"No reading at the breakfast table"

As you well know by now I'm aiming to slow down this year.  And am particularly aiming to start the year off slowly to leave room for the unknowns.  But after going fast for so long, I have to confess it is truly strange! Here's what I'm finding strange about not being madly busy: 1.  I feel like there is something a bit wrong with me for not being really busy. 2.  You don't get a lot of admiring comments when you do less!  You get lots of that when you're super busy. 3.  I'm actually saying yes to one-offs more often than no.  To spontaneous things like having a friend for a meal or inviting in unexpected visitors for a chat and a cup of tea. 4.  I don't feel exhausted all the time 5.  Cooking dinner doesn't feel like a mountain too high to climb 6.  I have time to text a friend and see how they're going instead of just being consumed by ME, me, me! 7.  I'll actually pray for people when I say I will - more tha...

When I had my first child I wanted to be very cool and relaxed about the whole parenting gig.  It's not my style to make a fuss and I just wanted to get on with it.  I didn't like all the business about researching the best pram, best cot, best maternity clothes, best nappies, best baby monitor, even before he was born.  I couldn't understand why having a baby needed to be so orientated around buying 'stuff' - expensive stuff (my view on this hasn't changed - I think a lot of the purchasing pressure surrounding a new baby is a total ruse). However, by three months old my beautiful little boy was suffering with horrible eczema.  This was the beginning of a long road of learning how to stand up for my child, how to barrack for him, how to advocate for his needs - actually - how to make a FUSS.  Totally out of my comfort zone. The eczema was followed by a violent reaction to milk at 9 months, a positive test to a lot of allergens (including peanuts, dairy, tr...

   If you've been following my blog you'll know that I've started the journey of letting my hair grow out to it's natural colour (ie. grey).  I needed this book and I wasn't disappointed. It's not a heavy book but I found it so refreshing and frankly, encouraging. I'm at the 4 month point which is not looking all that great.  I often used to straighten my hair to make my hair neater for work but I just can't do it with my giant streak of grey.  And I'm resisting going the pixie look because I do think that will age me very quickly (and plus it is winter and I don't want a cold head!). Anne Kreamer has a very similar story to mine.  She started to colour her hair in her early 20's and at 49 decided that she no longer wanted to keep up her three weekly hair appointments.  She saw a picture of herself standing with her teenage daughter and a peer with natural coloured hair and thought she looked like a fraud. Anne uses her experience of...

When my kids were little I read a fantastic book by Kent and Barbara Hughes called 'Disciplines of a Godly family'. I do recommend it and if you haven't read it, it's a great read. But I realized over the last school holidays that there was something in particular about that book that had stuck in my mind. They suggest in the book that you make your house the fun house to hang out at. The fun house for your children's friends to spend time at - a house in the community where everyone knows they can go if they want to see friends. They suggest that getting a pool is great when you have teenagers. Since we're renting and aren't going to be building a house anytime soon (well, really, in my lifetime), I never envisaged that the pool would be a part of the deal. But I did always imagine that my house might be that fun place to be.  Especially with lots of kids. And yet it's not. I like having kids over, but I'm not initiating great gatherings...

Thankfully Nanny McPhee isn't at our place!  Two days a week we have a nanny (I guess that's what you call her - we just call her Beck!).  She picks up the kids from school and brings them home.  Helps them with homework, home readers.  Keeps them safe while they hang out at home.  We decided to go down this path with childcare because we didn't want to leave them in after school care and with so many children it ended up costing just a bit more than putting them in childcare.  I really wanted the kids to be able to relax at home and get some things done, rather than staying at school for longer and having to negotiate more relationships in the school yard.  That's just us - and I have pretty introverted kids who need lots of down time. But would I like to claim the childcare subsidy that I'd get if they were in after school care?  Sure!  Absolutely.  It would be a lot cheaper.  Last week the opposition leader has suggested he...

So I turn 40 today.  Yesterday my work colleagues put on an incredible lunch for me - they do like to celebrate with vast quantities of food.  Today I'm going to go out for coffee with a group of my school mum friends.  And tonight I'm going to celebrate my birthday in true style (well, at least 'consistent' style in my life) by going on our annual church weekend away.  In April I'm planning a party.  So thus we are in the Festival of Jenny. How do I feel about turning 40?  I feel pretty fantastic to be honest.  I don't think there is much else that I would want from life that I haven't been able to have or experience in my forty years.  This feels like a great blessing and privilege to me.  Lovely family that brought me up, crazily unusual childhood, got to go to uni (a few times), I've been married for 17 years to a man who is incredible (and we still like each other - more incredible), have five (five? wow, really, that is truly unexpe...

I read this book in a day.  It is a disturbing book, but like a car crash, hard to look away.   Room  is told from the point of view of 5 year old Jack.  You soon discover that he lives in 'Room' and has lived there forever because he thinks this eleven by eleven room is the entire world.  He lives with his Ma and they fill their days with exercises and small chores.  His friends include Dora on TV who he talks to and he thinks is talking back to him.  But at night he has to hide in 'Wardrobe' because Old Nick comes into the room to sleep with his Ma (unlocking the electronic combination door lock to come in). It is all quite horrifying, but the relationship between Jack and his Ma is incredible, as is her determination to protect Jack.  I won't spoil the plot for you, but I'll just say that it doesn't all remain so depressing as the book goes on.  Beautifully and cleverly written.  Shortlisted for the 2011 Orange Prize and a worthy me...

One of the difficult things about being a full-time mum is wondering when your work starts and the work finishes.  It is soooo easy to get really tired, grumpy, angry and super resentful (because realistically it is basically a 24/7 job).  One of the things that makes me quietly laugh at work is when people ask me what I do  with all the rest of my week when I'm not at work (since I only work two days a week).  My experience has been that even on the days I go to my paid work I'm still clocking up a significant number of hours of my 'mum work' before and after my paid work. Having been a full-time mum for 12 years I learnt that the only way I would cope was by pacing myself during the day.  Sometimes you can be up from 5.30 am and going until 10.30 pm.  If I worked that many hours in my paid job without a break I'd actually get into trouble. It's not a sprint this mothering thing.  It's a long, tiring marathon and you need to take on supplies to keep...

Well - we survived.  Jaz had her surgery and is going brilliantly.  The kids did their speeches and went well. They coped with the fact that I couldn't be there.  And I'm still standing after two days at work. I had to ring Centrelink to tell them I had a new job.  The guy on the phone said "so is this the first time you've worked since you had kids?".  I said, um, yes.  Not quite sure why he asked, but he must have had my very empty work record up on his computer screen. No one at work made fun of me because I was back at work for the first time in years.  They were friendly and relieved to have someone actually doing my job (they have been muddling along with casuals for a while).  I even seemed to be able to contribute something constructive beyond 'where is the stationary cupboard?' and 'what's the password to get into this computer?' (I was only told, oh, about 10 different passwords for all the systems I have to access).  I actually e...

The Saturday paper contains a section on careers.  I read it in case the perfect job saying "needs no experience but a decade of being a stay-at-home mum would be looked upon highly favourably", suddenly appears.  They always have little articles about how to get jobs/write resumes etc.  This weekend contained an article on why women keep working even when the cost of childcare uses up all their earnings.  I'll share a little bit of the article with you. Jade Jones ... a full-time radio producer spends almost all of her wage on childcare for her one and two year old daughters.  'As a woman, I wanted to be defined by more than one aspect of my life,' Jones says.  'I want to be mother and a damn good mother, but I also wanted to do something else that was important to me and I wanted to set an example to my girls.  You can be good at more than one thing.' Juliet Bourke is a partner at Acquus Partners, a workplace change consultancy that specialises ...

Wednesday morning I sent this sms to a girlfriend, "Last night we had a couple over for dinner,  friends of Rowan's from uni,  who have only  been married for a couple of years.   I felt so old and cranky and tired in comparison.   Where has my joy gone?"   I've been asking myself all week about my question.  I just felt so weary when I was talking to them.  They were so keen and enthusiastic about their life, their marriage, their future.  I guess I felt a bit jealous.  I used to be like that.  Sometimes, I can be like that.  But mostly I'm not.  Mostly I'm just overwhelmed by all the jobs that I need to do.  While I write this I just know that somewhere more mess is being created.  Soon there will be a child that needs to me to do something for them.   Rowan and I always say that at as long as you keep laughing it is all good.  But I find myself often not laughing.  Just rolling along, gettin...

In the middle of a crazily busy month I keep wondering how I ended up (once again) in this situation.  I knew coming into this term that it was going to be busy but extras have ended up on my plate that I wasn't expecting. I keep thinking "Am I a people pleaser?  Am I just doing all these things because I want people to like me?".  I don't think I am because I know that I regularly say 'no' and end up disappointing people. I do feel the disappointment and sometimes my inability to meet everyone's needs can overwhelm me.  So while I have to say 'no' to just survive, I still carry the emotional aftermath of feeling that I've been less than I want to be. So maybe it's more of an issue of trying to meet my own standards and expectations rather than pleasing others. I keep reading stuff about how I should use my time according to what God's expectations are.  Not my own standards or the expectations of others.  So theoretically I kn...

Coming back to Australia when I was almost 15, for many years I felt like I didn't really fit in (I probably still feel that a little - see my previous post  ).  I felt that I didn't quite 'get' all the social nuances of relationships.  I was unsure of how I fitted into this new world. This is a very, very common experience for MK's. But you know what I've learnt?  That this is not just an experience for MKs.  This is an experience of human beings.  Talking to my friends who have always lived in Australia, there are still things that make them feel like they don't quite fit in. Perhaps it was not being cool enough at high school. Perhaps it was feeling not as clever as other friends.  Perhaps it seems that everyone else at church is really connected and they don't feel connected.  Perhaps all the other mums at school are involved in a busy social life and they aren't.  Perhaps it is thinking differently about something that everyone else ...

Another day, yet another article assessing women's worth by how much they earn.  Arrgh.  In May a 'Good Weekend' article in the Sydney Morning Herald, titled 'Long way to the top' made me want to scream.  Apparently feminism is failing because there are still only a small percentage of the huge pile of qualified women in high-powered corporate jobs.  And I imagine it's women like me that are stuffing up the statistics (I've got a few university degrees lying around that are currently going to 'waste'). I know that the point of the article is to show how women are simply not being promoted into higher level jobs, but it also places a high emphasis on how much women are worth.  And once again women's worth is measured by her earning capacity.  The dollar value that can be associated with what she does all day. And it's this that makes me wonder exactly this type of feminist position is supposed to be achieving.  I don't want to be a man. ...

One of the great things about getting older is that I feel a lot more settled with my life story.  I don't feel so reticent to share it with others.  In fact, as I've got older I'm valuing more and more my childhood rather than desperately wishing I'd had a 'normal' childhood in Australia. I lived in India between the ages of 5 and 14.  My parents were missionaries and we lived in a Bible college in a little Indian town in the middle of India.  Between 9 and 14 I went to a British boarding school for missionary kids which was a two day train trip away from home. When I was almost 15 I started attending school in Australia.  I had a posh accent and soooo desperately wanted to assimilate - quickly.  I lost that accent fast and started to try and learn about life in Australia.  What it meant to be Australian.  A real Australian.  Not just one that celebrated Australia Day and ate Vegemite.  It wasn't easy. I found the later years of hig...

Just a postscript to yesterday's post. When I was feeling particularly overwhelmed I found it hard to initiate conversations with people who I didn't know.  This is not usually something I struggle with so it was a bit strange for me. I was chatting to a friend who helped me a lot with this.  She simply said "Jenny, stop worrying.  Those people will still be there when you get your energy back". It was simple and it took the pressure off. And as the weeks went by I just talked to a new person when I felt I could and it got easier.  I think making small aims (like:  "I'm just going to chat to someone new for a few minutes" rather than "I might invite her over for morning tea" which is what I'd normally do!) helped. Still a work-in-progress I have to say.

I'm into week three of the school term and I haven't felt as exhausted as I did during first term.  I had many nights in March when I went to bed at 8pm and I never go to bed before 11. I've been reflecting on why I found the first term of school difficult this year. I have been waiting for 2010 for such a long time.  First year with four kids at school and my youngest at preschool 2 days a week.  I had such hopes and dreams.  Finish my uni course.   Stare at a wall.  Maybe watch a DVD during the day. So many possibilities and hopes that this became a loaded year.  Such expectations! And then  I just crashed.  I felt so weary.  It was like 12 years of mothering just collapsed on top of me because I finally had a bit of breathing space. So suddenly I didn't want to do anything.  I didn't want to talk to the new Kindy mums at school.  I found uni a struggle.  I found church a struggle  .  I found pickin...

I have discovered that your youngest child starting preschool, marks the beginning of an endless stream of well-meaning comments along the lines of "you mustn't know what to DO with yourself now you have so much spare time".  Usually from either mums with small kids (I completely GET where you are coming from - I have had ' all the kids out of the house envy ' for many, many years) or mums who are working. I was chatting to a friend at play group on Monday who said she was sick of feeling like she needed to be DOING stuff all the time.  "What is the obsession with DOING?",   she asked me. I know that I've felt a bit guilty over the past few weeks that perhaps I've wasted some of this precious child-free time and not been efficient with it.  Not DONE enough! It goes back to a post I wrote a few weeks ago about not being a supermum . I'm starting ( v e r y  slowly) to recognise the value of not always doing.  Last week I had my first mi...

Apologies to all my readers who are totally over my public processing of the start to a new school year!  Never fear - I will get back into the rhythm of life soon and will hopefully have other ideas in my head! I realised today that I've become one of those mothers who carts children around to different activities all week.  I've become a soccer mum - without the soccer part.  I've always been wary of over scheduling my kids because I know they need time to hang out at home and just relax and play. So I've been feeling bad about all that my kids are doing.  Until I suddenly thought about it and realised that individually they aren't doing heaps (enough, but not heaps).  However, when you start multiplying their activities by five children, it is me that has become over scheduled!  I am obsessed with how I'm going to fit it all into a day.  My brain can't seem to cope with thinking much past a day at a time.  Don't ask me about Thursday on Mon...

I've been a bit quiet over the past few weeks because I've been getting my head around the start to a new school year.  It is new for us on a number of fronts.  Our No 4 child has just started Kindy at school and our No 5 has started two days/week at preschool.  I have not had two consecutive days without children for almost 12 years. Even though I've really been looking forward to this time (and this is the first week of the new routine), I'm still getting used to the shift.  A few years ago I worked that I needed to plan ahead for this time.  I knew that I would find it hard to move into this next stage if I didn't know what I wanted to do with the time.  Which is why I started studying and retraining so I had a plan. It is certainly not a problem of finding things to do with my time.  There are more opportunities with church, school, preschool and other community groups than I know what to do with.  I also like the idea of working.  Bu...