighting.  The word 'Transition' in huge burning writing while the aboriginal tribe of this area did a small ceremony.

Afterwards the kids were awe struck watching the Japanese Drumming. Jack was bobbing his head to the beat and got into the cheering and whooping that everyone was doing on cue as part of the performance.

We could feel the skies were about to open again so we ran back to our tent to get the kids in bed while they were still dry and batten down the hatches.

Monday is pack up day, but we have decided to stay on and as we watched everyone try and pack in the rain we knew we had made the right decision.  There were some storm warnings come through they predicted gail force winds thunder storms and hail.  Luckily it mostly passed us by with just a few extra heavy downpours.

Waking up this morning to blue skies felt like a gift from the gods.  It has been sunny but not hot all day and everything is dry.  We have just spent today around the tents, the kids are playing with our friends kids, Andrew did some work, and I got some of my book read and finally got to finish this blog post.  We have great reception but charging our phones has been an issue.

We don't know what we are going to do for the rest of the week.  If we don't get kicked out we may just stay here or we might pack up and move down the coast a bit.  That's the nice thing about these holidays, no plans just the luxury of feeling like you can do whatever you feel like when you wake up.
xx

And so it Begins

Day 4

The picture above is of the view we woke up to this morning.  It looks perfect right? Well you'd be half right. During the day and early evening the camp ground was to die for, and then the night air came in and sounds started to travel more loudly and then we started to notice that you could hear the freeway.  By about 9pm the sounds of the trucks travelling along the freeway were so loud we may as well have camped in the medium strip.  Not to worry but it did keep us up for a lot of the night.

We made our way to Bellingen by 9.30am. By the time we arrived the camp ground was already packed. Apparently people started sneaking in at nine the night before.  We are happy with our spot but we are away from the people we know who had a guy on the inside stake a spot for then late last night.

Set up with the Uber rent-a-tent was easy even in the scorching heat.  We overlooked 3 other tent setups, men and women struggling in the heat with young kids freaking out from our spot in the shade and thanked the uber rent-a-tent.

Then it was a matter of whiling away the morning with a beer until the festival started at 6pm.  We wandered down to the river and cooled off.  Hamish slept while AB, Jack and I swam.  I feel like I have spent all year looking forward to jumping back into the crystal clear cool waters of the Bellinger river.

It was late by the time we headed up to the festival. Jack fell asleep as we waited to get in and Hamish saw a light-up sword and proceeded to spend the next hour pleading with us to get it for him. 

Then we felt the campers worst nightmare, the first drops of rain.  We high tailed it back to the tent to put the uncovered windows down.  Then in true AB and I style we decided that we may as well call it a night and stayed to hang out at the tent for a bit. Soon we are off to bed ... Party animals that we are <grin>

Tomorrow is another day, we hope to do lantern making, see the amazing drumming monkeys, dunk ourselves in the Bellinger again oh and maybe see some of the awesome music that is playing.
xx

Start with a Bang

Day 3

There is nothing quiet like a rude awakening.  I mean that quiet literally. Like when you are laying in your cozy bed thinking that in 10 - 15 minutes tops your hubby is going to take the kids out for their morning sojourn and you are going to be left in your cocoon for an hour or so's uninterrupted sleep.  Then you hear the dreaded caravan park camping words;

"someone has stolen our esky!" Quiet a rude shock to the system.

I lay there for about 10 minutes trying to decided if anything could be achieved by my getting out of bed. Only to decided that to be a supportive partner I needed to put my wants aside.

So yes our esky was gone, and just after we had filled it for the trip to bello.  Andrew decided to go for a walk around the park to see if he could see it but both of us had no thoughts that we would ever see our esky, let alone our yogurt, sausages etc and my bottle of wine. 

Although we were disappointed we knew that these things happen and it would all be ok, there would be more food and other eskies.

15 minutes later he returned without the esky.  So off he trotted to tell the reception and off I went to figure out what to feed the kids for breakfast (thank god for long life milk).  The guy at reception told him that there was a drain at the back of the park and that often when eskys are stolen (seems quiet common, not something that is in the brochure) they leave them there. So off he trotted again. By this time we had quiet a few grey nomads gathering around taking about how they knew someone who knew someone who had once lost an esky.  The kids were asking if a bug'la took it and I was trying to eat my long life milky breakfast without gagging.

Then like a cat who ate the cream back saunters AB WITH the esky and all of our food, minus the wine but it was cheap and I wasn't really excited about drinking it anyway. 

Another grey nomad (ie old person who travels around Australia in some sort of van) came over and said that there was an esky behind her tent and it wasn't theirs. I was about to thank her but say it wasn't ours, when I realised that the old esky we use to carry our pots and pans was missing.

HUZZAH

2 eskies stolen, 2 eskies safely back home again.

Really nothing else in the day could beat the eskies coming home.

* Uber rent-a-tent once again lived up to its name, as we were able to leave all bedding mattresses etc laid out and just fold it up and off we went.
* Stopped at Urunga which was lovely until it got so windy that Hamish almost blew over
* We spoke to the friends that we are camping with at the festival and found out that in spite of our cheeky ideas, you couldn't sneak into the camp ground 24 hours early
* I decided that we should go to Repton, to stay in a caravan park on the Bellinger river.

So here I am once again. Kids are asleep. Andrew and I are sitting at the waters edge about 6 meters away from the tent. He is fishing, as I write this he just caught his 5th fish (all under sized but still ...) And I am blogging with a glass of much better wine beside me, and a tim tam in my tummy. Its much warmer here so all in all for a day that started with such a bang the evening is positively peachy.
xx

Quiet Day in the Sun

Day 2.

We got into Port Macquarie later than expected last night and did most of our setup in the dark.  It was disorientating for the kids (and me) especially after seven hours in the car.  The kids just wanted to run and sleep and we wanted to setup and eat. Therefore within the first hour Jack, who likes home comforts, was asking when we were going home.

Luckily the uber rent-a-tent lived up to its word and was super quick to setup.  It felt to late to cook camp style so we popped into town, had a quick sit down meal and by the time we walked back the kids were well and truly ready for bed.  AB and I then sat on the esky had a glass of wine and went to bed ourselves.

I was worried that the bed setup was going to be  problematic seeing that the kids were on a mattress on the floor and AB and I were sleeping in a bed that needs a step and a grunt to get up into.  Both of the boys are used to sleeping very close to us (if not literally on top of us) but it turned out to be fine because;
 1. Jack slept through the night
 2. Hamish only woke up twice
 3. Mummy learnt how to get in and out of the very high bed while still in her sleeping bag

Morning for us also often turns out to be a challenge seeing that our kids wake very early (between 4.30 and 5.30) but they happily both slept till 6.  AB took them for a walk while mummy had another hour snuggled in her penthouse bed.

Then the day progressed like any caravan park camping trip: 
* 100 trips to use the new and fascinating (to 4 and a 3yr olds) toilets.
* One drive into town to get all the bits you forgot or replace things that turned out not to work. 
* Multiple walks around the park and plays in the playground.
* Two trips to find a decent coffee.
* Three playing along the breakwater.
* Three hours swimming in a pool so cold that made the kids teeth chatter.
* One shower for mummy and the boys.  With mummy grabbing her wet towel every 5 minutes and ducking between showers because dodgy plumbing meant that the showers didn't stay at the optimal 3/4 year old temperature
* Two hours Daddy fishing
* Mummy having her second (and then third) glass of wine for her holiday (that's it I'm stopping the count now, it is. Holiday after all)
* Figuring out the rest of the uber rent-a-tent gizmos so we can cook dinner
* and finally the last walk around the park, kids teeth brushed and asleep and mummy sitting with her technology, blogging.

Now that is finished, I'm going to move to a chair out of the sea breeze, refill my wine glass and read my book, by the uber rent-a-tents built in night light
xx

Time out from the Everyday

It feels like years since I have been on holidays.  In actuality it has only been one.  This time last year we were getting ready to drive up to Bellingen for the Global Carnival.  Today we are already on the road.

Last year was our first year at Global, and I was amazed at how relaxing 4-5 days camping in the heat with 1000 other tents could be.  The atmosphere was chilled, the people were eclectic to say the least, but for the most part lovely and the kids had a ball. To say nothing of the actual music and activities within the carnival.

We will also be doing some extra camping at different places on the way up and back.  I'm hungry for some time out and away from work, technology, politics and schedules and ready to embrace the kids running free, looking at the stars, cooking on a camp stove and no showers for a week or so.  There is nothing like having to deal with your kids pooing in a plastic bag at midnight in the rain to make you feel blessed to have a dilapidated  house with outdoor plumbing in the city.  I'm sure 10 days away and we will come back renewed and refreshed and happy to be home again.

Best Breast Forward

Breasts in the media are always perky and perfect. They sit plumply out from the chest when their owner is standing and they do not try and hide under her arms when she lays down. These are not real breasts. Real breasts move when you walk. They sag. They sag more after breastfeeding. They sag more as we age. Most women could hold a pencil under them, which when I was young was the sign of bad breasts. Unless your really young, most nipples don't point forward, they aren't always perfectly centered, they are different shapes and sizes and placement.

We do not often see these real breasts in mainstream media, we see these young or artificial or photoshopped breasts and it leaves most women feeling insecure or unsure of how their breast fit in the scheme of things.

This site shows lots of different breasts, none of them fake, all of the breast are perfectly imperfect.

Recently Kate Winslet did a film in which she was topless and she showed her amazing slightly used (she breastfed two kids) breasts in the raw. Sad that it had to make the news because it is so uncommon, but good on her ! hopefully more women will take pride in their slightly used saggy boobs :)

PostSecrets

Todays post secret made me cry

Lackadaisical Parenting

This is my youngest son. He has just turned 3 and is sitting on top of our 6ft fence playing with dropping a skipping rope over the edge watching how it dangles.

This is a daily activity, but just then for the first time I had a thought 'what if he falls?'

Now I know most parents would have wondered this one of the first dozen times they saw him doing this.  I have to admit I hadn't.

'What if?' Is rarely one of those things I ask. Either about my children or myself. I seem to have this 'she'll be right mate' attitude to most aspects on my mothering and my life.

I heard the term 'helicopter parenting' for the first time the other day.  It means a parent who hovers around their child in case their child need help. Basically it is the opposite of how I parent.  Neither is right or wrong, I honestly think that I fell into my style of parenting because I am innately lazy and following my children around all the time seems like far to hard work.  Plus I think most accidents would happen whether I am standing next to them or not, I mean you just can't be alert to another humans actions all the time.

So why today of all days did I decide to think 'what if he falls?'

I've been pondering on it a lot. Was it just that he looked especially precarious? Am I loosing a little of my lackadaisical attitude? I guess I'm not sure.

But I didn't get up, so I'm guessing I don't have to worry that I am becoming more of a helicopter parent maybe I'm wanting to play life a bit safer, maybe I'm getting older ... Nah *grin*

Romance

She has a romantic heart
Not flowers and chocolates
The romance of music wafting through the air
The sounds of bird roosting in the evening
Warm spring breezes and cool summer streams

Romance is dying they say
But to her it was barely beginning
The feel of her child hands on her skin
Sipping good wine after a cold day
The way the city ebbs and flows

From the outside her life would seem bland, almost to dull to bear but she so often saw the romance in the world, her heart would fill and tears of love would roll down her cheeks.

Romance is where you see it
And she saw it everywhere

Taking Stalking to a Whole New Level

Well we all know I am a little teensy bit obsessed with Neil Gaimans writing. I was on his Twitter list ... to much random information. I read his blog ... but he tweets instead of blogging mostly. I have read his website ... but really just to find out more about what he has written, but today I saw THIS

Now this is the kind of stuff that I really want to know about Neil, not his awards, not his marriage status but what's on his bookshelves, when so much of mine are dedicated to him. I was pleased to see a lot of books from my own shelves were also on his. Maybe he is my new "who to get stuck sitting next on a plane"

Plus who else's bookshelves can I browse on Shelfari .... hmm the mind boggles and gets its stalking glasses on *grin*