Winter Solstice

Doesn't the year go fast?

I remember our last winter solstice celebration

Yikes!

It's nice to think of the bigger pictures sometimes and realise we are on this spinning mass circling the sun each year. I read someone say recently about her daughers first birthday - she's survived her first revolution around the sun! kinda amazing when we think about it.  I like to take a little time out to reflect that fact occassionally. I was even able to teach the girls a little about it. They want to know how it can be the shortest day when there is always 24 hours in a day - its funny how kids don't really realise the sun sets earlier and earlier each day.  And a brief talk how how thankful we are for electricity so we don't have to sit in the dark all winter long!

We did the same things as last year.
Watching the sun set (and I saw it rise) A fire with marshmallows. Soup. Early Bed!

Our day started with sunrise (which was 6:40) but we dont see the sun till around 7:30! The sky was crystal clear blue and then BAM! Fog rolled in from nowhere and stayed for about 2 hours. Very fitting for this day. It was cold and foggy.

The fog! mins after those first photos

Then the day warmed up and was hot! I was wearing summer clothes it was so warm. I just re read last years post and it was the same! warmest day in weeks! so funny that on the shortest day, midwinter the last two years (possibly more often than that even) its been HOT.


We spent the afternoon in the park playing and watching the sun set.

And then home for soup and a fire!

I love the shorter days and cozy home and early bedtime. I also love the anticipation of the sun gradually coming closer and warming us that little more. Slowly filling our home with light.

And that is why I like to take a little time to remember the sun and the seasons.

We can find a little happiness in each phase of the year

So enjoy the short days while you can.

BENTO!

my first online shopping experience! Bento things arrived. So exciting!

I've often thought I would be one of those mums that put thought and effort into lunches and snacks.

I mean I cook from scratch almost daily. My kitchen is always getting a workout.

But maybe I realised rustic big meals are more my thing than fiddly little things.

I think my 2 year old is lucky to get a folded in half peanut butter sandwhich tossed at her most days.

What can I say. Can't be perfect at everything hey?



Therefore I am pretty please with my new efforts!

A lovely friend has recently moved to Japan. Now that she is back in the land of all things cute she has opened her own store selling Japanese Bento goodies! 

Check it out over at Little Japan Mama . She has some good sales prices.


I've always admired those cute Bento lunches so I was one of her first customers saying

'SIGN ME UP'! 

(I'm in the middle of organizing my second order now I know the things we like, works best for us)

I  am happy for the most part that it has been easy! and cute! and probably cheaper than the lunches I was making before.

Here are some of the school lunches I've made the past two weeks.

Lunches include :

Rice Shaped by these Heart and cherry blossom onigiri moulds
Carrot, cucumber, cheese, kiwi fruit, Devon cut with these Flower Cutters
Egg shaped by  these egg moulds
 Cute animal picks to make you smile when you open your lunch
Flower Picks to hold fruit, cherry tomatoes, sugar snap peas etc

 I totally recommend Shinobu's  Hamburg Meatball recipe - these are delish! and the kids loved them
The flower cutters are great because you don't have to peel the carrot etc. Using the cutter discards the edges. The kids love picking out which animal fork they will have for the day.

Only negatives I've found was we've had varying success with the egg moulds depending on the size of the egg. Sometimes they just haven't worked out which = a sad 5 year old. {on the plus side the kids are having egg in their lunch. Something they wouldn't before} and of course as with everything from japan the items were smaller than I thought they would be! So check scale before thinking photo is real size! Also my 9 year old reported that some kids teased her about having 'baby food' for lunch. Anyway she worked through it and is still eating it but no such problems from my 11 year old.

Also these types of food {meat etc} are only something I consider during winter/spring. I think Australian climate is too hot for meat to be sitting in lunch boxes for hours during summer. Unless I get more organised with my ice packs.


Hopefully we won't get Bento Fatigue and we'll keep enjoying.


Do you have any fun lunch box ideas for me?

Long Weekend

I think that is the sunrise. That tiny orange smidge. 10 mins later it was black with rain.

Last week I mentioned in passing that the Queens Birthday public holiday was coming up and we better see what we could do with daddy.

A child pipes up with

But we go watch the sunrise every queens birthday remember?

oh yeah. right.

We have done that for the last two years - seen here  and  here  so it is obviously tradition now right!?!



So off I go insearch for a perfect sun rising watching location.

We live in a gully (well downhill I should say , innercity with tightly packed houses)

soooooo the sun is usually quite a ways up before we get to see it.

Sun rise watching locations can be hard to scout. By that I mean you don't want the location too far away so you don't have to get out of bed too early! {personally I would have loved watching from the Coast} no, I want a perfect spot close to home , too much to ask?

In the end we went the same spot as last year. But no sunrise! Just cloud and rain and cold wind.

There was one other car there on the top of the hill. And whaddayaknow... we KNEW them! Another group of young adults from our church! Love how small the world is sometimes! Or maybe we were the only crazy people hoping for a sunrise on a wet day!


On the plus side for the weekend - on Saturday we found a new 'country feeling' spot only 10 mins from the city. It was nice to walk in a place with river, trees, cows, swans, birds, dirt, sticks, rocks etc. Even if we walked really far and the little kids were too tired to walk back. I tell ya scarves are not only good for keeping you warm.. they also work as a rope to pull tired kids 2km back to the car. And to make kites out of to get them to giggle and forget how tired they are! Luff you scarf!

and we had 3 fires in the fireplace this weekend. So cozy. Thanks to The Mr for his chopping of wood. We like to pretend we are tough country folk and that our dreams of owning some land out in the bush aren't totally crazy for city folk like us. Ha. Well I did enjoy the heat and relaxation that eminates from wood fires. Oh and the pyro children. They love it too!

and that is how you have a Queens birthday long weekend.

{oh and you also include a midnight run to a friends house going into labour, to look after their other kids. I was so excited! and then I was tired the next day. You'd think I gave birth! lol.}

The end.

Glasses help everything.

Did you miss me?

All 50 of you. My beloved subscribed readers.

Sigh. Nothing is happening. No inspiration. Writers block. Dull Life.

Also...

I used to blog while kids napped.

Now there is no napping.

And those older kids hog the computer all afternoon.

Then it's dinner, cleaning, yadda yadda and its 9pm before I can get back here.

.... and I'm tired and still have nothing to say.

I even thought alot this week about  giving up blogging.
I've obviously run out of things to say {sacriledge!} or that I'm wasting my time.



It's nice to keep this little journal though.

But I don't want to be boring and mundane.

But then I tell myself that I follow plenty of blogs that are really not about much at all.

So I'll cut myself some slack. Why should I be different.

You all want to know about my regular ol life right??? right!?

{If only I wasn't so envious of big bloggers making money showing pics of the hamburgers they eat and walking around city and photos of their cute babies.... and not much else.... or a photo a day no words fashion blog, or some simple paper crafts, or life of those living overseas, or daily musings on farm, and a bunch of silly frivolous other things I follow}


Except I don't live somewhere exotic, I'm not crafting barely at all these days, I don't eat out nor have any cool recommendations, I don't live on a farm or have any animals, I'm not a fashion blog, I don't own a camera {luff you iphone }, I don't have anymore cute babies,


Oh so that leaves me with what?


Taking self portraits in my kids play glasses .... thats what!