So I think with age, and with kids and all the responsibility that comes with them, a lot of us "grown ups" tend to become less and less spontaneous and more organised and planned. Of course we get this way out of necessity but I'm finding that sometimes being too organised and planned can actually suck the joy out what you're planning.
For instance an outing with the kids becomes stressful as I contemplate getting them all ready & in the car, with enough snacks, drinks, nappies and extra clothes should anything go wrong, and then while we're out I'm already focusing on what time we need to leave to be back home in time for everything else I have planned in the day, and I don't even take a moment to just enjoy what we're experiencing right then!
With that in mind I'm trying my hardest to be a little more spontaneous and a little less organised (read: stressed) about things.
So when
Celeste asked if she could come over to take photos of #Bang and I on a busy Monday morning my brain said, "No way, you have too much to do, the cleaning lady will be here and making a noise with the vacuum cleaner and the house will be a pigsty from the weekend, how will I get #bang to sleep for all the sleepy photos she wants to take and what if I don't get time to shower/dressed/makeup, and what if the rooms I have don't have enough light and I'm completely wasting her time...etc etc etc"...I forced my mouth to say the word YES and put the whole thing out of my mind. I made a huge effort not to even think of it.
Then Monday morning arrived, and everything was fine, I even managed a shower...sure #Bang didn't really doze off but she got some lovely photos anyway and considering I'm usually the photographer in my house I rarely get photos of me with the kids, so I'm so glad to have got some with Asher before he got too big!
I even grabbed the opportunity to snap a pic or two of my own while she was busy!
And here's just a few of my precious baby so you can all see how much he's growing.
And how much he loves his Dad
Also baking is something I don't do very often, I'm pretty bad at it, don't have a lot of equipment and I find planning for it stressful around getting ingredients, working around demand feeding and nap times etc.
Well recently my two have a new found love for banana bread, which works out well because none of us eat very ripe bananas and we invariably always have a few left over from the bunch which no one wants. So now I make sure I have all the ingredients for banana bread in house and we just bake as the bananas blacken and as the mood takes us!
And guess what, no disasters yet, and lots of fun mixing everything together! Now today Bear asked if we can do a chocolate cake next time...gulp! But I'm going to find a recipe and get all the ingredients on my next grocery trip and we'll give it a go one day soon!
The other day the kids each wanted their own little cake and to decorate it, as they don't like actual icing much I just let them use some decorations kindly supplied by their
cake baker aunty
And then a few Fridays ago, at 1:30pm in the afternoon The Dad gmailed me and asked if I wanted to take the kids and go away for the weekend. I thought he was joking, it was already a Friday afternoon, how on earth could we possible go anywhere with 3 kids without spending weeks planning and making lists of what needed to go with etc.
He wasn't joking, we'd been offered free accommodation out near
Mabalingwe by a work colleague who had time share he wasn't using.
I said yes, started throwing clothes in bags, food into cooler boxes and working out a small shopping list to carry us through the weekend as the place was self catering.
The Dad got home and we packed everyone into our van, he dropped me off to do a quick grocery shop while he filled up with petrol...and before we knew we hit the road a little shy of 4pm.
And guess what...we had a blast...and even managed to convince some family to join us. We ate, drank, laughed, played, built fires, and relaxed...and I had a far better time than I would have if we'd planned it in advance!
And we got in what was probably our last swim before winter sets in properly!
So here's to being more spontaneous more often!!!
