What Did You Do All Day?

A man came home from work and found his three children outside, still in their pyjamas, playing in the mud, with empty food boxes and wrappers strewn all around the front yard.

The door of his wife's car was open, as was the front door to the house and there was no sign of the dog. Proceeding into the entry, he found an even bigger mess. A lamp had been knocked over, and the throw rug was wadded against one wall. In the front room the TV was loudly blaring a cartoon channel, and the family room was strewn with toys and various items of clothing.

In the kitchen, dishes filled the sink, breakfast food was spilled on the counter, the fridge door was open wide, dog food was spilled on the floor, a broken glass lay under the table, and a small pile of sand was spread by the back door.

He quickly headed up the stairs, stepping over toys and more piles of clothes, looking for his wife. He was worried she might be ill, or that something serious had happened.

He was met with a small trickle of water as it made its way out the bathroom door. As he peered inside he found wet towels, scummy soap and more toys strewn over the floor. Miles of toilet paper lay in a heap and toothpaste had been smeared over the mirror and walls.

As he rushed to the bedroom, he found his wife still curled up in the bed in her pyjamas, reading a novel. She looked up at him, smiled, and asked how his day went.

He looked at her bewildered and asked, 'What happened here today?'

She again smiled and answered, 'You know every day when you come home from work and you ask me what in the world I do all day?'

'Yes,' was his incredulous reply.

She answered, 'Well, today I didn't do it.'

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Well, you know what, come next week i may just not do it either!!

This email I received summed up my week-fed an extra 4 for a few days while they shore off the wool around the sheep's bottoms prior to lambing, madly sewed, cooked and made organizng phonecalls for the School market, tried to remember to blog at least once and hoped that people will forgive me for my lack of comments...(I'll be back next week!!) and stayed up late into every night getting organized so i could skip town on the family for Friday and Saturday to attend the Church Ladies convention 5 hours away on the bus! We are holding it here next year and as President I had to go and see how it ran and receive the banner etc. My scariest moment was climbing on the mini bus and taking my seat...near a woman called Valda....and fearing that I was just like Mrs. Hoggett on Babe!!! Remember her going off to CWA on the bus fearing for Hooggett's sanity?-Well, i feared for mine! but I had a perfectly fine time..I kept remembering my parents credo for life-"you have to learn to make your own fun!"

I bought some great books which I will share, sewed a heap of redwork, ate some great slice and enjoyed being treated pretty much as the pet...because I was a good 20 years younger than everyone else! My family survived and appreciated me so much more when I wandered back -so all in all a good result.

I can't be bothered walking down to the woolshed tonight to get my camera, so photos of interesting happenings will have to wait-hopefully see you soon, have a good day, Tracey

My kingdom for the perfect container!

I LOVE plastic containers, actually, I will rephrase, I am crazy about anything that holds Stuff....have been since I was tiny, love all kinds of bags, trinket boxes, storage boxes, even painted styrofoam boxes! Chests really light my fire and a wooden crate...I can hardly breathe!

This week's evidence for the prosecution: because, if you are cleaning off your benches and trying to be better organized (witness Marty Robbins singing "that's the story of my life") then you have to have pretty little boxes to put the stuff in from now on.

I even labelled them, I started well, "General receipts", then "Important" and then fell to that bottom one that you can just see the sticker to, yes, you are correct, it says "Stuff". Now which do you think has the most in it already! The theory is then that it all goes from there to the office files. Another good theory!

When we go to Melbourne next week I have Howards Storage world and Ikea at the top of the list! Not sure they are the top of my daughters though but for the sake of the perfect container sacrifices sometimes need to be made! I love finding new and exciting ways to make better use of space. But maybe after the purging that has gone on here this week I mightn't need any more containers....NAH, I'm going anyway.

I wonder what a psychologist says about women who are always looking for the perfect container?

My Junior psychologist theory is that it is an entrenched desire to be completely organized and therefore some kind of hypothetical "Good" housekeeper.

Another great theory, (if I do say so myself!) but what a pity I can't stick to it-you see so many more exciting things (read quilting here!) occur on such a regular basis that my house is only ever completely tidy for about an hour...and you can guarantee not one person will visit during that hour...and that DH wont call in for a coffee...and it will be like a tree falling in a forest that no-one heard-did it really happen?!

Enough organization, DD home fairly ordinary today so I only managed a little patchy play; a doll's quilt in specified (pale) colours. If you look hard enough you are meant to be able to read Millie in free-pieced letters. It still needs another row of checkerboard and to have the strips sewn together, then I think 2 hours or more work will probably be sufficient. much bigger jobs to finish. Have a great day, Tracey

How to fill in a day when you don't "work".

I think Mums who work are amazing, even though it isn't for me. You see, I just don't have time to fit in the paid work thing ...and I have a husband who says he didn't wait until 40 to get married to then never see his wife.

Being on a farm makes it all very different. While my sister and many of you bloggers know that after your husband has left for work you have 8 or 10 hours clear in which to do as you like (READ BLOGS!) I'm generally never sure when mine will walk in the door for a coffee or to get me to deliver a calf/lamb, (because these hands are useful for more things than sewing!) help shift machinery to the next paddock, run to town for parts, draft a mob of sheep etc, etc (as the King of Siam would say!) So time management and Ladies lunches and morning coffees can be tricky...and paid work really takes a back seat. It would have been especially tricky in the past 5 months that precious girl has been more out of School than there, I can't even think of a plan that could have dealt with that!

But, being what is probably a Type A personality that likes to be busy and organising and have a hand in a lot of activities, not being seen as a "worker" can be tough. Our western societies define us by what we do, and overcoming this need to justify our existence can be very tough. Anyway, it may have taken me a while but I am well adjusted about my role now... I look at questions about my stay-at-home role as a type of adult peer pressure, and as I never cared about peer pressure in my Youth, I really can't see why I should let it affect me now.

So lets look at today's "non-work" achievements:

DD having a few tummy pangs so she is at home, try to clean in the morning while intermittently watching "Annie get your gun" with her.(she is fast becoming a musical/Howard Keel addict.)

Finished off the "Writing champion" capes for DS' classroom literacy lessons.

Preparing for the School fete, which I am convening. A parent sent home a box of apples which I convert to 12 foot of Strudel...and it's good.

All the time working on more Zucchini and cucumber pickles, also for the fete (and for me!) The top photo is to show you how they started...a beautiful aroma as they soak... and the lower pic is the end result.

Manage to get the last tray of Strudel out by 2 pm and realise in the 1 and a half hours until I need to go and see my little niece for birthday #2 I could almost make her a tractor blanket so at least she gets something with a tractor on her birthday and here it is-

It's not bound just done in the pillow case style with a bit of seam left for turning then I ran around it with top stitch. Has a nice cosy polar fleece on the back and when I last saw it she was using it to sit on in her lounge room and having a snack. The proper quilt can wait until a couple of free days and no kids at home. I'd say maybe for Christmas now!

Managed to pull out some pre-prepared and frozen-for-just-such-a-day-as-this meatballs from the freezer and turned them into everyone's favourite casserole after arriving home at 6pm.

...So you can probably tell that the detox and extra rest program is going well and I'm feeling pretty good...now if I could just fit in that walk!