This is the most concise and used and abused list I have ever written. This is my be all and end all list for going anywhere for more than 8 hours. This is the list I have been pining after for days. Maybe others have something more substantial, but for me, I cannot conceive of that being possible.
I read a mediocre book once, and the main guy was at a party and people were razzing him about his lists; he took his hands out of his pockets to mock-throttle one of them and a bunch of his lists fell out of his jacket, haha, yucka yucka yucka. That is not quite me – my lists are on my phone, the ipad or on the backs of random envelopes (channeling my mother) along the fringes of the kitchen. My paper lists rarely leave the house, but you get the picture. Besides the imaginatively titled “things to bring” list, the other most utilised list is my xmas list. I update it weekly as I have ideas or when I can confirm gifts ordered, but I’m not going to post that one. It also has on it things that I would like, so time-poor Husband may just order online, use the list as a guide or distribute it as he sees fit. That is the least-used list, actually, as there are few things that I really want, and actually, the same things have been on there for a few years running. So either someone is imaginative in their own right, or they are just not getting that particular memo, along the same lines as the infamous “TPS reports”. I hope I don’t get nailed by fate before I get my A into G and make my own version of the “JUMP…to conclusions mat” *cough*, cue the crickets.

Today is the penultimate day for packing, and I am half done! Well, maybe a quarter done. Our internet is not working so I cannot print off my super detailed list of things to pack, so I have been writing things down willy-nilly, and the boys were excited to pack their own clothes.
We are hiring a camper van and the company charges extra for bedding, plates and cutlery, can you believe it? Hail no. We have a thousand suitcase allowance so we are bringing our own, stuffed into an extra. Now I feel justified buying every kid-sized sleeping bag that I could find over the past two years! The weather is meant to be pretty nice, so I am going to take mostly dresses for myself. I am only taking those sweet new shoes for dressing up, but I will cram as many hats in my hat case as physically possible.
We had one heck of a busy morning and now that nearly 3yo is napping and the big boys are in front of the box, I can put my feet up and do what I do best – procrastinate. I will be hanging most of my clothes in the suit bag with Husband’s suit for the wedding, so I don’t feel like there is much more I can do right now, and not having my list makes me pretty much powerless to continue. Obviously I can’t pack toiletries until tomorrow night, and cleaning up is a loser’s game until after the boys are bedded down for the night.
We watched Lilo and Stitch in the interim but nearly 5yo turned off the receiver before we saw the ending. It turned out to be a little bit of a tearjerker. 6.5yo doesn’t like movies (even animated ones) that have people as the main characters, or even remotely bad guys, so he did not watch for long with us. And now that Husband has finished work for the day, I can access my almighty list. But wait, he has jetted off for some Husband time and the rest of us are a bit lackadaisical in our pursuits, but there is so much to be done. 6.5yo is heading out to the vege garden (after he makes almighty noises in the kitchen, wth is he doing in there??) to investigate and that will probably draw me in to planting more potatoes. Nearly 5yo is apparently going with him (off you go!) so that will need supervision regardless, and nearly 3yo refuses to do anything without me, so I can’t achieve much except a myriad of trips to and from the fridge and pantry. Ho hum. *this just in* I feel a sense of foreboding – impending doom lurks in my near future in the shape of something small and squishy, egad. That is only stalling this whole packing caper even longer – I can’t take my eyes off him for even a minute, so I can rush him off to the bathroom and reward him for my aversion to dirty laundry. Just once I think I would like to get a new pair of shoes for “dropping the kids off at the pool” as a friend once said. Maybe I will do that when we arrive somewhere exotic, I think there are leather products galore! I’m sure I can remember to pack myself a small empty case to bring home all of my special rewards, I will put that on the list right now!

I was in the school introductory meeting this week and the lady in front of me had luxurious blonde hair. I’ll assume she dyes it because underneath the lovely soft yellow was a leedle bit of dish water along the fringes (pardon me if you have blonde hair that is naturally dishy along the edges and it’s completely natural). It looked so soft and shiny, so clean. My hair is clean, but I don’t use commercial shampoos so that’s one of the reasons it isn’t salon styled very much – I also don’t have as many chemicals floating in my bloodstream like I used to. I could smell some of those chemicals coming out of my arm pits before I stopped using shampoo and deodorant! My hair is also shiny and soft, the shiniest and softest it has ever been. It’s also the smoothest it has ever been thanks to vinegar, but I have big hair and so it doesn’t always sit just right or be supermodel lovely. I have to constantly remind myself that supermodels may be on drugs, their hair is full of chemicals and the pictures I see of them may not even be real. And back in the day, when I was young, thin and carefree – before kids, obviously – I finally asked my hairdresser about her gorgeously shiny hair. Chemicals! I was flabbergasted, and obviously naive.
I must have a complex, I often think that everyone else is more grown up than I am, with their shiny hair and clean clothes.
My clothes were clean last night, I got dressed for the meeting while the boys were outside. That was after we were drawing with chalk on the driveway then apparently rolling around on it – I was filthy! I took a risk kissing the boys good-bye since they were super dirty when we were ready to leave, but we turned up (a little late because Husband couldn’t decide what to wear) clean and respectable, and yet the lady in front looked more than I felt. Phooey. I was wearing a nice dress, why should I care about her nonchalance? I chose my shoes and accessories based on what I like, rather than what I think other people might think. And yet. I’m in my mid-30s (!gasp!) and have recently, somewhat gracefully accepted my appearance, I can throw around the word ‘vagina’ with the best of them now, most of the time, so I have pretty much grown up. And yet. There is still a yet. I forget that when I am having a great day, someone who is not having one of their own sees me, and I see people having a great day when I may not be. So take that ‘yet’.

I may have lost that loving feeling, but I am certainly living on the edge these days. Oh, the excitement!
I have never been a risk-taker, even for no-money dice games at Nanna’s house, much to her chagrin. I could not bring myself to roll that dice even one more time because I might go over the points limit per roll. She would never take me to the poker machines, I’m sure!
Out for dinner this week I was torn between two meals, and I chose the scallops, even though there was tapenade in the dish. I don’t like olives but decided to challenge myself and ordered it anyway. I tried the tapenade, I even sampled it with the vegetables to give the flavour another chance, but, needless to say, it was left on the plate afterwards. I could have ordered pork or lamb, but I really love scallops and I rarely have them as a main meal.
Ordering the ‘other’ cocktail before dinner was actually a mistake, I’m sure the fall-back choice would have been as well, but it was different, it was a risk. I suppose it wasn’t different if I have been making different choices for myself recently, out of my comfort zone, and all that. I seem to have made that a habit, or am changing my spots, learning new tricks etc.
I headed to the powder room after dinner and danced around a little before choosing the bathroom stall that was not the first nor the middle, because they are too much in the forefront of a psycho’s mind when they spray the room w machine gun bullets. But if I’ve really changed my spots then I should choose one of those next time, so that some schwarzenegger type will waltz in and I will find that my husband is not some (devilishly handsome) medical sales-type, but some exciting spy and yada yada yada, that would be a cool new trick.

I just finished a book that was so fascinating! It’s called “Old Souls” and is written by a journalist by the name of Tom Shroder. It is about the case work of a scientist called Dr Ian Stevenson, and he travels all over the (developing world, mostly) world documenting cases of apparent reincarnation where children claim to remember past lives or claim to be someone from a past life. Dr Stevenson had been investigating such cases for nearly 40 years when the book was written, it follows him through Lebanon, India and Beirut, and ends with a case or two in the United States. It was compelling reading.
That sort of thing has always been interesting to me; in my early high school years I was always looking for new books in the ghost section of the library – I still remember the call numbers were 133.something. I dabbled in school-girl seances like any other, and was thankful that we only scared ourselves with elongating candle flames, rather than anything like the stuff from the movies. I watched all the Poltergeist films with my friends, then we spooked ourselves with stories that the lead characters all died from supernatural causes, like exploding hearts. And then, of course, there came the X-Files. Oh, Mulder, you smolder. What a hottie. One of the stand-outs for me – I cannot have just one favourite – was the episode where an anonymous tip called the FBI’s attention to a cult and one of the members seemed to have multiple personalities. The personalities turned out to be past lives. The poignant thing, though, was that one of the personalities/lives was connected to a past life of Mulder. The line she spoke in a long southern drawl “I’ve missed you” to Fox(y) dang near breaks my heart every time I think of it. He then investigates her past life and his own and it’s a standard awesome episode, including when he rushes to her aid only to find everyone has killed themselves *sob*.
Shroder wonders why there aren’t any or many cases in the United States then actually finds quite a lot. He supposes that some religions include reincarnation, so such claims by children are taken as fact, whereas comments or stories by children in western countries are dismissed because reincarnation is just stuff from the movies. Until he delves a little and finds a few cases that are more than that.
It all set me to trying to remember any funny things that my boys might have said (and that’s it, really, it’s all just funny things kids say, rather than anything more), and nearly 3yo did say a few things last year. It was not long, maybe a month or so, after our baby passed away, that was-then nearly 2yo said he could hear the baby crying, and he said it a few times over a few weeks, I think. I didn’t question him about it, I was a little bit petrified that he would elaborate, but it was still interesting at the time, even as it caused me pain. I was wondering if he was referring to his lost brother, or if he was remembering something from “before”, as some of the children in the book say.
I don’t remember the big boys saying anything that could be construed as something more, but it was a long time ago, my brain has been fried by having children and perhaps I dismissed it, even if they did say something.
I don’t think I would be interested in finding out about my own past lives because – aside from confusion and complexity for all and sundry – the subjects in the book have feelings for their “past personality” families, thus, confusion for all. I don’t think I would encourage the boys to remember “before” because I wouldn’t want to share my own children with other families, and of course, I wouldn’t want to share Husband with “other” wives.
Sometimes I wonder if people who go through hell in this life, must have done something very bad in their past life, but that’s an awful lot of naughty, just for my small circle of friends.
Garfield used to say – when I read his musings – that he wanted to come back as a pillow in his next life. In my next life, I may have many incarnations, one of which may be as a Praying Mantis, so that I may dispose of my spouse over and over. Another may be as a Penguin, so that I stay happily married for ever and the spouse may do the child-rearing. Perhaps I would be a tree, so that I may live for nearly ever, but that seems an awfully long time, and right now I am just hanging for naps.

Husband often leaves things to the last minute, as in – the night before he flies out very early in the morning and he wants to go to bed in 15 minutes and he needs to wash certain clothes because they aren’t clean – last minute. Thankfully we are not leaving for the wedding in the next hour, there is one week until we leave, but husband still needed scheduling from me to go and buy his sharp threads for his brother’s big occasion. Taking all the boys and his wife was also my idea, and while it was not a fun morning for anyone, Husband did get the threads required and we all need a dose of reality, sometimes.
Of course, boys received a stern talking-to (a number of times, actually) on the drive home and 6.5yo was the only one protesting naps on the grounds that he hadn’t been quite as bad as the others. What. Everrrrr. Husband took the nearlies upstairs and I indulged 6.5yo in my bed so he didn’t think of weaseling (!!) his way out of the nap again. *tear-jerker alert* And we fell asleep holding hands.
When I was pregnant w nearly 3yo, nearly 5yo was 2 and would nap in his bed. 6.5yo was 3.5 and stopped napping. At first that was not sooo bad, as I would let the tv babysit him while I napped on the couch beside him. That stopped working when Husband would stomp into the house and (loudly) whisper about something not important enough to risk waking the pregnant woman. I started taking him to nap in the basement bedroom (note: it was not such a dungeon as it sounds) so Husband could make loud noises indiscriminately, but he wouldn’t nap unless I stayed with him – and that was fine, until Husband kept dancing a bloody jig in the kitchen at nap time every, bloody, day. Anyhoo, for the whole nap charade to work, was-then-3.5yo had to see you sleeping or he wouldn’t follow suit, and so I had to give up sneaking looks at his angelic form and just go to sleep *snore*. No problem there! Part of the way to get him to settle down for sleep was to hold his little hand, which was an amazing experience to have everyday after a sometimes-tough morning with only preschoolers for company. I wonder if that will fly as the boys get older? Nearly 5yo does not hold my hand on the odd occasion that we nap together, and nearly 3yo is already protesting about the amount of hugs and kisses that I need, boo.

I have explained to nearly 3yo in no uncertain terms that I don’t like “poo in the underpants”. I have used phrases such as “I hate poo in the underpants”, I have bandied about adjectives like “yucky” and “dirty”, and also nouns like “treats” or “new toys” *long suffering sigh*. I have sat with him – on the bathroom floor, no less – for an hour again this morning, maintaining a mom visage that is “up-vibe and interesting” so I can read and sing the same pages or the same books over and again. And again, no dice. My morning is now in a holding pattern until he does unload in his drawers. I’m not going to bother changing him out of his pajamas just so a different change of clothes will be thrown in the wash 2 minutes after I turn my back. I don’t want to start on some choc-zuccini goodness, only to be stalled during some critical stage where I have raw egg and sticky dough all over my hands and need to fight him for the wipes until one of us is clean. And so the other boys, sensing my vulnerability, hover and pick fights, much like other predators, until they draw blood or the loud ire of their mother.
There is an hour until we have to leave and pick up a friend from summer camp. There is so much that could be achieved in this time – I have my sneakers on, after all – and yet, Husband’s unusually lackadaisical attitude to outside maintenance due to the long and continued presence of roofing contractors – and we are talking sometimes 12hr days! – has permeated indoors, so I may just sit and decry the absence of wifi and make another cup of tea, while I wait on the inevitable *long-suffering sigh*.

I love the pair of shoes I bought for the upcoming exotic wedding. I have been wearing them around the house (not outside yet, just in case) and feel so grown up again, like I used to do when I worked in an office and wore officey clothes. And don’t forget the shoes.
Anyhoo I have 95% finished sewing my butchered wedding veil onto a too-short dress I have (not last minute or anything), and the length is just right HOORAY! Husband approves so it is definitely legit. It is now very acceptable to wear without opaque tights, and will go very well with my new shoes, perhaps to the ladies’ dinner before the wedding.
I used my new dress form to help a little, though she turned out to be more of a pain in the ass rather than a reproduction of it. Firstly, I have no cushion stuffing lying around, so I used curtain fabric to jam in her junk, because that is something I do have copious amounts of, taking up space in cardboard boxes in what would otherwise be a fairly well organized and grown up boudoir. Therefore, secondly, she is heavy, so I can’t just hang the bitch up and drape great swaths of fabric off her shapely buttocks and cut to size as easily as I would like to. In fact, I have an electric oil heater, 2 different stools plus a chair in the corner of the room where I was trying to set up a pseudo-elegant dress form for the purposes of hemming my lacey-assed dress. Thirdly, Husband and I both get a little jumpy because she is life-sized. Not the correct height, obviously, but bulky enough to give one pause when entering the room. Fourth(ly), I don’t know what to do with her now, at least for the short term – easily 5 weeks – because the fair starts tomorrow, getting ready for the holiday, then the holiday, then 6.5yo starting first grade, nearly 3yo starting swimming lessons again, and hopefully some playdates for will-be-5yo-by-then in there to bulk out my schedule a little more. And sewing comes a close 59th in there somewhere. At least she will come in handy for halloween. I could very easily adapt her to be Mrs Lego.

I did end up bringing the trail camera inside this morning, since I woke up rudely early after about 6 hours sleep. Wt?? There were 2 pictures that were completely white and were taken at 10.40pm and around 3am. So there is something there but the camera won’t snap it. I think it is/they are ground squirrels – very anti-climactic.I have seen these 2 big squirrels around the yard lately, which is odd as I rarely see tree squirrels around here, owing, no doubt, to the dearth of predatory birds in the vicinity. Anyhoo, these 2 squirrels are bigger than their tree-climbing cousins and have a wide bushy tail. They have been hanging around the grass in the yard and along the fenceline to the orchard. I thought they were just stupid tourists who didn’t realize their imminent danger. But I scared one of them today when I was hauling a basket of clothes out to the clothes line, and it bolted straight to the tunnel under Toad Hall, before turning around and looking for me again. Hmmm. I have seen them around there more often, now that I am looking for them, and I suppose I don’t have a problem with them living under there. I don’t leave chicken food around and I empty the water container daily, so… But on the other hand, what is going on with the eggs? I suppose it just is too hot for the chickens. But what about the golf ball? Also, about 6 birds have taken to sleeping in one of the nesting boxes, which is messy, and I am sure it interferes with anyone who actually wants to sit and contemplate the world for a little while.

I need to place large boards between each box, so that the ladies may lay if they wish, and hopefully the walls will discourage people from sleeping (and pooping) in the nesting boxes.

I have also noticed that Buffy has not crowed very much of late, and I have not seen him have his way with the women at all since we came back from holidays 2 months ago. Normally he will jump anything that moves, up to 6 times an hour if he is really energetic. Perhaps he peaked too early.

After a day out and about with the big boys, (nearly 3yo was so sad not to come with us) everyone is finally in bed and it sounds like they are out like lights already. I can finally put my feet up (and ice my still-tender knee) and snooze during a movie (Ronin).
I managed a couple of snoozes this morning which were most unsatisfactory. A sore body is so hard to settle, even in a temperpedic, but shite happens when one is hemorrhaging iron, woe is me. Woe is actually dealing with this lady-business in a cement-enclosed hole in the ground – long drop style – without toilet paper, running water or sanitizer. At least the doors were lockable.
After a birthday party at a local bmx track, during which time the boys became absolutely filthy with dust, and almost unrecognizable, we headed to the local Sears for some quick shoe shopping. Is there such a thing when shopping for boys? Today, there really was, after a trip to the loo, of course, so we could all sit in style and wash our hands properly afterward.
6.5yo’s shoes were found and sized within 5 minutes HOORAH. Admittedly, the pair for nearly 5yo took a little longer, and ice creams for all took longer as well, but we eventually made it home.
After a bit of this, that and the other, I went and gorged myself before dinner on blackberries and was watching the chickens as well. The birds love blackberries as much as I do, and I think they are coming on nicely where I have been weaving them in and out of the wire fence. Eventually, I hope they – and some other plants – will cover the fence entirely. Anyhoo, supping on berries brought me down to the end of the orchard and chicken yard. Yesterday I planted the trail camera behind the house to hopefully see something. There was nothing. It does smell skunky, though. After I was done with the berries, I put the trail camera right at the corner of the chicken yard, where a new tunnel has been dug, right beside one of the concreted openings. I am hopeful to see something this time. Anything. Last night I dreamt that two moles were tunnelling everywhere in the chicken yard and the ground was collapsing, so I grabbed the pitchfork and killed one of them; then I was worried that the chickens would gorge themselves on the resulting mess and become bloodthirsty and turn on me before I could get out. Dude!
All during dinner I was watching the camera at the corner of the chicken house, and wondering if I should check it in the morning or wait until mid-afternoon. Probably the latter, as tomorrow the big boys are in summer camp and it will be a busy morning. Coming home from a playdate for nearly 3yo, though, I will be mentally cancelling my To Do list so I can while away the afternoon googling what creatures a shadowy snout might belong to. Dang, I have already put off most of my To Do’s for way too long, and Husband needs clean underwear!