116 looking at the world upside down
Good evening friends. I just got hit by a flying pink doll and a giraffe. Genevieve is learning to play herself to sleep as I sit on the floor next to her crib. Ahh! A bunny just came down too! Eventually she grows tired of the dropsy game, of babbling, of tugging on the red ball on her mobile, of standing up and sitting back down, of watching me and rolls onto her pillow and gives in to sleep. Ouch! A dog and another doll have just landed on my head. Now she’s talking to the candle, marvelling in delight, sticking her hands and legs through the slats, ouch! A gnome! I’d always heard of babies being able to play themselves to sleep, it actually works. This is quite a revelation after doing it the hard way for so long. Better late than never I suppose.
I guess this is what I should say about Genevieve’s sleep habits. It shocks me that our eleven month old sleeps less than our three year old. I think she might enjoy sleep, but she just can’t turn off if there are any other options. She might be two seconds from nodding off to sleep. Then she’ll hear Keith whistling outside the window or Jacinta ask me a question and wake up as if she’s just had an hour long nap. She just heard Matt and Mary talking about tennis through the window. She stood up as close to their voices as she could and started talking to them and waving, as if she could somehow fly out of her crib and join the party, once again. She slept well last Monday in the silence while Jess was at pre-school. Even I fell asleep with a book in my hands.
Unfortunately when I picked Jacinta up from preschool, she was in my friend Michelle’s arms with a red tear-streaked face. She had a rough day, missing her family as soon as she realized we were gone. I had pictured her playing and painting, instead she was being held through her tears by the teachers. Needless to say, we’ll be having a much shorter pre-school day this week. To add to the sadness, some Sydney friends of ours with two little girls were meant to spend the night and had to cancel due to not one, but two deaths in the family. Jacinta had been counting down the hours to their arrival. She can not understand why a death might keep her little friends away and keeps asking how much longer it will be until they arrive. To cheer her up, I packed up quickly and we went out to a friend’s house for lunch. You’d think we’d just go outside and play but the constant rain and dreadful mosquitoes are a bit of a deterrent. In any case, she sang the whole car ride out and had a lovely time.
Matt could then do his phone interview with Riane Eisler on her book Sacred Pleasure without the sounds of a loud wife, a tired baby and a little girl with all of her anxious visitor energy stuck in the house. The interview went well. His book, Originally Blessed is giving him the opportunity to talk with many interesting and inspiring people. Matt is reading new authors and getting to know artists of all kinds while trying to fill all of the slots in his book. The amount of communication he must do from afar would be almost impossible without the internet. In transcribing the interviews and editing people’s written work, they can send drafts back and forth with comments very quickly. His goal is to print the book by July this year, so time is of the essence. It still leaves a little time for cricket and tennis watching, some time for hot, sweaty manual labour and a lot of time for the girlies.
Jacinta and Genevieve love having Matt out in the TV room watching cricket while he works because it enlarges the area they can roam. I often keep the door closed to keep Genevieve within my sight and Jacinta from relying on Keith’s entertainment all day long. Of course we go out once in a while for playtime and visits, but mainly I like them in our quaint little space. Although Matt is actually getting work done on the computer, the girls see him out there and think, “Ooh, maybe this adult will pay more attention to me! Watch my tricks!” Evie’s latest trick is standing up, bending down to stick her head between her legs and look at the world upside down. Jess’s tricks got her into trouble today though. In her excitement to see Pop she jumped off the step without giving him any warning and he missed, as you would. She whacked her head very hard on the step and got a huge bump on the back of her head. The bump didn’t take away her energy though. She was still keen to swim in the spa, paddling around looking like an insect with her goggles: a daily activity now. She still had energy to paint with the new watercolours, another daily activity. The question is...what shall we do with all of this precious artwork? Perhaps keep a few, recycle a lot (in secret) and just enjoy the act of creating.
We’re trying to garden daily but the energy it takes to get out there in the rain and mosquitoes is hard to muster some days. Although she’ll try to find every reason in the world to stay inside, Jacinta enjoys watering the plants and trees. She is especially proud now that she can turn the tap on and off. The trouble is that there is no need to water right now. It’s a small sacrifice I suppose, letting her overwater the plants using the overfull dam water so that I can weed for a few minutes. The weeds are so high that Matt had to mow them down and discovered a watermelon! Jess loves spraying the aphids off the citrus trees. I suppose I should thank the aphids for entertainment. I try so hard to make it a short trip down and back, but sitting amongst so many opportunities for work makes it hard to pull myself away. The storytelling still works for a while. Genevieve makes it a very short trip but enjoys herself for a few minutes, picking and eating green and now red tomatoes and crawling over to the strawberry patch. The other day she actually spotted a hidden red strawberry three feet away. She excitedly crawled around the tree box, dug her hands through the leaves and held it up to me as if to ask, “Can I eat this?” I smiled. She then picked and ate the lovely berry.
We don’t get much else done in the garden, but I’m at peace. I figure the mosquitoes will calm down again someday. They were never this bad before we moved here, the locals say. We live in rugged garden territory. When the girls get bigger it won’t seem so intimidating and difficult. My friends live on flatter land but no matter, it’s hard to have a baby in any garden. It’s worth using it as a playground though, just to enjoy its beauty and fruits. The difficult part is having the time to tend it. All things in time. Perhaps they’ll be happy to linger down there with me someday. If not, I’ll still enjoy it on my own as my grandma and my step-mom always did. For the moment, we have a few beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and herbs to eat and one amazing sunflower plant with over thirty flowers on it. Our corn looks nice from the outside but tastes terrible. My friends have been stocking us up with lovely veggies from their gardens, lucky aye? It has been very wet, so some crops are having troubles but most things are growing like crazy.
I am looking forward to winter, and hoping the mosquitoes will go away with the wet heat. Perhaps by then we may have a chook pen and some eggs. Our neighbour Angela called and told Matt to look out the window, “The fox is coming over to your place.” There she was, scrawny and hungry looking in broad day light. After seeing big scary Matt, she didn’t bother returning that day. We still have our three chicks in a cage and three chickens sleeping in the trees. It’s strange for me to want something so badly. I spend most of my days right next to the defunct chicken pen, yet I don’t have the time or ability to do much about it. I used to think of myself as very capable of anything I set my mind to. I guess it’s another case of reality and growing up. We all want to do so much here on earth, but we have to prioritize in our short little days.
The other day Matt (without talking to me) suggested to Jacinta that we might have a “French day, and mommy can speak to you and Genevieve in French all day long!” Since it was Matt’s idea, she really liked it and we did it. It was a nice twist on daily life. By the middle of the day Jess was repeating what I was saying a little bit, counting, singing and repeating in French. We gardened in the rain, then went to the beach and swam and sang in French, in the rain. Later on we made bread in French and Jacinta actually wanted to help. Genevieve was helping and made it look messy and fun, and it was! I am much more playful in French than I am in English, I’m sure she senses this because she wanted to help me cook dinner too. We’ll try to do it more often. It brings back my gentleness with her and brings back her sense of awe, being set back linguistically a few years. This can only be a good thing, especially now that she has a good grasp on English. So thanks to Matt, I might not lose my French as it is deteriorating being so far from all French culture. I just needed someone else to remind me that I should.
Another thing I’ve been wanting to do is make ice cream, and I finally did! My friend Trish said she had an ice cream maker and would bring it over. I jokingly asked Keith if he had one in the shed, and he did! So Jacinta and I have made our first batch, carob ice cream without a machine, and now we have two machines sitting on the table. Needless to say, we’ll be eating some ice cream this week. The rain has stopped for a few days, and the sun is hot. So we hope the dampness will disappear and deter the mosquitoes. I can do laundry again, and actually enjoy the hot sun.
The girls and I spent a few days at Michelle and Rory’s house, in preparation for his birthday party. Matt went to Sydney for one night for some friends’ anniversary celebration so we even had a sleepover there. We cooked party food, played guitar, harvested Michelle’s nice veggies, enjoyed the lack of rain and mosquitoes, and relaxed. Jacinta particularly enjoys the trampoline, as does Genevieve The party was good fun, lovely people, great food and good games for the children. I wrote Rory a song and got up the nerve to sing it at the party. Rory’s like a big brother to Jacinta in many ways. He is fun, kind and condescending all at the same time, as an older sibling must be. They are very different, yet they enjoy some of the same things and know how to laugh together. Jacinta slept in Rory’s room without me and loved it, and actually slept. Genevieve had a rough night (thus, so did I) with a teething fever but Michelle and I stayed up late playing guitar and chatting about everything but children. To finish off our little “holiday” at Michelle’s we visited the large market garden she started up with a friend. In addition to an amazingly neat and productive organic garden, we saw baby turkeys and piglets just born that morning.
Now we are all home again ready for the week ahead. Genevieve has been asleep for a long while now. Jacinta is sweetly sleeping in her own bed. Matt is doing the dishes, what more could I ask? The winds came today and blew so hard the mosquitoes have been thrown off the path to our door! To top it off my sister bought airline tickets to come out and see us, it’s final now. Dreams can come true. Now all I need is Jacinta to enjoy herself in preschool and the garden gnome to get off his bum and weed my gardens. I guess while we’re dreaming here, I might also request a halt to all wars and injustice. We can all dream. Have a lofty dreamy week friends.
Love,
Shana
I guess this is what I should say about Genevieve’s sleep habits. It shocks me that our eleven month old sleeps less than our three year old. I think she might enjoy sleep, but she just can’t turn off if there are any other options. She might be two seconds from nodding off to sleep. Then she’ll hear Keith whistling outside the window or Jacinta ask me a question and wake up as if she’s just had an hour long nap. She just heard Matt and Mary talking about tennis through the window. She stood up as close to their voices as she could and started talking to them and waving, as if she could somehow fly out of her crib and join the party, once again. She slept well last Monday in the silence while Jess was at pre-school. Even I fell asleep with a book in my hands.
Unfortunately when I picked Jacinta up from preschool, she was in my friend Michelle’s arms with a red tear-streaked face. She had a rough day, missing her family as soon as she realized we were gone. I had pictured her playing and painting, instead she was being held through her tears by the teachers. Needless to say, we’ll be having a much shorter pre-school day this week. To add to the sadness, some Sydney friends of ours with two little girls were meant to spend the night and had to cancel due to not one, but two deaths in the family. Jacinta had been counting down the hours to their arrival. She can not understand why a death might keep her little friends away and keeps asking how much longer it will be until they arrive. To cheer her up, I packed up quickly and we went out to a friend’s house for lunch. You’d think we’d just go outside and play but the constant rain and dreadful mosquitoes are a bit of a deterrent. In any case, she sang the whole car ride out and had a lovely time.
Matt could then do his phone interview with Riane Eisler on her book Sacred Pleasure without the sounds of a loud wife, a tired baby and a little girl with all of her anxious visitor energy stuck in the house. The interview went well. His book, Originally Blessed is giving him the opportunity to talk with many interesting and inspiring people. Matt is reading new authors and getting to know artists of all kinds while trying to fill all of the slots in his book. The amount of communication he must do from afar would be almost impossible without the internet. In transcribing the interviews and editing people’s written work, they can send drafts back and forth with comments very quickly. His goal is to print the book by July this year, so time is of the essence. It still leaves a little time for cricket and tennis watching, some time for hot, sweaty manual labour and a lot of time for the girlies.
Jacinta and Genevieve love having Matt out in the TV room watching cricket while he works because it enlarges the area they can roam. I often keep the door closed to keep Genevieve within my sight and Jacinta from relying on Keith’s entertainment all day long. Of course we go out once in a while for playtime and visits, but mainly I like them in our quaint little space. Although Matt is actually getting work done on the computer, the girls see him out there and think, “Ooh, maybe this adult will pay more attention to me! Watch my tricks!” Evie’s latest trick is standing up, bending down to stick her head between her legs and look at the world upside down. Jess’s tricks got her into trouble today though. In her excitement to see Pop she jumped off the step without giving him any warning and he missed, as you would. She whacked her head very hard on the step and got a huge bump on the back of her head. The bump didn’t take away her energy though. She was still keen to swim in the spa, paddling around looking like an insect with her goggles: a daily activity now. She still had energy to paint with the new watercolours, another daily activity. The question is...what shall we do with all of this precious artwork? Perhaps keep a few, recycle a lot (in secret) and just enjoy the act of creating.
We’re trying to garden daily but the energy it takes to get out there in the rain and mosquitoes is hard to muster some days. Although she’ll try to find every reason in the world to stay inside, Jacinta enjoys watering the plants and trees. She is especially proud now that she can turn the tap on and off. The trouble is that there is no need to water right now. It’s a small sacrifice I suppose, letting her overwater the plants using the overfull dam water so that I can weed for a few minutes. The weeds are so high that Matt had to mow them down and discovered a watermelon! Jess loves spraying the aphids off the citrus trees. I suppose I should thank the aphids for entertainment. I try so hard to make it a short trip down and back, but sitting amongst so many opportunities for work makes it hard to pull myself away. The storytelling still works for a while. Genevieve makes it a very short trip but enjoys herself for a few minutes, picking and eating green and now red tomatoes and crawling over to the strawberry patch. The other day she actually spotted a hidden red strawberry three feet away. She excitedly crawled around the tree box, dug her hands through the leaves and held it up to me as if to ask, “Can I eat this?” I smiled. She then picked and ate the lovely berry.
We don’t get much else done in the garden, but I’m at peace. I figure the mosquitoes will calm down again someday. They were never this bad before we moved here, the locals say. We live in rugged garden territory. When the girls get bigger it won’t seem so intimidating and difficult. My friends live on flatter land but no matter, it’s hard to have a baby in any garden. It’s worth using it as a playground though, just to enjoy its beauty and fruits. The difficult part is having the time to tend it. All things in time. Perhaps they’ll be happy to linger down there with me someday. If not, I’ll still enjoy it on my own as my grandma and my step-mom always did. For the moment, we have a few beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and herbs to eat and one amazing sunflower plant with over thirty flowers on it. Our corn looks nice from the outside but tastes terrible. My friends have been stocking us up with lovely veggies from their gardens, lucky aye? It has been very wet, so some crops are having troubles but most things are growing like crazy.
I am looking forward to winter, and hoping the mosquitoes will go away with the wet heat. Perhaps by then we may have a chook pen and some eggs. Our neighbour Angela called and told Matt to look out the window, “The fox is coming over to your place.” There she was, scrawny and hungry looking in broad day light. After seeing big scary Matt, she didn’t bother returning that day. We still have our three chicks in a cage and three chickens sleeping in the trees. It’s strange for me to want something so badly. I spend most of my days right next to the defunct chicken pen, yet I don’t have the time or ability to do much about it. I used to think of myself as very capable of anything I set my mind to. I guess it’s another case of reality and growing up. We all want to do so much here on earth, but we have to prioritize in our short little days.
The other day Matt (without talking to me) suggested to Jacinta that we might have a “French day, and mommy can speak to you and Genevieve in French all day long!” Since it was Matt’s idea, she really liked it and we did it. It was a nice twist on daily life. By the middle of the day Jess was repeating what I was saying a little bit, counting, singing and repeating in French. We gardened in the rain, then went to the beach and swam and sang in French, in the rain. Later on we made bread in French and Jacinta actually wanted to help. Genevieve was helping and made it look messy and fun, and it was! I am much more playful in French than I am in English, I’m sure she senses this because she wanted to help me cook dinner too. We’ll try to do it more often. It brings back my gentleness with her and brings back her sense of awe, being set back linguistically a few years. This can only be a good thing, especially now that she has a good grasp on English. So thanks to Matt, I might not lose my French as it is deteriorating being so far from all French culture. I just needed someone else to remind me that I should.
Another thing I’ve been wanting to do is make ice cream, and I finally did! My friend Trish said she had an ice cream maker and would bring it over. I jokingly asked Keith if he had one in the shed, and he did! So Jacinta and I have made our first batch, carob ice cream without a machine, and now we have two machines sitting on the table. Needless to say, we’ll be eating some ice cream this week. The rain has stopped for a few days, and the sun is hot. So we hope the dampness will disappear and deter the mosquitoes. I can do laundry again, and actually enjoy the hot sun.
The girls and I spent a few days at Michelle and Rory’s house, in preparation for his birthday party. Matt went to Sydney for one night for some friends’ anniversary celebration so we even had a sleepover there. We cooked party food, played guitar, harvested Michelle’s nice veggies, enjoyed the lack of rain and mosquitoes, and relaxed. Jacinta particularly enjoys the trampoline, as does Genevieve The party was good fun, lovely people, great food and good games for the children. I wrote Rory a song and got up the nerve to sing it at the party. Rory’s like a big brother to Jacinta in many ways. He is fun, kind and condescending all at the same time, as an older sibling must be. They are very different, yet they enjoy some of the same things and know how to laugh together. Jacinta slept in Rory’s room without me and loved it, and actually slept. Genevieve had a rough night (thus, so did I) with a teething fever but Michelle and I stayed up late playing guitar and chatting about everything but children. To finish off our little “holiday” at Michelle’s we visited the large market garden she started up with a friend. In addition to an amazingly neat and productive organic garden, we saw baby turkeys and piglets just born that morning.
Now we are all home again ready for the week ahead. Genevieve has been asleep for a long while now. Jacinta is sweetly sleeping in her own bed. Matt is doing the dishes, what more could I ask? The winds came today and blew so hard the mosquitoes have been thrown off the path to our door! To top it off my sister bought airline tickets to come out and see us, it’s final now. Dreams can come true. Now all I need is Jacinta to enjoy herself in preschool and the garden gnome to get off his bum and weed my gardens. I guess while we’re dreaming here, I might also request a halt to all wars and injustice. We can all dream. Have a lofty dreamy week friends.
Love,
Shana
posted by Matt & Shana & Jacinta & Genevieve Henry at
10:41 PM
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