Complete Fragments Blog

This morning, 11am, No1Son - "please turn the tv on mum". Me - "no sorry, we have so many other cool things we can do rather than watch tv. What about all those boxes you’ve got, or the toys from the toy library".

5 mins later, No1Son = "I want to make a tv out of a box". (love that thinking - if she won’t give me what I want I’ll just make it!)

We literally spent the rest of the day playing with our cardboard tv.  It became a stage for us to put on "shows" using all sorts of toys, play food (the Food Channel!), lots of sports channels (cars, motorbikes, horses, etc), the news, you name it. There were regular requests for more buttons, plugs, aerials, remotes, etc, etc. All made from cardboard. It came into the bathroom so he could continue "watching" the World Cup Football while he had a bath.

It was awesome. A whole day with no tv, lots of imaginative play, creative solutions to his desire for more gadgets and accessories.

Today, The Universe had a win, things were slightly balanced out.

Tiger Woods came fourth at Augusta. Phil Mickelson won - a man whose wife is battling breast cancer, a supportive husband, a father.

In my eyes that is just proof that good people do get what they deserve sometimes and that the Universe is sorting things out. Over the past 2 years there have been many occasions when the words "the Universe, she is a bitch" have passed my lips. Today, I humbly recognise that the Universe, she is a vengeful, wrong-righting rockstar.

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/golf/phil-mickelson-wins-us-masters-20100412-s1dx.html

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/golf/why-i-am-disgusted-with-tiger-woods-20100320-qn2k.html

• new computers. Finally settled claim from last november with insurance company and we now have 2 wizzbang shiny nerd machines
• warm days. Autumn, how I love thee.
• 2 cuddly kids. I have been covered with kisses and cuddles this week
• pompoms. Bags of pompoms from the $2 shop have given us hours of fun. Are they rocks, a river, a mountain? Can they be sorted by size, colour?
• www.bookdepository.com. Cheaper and faster than Amazon.

I’m on a horse…. SO funny! 

Lately, I seem to spend most of my life feeling torn between opposing forces. For example:

~ I see ads on TV for hair colours, makeup, clothes, etc and I WANT ‘em all! But… I have been trying to simplify my life, to reduce the number of chemicals I put on or in my body, to reduce my spending on frivolous things. How can I be natural and still look really well groomed??

~ I’ve been slowly trying to reduce clutter in our home by selling or giving away things we no longer use. I love how much lighter I feel as I reduce our possessions. But… I see so many things and I just WANT ‘em! I’m such a sucker for bright shiny new stuff. I’ve been very good and generally I resist the urge to acquire, but some days it takes all my strength.

~ Enjoying life and looking to the future while continually grappling with my grief. I swing from feeling so completely destroyed by the losses I’ve experienced to feeling up and positive and planning for cool stuff in the future. Sometimes I think I’m almost manic in the extremes I feel. My poor, long-suffering husband! You feel his pain, right?

~ Adoring my children, feeling so incredibly blessed to have them…. Then seriously considering locking them both in a cupboard and going out shoe shopping! How is it I can be so in love with them, but some days I just really don’t want to be around them?? I think this has much to do with my grief - little things overwhelm me these days. Listening to a grumpy baby is pure torture, where in the past I would have just coped with it.

I wish I knew how other people coped with such opposing internal forces without imploding. Maybe other people don’t suffer from this?

Ok, so in my last post I talked about wanting to get my blogging mojo back… and then nothing, total silence here. I’m so lame and so crap at this!! I so desperately want to be a good blogger, but it’s just not happening… grrrr. Anyway, blah, enough already.

So, I’m feeling pretty wrung out. Last week was a biggie - Miss S’ 1st birthday, Mum’s birthday (all these firsts really suck), Miss S learning to walk and subsequently having several big falls with lots of blood, the TV, DVD  and my computer got cooked in a power surge. And all I desperately want this week is a massage to ease my aching back, but I can’t get an appointment until next week. Anyway, enough, I sound like a bad country song.

Lets lighten this up a bit. Here is a quilt I finished recently. It’s made from cheap Spotlight flannel - I’m only learning and didn’t want to practice on expensive material - and I’m so pleased with how it turned out! It’s so snuggly and the kids love it.

~~~~~

No1Son: Mum, this toy is crapped.

Me: (upon inspection discover it is “cracked”) You mean it’s cracked?

No1Son: No Mum, I mean crapped.

I like his word better anyway…

It has been raining here for what seems like forever, but is actually probably 2 weeks. Woke this morning to sun and a breeze - perfect washing weather. So, of course I dashed about pulling sheets off beds and swapping towels. I have a clothes line and an airer full of washing outside, and it just started raining again!!

Oh well, I’ll just have to resort to what I usually do - hang everything on airers in the laundry and turn on the dehumidifier. What a shambles!

ok, I know this is a pretty lame post. But I’m trying to get my blogging mojo back and I figure the best thing to do is just say something, anything for now and hope that with practice the quality will come and the habit will form. That’s the theory anyway!

And so this isn’t the worlds’ most boring post - here is a photo of the latest train track No1Son and I built yesterday with Miss S right in the middle modelling a vest and pants I made for her recently. No1Son is currently obsessed with trains. Come to think of it - that is an idea for another post - how I’m translating his obsession with trains into learning opportunities….hmmm, I’ll work on that.

Where have I been - that is such a big question I’m not sure where to start. So I’ll start with where I was yesterday - the Craft and Quilt Fair in Hamilton. My wonderful hubby took the day off work and stayed home with the kids so I could go and enjoy the crafty goodness on.my.own…. What a treat. It was busy and crowded but wonderful. I came home with some beautiful stuff…I’ll post photos soon.

So… what has happened since my last real post (we’ll ignore the few random things I’ve recorded here), well a hell of a lot. To say it has been “the best of times, the worst of times” is an understatement.

Last november my beautiful daughter was born and she is such a blessing. But since then life has been pretty bloody tough to be honest. In december my brother-in-law was killed in a car accident, leaving behind a wife and 2 young children. In january my uncle died as a result of a long illness - not a surprise, but still sad. Our beloved dog Kelsey passed away in february, she was 17 yrs old, partially blind and deaf and she succumbed to the heat during a record breaking summer. The week before she died it had been over 40 C every day. But that all pales into insignificance (yes, really)… in april my Mum died after a long and courageous battle with breast cancer. I spent the last 2 months in Australia helping care for her with my Dad, sister and aunty. It was tough leaving my husband and son for so long, but I am so glad I was there. Mum and I got to talk and I feel blessed to have been able to look after her. But my god, it is the most distressing thing I have ever experienced. Watching my beautiful, strong, graceful Mum waste away and suffer so much was beyond belief. And I am so bloody angry I feel like I’m going to explode most days. She suffered so much and she is so missed and I need her but she’s gone. And I’m struggling to accept that this loss, this pain, is now a permanent part of my life. She was my best friend and I don’t know what I’m going to do without her.

But, I have to get out of bed every day and just keep going. My beautiful children deserve to have a loving, attentive Mum. My husband is wonderful and understanding, but truth be told, he just wants to get on with life. My friends all have their own lives and worries and stresses. So I put on my brave face and just get on with it. I am working on a few things that hopefully will help with my grief - things that are positive and fun and that Mum would have loved and that she would have been proud of me for. I’ll reveal more here as soon as everything is confirmed.

So that is why this blog has been so neglected. Caring for a very active 3 year old boy, a new baby, supporting a busy husband, caring for Mum and now coping with my grief has taken every ounce of strength I have. But I have missed this place and I really hope to be able to spend some more time here again, it brings me joy and I really need more of that in my life right now.

I’ve made some changes and the blog is looking better, just needs some tweaking. Let me know what you think..

Apologies for the appearance of the blog - I just upgraded Wordpress and all my customisations are now gone. But I need to get to bed, so I’ll fix it all up in the next few days.

Thanks!