I just love how God orchestrates events, meetings and people connections that just speak to your heart and feeds your passion or vision. Its been said if we want our own vision or passion to flourish and grow then we really should be investing into and encouraging other people's visions.
Tonight I was blessed. I wasn't up to going out tonight because I am feeling a little under the weather as I think Frankie has been kind enough to share her cold with me. Anyway I did decide to go out as I was invited to a speaker that oversees the running of House of Grace. A house for young pregnant girls that need extra support during pregnancy and beyond.
Low and behold I had met her before and we got talking and talked of ways that we could support and help each other out from time to time. If you don't know by now...you should know that I am a self confessed birth nerd with a passion from mums being equipped with tools and the knowledge to make the best decisions from themselves and their babies. For them to be supported and encouraged in ways that are meaningful and helpful to them. To see families succeeding and happy. It breaks my heart to know that babies are being disadvantaged and mums aren't in a supportive environment.
House of Grace is doing a great job at providing care and guidance for some of these mums....I guess this is why tonight has left me beaming. It has excited me to be networking and making meaningful connections with people that share the same heartbeat as I do.
Loving Arms is continuing to grow and forge ahead. Its getting busier which means new structure is needing to be put in place to help things run smoothly to ensure no mum gets left behind and no baby misses out.
I am ever so thankful to God for this vision and for the people who believe in it just as much as I do. I am thankful for opportunities like tonight that increases my network of people who love and live what I do.
How was your Saturday night?
One of the things I love the most about my backyard is that my kids are able to be kids without mum or dad worrying about what the neighbours are saying or what the yard looks like from the road. They can play, build and create as much as they like. And believe me we have had it all. Ropes dangling from trees, random tree houses, huts in the hedges, bubbles in the paddling pool, extra extra extra long water slides and now this.....make shift sand pit, right smack bang in the middle of the yard. Its also been made in the middle of the bigger kids soccer pitch much to their frustration.
We actually have a sand pit over by the hedge and definitely out I the way of flying soccer balls and swinging cricket bats. Over the past six months it's become quite overgrown with weeds and seeing we were busy with wedding prep....sand pit maintenance wasn't high on our priority list. Perhaps it should of been.
Now what started out as a bucket full of sand or two and a few cars and trucks has now turned into a full blown sand pit....the real deal. Its even got boards encasing the sand to stop it from being spread all around the lawn. This guys have done it all and every time I look out the kitchen window someone is playing in it.
Hmmmm it looks like its time to upgrade the neglected sand pit with a bit of weeding and trailer or two of sand. These guys are amazing I love watching their undirected free play, they way they interact with each other and negotiate terms and conditions of play and who is going to be having the blue spade or the tractor and trailer next.
Quite the preparation for life really isn't it. Maybe we could leave out the fistful of sand in the hair and the rake to the forehead as adults though....that perhaps wouldn't work to well in the workplace or would it?
I wonder what they come up with tomorrow?
Of all the random places that any of my kids have fallen asleep this one takes the cake.
Found my wee Frankie pants curled up and snoring her head off on the trampoline. If she wasn't filled with snot I would of popped a blanket on her and left her there. Instead I quickly took a photo and snaffled her up ( is that even a word?) Took her inside and gave her a long luxurious mama cuddle. Poor girl not her usual spritely self but grumpy tired and full of a chesty kind of cold.
It's times like these I am pleased that I am still breast feeding her. All that goodness can only do wonders in getting her better. Weaning is the thing I hate most about having a baby. I loathe it. It's such a special time between baby and me, a time where no one else can encroach in on it. So precious. Once weaning has taken place I have to share all of her and maybe I don't want to.
So for now we share these precious moments together throughout the day and night and I cherish them. For the most part it doesn't worry me that she is still feeding three four times a night....that's when it's most precious, snuggly and intimate. Call me nutty if you will but I think it's wonderful.
I know the day will come when I will have to wean her. I feel it looming up at me from the distance. Maybe I am finding it extra sad and difficult knowing that she is probably going to be the last bubba for us.
She is growing so fast and becoming more and more independent and ooze more and more of her beautiful personality.
I miss her babyness but am looking forward to all the amazing things yet to come.
Am I more than a little weird?
Sometimes the best thing to do is gaming.......but not what the type of gaming you are thinking about.
What I am talking about is actual gaming....in person....face to face gaming....like with cards and people.
After a whirlwind kind of day and the little kiddies were in bed and a glass of wine or two.....all to do was have a game or half of dozen I spoons with my boys. Spoons where you pass cards to your left, the first to four cards of the same suit grabs a spoon, then everyone else grabs a spoon and the last person who misses out loses. It's a loud game, can get a little heated and perhaps a little violent. Don't blame me though.....it's my boys. They hate to lose but love to win. I need not say anymore.
So tonight that's me folks...just playing Spoons with my boys.
What did you do this evening?
I need not say anymore...he's home. And how glad am I! I am so tired from having next to no sleep due to a sick wee Frankie and a cling on three year old who wanted to sleep jammed up next to me like a sucker fish. But yay he is home! Home with not one but two deer for the freezer. We will be right for meat for a good while now.
Of course all the kids were excited and were full of stories and questions for him and just had to help him unpack his food pack to ferret out any leftover yummy snacks. I have got for dibs on the leftover chocolate bars....it's a wife's right ah? So the annual roar hunt is over for another year....phew! I have already heard the plans for next years one.... *cue smile and nod. No doubt I will hear the stories about each deer heard, seen and shot over the next few days. It's just what we do around here.
So back to our normal busy lives now. We have a few birthdays coming up soon as we are just about enter into birthday season number 2. Leaving you with this short post tonight because......well my husbands home and I need a back rub.
This was the view outside my side kitchen window at four thirty this afternoon.....My three old engrossed in his own world, his own game, doing his own thing. No one dictating the rules, no one bugging him, no one to interrupt him with invitations to play something else. Just a boy, his trucks and a pile of dirt. I don't think he would rather have been anywhere else. To me this right here is almost the epitome of childhood. *sigh.
While my week has been busy and filled with good family time it's been a long one also.
Tonight is the last night I have by myself....tomorrow my husband comes home from his annual hunting retreat with his brother and buddies. Five nights gone in the middle of no where, choppered in, sporadic communication out and none in. I know it's only five nights but I think the fact I can't talk to him or contact him makes it seem longer. But tomorrow afternoon he will be home and all will be well again.
I have missed him more this year for some reason. Perhaps because we were super busy leading up to him going away. I know he loves this time away and he LOVES his hunting and any meat he gets is an added bonus. I hope I can sleep tonight because I so desperately need it. Twenty more hours to go....Oh 19 and a half now!
One in bed and six kiddies to go! Not that I am counting or anything. How was your day?
There are examples and life lessons all around us aren't there? We just have to be looking for them and also be willing to see them and to learn from them. He is my latest lesson and it's from my garden!
Check my bright red chilli........My first one ever! I can't help but marvel over at it intense bright redness. I was so excited to see it finally turn red. Everyday I would go out and scrutinise all my four plants to see any signs any at all of them turning red. I thought maybe I had planted four dud chilli plants or that I had done something wrong to make them not be able to turn red or that actually maybe I would just pick them and hoped that they would turn red sitting on my window sill. I even checked with other garden enthusiasts to see if their chillies were turning red yet. I mean I was the epitome of an impatience! I actually even pleaded with my plants to have at least one turn red soon. Pathetic ah? But at last one morning I ventured out to see a glimpse of orangey/pink/redness. Yahoo! Blow me down and call me dusty! Nature really does know what it's doing doesn't it?
Aren't we like that in just about every aspect of our lives? We want things done yesterday thanks. And if they don't we get impatient ( like me) we want to hurry things along, interfere is natural processes, lend a helping hand to God himself and make it happen our way in our time.
But take a lesson from the chilli plant.....it will happen when it's suppose to, when everything is at its optimum for it to come about and be at its best. Most things don't need our help at all we just need to WAIT. *groan
As hard as that is....its what we need to do. We want the best don't we?
There is something about being in the bush that I find incredibly calming. As soon as I step into it a sense of peace and grounding overcomes me. We took the kids here today.... Ruakuri Caves, part of the Waitomo Caves network only free. Its says a 30 min loop walk but you would have to be speedy and not stop to look and investigate all the nooks and crannies this walk has to offer.
We did the 1km walk in an hour and a half with 10 kiddies ranging from 14 to 2 years with an 18 month old being backpacked along. Not at all pushchair friendly as there is a number of steps but totally doable for all fitness levels. Aren't I sounded like a travel journalist today? But seriously this walk is totally cool and every kid is going to love the tunnels and caves you walk through, the pounding majestic waterfalls and the meandering stream you find along the way.
Best part. ...it's free as most bush walks here in New Zealand but here in Waitomo if you want to experience some really amazing cave systems its going to cost you a pretty penny or two. So this walk could be said to be the poor cousin to the just mentioned caves but beautiful poor cousin and if you are on a budget like us.....perfect.
My kids loved the day out doing something different and being to run and explore along the way. I always love watching their faces and expressions as they experience something new or see something they have never seen before. A true sense of wonder and awe. We truly live in an amazing country with so much on offer and out there for the taking....You just have to find it.
We are blessed to be living in a safe and beautiful country where we are free to roam and come and go as we please. Another good day which started off with an incredible sunrise and ended with a scrumptious dinner of roast vege salad topped with crumbled blue cheese!
Simply divine!
It seems we are doing our rounds of cool parks for kids at the moment. This particular one has a really cool slide that's probably in a child's view, really long and really steep. Check out the facial expression on my nephews face. Isn't it just perfect! I love it.
This park in the city was just swarming with kiddies today being right in the middle of the school holidays. I think it may of made keeping an eye on 9 kids a little more difficult though. I was at a meeting at the hospital just up the road so child care was left to my sister and brother-in-law and my mum.
If you are looking for a cool park then this has it all really. The normal swings, slides and climbing frames make an appearance but you also see water and sand play as well. You could stay for the whole entire afternoon really.
My meeting went well.....I left on a high. Seeing things that I have given feed back on or helped develop come to fruition is really cool. Also when your suggestion is met with a big yes please or that's a perfect solution is a bit of a confidence builder. Every time I leave these meetings I thank God because I truly feel like it was His gift to me and that I am using my heart passion to be a game changer......helping improve the maternity system for all women.
Today has been a good day all finished off with a glass of wine or two with my mum and sister! How was your day?
Everything about this photo makes me happy and makes my heart sing. Even though the kids are blurry I think it captures the freedom and pace of play they were engaged in.
We are fortunate to have this right next to playground. An area with shady paths, stone bridges, trickling water, islands surrounded by moats and rocky outcrops just calling out to be explored and jumped off. All this situated under a tree canopy that gives it a feel of mystery and adventure.
There are acorns and acorn hats to be found, leaves and sticks to floats, vast moats to jump across daringly and at this time of year mushrooms to discover. We are really blessed to have all this right on our doorstep for kids to get lost on their imaginations and to run free. No need to dictate their play or interfere and make it a "learning" experience. I have seen just exactly that so many times. That just brasses me off. Just leave them alone.....just let them be free range kids just for a while. They are learning and experience authentic life right there, don't interrupt!
Oh how I wish this was in my actual backyard! My kids and their cousin's had a ball, I wish we could of visited longer.
We have my sister and her family staying at the moment. A total of ten kids in residence at present! There is something just a little comfy about when family come to stay. Like a familiar pairs of track (sweat) pants who have probably seen you in every facets of life.....the good the bad and the ugly. My kids enjoy their cousin time and that makes me happy.
On a side note also feeling super blessed and super full. My brother-in-law who is a chef cooked a top notch chicken curry tonight. I know I ate far too much of it because it hurts to move now! So good!
Its just keeps getting bigger this God given vision. I really shouldn't be surprised though should I when He is the one driving it, leading it and opening doors.
When Loving Arms started it was a result of a midnight wake up call from God.....you know one of those those calls. I think I even had to get up and write it out because I just couldn't sleep.
I remember the first mum we helped out, actually I have become friends with her and we still see each other from time to time. I remember driving to her house with a piping hot meal and others that were frozen. I remember being so nervous and praying all the way there, for her, her baby, for Loving Arms.
Funny that I was such a basket case about it but I really couldn't believe that what God had planted in my heart was actually happening and Lord please dont let me stuff it up somehow.
Fast forward to now.....a package just left our door for mum number 20 for 2016. Not that we number our mums but you know what I mean. That's half the amount of mums we did for the entire year last year and its only April. Sometimes we help a little and sometimes we help a lot but no matter the size of what we do its making a difference in someone's life and that's the main thing.
All but two mums have been super duper grateful and its been so much of a blessing to help and share a little of God's immense love with them. Love them until they ask why, as some cool people once said and that is what we are doing!
You meet the most amazing and coolest mums ever doing this. Each have their own story to tell and each with such a strength about them.
Bring on the next eight months.....I just know it's going to be amazing and that we are going to have some stories to tell. Watch this space!
