See what happens ..

by the end of the school holidays? Check out the post below .. a random thoughts post that is completely empty .. like my mind! (Actually I pressed the wrong button and it posted so I figured I'd just leave it there to remind me of why I used to work during most of the school holidays .. so my mind would continue to function at a rate faster than a turtle mugging a snail!)

On the topic of school holidays ... only three more sleeps until we're back on the merry-go-round that is getting children out of bed early enough to be fed, dressed and packed for school ... but not too early that they have time to complain about how early you got them out of bed. I reckon mothers are the best juggling and balancing acts in the world! (Then again, that brings to mind the saying 'too many freaks; not enough circuses' so I suppose it can be looked at many ways!)

Seriously though, it has been good to be home for the holidays and to actually spend time with the boys. Sure, I've wanted to kill them a time or two (or fifty!) but we've spent time together doing things away from the house as well as at home and they seem to have enjoyed themselves and surprisingly enough so have I. I say surprisingly because I was concerned with having them all at home, all day, every day for nearly three weeks. The weekends are usually bad enough with the bickering and fighting so I thought it would be worse because of all the extra time together. Most of the time they got along fairly well and the other times were relatively easily dealt with by removing one person from the mix .. and yes, sometimes that person was me!

We went out for a 'sausage sizzle' lunch at Bickley Reservoir on Saturday with Clare and Richard. I realised just how slack I've been in parenting these kids when they told me they didn't know how to play 'french' cricket .. the one where you stand in the centre of a circle with the bat and aren't allowed to move your feet as you hit the ball. My excellent (snort!) hand-eye skills were extremely helpful in ensuring I never got a turn at bat because I couldn't manage to catch a single ball! They all finally took pity on me and I got out on my first bat! Oh well, at least I got some exercise chasing the ball all over the place.

Then we went for a bush walk, led by Alex with me bringing up the rear. Clare had worn some lovely looking sandals while the rest of us were in runners. Poor thing got bitten about 50 times by the bull ants that were absolutely everywhere! When her hopping around trying to remove the ants started to resemble a cross between a Native American rain dance, Peter Garrett's efforts out front of Midnight Oil and Riverdance, we gave up on the walk and headed back to the car park. Unfortunately we ended up on a different track going back up the hill and there were more ants for us to contend with. I'd forgotten how much those little buggers hurt when they bite .. ouch! All in all though, a good time out .. I'll just remember to take the Stingose or bi-carb next time!

Sunday was very quiet with all of us managing some sort of sleep in followed by a lazy day doing nothing much at all, apart from finding out that Alex only has three shirts, two pairs of shorts and nothing much else in the way of clothes. Why did he put the rest of the clothes away in his drawers if he knew they didn't fit? Apparently, so that it looked like he had clothes. Huh? Yes, that was his answer!

Today I made them all come away from the TV screen and out to the backyard to help me do some gardening .. much to their disgust! We managed to fill the garden waste bag with all the weeds we pulled and all the trimming of trees we did and we, oops I mean I, also managed to plant the grevilleas and waxes I bought a couple of weeks ago. Now if I could just get the bore reticulation to work I'd be happy. I'll never have a display garden (I'm way too lazy for that!) but at least the weeds aren't taller than me any more.

I'm still looking for a job and you'll probably call me crazy (everyone else does .. it's OK to join in!) but I turned down a job last week. The original ad said it was part-time, 4 days a week. Turns out it was part-time hours five days a week and 1-in-4 weekends with 4 weeks of full-time training in the city first. I can understand having to be trained properly, but working weekends and every second afternoon until 5:30 wasn't going to be good for the homework situation .. or my mental health! I know, I know .. I'm being too picky but at least I know I can get another job now! Great boost to the self-esteem.

My scrapping mojo made a temporary appearance the other day to enable me to finish some UFOs (Un-Finished Objects) that were hanging around driving me insane. I don't know where he's gone now though .. probably back into the bottom of the laundry hamper. I have realised he only seems to make an appearance when the hamper is empty so I figure that's where he must live. I say 'he' because no self-respecting female mojo would live in a laundry hamper full of boys' sweaty underthings!

On that pleasant note, it's time to get some sweaty boys through the shower (with soap and shampoo, boys!) and get ready for dinner. Now what to have ....