Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Term 1, 2013...and back at the beach!

6.00 am...alarm goes off and gets snoozed.
6.09 am...alarm goes off again and Lynn gets up.
6.45 am...into the kitchen to make sandwiches.
7.00 am...wake boys, get breakfast and drink coffee in front of FB.
7.15 am...in the shower, getting dressed etc.
8.15 am...out the door and on our way.
That's how the schedule ought to look.  Today I would have expected everything to run late but in fact, we all ran terribly early, with Aaron being up and dressed before 6.45 and proudly parading himself in the kitchen before I'd even started making school lunches.  Only problem was, jerseys were nowhere to be found.  They still haven't turned up but with a weather forecast of 30 degrees, who needs a woolen jumper?  Left home around 8.09 am.  Like I said, ran every early.  Good thing though because it gave me at least an extra 6 minutes to tuck into the clutter on my desk.  I knew things would be fairly chaotic but surprisingly there was not a lot of panic (not from the office staff anyway; the teaching side of things looked a little more bulgy-eyed and paper-flappy).  I'm pleased to say that by 3.15 pm my desk had reappeared although I daresay by tomorrow I would have generated an even worse mess, fleshing out the one-line notes I have made of things needing doing.  Great to be back at school!  The boys fared a bit better although Caleb is disgruntled with some of his classmates of the female persuasion who seem to be overly talkative.  "Person xx is so annoying", he explains to Aaron on the way home.  "In what way?" asks little brother.  "In every possible way".  Oh dear.  Seems like tolerance and long-suffering are going to be learned this year (along with how best to insert ear-plugs?).  Home at 3.45 and Nick had been chopping and stowing wood.  He had also been thinking about taking out the kayak; we definitely weren't ready to say goodbye to summer holidays and since the boys didn't have homework and bible studies haven't yet started, why not extend the holiday mood a bit?  Besides which, that 30 degree forecast couldn't be ignored.  A quick text to Liz announcing our intentions soon had her in togs and out the door - she was at home doing more unpacking and taking photos of fly-catching plants.  Graham got in on the action too and met up with us at the beach after work...a whole five-minute walk brought him from his computer to the sand - what a luxury!
 I found the calm and warm afternoon to be more conducive to retrying the kayak and really did enjoy the paddle to the docks and back.  Liz swaded out, phone in hand, to get a shot (our new word, swaded, also describes how we got into the sea today - a cross between a swim and wade). 
 Liz went up behind the boys to push them in but had a bit of a go getting Caleb off the pier!
It was far too glorious an evening to rush home to cook, so Liz and I left the four boys at the beach and went out for fish and chips, which we ate on the sand.  Fabulous end to our first day of unholidays!

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