Studies, De-Cluttering, Girls' Swimming, Fake Tattoos in Days of My Destiny

I am totally getting back into my studies, FINALLY! A lot of the feedback I've received from the markers have been things like, "use more references if you want a better grade than a Credit," right? At some point I got sick of it and thought, "PLEASE, I'm a former UNI STUDENT. You want to give me a challenge? Fine, I'll take it. I'll show you just how well I can do." But you know what..... that was months ago, lol, and honestly by now, I am a bit more realistic in the sense that, well.... I know that rising up to that challenge means that completing this course will take a lot longer because it will take up a LOT more of my time..... and by now I'm just like...... who cares. I just want to finish this course by April (just a random month I have chosen, I actually have until August to finish it) and frankly, it's such a simple course that even though getting a Credit is not necessarily a good thing (because of the course's simplicity), I honestly don't care. At the end of the day, a Credit is much better than a complete Fail, right? Besides, getting my actual certificate to say I've completed the course is just the beginning. I know I will prove myself and my abilities in the real deal, when I'm IN the classroom with students and making changes for the better for them in their lives. Ya know? So yeah... I'm just going to play it cool and get the course DONE! DONE AND DUSTED!!! Wooooooot!!!!!!!!! :-D

The last couple of days have been awesome. Hot, but nice within our little family. The girls have totally settled back into their own home routine and they're even being nice and playing well together again, lol. Yesterday I got to sorting through the toy section (for the third or fourth time in two years!). I thought it would be harder than it was, because there were a lot of NEW toys and general fidgety, small, crap items that were given to them for Christmas (by the in-laws) that I wanted to get rid of. I had been wandering how I would go about this discreetly, but it was pretty easy, I just hid it under actual rubbish in the cardboard box I was using for rubbish, lol. Mean, but effective. It's my house and the values I want my children to cherish are along the lines of, "You don't need everything (or much) to be happy." I don't want them to be materialists, relying on having it all to be happy. I find that to be probably The Most Disgusting Lie that is a recurring theme in the modern, western society I live in, and you know what? I reject that notion! And I will GLADLY make a stance and get rid of shit that is just that! I will GLADLY get rid of the things that contribute to useless clutter and over-stimulation of my children when in the end they walk into their toy section and have NO IDEA what to actually play with because there is too much in there! I will GLADLY get rid of the things that will contribute to my children being BORED with everything they have because they want more of everything! (Something I have experienced with my oldest before.) And of course, there is the added bonus of having less shit to tidy up and nag about (but honestly that is SO secondary to my reasons of de-cluttering.) So yeah.

[And you know what? I had started to de-clutter that whole area without the girls actually there. At some point, when I was almost done, they walked in and were surprised at how much I'd tidied up and they were so happy, telling me what a good job I had done! Which speaks for itself! They don't WANT all that stuff! And from that moment on, I could feel this relieved sigh in their bodies, they were so much calmer and focused for the rest of the afternoon.]

ANYWAY. So cleaning and organizing the storage room the other day was what really got the ball rolling for me, and so since by now I've thrown old furniture outside ready for the dump, I figure, might aswell finish this baby!!! Lol. You would not believe just how much I have put aside for Vinnies from the toy section, and how much I put into a big cardboard box and threw it straight in the bin!!!! The girls started going through the stuff at one point and complaining to me about this or that and saying, "No don't throw that away, I play with that," and finally I put my foot down and said, "No you DON'T play with that, I NEVVVER see you play with that, and actually I'm not throwing out the things you DO play with, so be grateful!" and they were, lol. M decided she'd clean and organize her Big Sister Room and even started choosing things to get rid of herself!!! Yay!!!! (She brought out a magnetic noughts and crosses game that was sent to her from overseas from grandma's sister, and she says, "I might throw this out, because the lid doesn't close properly and besides, it's dusty." LOL. Like, BARELY dusty and the lid is just a tad loose, lol. So I suggested she ask L if she wants it, lol.) So now there's not much at all left in that toy section. Really there is still heaps left, but they are things they actually DO play with. I filled the cot with all the plush toys so they're at least out of the way. (The cot's still assembled, sits in the toy section - the toy section is an enclosed verandah in a part of the house that we grown-ups never ever use, lol) So anyhow, all that is left now to de-clutter is this disgusting brown cupboard that was here when we moved, and we have since filled it with stuff that we never ever use. Even the top of the cupboard is cluttered with crap. L said he will go through it and sort it out and I am THANKFUL, because I'm done with this de-cluttering business. I told him from the beginning that I didn't want that cupboard in the house, that we didn't ask for it to be left behind, but he said it would come in handy. Well it sure has, it's come in handy for all the useless crap we don't use!!!! At one point the door of this cupboard no longer closed due to hinges and the actual door falling apart, and L fixed it. For a while there it worked properly again, but now the door is back to how it was - not closing. I got the shits with it the other day and said to L, "Babe, I want this cupboard out of my house." Lol. So he said he'll empty it and take it to the dump. It's just old, ugly etc etc. MAYBE someone will take it from the dump and use it for something. Who knows. I just want it gone!!! (It's not even sturdy.)

The girls had their swimming lesson today. M is sky-rocketing more than ever. She now loves jumping into the water and going right under with her head. When the instructor saw this today, she looked up at me and said, "Well, SHE'S a different person than she was a couple of months back!" lol. M swims for up to 3 metres in one go, with her arms and everything. I can see in her face that she loves swimming, I see the focus and determination in her eyes to try a new challenge, and she LOVES it! Today she even raced with another girl for about 4 metres, and I was so so proud to see that a) she's the better swimmer and b) she won! Such a simple moment, and I'm not competitive by any means, but it just makes me so happy that she is swimming so well and has come so far in such a short time! This is the girl who used to absolutely HATE laying down in the bath tub in order for me to wash her hair!!!! When she was 3, I decided to avoid this whole ordeal as much as I could and told her that I would only wash her hair every Monday, so that she'd know when she'd have to lay down in the bath. Every single day, she'd look up at me from the bath, the underwater, on her back, going underwater, sitting on the bottom of the pool, and coming back up with glee written all over her beautiful radiant face!!!!!!!! I am ONE PROUD MUMMA!!!!! L on the other hand has, in the last few days, started to be scared again. This is because the other day, the instructor was getting her to float on her back and kick her feet. Every single time this has happened, the instructor holds her head gently and directs her. But the other day, she got L to hold onto this mini kickboard as she was floating and kicking, and then she let go of her head. She was still RIGHT behind her, and obviously she thought that L would be ready for something like that, but she totally wasn't. Immediately her whole body writhed as she tried to turn and rach out for the instructor and she started crying. I really felt for her, but I knew she was safe. Anyhow, so today this fear was still there with other things. For example, the instructor gets them to climb up onto this floating mat thing, and even though L has always LOVED this mat, today she was scared of getting onto it and started crying, saying, "I don't want to!!!!" (something she's never even said before about any part of her lessons). But of course once she was actually on the mat, she was fine. My poor bubba.

L came with me to the swimming lesson today, seeing as he is on afternoon shift and today's lesson was actually brought forward by a few hours. It was SO GOOD to have him there, watching just how much the girls have progressed. He was really impressed and was really really glad he was there. He's an awesome dad like that, he really LOVES being involved, he loves seeing them have their lessons and last year he came as often as he could. He's such a great, great guy.

After swimming today we came home and had lunch before L had to go to work and I had to set off for Tom's 4th birthday party. It was good to catch up with some people and meet others. J is a really good party-mum, lol. Really organized. She had all these pirate-themed games and wow, she did not stop moving the whole time. I'm just not like that. When I organize my girls' birthday parties, I just organize the food and let the kids find their own entertainment. But it's starting to not be enough for M's age range, as at her party they were coming up to me and asking what games they were going to play, lol. (I was thinking, um, the one you're already playing.....?) So yeah. J finally sat down and had a glass of wine and I could see she was ready to relax, when suddenly another boy had an accident on the cement under the pergola where we were, and his mum started stressing out and washing it away and still stressing that the other kids would slip on the cement and she wanted a mop to mop away all the water, and so poor J had to get up and get moving again. I just know what that feels like, and it sucks.

At one point, J got some sticker-tattoos out and my girls were excited about this (as were the other kids). For some reason, my girls have been talking about tattoos lately, and I have no idea where this newfound fascination with tattoos has come from!!! At the party I was a bit like.... hmmm... not so sure about this........ but in the end, I decided, well, I was fascinated by them as a kid and had a few here and there, and I haven't got one single real tattoo on my body. Seriously, tattoos aren't something I want my daughters to ever have, but I know that come the day when they're grown-ups and ready and actually go and get one (if they ever do), then it's not something I'll have a hell of a lot of say in. I don't have anything against people who DO have tattoos (my own husband has one), it's just that I personally wouldn't ever want to put myself through the physical pain of getting one and I wouldn't want that for my daughters either. Anyway, it was just an interesting mental experience, having to realise that hey, a couple of fake tattoos on their arms at this one party in all of their childhood isn't going to be big enough of an influence to make them suddenly badly want a tattoo when they're older. And if they do, then it will be more heavily related to some other thing than this one experience today. So yeah. Interesting.