Category Archives: Photos

Pottering around

I’d love to say I’m a gardener and have a green thumb, but unfortunately I don’t. That doesn’t stop me trying though. The kids and I have spent lots of time outside lately when I’m not working, just pottering around the garden. Weeding the garlic garden bed (the only thing I have tried planting in my veggie patches this year), pruning my roses, planting spring bulbs and just hanging out in the garden, having tea parties and just enjoying the fresh air, soaking up the beautiful light and the smell of autumn setting in. As it has started getting colder in the mornings we simply put on more layers and change what we’re doing so we’re not sitting on the wet dewy grass.
 
I have chosen to focus on just one veggie for a few months and shower them with tender love and care, rather than try and plant lots and lose track of them all. I chose garlic – and I’m a little bit excited as they’re all thriving and seem to be loving the weather, I know they’re a long developing little plant, but I think it will be worth it!
 

19/52

 
 

Joining in with Jodi at Che and Fidel for 52 – A Portrait a Week, Every Week in 2013.

Muddy Organiser – Constructing a bird’s nest in the sandpit with great concentration
Muddy Pixie – So much fun on the trampoline lately
Muddy Puzzler – In motion – again on the trampoline
Muddy Baby Boy – Just a ‘boy’ with a smile

Grateful for farming stuff…..

I feel like this week has passed in a daze, struggling to focus on what I’m doing from minute to minute, losing track in conversations, starting one task, getting side-tracked by another and forgetting what I started. It’s been driving me crazy.

This afternoon though I got to do farm stuff, nothing ground breaking, just feeding sheep, but I loved it. Simple straightforward in the outdoors, despite the number of gates I had to open and close and the return trips to pick up hats and drink bottles Muddy Baby Boy threw out the window, it was invigorating.

It was also slightly depressing driving through paddocks with no feed, watching the sheep race toward you when they see the big yellow feeder bin on the back but I was out and about so I put that stuff aside.

Somehow just being in the garden isn’t enough, to drive over the farm and see the sheep and what’s happening from block to block just gets straight to my heart and lifts me, that’s what this afternoon did, despite the tiredness and crazy brain my whole mood was lifted and for that I’m grateful.

 
 
Linking up with the fabulous Bron over at Village Voices for 52 Weeks of Grateful.
 

18/52

A Portrait of my kids once a week, every week in 2013


Muddy Organiser – The trampoline full of static
Muddy Pixie – Off in her own world
Muddy Puzzler – Picture Perfect
Muddy Baby Boy – On the run

Linking up over at Che and Fidel for 52 – A Portrait a Week

My Muddy Pixie

This is the year before my Muddy Pixie starts school, the year before her world opens up even more and she is no longer a ‘preschooler’ but a school kid instead. I am worried about my Muddy Pixie starting school,  the special qualities that make her her are not all suited to a school classroom, so of course – I worry.
 
My Muddy Pixie is the total opposite of me, I am all about order, routine, structure, and without those I do not function so well. My Muddy Pixie however is all about what’s happening in the moment, what adventure is happening next, what joke is the funniest or what imaginative story can she tell to crack herself up into fits of giggles.
 
She is anxious, but sometimes it’s just for show, she is intuitive, she is a dancer, a story teller, a cycling pro, a little waif, a distractable, yet focused little soul.
 
We are facing some challenges this year to help get her ready for school, we are working on things as a family, and I have been amazed at how Muddy Hubby has stepped in to do some things with her that I do not have the patience for, despite trying to remain calm and composed and do the best I could sometimes there are just things that Dad does better.
 
My Muddy Pixie is certainly keeping me on my toes.
 

Warrumbungle Wanderings

Back in January the nearby Warrumbungles were hit with devastating bushfires, they pretty much wiped out most of the national park, very little flora or fauna survived. We watched each day from home as the smoke billowed up as it continued to blaze.
 
This weekend we packed up the Muddy Kids, grabbed some lunch and headed up to check out how nature fights back after this kind of devastation. There is a pocket of greenness at the bottom where we set up camp for lunch and explored the creek, it’s almost like an oasis, for as you continue to drive up in to the park the only green is where trees are beginning to reshoot. It was amazing to see.
 
We reached the only lookout open at the moment and walked the short walk to the top for an awesome view of the park, but it also took your breath away to see how much damage had been done. A definite eye-opener thinking about just how long it will take to fully recover. It is however a geologists dream, a rare opportunity to see the rock layers which are normally under the cover of trees. It was also a good chance for the kids to see what all the smoke and fire they saw back in January was about, allaying some of their fears and answering their questions.

 

Grateful for Sleepovers and Besties

Since I’ve added an extra day into my work days I have struggled to find time to catch up with my friends and subsequently my Muddy Kids have also missed out with only a small amount of spare time to fit in a long list of things. These school holidays thought I’ve tried to make a conscious effort to let my Muddy Kids get some quality friend time in. We’ve had sleepovers and play dates and netball clinics. All things that would normally have to slip by the wayside.
 
It has been so delightful for my two big Muddy Girls to go on a sleepover together and see how much fun they had, my wonderful friend made snow globes with them and let them watch a movie and have a spa. We had the Muddy Pixie’s bestie over for a play and they had so much fun playing in the wool shed, jumping on the wool bales and playing hide and seek in the sheds. We even braved the world of having a friend for a sleepover and it was lots of fun. Not only has it kept the kids entertained and they are falling into bed exhausted each night but the smiles on their faces and the joy it brings me lets me know it’s worth the effort.

 

So this week I am grateful for my Muddy Kids friends for being so special and bringing such lovely friendships into their lives.

 
Linking up over at Village Voices for 52 Weeks of Grateful, hosted by the lovely Bron.

16/52

 
A portrait of each of my kids every week for 2013

Muddy Organiser – Exhausted after her first foray into a Netball Clinic but adamant to tell me everything about it
Muddy Pixie – So excited to have her bestie over for a play – captured in the middle of play
Muddy Puzzler – So cheeky climbing the slippery dip
Muddy Baby Boy – Following along, just trying to keep up

 
Linking up with Jodi at Che and Fidel for the most amazing collection of photographs for 52 – A Portrait a Week

Tantrums and All

I am feeling strangely reminiscent this week, I have been looking at old photos of the Muddy Girls at the same age my Muddy Baby Boy is now – almost 20 months, which other than the tantrums is one of my favourite ages. They are into everything, exploring, emptying cupboards, climbing everything. I am amazed though at the differences as well between all my kids at this age, from their interests to their skills development they are all so wonderful and individual.
 
By far though my Muddy Baby boy has proved the most physically challenging, as I run to try and catch him before he falls, or run after him as he takes off out of the house yard and toward the shed, or rescue him from the tree he has just climbed, or wrestle him down to change his nappy, or keep him challenged inside on a rainy day when he’s an outside kid.
 
He is a boy through and through and I am loving every second of it, including the tantrums.

Too Fast…..

My Muddy Puzzler is a little bit of an enigma, stronger in nature than her older two sisters and focused on whatever task she chooses to pursue, even if she knows it’s the wrong thing to do and it will turn my smile upside down, once she starts something she must finish in her eyes.
 
For me she is growing way too fast, she is three and a half going on thirty three, she is way more ahead in areas than her older sisters were at the same age, focused on practicing writing letters and copying them whenever she can, doing somersaults on the grass, riding a bike, all things that even now her older sisters sometimes struggle with.
 
I am in awe of her everyday, especially when she shows me something new she has learnt to do. I know she has her older sisters leading the way and she is desperate to be doing exactly what they’re doing but for me it’s all too much too quickly. I want her to slow down, I want to savour her being a 3 year old, tantrums and all.