Sometimes winter isn't only for learning endurance. And the best pear tree teepee ever.

I love Autumn. I love the change in the air. I just love change for the most part.

My greatest flaw is that I can become bored easily and I find it hard to just sit still and be. I generally like moving onto the next big thing. I love the anticipation and challenge as much as I love the crisp Autumn air as I go to hang the washing out of a morning and the leaves in their various shades.

But deep down I always know that winter will come. The leaves will be gone and it will be just cold. Like this realisation, I sometimes know that moving onto the next big thing will require a winter of my own. I remember coming to this point right before I gave birth to Daisy. Oh so excited! Standing on the brink of a new adventure. Oh so terrified. Winter was near and I knew it.

Yesterday Craig cut our pear tree back. Autumn is long gone, so sadly it was time. I don't like this part of winter. All the beautiful trees are pruned back to nothing, ugly, until spring. So I watched on as I hung the washing out, hoping winter would hurry up and go. Reflecting as I did, winter is just to endure. Waiting. As patiently as possible, until spring.

Walking back inside I sighed, knowing all that was left was to pick up the pieces. More work. Reminding me of the winter I have since emerged from. Soon I became caught up in other tasks and forgot the remains of the pear tree.

Later that afternoon with busy children milling about the house, girls in their pjs early after a hard day at school, the boys ran outside to play. Isabel and Lucy took turns playing with Daisy and doing their homework, giving me time to finish up a blog post and organise the washing (dry, dryer needed, inside hanging required). The afternoon passed and suddenly Jack and Henry appeared at the back door with huge smiles, claiming that I just had to see something really special. I slowly got up from typing, as this request is a constant one in my house, and made my way rather unenthusiastically to the back door.

As I walked around the corner, an amazing stick teepee stood before me. The boys stood beaming, "mum look at what we made!" At first I was speechless. It always impresses me just how wonderfully creative they are (although the creative following-of-directions not so much!) I smiled and replied, "wow! Great effort boys! You must have worked really hard on that." Everyone came out to look. Lucy in her pjs, Elsa dress and all, because how often is a great teepee made from left overs?

As it turns out winter is not just for enduring. For me, I will look on my next winter with new eyes. It's a time to be creative. To look that bit harder for the good. To make teepees out of a beautiful tree that has been cut back to nothing and had its growth discarded. Because when life next lands around my feet, I hope I will see the endless possibilities that lay before me. Not just the mess and loss of what I once had. I hope.

Putting the tree back together would never have worked. It would never have been the same, and trying to make it so, would only have been a reminder of what was broken. Using the pieces to make something new was the amazing part. 

I often reflect on the fact that I have learnt more and grown more due to my children, than they do because of me. Hard work with a dash of creativity, minus focusing on what was. Thank you my gorgeous boys. Lesson learnt.

School speech topics and unplanned lamingtons in the park.

It all starts with 'news.'

At the beginning of kinder 'news' was cute. With my first at school it was even a bit exciting. Jack loved it! Speaking in front of a group of people uninterrupted - wow! He is the reason teachers are so great at the line "Just one more thing and then its time for questions." I'm sure that even then he probably had to be cut off when giving his answers. Jack would "um" and "ahh" about his topic of choice at first and then, when a list of topics came home, I barely gave it a glance. He could speak on any given topic. At length. Unendingly.

You see schools send home a list of weekly topics beginning in kindergarten, mostly to help children further investigate topics they are learning about at school. And perhaps partly because everyone ends up bored to tears after 24 talks based on the Lego movie. It is also put in place especially for those students who hate public speaking and seem to have nothing to say. My middle girls. Only they have plenty to say. Just not to the whole class at one time. Public speaking will probably never be their thing and I'm completely OK with that. After all, not all jobs require outgoing people and leaders need quiet followers too.

So unlike the years of Jack sailing through news and speeches, our weeks are now often guided by the news topic of the week. There are sighs of relief all round on 'free topic' week. Lucy grabs a toy as she leaves the house ('showing news' is easy) or if we forget she comes home complaining that she had to do 'talking news' (more accurately titled 'miming news' because no one can hear her.)

This term Lucy's class has news topics based on transport. I silently cheered reading the first topic she has to talk about is using different forms of transport while on holidays. Yay! I can relax and say "go and write." We even have props! So I pinned the note to the notice board and went to have a cuppa.

Then Izzy walked in from the mudroom holding a note. I forgot about Year 3 speeches. First topic: write a speech on a natural, built or heritage feature in the local community. Visuals encouraged. Now Isabel loves writing. But she also very much prefers to write from experience, so I knew this would mean a family day out. Pushing aside the long list of things I was excited about finding time to do over the weekend, I put on a smile and told her this would be so much fun! Where to go?

The Kiama Blowhole was her choice and soon everyone was excited. I'll admit I was a little afraid that the kids would find it boring after such a huge and exciting holiday, but they had a ball. Running around finding the best viewing points, discussing how people could have died due to unsafe practices and guessing when the next lot of water would shoot up. We looked at the lighthouse, walked all around and then discussed where to next.

As it turns out, I forgot snacks. Mum of 5 with not a single drink bottle or snack in the entire car. To make matters worse I also forgot to bring money or a card. Thankfully Craig had $17, but a cafe was out of the question with that amount, so off to find Woolies it was. A few u turns and a busy car park later and we had what we needed. In our search we came across a great park by the beach, that I had not been to before, so we stopped to eat and play.

As the kids finished up the unplanned lamingtons and ran off enthusiastically to play, I sat on the park bench and just watched. Daisy in awe of the water, dragging Craig toward the beach. The older kids laughing with everything in them, collapsing to the ground, only to get up and chase again. The completely contented smiles, as they jumped and swung and encouraged each other higher. Nowhere else existed for them in that moment. And I smiled knowing nowhere else existed for me either.

I'm all too aware that I'm great at the 'doing'. I can plan. Oh I can plan! I can organise. And I can see things through to the end, making sure nothing is missed. Doing is easy.

But I'm also all too aware that I find the 'being' hard.

Just sitting and enjoying the moment. Stopping. Really stopping and doing nothing. Not willing a moment to pass so I can get back to finishing something. Not sending my mind to the 5000 tasks I have waiting for me at any given time. This is such a huge challenge for me. But it's a challenge that I need to take up because my family won't remember the organising. They won't remember the planning or the washing, or the cleaning, or the dinner, or the endless amounts of vacuuming. My family will remember me looking into their eyes and smiling. My children will remember me watching first bike rides, jumping on the trampoline and sitting in my lap listening to stories. They will remember hugs and me holding their hand and listening, as they tell me about playground dramas. They will remember me just being with them. Just being. I hope.

Today I didn't finishing making curtains for the bathroom. The vacuuming didn't get done and at some point tonight I will get to cleaning the kitchen. But Lucy found three feathers. Jack rode his skateboard all around the park as I watched. Isabel experienced the Kiama Blowhole first hand. Henry climbed really high. Daisy visited her favourite place, the beach. And we all watched as a rainbow appeared. Sometimes gold is found where I least expect it. In a park, with unplanned lamingtons and learning how to just be.

The shaky lipped girl and the one she adores the most

Daisy introduced our family to the shaky lip early on.

When she was inconsolable, her bottom lip would tremble and we knew that she was REALLY upset. The other kids would tackle her rush to her side, trying to make better whatever was wrong. But Daisy only wanted mummy. It's always been all-about-mummy for her. And secretly I loved it.

As Daisy grew, I started to see shaky lip less. Suddenly it was not only me who could settle her. Jack especially could be counted on to help make her happy. He would find toys for her to play with. He would talk to her and gently convince her to play instead of wanting me at every possible moment. She learnt to trust both Jack and Isabel. And learnt the get-out-of-my-face hand swipe for her other two siblings. Four and six year olds find personal space a challenge.

This week the shaky lip came out to play yet again. Everything was the end of the world. Cuddles were needed in abundance. And carrying. "Mumumum" was the word of the moment, so naturally I thought it was all about me. After all, everything is, right?;) Obviously Daisy had missed me while I was at work. But by today I was left wondering if there could be more to this clinginess than I first thought.

Then Jack came home from camp.

I quickly realised that this was in fact all about him. The shaky lipped girl missed her adoring older brother. The brother who always smiles at her. The brother who is always happy to see her. The brother who told me before he left, that his biggest concern about camp was that he'd get homesick and miss Daisy too much.

I wondered: perhaps it had just been quiet around here because they were all so busy with missing. Missing someone who is so much a part of their lives, that they are not quite sure how to do life without him.

I realise I really have missed something this week. I missed this. I missed the you-are-never-getting-us-into-bed ganging up on me. I missed the chasing around the house, complaining about the unfairness of shower usage and the no-that-is-the-pencil-that-I'M-using craziness. The chaos that makes up every normal day of my life, because in all of that, are the moments I don't always notice. The moments I should notice. The look of absolute, complete I-will-do-anything-you-say adoration that Henry and Daisy give Jack, every moment he is in the room. The way Isabel laughs hysterically at the things Jack says, even when he is not being that funny. The patience Jack shows as he explains something so deliberately to Lucy, getting down to her level to make sure she understands. The light in their eyes, that seems to come alive when they are all together, just being the collective 'us.'

With all the hard work, the too-much-to-handle situations and I-just-can't-do-this moments, come the amazing bits that would otherwise never take place. Memories that will be the ones I will treasure always because they are hard won and never come easily. These are the moments that make up my life. Not necessarily an easy life, but one that feels worthwhile to me.

So life is all about Jack right now. Henry just HAD to shower because Jack did. Neither Lucy or Isabel even looked at me or said hello coming out of school today. They looked into the distance and said "where's Jack?" But I can just smile. It's not all about me. And I wouldn't change that for anything.

Jen.x

One day I'll look back......

I look back. I do. At all the good, bad and in-between-just-doing-everyday bits. I judge myself. I silently give myself high fives. At times I want to go back. Sometimes I want to forget. Other times I'm afraid I will forget. And I then realise: all I do now will become memories, in a future I know nothing about.

What will grandmother-me think, when she remembers the me-of-right-now? Will she remember laughing at Daisy learning to blink? Will she remember Henry's sweet quiet voice saying "I missed you today, Mummy," so no one else could hear? Will she remember the girls' squeals as they showered (and the yelling that followed)? Will she remember the promising scent of dinner cooking, mixed with the baby scent of shampoo and soap, as a little one snuggled into her side without a word?

Will she remember alone?

Today I read about a village. The village we are often told it takes to raise a child. A village unlike anything that exists in my world. What struck me was the thought that these fictional villagers would one day look back and share memories together. A group of mums, who together have seen it all, helped each other through, and can now reminisce about the sweetest and hardest of times.

Well, I want in.

I want to be part of a village. A village where support exists regardless of agreement. A village where high school pettiness is long gone and is instead replaced with nodding and I-know-exactly-how-you-feel-s. A village where crying or laughing together happens alongside genuine you-REALLY-can-do-this encouragement and the sharing of wisdom that can only be gained through experience. A village of women who want to look back one day together and know they made the most amazing memories possible. And better yet, they have shared them with each other.

So this is it. A place where I will share with you. I will share my life, my family, my how-I-make-it-work-s, my hopes and my failures, honestly and without regret. And you can share with me. And everyone else who decides to join us. A group of mums who will know they aren't alone. Unless they want to be. And even then can be silently supported and applauded in all they do. Especially if what they want to do involves showering alone or having a cuppa without interruption.

Let's look to the future and back to now and make a decision to do this thing called motherhood together.

I'm all in.x