life

What We Read This Week (25/05/2025)

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Those bedtimes. Those bedtimes I go into as a fool, with the thought, “Well, she’s so tired she’s sure to sleep soon”. HA. Never. Ever. Happens. And you would think I would know this now, as I have been doing this mum-doing-bedtime-with-at-least-one-child thing for over seven years. But apparently I just don’t learn. The only time I have that thought and the child DOES fall asleep quickly is when I get the child to the bed and have to leave for some small thing and when I return, they are in dreamland already.

But that is rare. And not a guarantee, so I’m unlikely to change up the bedtime patterns for that. I digress. This week has seen a lot of the initial above thought. She’s so tired… She’s not that well so even though she napped at daycare, it was the ideal nap – early and short – so that shouldn’t affect things, should it? It does, of course. E and C have needed all of the help to get to sleep this week, and after the initial phase – into bed, do you need this, do you want that, okay off to sleep now – one of them has asked or insisted on a story. 

S is still into “my piggy book” – Pig Out – with it’s cut-out middle and squishy snout and funny-coloured animals and a hairdryer. It seems to have overtaken the Never Pop a Penguin contender for now. Yesterday she also found the “Baa baa book” – another sensory book with fluffy animals in it, the name of which escapes me and she has taken it somewhere special, I see, because it is not where I thought.

E has been really loving – again – The Very Hungry Caterpillar. In fact, loving it so much that on Friday, she put it into her “supercase” (suitcase) with her most treasured possessions – her new chew necklaces and three of daddy’s bandannas. Little Red Riding Hood has also been a favourite, and she will give tremendous spoilers on every page, as well as describe the wolf in great detail every time he is in a picture, and give running commentary on how Little Red Riding Hood’s mother must feel after various events. Honestly, it’s like she’s been to a combination pantomime audience class and spoiler academy. Her other choice this week has been Ruby Red Shoes, which is one of the best choices for bedtime for my girls. It calms them AND me. Today, as I was baking and girls were keeping themselves occupied, I heard her ask C to read it to her. C did not (cubby building was underway) so E did her best to read the story, based on her memory of it and the pictures. Absolutely delightful.

C has been independently reading everything she can, it seems, as the Premier’s Reading Cup challenge is on again. Plus, she is taking this opportunity to read all of the books we have, it seems, to her big ted, Gus. She and I are still reading The Secret Garden. This week C really started to be invested in the story, and if I dare to end a chapter and say that’s it for the night, she gets really upset to the point of a tantrum. She has definitely moved on from the stage of listening with curiosity to this story set in a strange time in a strange world, to being very much in that world and making predictions of what might be coming next and dreaming about what it is like in the garden. 

The Table

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[Trumpet fanfare]Dooo doo doo DOOOO! As mentioned in the Mother’s Day post, the cloth tablecloth has been reinstated, and placemats introduced.

Thank you.

You may be perceptive enough to realise that this is a big deal for me. For a few years, we have used plastic tablecloths and only an occasional placemat. Plastic tablecloths are fantastic. Spray and wipe clean. Ready craft area. Ready craft material, too, apparently. Girls drawing on the tablecloth? Cool, look at that pattern – and did you just draw a letter? Wow! Girls practising their scissor skills on the tablecloth? Meh, it’s fine. Gee, this tablecloth is looking a bit terrible – that’s okay, let’s chuck it out and buy a new one. 

The environmental impact of us using plastic tablecloths was outweighed by the reduction in my stress levels. It was on the same level as using silicone plates and bowls for small children, and having my hot drink in a metal insulated cup instead of a grownup lovely ceramic cup. Things change when you have kids around. They can change back, but there is a time of life when you want to be surrounded by non-breakable, wipe-clean stuff.

Given the amount of craft and colouring and especially cutting that happens at our table on any given day, it didn’t seem to be such a good idea to move away from the plastic. But. Plastic can only be cleaned so much. It starts to wear out. Cleaning the area near where S sits was getting – well, impossible to clean. And it feels like she is nearly always at least a little bit unwell. Plus, plastic tablecloths are not circular, so the tablecloth would often be pushed around as C would try to get the dangling corner to stop tickling her legs (which I totally understand).

About a month ago, I made the decision. No more. It was time for us to progress – or regress? To ditch the plastic and go back to cloth. Ahhhhh. And I wanted placemats for everyone, to have at least a little protection for the tablecloth. I could have bought some. I could have made boring rectangular ones. But I have this pattern for leaf blankets which comes in different northern European leaf shapes and different sizes. I have made a leaf blanket for each girl, and I thought doing tiny sizes would be a fun placemat idea.

I was right. 

Now we have English Ivy leaves adorning our table. I have used fabric from the extensive stash, including using shorts that Glenn has worn that didn’t last. I am annoyed the shorts didn’t last but I’m so glad I can sew and save the material. Because my plan is to definitely definitely on Sunday evening clear the table and bundle up the tablecloth and the placemats, I knew I needed a second tablecloth and placemat set. Another set of stash-busting ivy leaves were made (slightly differently this time because they’re placemats not actual blankets). A little detail that makes me smile (and C absolutely loves) is that for the first set, I machine-embroidered EAT on the leaf stalks, and on the second set I put MANGE, as C and I are learning French. For the second tablecloth, though, I chose not to get out our lovely linen handprinted wedding present tablecloth. Instead, I bought a checked rectangular tablecloth from Kmart for $10, measured the diameter of our round table, added a bit for overhang and a bit more for hemming, and cut a circle out of the cloth. Bonus: I will be able to cut another circle to fit our table out of this cloth. 

My Sunday evening plan worked. Table cleared. Floor swept. Tablecloth and placemats bundled up and into the laundry for Monday morning washing. New tablecloth and placemats on the table. Monday morning, cereal and hot chocolates with marshmallows for girls… and of course, seeing S about to knock over her hot chocolate, my brain said, “Save the hot chocolate!” Yes. I spilt the hot chocolate all over the fresh everything. Sigh. Everything was washed and dried that day, though, so now we have slightly crumpled ivy leaves on a slightly crumpled, fraying-because-I-haven’t-hemmed-it yet-checked tablecloth. 

abThis has actually been almost ready to post since the middle of the week. I really wanted to take at least one nice photo, but haven’t managed to catch any nice photos of either set. I’m going to put that in the Too Hard (for now) Basket, and promise to share them here as well as on instagram as soon as there are some ready to share. Promise.

Mother’s Day 2025

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We’ve just had How Was Your Easter. How was your Mother’s Day is really the next event that has a question posed that expects a positive and glowing rundown.  And while Easter has an expectation that the whole family or friendship group has worked together to make it an amazing four days, Mother’s Day … well, it’s different. How was your Mother’s Day expects pampering; expects sweet cards and pictures; expects the whole family to make mum feel special; chocolates and flowers and fluffy slippers and breakfast in bed.

I think it must be that way only in magazines and dysfunctional families. Not the classic dysfunctional family of split parents or addiction abuse. No, the dysfunctional family of a parent being overwhelmingly controlling to the point that everyone does what they say no matter what.

What a start to a post about Mother’s Day. Sorry. What I mean is, there’s what society puts forward as what should happen, and social media presents as amazing, and then there’s the reality of Family Life. One of my new favourite Instagram accounts shared a video to this effect. Paraphrasing a small part: Breakfast in bed, made by the kids, is meant to make me relax? Thanks, but I will be on high alert as you carry hot liquids up the stairs as I have not known you to go anywhere without spilling anything.

A lot of media brings out the old trope of mums can’t relax because they have to still clean everything because the kids and husband are useless and incapable. That’s getting so old and, quite frankly, offensive. I grew up surrounded by males – a dad, two older brothers and a younger brother. Various levels of weight was pulled at different times for all sorts of reasons, but we all are capable of cooking, cleaning and washing. Modelling is important, and this is not just thanks, mum but also thanks, dad. And I married someone later in life who was so used to doing his own cooking, cleaning and washing that both of us were a bit surprised when I moved in that someone else had done the washing or the cooking or the cleaning. We soon settled into our preferred roles within that, but I knew that when I went into hospital to have babies or because of Covid or because of an explosive postpartum infection that he would be able to keep the place and the children together.

But on a deeper level, that old mum can’t relax because the dad is useless thing just – well, yes. I accept that for some or even many relationships it’s like that. Expectations are important, and mental load for each party is important and not talked about enough. I am getting so sidetracked here. The point is, good relationships are built on love. If I love someone, I will do what I can to help them. If someone loves me, they will do what they can to help me. So yes. On Mother’s Day, I may have the option of putting my feet up a bit more, but I’m not going to be happy lounging around all day while everyone else serves me. 

Also in the real world, more and more people can’t have the whole day as a big family unit. Glenn works in retail. The retail world rarely pauses, and Glenn was working on Sunday. A relaxed breakfast would have had to have started at (doing some quick mental calculations here) um maybe 6am or so, and would not have been at all relaxing for him and therefore me if he had had girls helping him. They’re each becoming quite capable and definitely enthusiastic kitchen helpers but all at once – I know from chaotic experience that that is not going to be a relaxing start to anyone’s day. And Glenn doesn’t need any extra stress in his life, and definitely not when he’s trying to make my day a nice day and definitely definitely not before he has to go to work. Instead, he bought my favourite celebration breakfast (croissants) the day before and I organised the heating up and the cups of tea and the hot chocolates while Glenn and E organised the bandanna-wrapping of my presents.

I’m not sure if everyone is aware of just how sweet young kids can be when giving a present to someone. They are bursting out of their skin with excitement, especially if they are unaware of what’s inside, and also very much so if they DO know what’s inside. Little hands holding a gift up to your nose and saying “Happy Mother’s Day”, or in the case of S, “Happy birthday, mummy” is one of life’s sweet pleasures that I know won’t be forever. Glenn had taken the girls shopping on Saturday afternoon and apparently they were not only beautifully behaved, but also very thoughtful when choosing gifts for me. The big joke was that they would give me a hairdryer. S is in a very black and white phase right now. (“Are you a cheeky chops?” “NO! I’M S!”) After they had shopped, Glenn asked her, “Did we buy mummy a hairdryer?” And she looked at him, utterly bewildered, and shook her head. What planet was he on?! “Is it a nice pink hairdryer for Mother’s Day?” Vigorous shaking of the head. No hairdryer for me, but a number of pampering items as well as crafty things and soft slippers. This is one happy mummy.

We are finally in an era where C is old enough and capable enough and thoughtful enough to pamper me. She was rather fixated in her mind about what was going to happen, and I had to steer/direct her away from having all of us doing day spas with our feet in water in the (carpeted) living room, but we could come around to agreement. She and I stuck our fingers in little dipping pots and our feet in bowls of water on towels in the girls’ room and scrubbed and brushed to our heart’s content while having mummy-daughter chats. This is going to happen more. E came in and did a bit of wild 4yo joining in, and S came in for a cuddle. Later on, S did her own personal day spa in the bedroom and was not quite so careful with the water.

C and E helped me make the red velvet mug cake which we then had for morning tea. Girls watched movies and shows and did jigsaw puzzles and water painting and craft and the day travelled along nicely. We had a FaceTime with my mum (and dad) in which girls were lovely, and didn’t get into mischief in the background, and didn’t bicker in the background, and didn’t go crazy, but engaged in conversation with my parents and were their actual delightful selves and no-one jumped on anyone else’s head this time. 

Glenn didn’t have a whole day at work, and after prepping dinner for me, he had a rest while girls played together (I know!) and, it turns out, independently, as S turned on the water filter with no cup underneath the spout and just watched the water and listened to the sound of the water hitting the tiles until the kitchen floor was mostly covered in water before E went in and I heard “S! What are you DOING!” So yay for responsible big sisters and just enough towels in the cupboard to soak up the flood. This is why you can’t go to the toilet or do ANYTHING with a toddler around. Still, once that was dealt with, I could do some quick sewing (I know!). I was going to gush about the sewing project but it is honestly enough for its own post so suffice it to say that I made a set of placemats and we are back to using a cloth tablecloth. I brought out my special chair so we could all eat together at the table for dinner. My special chair was made by my grandfather, who was a carpenter, and it is beautiful. I explained to the girls (who hadn’t really seen or noticed it before) that it was special for me, and that my grandfather made it. At least three times a day since then, S has relayed to me that my grandpa made it for me. This brings happy tears to my eyes every time, especially as she looks most like his wife, my grandma.

So. Was I brought breakfast in bed and pampered and showered in flowers and able to relax on the sofa all day with beautifully behaved children and surrounded by beautiful extended family all celebrating motherhood? No. Would I ever want that? No. My life is not a magazine photo shoot, or a cartoon, or so self-centred that I want everyone to serve me and coddle me while I have no thought to anyone else’s comfort or wellbeing or mental state or their life at all. That’s not what motherhood is about, so a day where that is what it is made to be is simply hypocrisy. I know that next year or the year after, C will most likely have formed the idea that she must make me breakfast in bed and she must have her sisters help her, but it will be a far less stressful experience for everyone then and the idea of working together will be more important than making the day like a magazine shoot. In the long run, what do we want to remember? The stress of hearing everyone fighting over making your life perfect, or running around after you while they get stressed? No. A kitchen flood brought on by a 2yo experiencing something sensory? Yes, please. A gift that “wasn’t good enough”? Absolutely not, not ever. Cards made with love, unprompted, by children for you that you can keep forever? Oh my goodness me all of the yes. 

As a side note, I am about five days late in posting this. Not that I have a deadline or a real schedule, but there is a limit on how much after Mother’s Day one can post about Mother’s Day. The last few weeks have been wild, with at least three sick people in the family on any given day. I had hardly any voice on Saturday and absolutely none on Sunday. Nights have been unsettled, and dealing with sick children at 2am, 3.40am, 4.08am, 4.26am and 4.58am usually means I don’t wake up in time to do anything before exercising, or that I don’t even wake up to exercise before girls need breakfast. I feel a little bit smashed but here’s to getting back on track, at least for a few days.

What We Read This Week (04/05/2025)

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Christmas in May is a thing, isn’t it? I’m all for seasons of the year, and keeping some things to that season, but then girls will find a book and want it read on repeat and it just happens to be a Christmas book so what am I to do? Like, not read it or something? Crazy talk. (Same with Christmas clothing, honestly. If they want to wear the Christmas overalls I made C when she was two and has been worn randomly throughout the years and still going strong then who am I to complain??)

So. Bluey’s Twelve Days of Christmas has been flavour of the week. S and E have tried to get me to sing it every night which has its fun but really we get to the end and my tired voice mostly just says, “And a fruit bat in a mango tree” go to sleep now okay please sleep now goodnight! Which unfortunately just adds to the hilarity and they, crazily, don’t just go to sleep then and there. Weird. S then insists that the book goes to her, and she reads it backwards, usually. Nearly always like this:

S: Two! Mummy, I two!

Me: You sure are.

S: [counts to twelve] twelve guitars! So many!

Me: [clicking] Ah yes. Twelve guitars, and you saw the number two?

S: Yes, because I two! [turns pages, backwards and forwards] ribbit. Ribbit. Hehehe. [random page turning] mummy, what’s that?

Me: [knowing by now what she is looking at] yabbies.

S: snap snap. [more random page turns with the occasional ooh or aah or giggle] BLUEY/BIN CHICKEN. Mummy what’s that?

Me: [checking out which page she’s on] that’s a fruit bat. Bluey’s hanging like a fruit bat.

S: [closes book, places it about halfway along the side of the cot, stands her water bottle on it. Tries to lie down which makes the bottle fall over] Oh MAN. Not again. [repeats the bottle stand up/lying down attempt a few times before remembering to put the bottle into the rails a bit more. Lies down. Sleeps.]

E’s bonus Christmas book has been We’re Going on an Elf Chase. Lift the flaps. Trace the path. Very E things. Like also finding her engrossed in the Pop-Up Punctuation book. She is so careful, and loves them so much. Not Christmassy, but her other choice with me this week has been Thelma the Unicorn. I so love all the questions E asks, revealing her consideration of the story and the pictures and the characters. 

Speaking of questions, C and I finished What Katy Did. This wasn’t Finished until I had asked her the questions that were in the back of the book and she had added her own. We have now started on The Secret Garden which meant discussions about cholera and death and transmission of diseases. What a fun end to my day. 

What We Read This Week (27/04/2025)

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This week is brought to you by the letter “P”. 

When my lovely sister-in-law discovered the girls’ love for Each Peach Pear Plum, her eyes lit up and she asked “Do you have ‘Peepo’?” I had a vague recollection of it but nothing more. So the next time we saw them – a mere 10 days later, very exciting – they brought us some beautiful material (score!) and Peepo. I have read Peepo many times this week. 

One thing I love about reading to E is when I turn a page and she is suddenly, somehow in the book. “Wait, mummy. Go back”, and she turns the page back herself and asks me about something she saw on the previous page, or shows me a tiny detail that she’s noticed, or wants to check the visual on the words she’s just heard. Where’s the grandmother. Where are the sisters. See the birds in the sky. Why is the baby in the stroller. What’s a pushchair.

The other favourite – asked for time and again, turned to for comfort – was Never Pop a Penguin. One of those books with a fidget popper in the middle so each page you can pop the tummy of whichever creature is being discussed. E pushes a couple on each page, then finishes them all off at the end. S may push one on a page, with a look of pure mischief on her face. If I do that, though, she shouts NO at me and turns the book over to un-pop what I have done. Once it is read, she will pop them all and then turn it over to do it all again.

Even though this is a simple book, with only 5 pages that are all nearly the same, it has prompted much discussion. What actually is a narwhal and do they really have rainbow horns like unicorns. Why is the polar bear wearing pool slides. They’re skis? What are skis. Why is the marshmallow on fire. Do you see the cheeky seagull stealing the toasted marshmallow.

Unfortunately, P is also for… yeah. Poo. I saw about a month’s worth of it today. And every time poor E was on the toilet, she wanted me to watch her (as they all do most of the time), and – so that I wouldn’t be bored – read to her. Superworm has been read and read and read today. Note to self: dig out the mole book. 

Of course, once I had in my head that this week was seemingly brought to you by “P”, this evening a very tired S and a very very tired E just went for Christmas books. Bluey’s 12 Days of Christmas, which has E laughing more and more as I continue trying to fit too many syllables into a line and speed it up apparently hiLARiously, and S will half sing it, approximating the words, and comment on each page that has Bluey and/or Bingo on how many there are! And general chitchat about what’s on each page – ooh guitars! Glasses. Bingo is a froggy! Straight after that, We’re Going On An Elf Chase, in all its lift-the-flap glory.

C and I are getting close to the end of What Katy Did. My voice has been rather tired of late, and C has started taking over some of the reading. This is one of my favourite parts of the day. She reads so well! And I love love love it when she does voices. The best.

How Was Your Easter?

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You always get that question, don’t you? “How was your Easter?” Asked with such enthusiasm and the questioner’s desire for the answer to be positive. I feel that acceptable answers are: “Lovely, thanks! We had a whole extended family camping trip out at Whoop Whoop so, you know, no reception so the kids couldn’t be on their phones the whole time. It was SO wonderful being with the whole family. The cousins just played out in nature all day long”. Or, “It was wonderful! We went to the dawn service and it was so, so special. Then we had family over and it was just such a special day”. Or, “Great, thanks! It was so nice having a four-day weekend, wasn’t it? So much time to spend with the family, just relaxing. The whole street put on an Easter egg hunt for all the kids and it was just so special”.

Variations on “It was amazing!” 

But what are you allowed to say if “amazing” was so far from your reality that you just… can’t?

If the sneezes of S on the way to the children’s service on Good Friday – I should elaborate, the 12 sneezes in quick succession – were followed by a day of her wiping her snot on you and you realised that, yep, we’re not going anywhere this weekend. If E suddenly has a nasty sounding cough that is just a cough and isn’t accompanied by any other symptoms of unwellness but oof it doesn’t sound good and … and … you yourself recognise the signs of sickness in yourself.

If the children’s service on Good Friday turns out to be a), a wonderful experience for children and explains all of Holy Week within about 45 minutes, and b), a demonstration on the part of your girls of how much they get into experiencing things , and c), a demonstration on the part of your girls of how much they ignore instructions from you about things like “Please stop hitting the rocks on the cathedral floor even though I recognise it is a new sound experience for you” or “Please stop waving the palm leaves so vigorously as you are hitting other people and even though they’re really nice about it, you just scratched me in the eye so I know they’re just being polite as this really hurts”.

If a basic shopping trip is filled with “I’m bored”, “I don’t want any fruit but can I have a yoghurt pouch instead”, “I’m so huuuuuungrrryyyy” and then girls going wild in the Easter section as you chose one (1) Easter treat for your husband and when you have chosen it you discover your – yes, your – kids have pulled out half a dozen bunny ear headbands and E is dancing with a ginormous and quite lovely bunny dressed up including ballet slippers but you are not letting any more soft toys into your place and C has found all sorts of things that she jumps around telling you about and asking you for all at once.

If taking girls outside to get them doing something other than bickering inside and watching shows means major shouting and screaming and fighting and crying over little things, looked at the situations from the perspective of grownup eyes, but clearly mean the world to the person feeling wronged. If taking them outside makes you doubt your ability to parent at all.

If you feel ignored and disobeyed all weekend.

What do you do with that? How do you avoid saying in response to an enthusiastic “How was your Easter?”, well, actually, it was horrible and I was so glad when Tuesday arrived. I was upset and cross with girls all weekend and they were ignoring any request or instruction from me all weekend and I was so frustrated I wanted to claw my face off several times.

You have to dig deep and find those kernels of joy and loveliness and delight. Bring them to the top. Polish them. Display them. Cherish those gems and make sure that’s what you tell people and especially your children about. After all, deep in your heart you know that your reasons for grumpiness – initially, anyway – had nothing to do with your girls. You know that none of them was trying to be naughty or to push your buttons or seeing if they actually land themselves in hospital to find out if the Easter Bunny actually does visit kids in hospital. You know that two of them were also unwell and that brings irritability. You know that all three of them were excited for Sunday. You are coming to learn that C will have in her mind how she wants the day to go – wants, thinks, imagines, plans – and the more excited she is about that, the more fixated she will be on having only those things happen and other things that pop up like me needing to give S a cuddle or E wanting a hand held will derail her plans and that affects her, big time.

So instead of all the grr of the weekend, I am going to focus on these things. 

I am going to focus on how wonderful it is that the girls feel so comfortable expressing themselves, and that they feel so comfortable at church, in a space that is also incredibly awe-inspiring. 

I am going to focus on the three rainbow-eared bunnies I brought home with me from the shops, each with their own new breakfast set of bowl, cup and spoon. 

I am going to focus on the calm that settled in when we took to painting the Easter eggs. The fun they had painting themselves, as they nearly always do, after the eggs were painted. 

I am going to focus on the way S and E sat on my lap in turn while I did little bits of sewing, each quietly playing with pins and only occasionally pressing buttons on my machine, and then only by request. 

I am going to remember that C roller skated down the small hill and past the bend in the path all by herself for the first time. I am going to remember E scooting so confidently now, with her unicorn helmet and princess dress and C’s long socks and her sparkly pink jelly sandals. I am going to remember S just cruising along on her flamingo tricycle, holding up the impatient traffic, then doing melodramatic dives to copy any stacks that the older two did for real, complete with token wailing.

I am going to remember that there was a Bluey-worthy Easter egg hunt on Sunday morning. An Easter egg hunt so wonderful that this is the first thing the girls share about their Easter. There were clues, just like Bluey and Bingo had! A picture and a magnet creation and plants and blocks in the wrong spot and a doctor kit item in the wrong box and then it could have just been something else on the floor but the doctor knife pointed to the table and the Easter Bunny hid the Easter eggs under daddy’s bandanna!!! I hope you read that in a voice that became higher and faster and louder as it went through.

I am going to remember that kids see things differently. They don’t bring all this history and awareness and “Should” to the table. They just want to enjoy it and learn to get along, however loudly that might happen. 

Did I mention the Easter egg hunt? Sorry. It was kind of a big deal.

How was my Easter? Kind of amazing, really.

Tradition!

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In the last few months, we have started doing “Favourite Thing” at the start of dinner. This started because of about 70% wanting to delay the “Can we watch something?”, and 30% wanting to hear more about their days and what they remembered about good things. Well, those are very vague percentages because while writing this I also remembered that part of it was to get them to start going back over their days and pick out positive things. A bit like practising gratitude. Note to self:  introduce a gratitude element.

Sunday night, before Favourite Thing, I reminded them of what had happened that day. It had been huge. It was Glenn’s first day back at work after some leave, and I had already decided train to church for us because of potential traffic delays and sitting practically still on a bus when you can literally see your destination but can’t get out of the bus at all and you have three girls who just want to be off the bus and seeing their friends or doing anything other than just sitting moderately quietly on a bus is not an experience I would like to revisit thank you very much. So we all caught the train in to the city. Then church itself was very different because it was Palm Sunday, which meant very much out of the ordinary and I’ll get to it later. Once home, the girls had edamame (“enamummy”, “emadahmah”, “enadummy”) for lunch which is their second favourite food, plus I let them watch Despicable Me 2 while eating. Outside later in the afternoon, C did roller skating all by herself for the first time outside while the other two played this and that and climbed on the wall and played ice cream shop at the letter boxes. So. Much. Happened.

C’s favourite thing was catching the train with daddy in the morning. E’s favourite thing was seeing her favourite person at church. S’s favourite thing was catching the train holding on the stroller. Glenn’s favourite thing was catching the train with all of his girls. 

My favourite thing was being part of, and having my girls be part of, the Palm Sunday traditions and experience. Religious ceremony that is centuries old. Religious traditions that happen every year, all around the world, in some way or another, that people have been doing, repeating, for hundreds of years, and my girls are now able to live that and be part of something much, much bigger than themselves. All of those elements are, I think, very important. They are important to me – for my soul, for my being, for my mental health – and as someone tasked with raising children, I see it as an important element to have as part of their lives. 

The words that keep coming to me are words like “duty” and “due diligence” and “responsibility”. These words are close but wrong. Those are the words that I hear in court cases and hearings and so forth. Those are the words that come when love isn’t enough. 

I love my girls. I want, and need, them growing up in as many circles of love and care as possible. I want them to have places to turn that are safe, places and people who are safe and comfort and love, who love them because they exist and not for what they can do or what they look like or what they say. Extracurricular activities help with that, as well as practising those resilience muscles and persistence and practice and determination skills. School is also providing an extra circle of care and a wide variety of backgrounds and culture and language. All those are good to have, and I am conscious that we are so, so fortunate to have great (such an understatement there) daycare and an excellent school, as well as the funds to have the girls do swimming for now and for C to do Irish dancing. Church, which often feels like an added extra and sometimes just too much, is just as vital to their wellbeing. And honestly, when E asks “Where are we going when we wake up?” – as she does every single day, sometimes as early as morning tea – if the answer is “Church, so long as everyone is well”, it gets the biggest cheer.

There is a whole mountain of reasons why church – the building, the people, the ceremony – is important. Why I was determined to get the girls to church when we could from when S was three months old. Trying to organise the reasons in my head and new reasons keep emerging. I will try, and I will try to keep it organised so this isn’t a flood. (Posting this later than I wanted because clearly that was harder than I anticipated!)

At the very surface, it is an outing. A Thing to Do. Something that gets us out, family energy out, and stops (or at the very least, reduces) bickering that happens from staying home. When public transport fares were at the past rates, sometimes this was just too expensive but 50c fares, with free travel for kids on weekends, make this much more available. Kids have a children’s area with space and toys and craft. Kids are part of the service, while not having to be too quiet or sit still or kneel or anything, or even be part of anything if they don’t want to. Kids are given a snack during the service because at some point, someone realised that the service really went through morning tea time for kids and 20 hangry kids is not something anybody wants in their life. 

Kids who are there because they have a parent or sibling or both or more involved in the service are just as welcome and included as kids who are there because their parents are there under slight duress to make a good appearance at the baptism of their niece or nephew when really their part of the family is atheist. Kids are welcome to listen to anything the person in charge talks about (this is the bit closest to the Sunday School of my childhood) and to participate in the relevant activity, but also if they just want to keep going building the most amazing train track they’ve ever built, that’s fine too. It is such a safe space for children.

A safe space for children, which means a space I can take them and then sit or stand by myself. I can watch them, with some space between us. I can watch them interacting with others. I can watch how and what and who they choose to play with. I can even now get a cup of coffee at morning tea and have a conversation with an adult – like, a real other grownup! – and not have children hanging off me to do so. Church is for me, too.

Church also provides that extra circle. Not that they are needing it now, but if we don’t do this now then when they do need it it will be much less strong. And this circle has so much variety. A big factor for me was to have them know as wide a variety of people as possible. They play with kids aged 1-11 and coo over any babies that are brought around to the children’s area. They play with kids of a variety of ethnicities, a range of neurotypes, a range of wealth, a range of family types. This is both normal for them, as well as developing their inclusion muscles and their flexibility muscles. It’s also, if I’m honest, developing my parenting skills. If one of my girls is rejected or slighted at the park, I can just whisk my girl away and have a few words about the situation, whatever it was. At church I am more inclined to see what the kids do to work it out themselves, and find out the why of the other kid’s behaviour. I won’t go into any of the “why’s” here, but it’s enough to stop any assumptions in their tracks and to practice kindness first.

Tradition. My tradition, of growing up with church. Remembering that often there was a feeling of “but why???” Knowing now that that questioning is healthy (as it was treated when I was young, too). Knowing now that sometimes the answer is too huge to explain but sometimes it is as small as being the tradition. Tradition is important. It gives a sense of security. It grounds us. The comfort and familiarity get me every time. Tradition!

On Movement and Monsters and Music

/ annamurray / Leave a comment

There have been a few things happening lately that do not seem at all newsworthy. By that I mean, they are not newsworthy. They are not the kind of thing to do a Facebook post about or shout from the balconies or make a note in the diary. The sort of thing, though, that I will tell my mum about. The sort of thing that I will chat about with Glenn in the microseconds of conversation we get these days. The sort of thing that makes up the stuff of our life, that we will look back on in a few months and a few years and many years and reminisce.

Recently, my girls stopped walking. Not entirely, of course, but if they are not keen on something, their feet stop and all their core muscles fail and they are suddenly slumped on my sofa like a Dali painting. This would occur for getting dressed, or being told to go to the toilet for a tactical wee before we head out to do something fun, or having a bath. Fortunately, I also discovered at this time the power of the piggyback and horsey rides and cuddle walks.

Cuddle walks had been around for a while – since C was a toddler, I guess – but she had started to request to be carried like she was a kitten or like she was a baby or like she was a baby bird or like she was a baby unicorn cuddling a mermaid and it was getting wild. And she expected me to remember what every one of these holding positions was. I would have a blank in the heat of the moment. She would get upset with me for doing the bird hold instead of the kitten hold. Bedtime would be ruined. 

I can remember how to do a piggyback each time, though. Once the younger two saw me doing piggybacks for C, they wanted in too. It is much easier doing piggybacks for them. They are more like koalas on my back, warm and compact and solid, and they are not as daredevil so they hang on for dear life as I “go faster” by doing lots of little steps down our rather short hallway to the toilet. S loves having a piggyback to the bath after dinner, which means climbing onto my sofa then climbing onto my back so I can transport her down the hallway to the toilet. Pre-bath wee, bath, get dried and dressed and teeth done, then she will announce in my face “I WANT A PIGGYBACK” and screamlaugh running back down the hallway to the Piggyback Station (formerly known as my sofa arm but here we are) to climb up and onto my back so I can do little steps back along the hallway to her bedroom which is just opposite the bathroom. 

I think C has realised that she is more like a leggy giraffe than a koala and so she likes to do horsey rides on my back instead. Although I much prefer her sitting on my back, often wrapping her lower legs around my midsection and also not hanging on (work that core!), to having her do a piggyback where she doesn’t really hold on with her legs but wraps her arms around my neck. That said, my knees are copping it. I have a much closer view of the carpets. Even though we vacuum daily, it’s not enough. 

Speaking of C and of movement, C was given roller-skates for her birthday. I think they might be her most favourite thing ever in the history of the world. After several afternoons clomp-gliding down the hallway while I was working, punctuated by crashes that were always followed by “I’M OKAY”, on Friday afternoon she had a go outside for the first time. There have been a few more outside skating sessions since then, too, where I hold her hand for the most part and apparently twist her wrists when she is about to fall over and she is skating over my toes. She has a long way to go, but I am so, so impressed by her resilience and persistence. This is something that she is finding difficult to get going and it is not at all coming naturally to her, but her only pouts have been at me for walking too fast or too slow or (inadvertently) twisting an arm.

Moving on to monsters. I mentioned recently that S had had a scary episode one night. The next night, as well as me reading Ruby Red Shoes to her, Glenn gave S an LED tea light and showed her how to brandish it against any monsters. Very sweet voices were soon calling out, “Go away, monster!” These tea lights are perfect. S still uses a dummy – and by using the singular, I really mean she usually has only one in her mouth (sometimes two just to be funny), and preferably 1 or, better yet, 2 in each hand. The tea light is the same kind of size as a dummy and has an interesting feel thanks to the fake flame, so now S prefers one hand to be holding a tea light while she goes to sleep. C likes to have one in her new lantern. E likes to have one next to her on the floor or on the desk. We use a salt lamp in the girls’ bedroom but now we have little spots of extra warmth thanks to monster-repelling tea lights. 

Moving on to music. Glenn and I are both violinists. He still plays and has gigs here and there. I do not. There are so many of my former colleagues who have managed to have kids and still teach and perform and do gigs but it was just not possible for us. I mean, after C was born I went back to teaching and that was fine – “fine” as in, acceptable – but two big things shifted. One was that I just didn’t have the zest for teaching anymore. I am very firmly of the belief that teachers have to really want to be a teacher. If they don’t, they don’t teach as well and students don’t learn as well and then students don’t want to learn at all and teachers might as well drink tea and crochet. I lost the zest and I knew I should stop. The other big shift, when my just-7-year-old was about to be turning 2 – so five years ago – yup. Pandemic. Parenting in a pandemic was hard. Trying to teach in a pandemic was hard. Trying to teach while having a young child at daycare during a pandemic was super ultra hard. So when E was born, I didn’t go back to teaching. Even though I absolutely loved it when I was doing it, this was clearly the right choice as I do not miss it at all. 

Buuuuuut I had C start violin lessons last year, learning with my lovely sister-in-law, Alys. E soon started mini lessons, too. We went for a Saturday morning lesson time. Glenn was either working or getting ready for work or needing to cocoon himself from being at work, so violin lessons were always a mummy and three girl event.  This meant that if one was sick (or two or three or three plus me), then no lessons. This was a frequent situation. Sporadic lessons meant little progress, which meant little enthusiasm, which meant no practice and a frustrated mummy. When Alys and my brother moved to the other side of town, I decided not to keep our spot and just move on.

When we did have good practice weeks though towards the end of last year, I had switched gears. I stopped being a stand-off mum, letting C do the practice as if I knew nothing about violin. I did what I had said to myself at the start that I would not do and I got back into teacher mode. Violin practices turned into lessons. When I’m in violin teacher mode, I am a different person, and I had C laughing and doing what was needed and making progress until one of her sisters dared to come in.

This year had been quite light on in terms of practice. I just wasn’t going to force it. Then, out of the blue, E said that she wanted to play her violin again after dinner. We didn’t do after dinner but after lunch on Saturday. Then S wanted a go, clearly not wanting to miss out on this thing that she could tell that she would definitely be able to have a go at, and then C was really keen to get back into it, too. Violin happened on Saturday and Sunday, with the usual mayhem of three girls and two violins and one xylophone (surprise!). I’m still not sure how to get violin in during the week, but weekends seem to be a good start.

Old Me/New Me

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When C was a baby – not a little tiny baby but rather, hurtling toward her first birthday – I was chatting with one of my best friends, Michelle. Michelle has 3 kids – a boy, and twin girls – who were (doing some mental calculations here) um 7 and 5 at this time. I think. They were all in early primary school, anyway. The point is, Michelle asked me, “Do you feel like you’re not a real person anymore? You’re no longer Anna. You’re a mum. You’re C’s Mum, and that’s who you are and how you’re seen now?” And even now I remember this gasping realisation of oh my goodness me that’s it! That’s a perfect encapsulation of how I feel I am now. 

I mean, there are a few things to explain here. The early weeks of motherhood were a wild ride but  I didn’t experience that exhaustion that I was told to expect (ha – like sooooo many other things) because I was so happy doing these things for this little bub. But then as the newborn phase waned and it became clear that I had a baby who didn’t sleep, things changed. And then she turned out to be an enthusiastic but small eater. But because she was such a poor sleeper and my advice from everywhere was that if she has more solids then she will sleep better – well. I felt like I spent most of her baby time trying to get her to sleep and trying to get her to eat. 

And I know it is perfectly natural for other children – and parents (me included here; I’m not judging this AT ALL) – to refer to other parents by reference to a child’s name. I am C’s mum, or E’s mum, or S’s mum, or sometimes the mum with the three girls, depending on who I’m talking to. And there is all of the mental work that goes into caring for children. Like thinking ahead for the basics like clean clothes, and change of season clothing, and next size up shoes, and swimming lessons and daycare and school and homework and play dates and lunches and snacks and how to go grocery shopping with young children.

But eventually there is the realisation that all that is not enough. “You can’t pour from an empty cup” is a phrase that is thrown around a lot in parenting forums, but I don’t feel it’s apt for what I am trying to describe. It doesn’t describe the feeling of being scraped out with just the shell remaining. I need to do all that, be all that, and more. I needed to be Anna again. Still Anna with the three girls, but also Anna who does… things to be Anna.

Before kids, when I was still a violin teacher, a mother of three girls asked me what I DO with my time? I remember wondering, How do YOU fit everything in? She had three girls. They all did violin, with lessons and practice and ensembles. They each did either ballet or gymnastics. They all went to a private school. The mum worked a full-time job but also managed to ferry the girls to violin and ballet and gymnastics. Like, was there some secret pocket of bonus time that opened up for some people? I’m still wondering that, actually, but in the meantime I have started to work it out. 

If something is important enough, work out how to make it happen.

My health is important to me. Admittedly, partly for vanity. I don’t want to cringe when I look at photos of myself, and I don’t want to avoid being in photos. I know they are important. So I worked out actually when I could exercise, committed to it, and now it happens every morning. Writing this blog is important to me. I know if I abandon it and don’t make any record other than photos of our family life, then in five years I will be very sad with Now Me. Writing happens when I can get up earlier than exercise. Yes, it feels like I hardly sleep. In fact, my watch confirms that I hardly sleep, but I’m working on going to bed earlier. Promise.

There are other things that I used to do that I didn’t even think about as being Anna Things. Wearing jewellery. Making jewellery. Well, that was very much an Anna Thing but I didn’t anticipate how hard that would be with kids. Beading is therapeutic and so relaxing until a small child accidentally tips your box of beads or findings and then you don’t quite know how many small swallowing hazards you are suddenly looking for on the ground in amongst all the other detritus that comes with Living With Small Children. 

Having a food box delivered. This had started with an organic fruit and veg box, then extended to milk and meat and dairy, but when I moved in with Glenn that felt a little redundant. We live right next to a shopping centre, and Glenn likes to shop to cook, and one of the delivery companies went bust, and we just stopped. Fast forward more than 7 years, and I saw a picture of a funny strawberry on Facebook. As it turns out, there are a few companies that deliver supermarket rejects. We picked one company, and now have a medium box of wonky fruit and veg delivered every fortnight. Not surprisingly, this is very much looked forward to by everyone in the family. Glenn loves seeing what is delivered and then planning meals around that. The girls love inspecting our funky food and marvelling at the bananas as long as their arms or the 4.5 kg watermelon or the tiny pears the size of S’s fists. I love not having to shop with children, not having to plan, and working within the parameters of the delivery. Right up my alley.

One thing that is not an Old Me thing but if it had been around, it would have been. Recycling. I’m not talking your standard paper/cardboard/glass type of thing. I’m talking containers. It used to be that containers would taunt those of us not in South Australia with the label along the lines of “10c refund at participating depots in South Australia”. I legit was super excited to go to South Australia for the container refunds, but it turned out they weren’t lauding it over the rest of the country and this wasn’t obvious at all. Fast forward to that week between Christmas and New Year, and I saw a Containers for Change ad offering to come and collect if you had 100 containers. Challenge accepted. Now we have a special tub for containers, and I have a page of container labels to print. My process is getting better. The tub has a bin bag in it. Every eligible container that goes in gets a tally mark on a piece of paper on the fridge. When the bag is full (about 35 containers), it gets tied up and a label stuck on it, then taken to the garage. New bin bag in. Heavier glass bottles go in paper shopping bags, and once they have 8 bottles, same deal. Container label stuck on and then to the garage. Every few weeks, we organise collection and it’s just… easy. I love it. 

There are still some Old Anna things that I am really missing and yearning to bring back into my life. Some things I feel are the frugal Scottish side of me coming through, or maybe it’s a very strong sense of independence or getting back to making it yourself so you know what’s inside. Making yoghurt. I tried recently, and you know what stopped me? Not the lack of time or available bench space or available milk. No. I couldn’t find one of the containers and any of the lids. How could you lose them, Anna? Old Anna asks me. Pre-kids Anna asks me. If I explain to you that the containers (originally with their lids) live/d in the cupboard next to the fridge and so girls have loved to play with things in that cupboard – sanctioned, thankfully – but occasionally have major imaginative play scenarios requiring removal of said things to other play areas, does that explain it? I have since found a lid in a toy hamper and another in the craft department so there is hope. 

Baking bread is another thing I am getting the urge to do again. As my preferred bread is a spelt bread that used to take 2 hours for me to make I really should just remember to buy spelt flour, shouldn’t I. Hm.

Photography is a big part of who I used to be. Art photography, that is, not just of my girls. I have little flurries of photographic activity but I really haven’t been as inspired most of the time lately. Having scenery dotted with cranes is really not helping. Having children who are either impatient to be where they want to be or willing to be distracted and not get going when I need them to after the photo is really not helping. Only wanting to take photos of my children sleeping in funny or endearing poses doesn’t help the artier side, either.

I am also very keen to get back into playing violin. I said this last year, but when daylight savings ends and my work hours go back to starting at 10am instead of 9am, I am hoping hoping hoping that even a little bit of music making can come back into my life. These last two things – aspects of me that I haven’t gone back to after having kids – are two big things that drew Glenn and me together. I need them back. Not from anything that he has said, mind you, but I don’t want to lose ME and the person he met and married. I don’t want to look back on this time and regret things that actually are doable and regret this being the time of life when something stopped. 

If something is important enough, work out how to make it happen.

What We Read This Week (30/03/2025)

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Do you believe in ghosts? If you had asked me 10 years ago, my answer would have been a firm “No”. Absolutely not. Except, of course, for the Holy Ghost if we’re using the 1662 prayer book. Or that time when one of my older brother’s friends died suddenly in a car crash and he says she came to visit him that night. But no. 

And then Glenn’s mum passed away, and even though C was not yet one, I am quite sure that all 3 of us saw Sioban that next night. C wasn’t talking yet, so this isn’t confirmed, of course. But what I saw – Sioban in her near-death skeletal body, but calmer because that battle was over, and dressed in a long swishy skirt with a colourful top – matched what Glenn described he saw. 

Fast forward to a few months later, and C was now in the second bedroom to sleep. She woke up terrified one night, pointing with a look of horror at the wall next to the door. I couldn’t see anything other than what was always there, but she could clearly see something. 

Fast forward even more to Monday night, and S woke up terrified. I got her out of the cot for a cuddle and she did exactly what C did about 6 years ago, but she could articulate “Scary” and “I not going in the cot”. A total of 2 hours sleep for me that night, with S falling asleep on me on the sofa while singing Skidamarink at nearly 4am.

Tuesday night, and I was really apprehensive that I may have S refusing to sleep at all. I brought out the big guns. The secret weapon. I read her Ruby Red Shoes, and then Ruby Red Shoes Goes To Paris. She fell asleep early in Paris (but I kept reading it to E who is now absolutely loving them). The other thing that helped was a little fake tea light that Glenn showed her how to hold up and say, “Go away, Monsters!” So, you know, we’re all set. This evening, though, she did say to me that she isn’t going in her cot because of the ghost so a few mysteries have some sort of – explanation? That doesn’t seem right. I’ll think on it.

So Ruby books are very much back in the favourite pile. Middle of the night wakes, and S wants me to read her “The bunny books”. Sometimes she will tell me to lie down! You need to sleep! And she takes the books from me and sits up with her soft bunny on her lap and reads them to the bunny while I dutifully and exhaustedly lie down. I am so, so glad that C would ask for these books everysinglenight for months on end, because it’s hard reading a book in the dark when all your body wants to do is lie down in your own bed and curl up with closed eyes and sleep, but when your brain gets the cue from the picture and you can just recite the words for that picture, it is easier. I confess, there are often          long   pauses and sometimes I 

might miss a phrase

but thankfully S is not so familiar with these stories just yet so just gives me, I’m sure, a little eyebrow raise, like a teacher who is going to talk with me later about my work.