Category Archives: 52 Weeks of Grateful

Grateful for Reading

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As the mornings start to get a bit cooler and the weekend dawns you seem to get that urge, to just snuggle down in bed a little more, pull the doona up and try and sneak in a sleep in. Work days are fine, my brain switches on and I jump up and into the day, but Saturday and Sunday mornings I crave even an extra five minutes of doona time.

Lately on a weekend my Muddy Girls have been getting themselves up, visiting the bathroom and heading back to bed to read books to each other. The Muddy Pixie and Muddy Puzzler sit listening attentively to the Muddy Organiser read them book after book, before they take turns making up the stories in their books and reading them out.

It is a joy to listen to them, all from the comfort of under the doona, yes I may not be asleep but I’m cozy and I’m ridiculously happy listening to them read books, knowing they love them as much as I do.

This is what I’m grateful for this week, the joy of reading, so happy it has been instilled in my Muddy Kids.

Linking up for 52 Weeks of Grateful, hosted by the lovely Bron of Maxabella Loves..
 

Grateful for the Garden

Thursday afternoon I knocked off work early, I got to pick my kids up from Preschool and School for a change (Muddy Puzzler was very excited not to catch the bus) and the sun was still shining by the time we arrived home. After two days in the office I was itching to be outside, so Muddy Baby Boy and I put on our ear muffs and jumped on the lawn mower to mow the lawn. I was in heaven. I love being outside, I love pottering around the garden, doing little bits here and there.

This week I am Grateful for the Garden, for time outside to just potter around.

I am Grateful that I found time to plant my garlic and start to dehead the dead roses, that I can sit and soak up the fresh air, lie on the grass and play with the Muddy Kids. I am Grateful that we have space to do it, to run and run and chase and fall down, to ride bikes and scooters and plant veggies and flowers and grow our own fruit.

Without the Garden I think things would be a little less bright, so this week I am linking up for 52 Weeks of Grateful about my spacious garden that brings me and my family happiness.

Grateful for Organising Tasks

No, this is not my house but things like this make my heart sing, sad really! source

I am the kind of person that when things start to get very busy and out of control my head races, I can’t switch off and everything just starts to snowball and I feel very unsettled and I don’t like it one little bit. This has been my life lately – unfortunately.

What I have found over the years though is that if I take a some time out, even just a few minutes, to reorganise something in the house then I am instantly a little calmer.

Sometimes it’s going the whole hog and rearranging bedrooms, sometimes it’s reorganising the filing system. For me today it was cleaning out the spice cupboard, you know the one that has countless amounts of herbs and spices, often multiple jars of the same one, mostly out of date because you just bought them for that one recipe you had to try and haven’t been back to use ever since.

My spice cupboard is a big one, it also has all the food colours and gels, the stocks and the salt and pepper shakers in abundance, so it was not a small task, but it was a calming one. Getting rid of the excess, even alphabetising the herbs and spices to make them easier to find, all served to give me a small semblance of calm heading into the weekend and for that I am grateful.

Linking up for 52 Weeks of Grateful, hosted over at Village Voices by the lovely Bron. Such a fantastic place to visit.

Grateful for Good Friends with a Hammock

After feeling very sorry for myself last week and my lack of friend contact Muddy Hubby and I made the decision to get away from the farm for the day and go and visit some very good friends we hadn’t seen in a while. It was just lovely and wonderful and delightful. I felt like a kid in a candy store getting to spend time with friends, soak up the time away from the farm and spend the time catching up and just chatting like good friends do.
 
The Muddy Kids were entertained, they spent a large portion of the day on the tyre swing or in the hammock. So quite simply this week I am grateful for the hammock swing for keeping my Muddy Kids entertained so we could chat with friends and enjoy being away from the farm.
 

 
Linking up over at Village Voices where the lovely Bron hosts 52 Weeks of Grateful. What are you grateful for this week?
 
 
 

Grateful for good friends.

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At the moment I miss my friends, friends both near and far, things being so flat chat has meant that I haven’t had the chance I usually do to make phone calls, have an occasional cuppa with my friends or even run into anybody really. The focus has been on work and home, trying to get that balance right and keep things moving.

The thing is though that for me it’s my friends that keep me moving, that keep me running on an even keel. Yes Muddy Hubby is fantastic and he and the Muddy Kids are my world, but sometimes I just need a friend to bring things back into focus.

So this week I am grateful for my friends, because I know when I finally find some time they will be there for me, to listen, to laugh and to just enjoy spending time with. Because that’s what good friends do, just be there for you, even when you don’t have time to call them!

I am delighted to watch my Muddy Girls start to make more friends and I am hopeful that one day they have built a strong friendship network just like the wonderful one I have.

I get such joy out of them coming home and saying ‘I made a new friend today’ and hearing all about their new friend and what they did at school or preschool together. We sit down and we talk about the importance of friendships and being nice to everyone and I can’t wait til they realise the true value of good friends who will always be there for you.

Yes, this week I’m grateful for good friends, you know the ones, they’re always there for you no matter what.

Happy to be linking up with Maxabella for 52 Weeks of Grateful over at Village Voices. Please check it out, you’ll be pleased you did.

Grateful for Rain

It’s been busy, at home, at work, in my head, things have been going along at a fast pace and I am scrambling to keep up with it all. The best bit about this week though has been the rain, up until this morning we had had 59mm, that my friends is glorious rain for us, the last decent rainfall we had was in July last year, so this was very welcome, as things were getting dry and everyone’s confidence was getting low.

So this week I am grateful for the lovely rain we’ve had, for the fact that even though I’m in a bad mood, the rain kind of matches my mood and it’s made Muddy Hubby very happy, so that is a good thing.

I’m also grateful for the lovely Bush Mobile that comes once a fortnight, it lets my kids get dirty and messy and have lots of fun and my only thing to clean up is their clothes. It’s a win win for us.

I am grateful for the afternoon routine of feeding the animals, to stroll outside and spend some time feeding the animals, getting to know them and watching the kids joy as they feed them and care for them.

Lastly this week I am grateful for shovels at the back door, so that we are always prepared when the snakes are about. We got another one at the back gate this week, it was dark and my wonderful sacrificial snake dog alerted us to it, and Muddy Hubby was quick to act, stopping the snake from getting our precious dog, so yes, I am grateful for shovels and for my snake sticks which are now charged and working in the garden.

Linking up for 52 Weeks of Grateful over at Village Voices. Bron hosts a great link up every week, definitely worth checking out!

Gratefuls on Struggle Street

I’ve struggled to hit my stride this week and get back into routine. I’ve chosen to linger and savour the sounds of the morning rather than get up and make sure all the lunchboxes and eskies are packed. I start one task, only to get sidetracked with another and not remember I had already started one. I’m not sure whether it’s the after holiday let down or there’s something else ticking over in my mind, whatever it is it’s not made this week an easy one, today was the worst of all.

In all the struggle though there’s been rays of sunshine that I am so grateful for.

Having good friends that listen to me rant or worry or just make me laugh, good friends are wonderful and special and I am so very lucky to have some lovely ones in my life.

I am extremely grateful to my neighbour who picked up my ‘snake sticks’ for me today, because I couldn’t get to town for another week, now I just need to charge them up before strategically placing them in the house yard.

I am grateful for my gorgeous Muddy kids and the love they have for farm life and farming, for the joy they get from going to work with Muddy Hubby and helping out where they can. That is so precious and I hope they never lose it.

My Muddy Puzzler has done a complete turnaround on her bus enthusiasm, so I am grateful for the wonderful and caring preschool staff that encourage her and praise her and ensure she feels safe on the bus and make sure she’s happy to get on and off.

Today though the thing I am grateful for is  those ‘lightbulb moments’ you know the ones, where you’ve been struggling to find the answer to a puzzle and suddenly inspiration strikes and you see it in a different way and you know how to go forward. Yes, that today I was very grateful for, now to just try and put it into action.

I am linking up with the wonderful Bron who is hosting 52 Weeks of Grateful at Village Voices. Stop by and have a read, you won’t regret it!

Grateful for bits and pieces of our holiday

We have had a lovely relaxing week away, just us, as a family hanging out together. It’s rare and we have soaked up every bit. My Muddy kids have done really well, trying to get along and help each other when they need it, play together more and more and just enjoy being together.
 
Over the week though there’s been a few things I’m extremely grateful for.
 
I am Grateful for my Muddy Hubby who is not afraid to get himself dirty to help the kids have the most fun. He will sit in the sandy shallows and help them enjoy the surf, he’ll let them bury him in the sand til he has sand everywhere and then he’ll turn around and help them bury themselves.
 
Consequently I am grateful for the beach showers, which meant I could shower off most of the sand and it didn’t have to be carted all through the cabin we were staying in.
 
I am grateful for the shells on the beach that kept the Muddy Girls entertained for hours, collecting them, washing them, sorting them, talking about them and finally sharing them by showing them off.
 
I am grateful for the abundance of parks on the coast which meant the kids didn’t get bored with the same one over and over.
 
Overall I am grateful for a relaxing family holiday, it’s been long overdue but we have soaked up every second and made the most of it.

Linking up at Village Voices for 52 Weeks of Grateful, hosted by the lovely Bron. Please stop by and check it out.

A Grateful Week

Tomorrow is a great day – tomorrow we go away on holiday. Yes it will probably take us over 8-9 hours to make it to the coast, but we will meet up with friends and celebrate a very special friend’s wedding. We then get a week of beach action before heading to the big smoke for an engagement party for one of my cousins.

Each and every member of the family is busting with excitement and it’s been a busy week trying to get things sorted before we go. I am one of those people who cannot go away unless my house is spotless, there’s no washing hanging around in baskets and my lawn must be mowed, so it’s keeping me on my toes.

I am grateful though for my lovely mother-in-law who looked after my kids so I could finish the packing and the cleaning unhindered.

I am grateful for my sister-in-law for keeping me supplied with vomit bags, because the reality is we will not make it to the coast without at least one vomiting child, and I would rather be prepared than spend my holiday trying to get the smell out of the car.

I am grateful for my Muddy Organiser’s care and kindness, looking after her baby brother when I need her to just take his hand to help him walk somewhere or keep him busy while I complete a task, she continues to amaze me with her thoughtfulness.

I am also grateful for my hairdresser, for fitting the kids and I in for hair cuts before we go away, for knowing my kids so well that they are comfortable enough to let her wash their hair and cut it without clinging to me like they used to.

It’s these little things that make me smile this week and that I want to link up at Village Voices for 52 Weeks of Grateful, graciously hosted by Maxabella Loves. It’s definitely worth a look.

Grateful for the bus driver

I love the excitement of a first day, all that nervous anticipation, the barely contained nervous laugh as they try to contain both their anxiety and their excitement. We had three kids start school and preschool this week, and I am breathing a sigh of relief as we slowly return back to the normality of a routine (almost).

Amongst the return to normality was my Muddy Puzzler’s first day at preschool. We were dressed and organised early, I was going to take her in, but we pulled up at the bus stop for my Muddy Organiser and out she jumped backpack on ‘I’m catching the bus Mum’. Now of course I was incredibly apprehensive about this, incredibly. I talked her through it all, changing buses and where the bus would stop before it got to preschool, including the fact that once they stopped at my Muddy Organiser’s school, that she would be on the bus on her own and the bus driver would drive her straight to preschool where I would be waiting. ‘Yes Mum I’m going on the bus’ was her constant reply. On she jumped, not a problem in the world, happy as Larry until of course every other passenger got off the school bus, then the tears started and did not stop til she got off the bus at preschool where I was waiting.

So this week I am very grateful to the lovely bus drivers that drive my kids to school and safely home. To the bus driver who calmly talked to my Muddy Puzzler while she cried her little heart out. I am so very grateful that he has decided to change his bus route just for her and drop her off first before he does the other school drop offs so she won’t cry again on him! Yes he is that lovely and I am so very appreciative of his kindness and care for my kids.

And rest assured my Muddy Puzzler was quickly calmed down and off to do craft within minutes of arriving at preschool, confidently telling the staff that she’ll be catching the bus home!

What are you grateful for this week? Make sure you check out 52 Weeks of Grateful over at Village Voices where Maxabella hosts a lovely link up each week.