Author: Renae

Living life as a wife, a stay at home mama of 3 kids under 5, a marriage celebrant, a craft and sewing amateur, a cooked breakfast lover, coffee enthusiast, extroverted socialite, and most recently, someone who is trying to keep a tidy house. It's tough I tell you!

Remember the time

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There have been many stages to my grief this year. First there was shock, followed by a long period of numbness, overlapped by sadness, with some frustration, pity and bewilderment thrown in. If I’m honest, I’ve allowed myself a lot of sadness for my kids, and not a lot for myself. It’s been too hard.

There has been a lot of anger in my heart lately. A lot. It has definitely taken over the sadness; perhaps as a coping strategy. Self preservation of you will.

But tonight I allowed myself to remember some things about Frith, that I only I ever got to experience. I allowed myself to remember times when he was running late for work, all dressed up in his vest and tie and boots, me in my daggy pjs and dressing gown, hair all over the place. He would say goodbye to me, and I’d give him the biggest, longest, lingering kiss. It would stop  him in his tracks; he would be in a trance (yes, I was that good) and say “hmmmm can I stay here with you all day?”

I allowed myself to remember the quiet moments with the kids, when he didn’t know I was listening; his soft words, his cuddles, the endless number of stories he would read, or the countless times he would read Fox in Sox. He knew it by heart.

It was his birthday on Saturday. He would have turned 37. We had a family day filled with potjie, Lego, music, wine, a fire pit, movies, pjs, a skateboard, lemonade, lollies, Savanna Cider, and cheesecake. In case you don’t know, Frith hated cheesecake. But we all love it, and we all have our own memories of trying to make him like cheesecake over the years 🙂

Here was our day. Lego before…

Ice cold Savannas
Cousin cuddles around the fire
The skateboard
Brotherly love
The Lego, finished, hours later
Amazing beef cheek potjie!! Served with polenta. Thanks Ma!
The cheesecake (there was also home-made sticky date pudding and orange polenta cake that were, quite frankly, outstanding!!)
I know I’m allowed to be angry, and sad, and everything in between. But I also know it’s nice to remember some good times for myself, and not just remind the kids of all the wonderful things he used to do for them, and with them. He did a lot for me. We did a lot together. He loved me. And I need to remind myself of that every day, to keep his memory alive. And perhaps to help soften the anger that is sitting in my heart.

The post about Pizzeys that never got written…

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… until now!

Gosh I still cannot believe I didn’t write this post two years ago! I do recall at the time not having a lot of blogging mojo, so that might be what happened. It just occurred to me that I may have shared a few pics on fb but nothing on my blog! Anyway, here we are.

In April 2016 I met my dear friend Kate and her two gorgeous boys at Hervey Bay for the weekend, while Frith headed down to Rainbow Beach for our nephew’s 21st birthday camping weekend. Mum and Dad came up from Brizzie as well and stayed at Pizzeys, and we took a trip out there on one of the days. It was so nostalgic for me! We spent so many holidays here while I was growing up. For example, I think I would have been 11 or so (??) in this photo. The early 90s served me well as you can see!

The river is just so beautiful and while it has changed so much in 40 years, it has also remained the same.

I just love that we can come back here time and time again and pick up where we left off, with whomever happens to be around at the same time.

Dad is teaching Chance the importance of only keeping fish that we will eat, and how,  if you catch it, you have to clean it yourself. He’s slowly learning, and I’m so grateful to have Dad around to teach him these lessons.

Darby (18 months) and Quinny (3 years) checking out the catch of the day. And of course unable to both look up at the same time!!

Quinn getting her adventure on!

Darby and I enjoying the view together
And Darby getting up to mischief!
And I just noticed Darby is wearing the same shoes here as Jules was wearing on our visit to Pizzeys last weekend! Funny stuff!

Once the kids get a little older, I know it will be easier to take them for more than a few hours at a time, and I know they will treasure these times, and as they get older I hope they can appreciate such a simple, quiet, peaceful place that holds so many memories for so many of us.

Another Pizzeys Trip

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Oh wow guys. We went up to Hervey Bay last weekend for my Mum’s aunty’s 90th birthday and it was so amazing to catch up with those rellies. They are just some of the best people in the world, and even though I only see them once a year (sometimes less!) it’s always good for my soul.

We made an impromptu trip out to Pizzeys on the Sunday, and the kids had an absolute ball.

I have spent the last 20 minutes looking for the blog post I thought I wrote about our trip to Pizzeys two years ago, but I can’t find it anywhere, and can’t believe I didn’t blog about it! So annoyed. So some background info: My mum’s family own some old fishing shacks along the Burrum River and the place is named after Jack Pizzey who founded the area (or something like that!?) and we have been going there since we were kids. We grew up fishing and crabbing and boating and swimming and just getting up to all kinds of fun and mischief with our “cousins” (second cousins once removed if you’re playing at home!) and now all of us cousins have had kids of our own, and so the adventures continue. I will blog about our trip from two years ago for my Flashback Friday post. Stay tuned!

Anyway, Chance was desperate to go fishing (“Mama, I was born to fish!”)

And the older boys took Darby under their wing and showed him the joy of Burger Rings fingers!

Quinny stayed pretty close to me as there were dogs around and she’s not a huge fan of dogs at the moment, and we all took turns following Julius around as well.

Quinny was also the only girl there. There are a lot of boys in this generation!

And they are really all just lovely. Even though it was an exhausting few hours, trying to keep track of Darby (the place is a death trap for an adventurous boy like him!!!) and leading Jules away from this and that, it was 100% worth it.

I’m just not ready

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It’s been a really hard decision, but I’ve decided to postpone our trip to Rocky. I had planned to drive up and stay from the 4th to the 11th of July, but I have been feeling anxious and uneasy about it and once I gave myself permission to postpone it, I felt a weight lifted off my heart.

I’m just not ready to go back. And that’s okay. One day I will be ready, and I will know, and it will be for the right reasons.

I realised that a big part of my trip back was for other people; to let my Rockhampton “family” know that we are doing okay. But with Jules still so young, Darby so energetic, Quinn so fickle with her moods and Chance so aware of Frith’s death and it’s relation to Rockhampton, I just wasn’t ready to face it all.

I know everyone understands, and I know that I just have to work through the guilt of disappointing people, and I know the kids will be a bit sad, but there are plenty of things happening down and around here that I can now say yes to.

So if you’re around Brizzy for the school holidays, I have plenty of days free for a catch up! Let’s book something in 🙂

Today was a good day

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Tuesdays are generally pretty good to be honest. They always start badly though, as our cleaner comes around 9am, which means we are doing last minute tidying up before we herd the kids off to school. Every Monday evening and Tuesday morning, without fail, I regret having a cleaner. It’s so much pressure to get the house tidy, even though I try and get the kids to do a tidy up every day. There’s always stuff to be put away, and the bench needs to be cleared.

But every Tuesday at midday, I am reminded of how wonderful it is to have nice clean floors and bathrooms and kitchen, and how grateful I am that we have someone who does it for us. So grateful. Sure, I could do it myself, but without the pressure of having to do the big tidy up, I would constantly put it off. It’s just the kind of person I am. And I’m okay with that 🙂

We spent this morning at a friend’s house, where I got to enjoy two hot cups of tea (bliss!!) and a sneaky melting moment, while our boys played. Then I came to my aforementioned clean house, and just hung out with Darby and Julius while they played. It was seriously relaxing and low key.

I then went to Quinn’s class at 2pm for their celebration of learning, where parents (or grandparents/significant adults etc) can come and do an activity with their kids. It was really lovely and my kids always get a kick out of having me in their classroom. I have the same for Chance tomorrow and we’re both looking forward to it.

Yesterday was not a good day. I was unwell with a tummy bug, and I had reached my pain threshold for my shoulder, so I headed to the doctor. I have a strong anti-inflammatory that I will try for a week before I look at doing anything else. By lunch time today it was actually starting to feel a bit better, which has definitely lifted my mood. The physical pain, on top of everything else, nearly tipped me over the edge.  Soooooo cranky!!

I can’t believe the kids finish term two next Friday. That is so crazy to me. It’s Frith’s birthday this Saturday which will be yet another first for us. We will be having a Lego building day with the family in his honour. I think it’s going to be all sorts of lovely and horrible, all rolled into one big day. If you believe in it, I feel a prayer or 37 would come in handy for us all this weekend.

But today was a good day, and for that I am grateful.

Flashback Friday

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Happy 18th birthday to our sweet niece and cousin, Isabelle.

This was the night of Frith’s PhD graduation ceremony, July 2016. It pretty much summed him up as a human – he made sure his best mates were with him for the duration, he ate good food and drank a little too much, offended his siblings, but brought it home with some serious dancing with our nieces at the end. He may not have always been classy, but he was all class.

And our kids still love this song. It’s a Dadda song.

It’s a neeewwwww caaaarrrr!

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I picked up my new Kia Carnival the day I went to see the Whitlams. When I say new, it’s a 2017 model that only got driven for a month during the Commonwealth games. So basically new.

The kids named her Spacey. Just like my friend’s car 20 years ago (couldn’t believe when they came up with that!)

It really is very roomy!! And Spacey!

And then I got some stripes, so we could stand out in a crowd. These cars are everywhere!!

And of course the inspiration behind the detailing. Just in case you’re new here 🙂

I’ve never owned anything like a new car – it’s amazing and terrifying! And of course the kids aren’t allowed to eat in it… for now. I know it won’t last but I’m certainly enjoying the novelty of some new wheels! Come for a drive some time!

10 things on the 10th

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10 things currently on my mind

1. Which suburb to live in. I’m not used to not having boundaries. I could literally live anywhere I want.

2. The extremely painful bursitis in my shoulder.

3. The fact that I haven’t done a weights session in over two months.

4. My new car! (Blog post to come.)

5. My new bed! I’m no longer sleeping on a mattress on the floor.

6. Weaning Julius. My last baby and counting down to my last feed.

7. How to get words out of my head and onto paper.

8. The recent high profile suicides. What can we do?

9. How grateful I am to be living on the water. It’s very good for my troubled soul.

10. My blog turns 10 on the 1st of July and I don’t know how to celebrate.

That is all.

Fickle Feckers

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Kids are tricky little creatures, aren’t they? Just when you think you’ve got them figured out, when you have a nice little routine happening, when you start to relax a bit, BOOM! Something happens that throws all that hard work straight out the window.

They don’t need to go to bed as early as their siblings anymore. Which is complicated when they all share a room and have an unrealistic idea of what “fair” is.

They get sick and take weeks to get over the night-time coughing.

They decide that bedtime is when they desperately need your undivided attention.

They suddenly develop a fear of the dark and need to come into your bed with you in the middle of the night. When there’s already two other kids in the bed with you.

They are ready to be weaned (read: I am ready to wean them) and need to be patted to sleep for 45 minutes, several times during the night.

See? Fickle I tell you.

It’s hard enough to roll with this punches under normal circumstances, but when you’ve already been punched in the guts and kicked in the shins, patience runs pretty fecking thin. Frith was always very patient with the kids, and would step in when he could see I was getting close to the end of my tether. And I would do the same for him, when he’d had a long day at work and was not up to the bedtime shenanigans.

Thank God (I seriously thank God) my parents are not only patient with the kids beyond belief, but they are eternally forgiving and supportive of me and my current short temper. I know that some days I crave a big yard and a house to call my own, but for the time being, this is exactly where the kids and I need to be.

Thanks Mum and Dad. Seriously.