On the eve of Term 4 starting , I have joyfully been working hard to get my fridge and freezer prepped for the Lunchbox. I’ve also been using that prep time to reflect on the last two weeks, and how it was wonderfully spent – just the right amount of adventure, interspersed with just the right amount of downtime. I’ve learned it can be a hard act to balance – the joy of doing something fun and exciting can be oh so exhausting, so remembering that School Holidays can also be used to recharge one’s batteries is important. I think waaaaay back at our first School holidays, April 2018, we didn’t get the balance right, and ended up with an exhausted Giggles Magoo back at school. That made for an incredibly long second term for him, and he certainly found the term more challenging than the first.

Having a little more experience in the school holiday department these days (we’re practically pro’s) it was spent with a lot less planned activities, slower mornings (even those dastardly mornings where I’d have to chuff off to work) and of course the obligatory later nights. As we are in New South Wales, we needed to also factor in Daylight savings, or in our case, not factor it in and end up having both Giggles Magoo and Little Mate in bed well after the clock has ticked over 9pm.

The two weeks goes epically fast (particularly for me as a good chunk of it was spent in bed with The Lurgy), and I feel I need to capture some of the adventures before Giggles Magoo grows up more and doesn’t want to spend his time with us (well, me. Let’s face it. It’s my blog and all about me!). We’ve spent it at backyard birthday parties, on bushwalks and gardening in our ‘new’ backyard; we’ve been stuck inside watching movies due to incessant rain and then followed it up with a visit to the local movie theatre to keep a variety in our screen type; we’ve been to parks for play dates and bike rides in the rain because we just.can’t.stay.inside.anymore; we’ve been to the city for dumplings and dinosaurs and trams; we’ve spent it at bowling alleys, at trampoline fun houses and braved high-ropes courses;  we’ve swum and laughed with grandparents; we’ve hung out at friend’s places and even just hung out at our own. Chess and card games have become things: Uno! skipbo! Shithead (which we are unceremoniously calling ‘poohead’)! Snap! Dominos! Puzzles! Lots of my childhood school holiday memories are being re-created, and the reminiscing feels amazing.

All in all, it’s been a pretty lovely time spending it with the boys as they act out their imaginations or read books together or throw lego at one another. I should probably take this moment to insert a caveat: I do have that frazzled and completely-over-spending-all-this-time-together feeling going on, and I secretly can’t wait until that drop off tomorrow morning. But, it is also nice to just focus on the good bits and forget about the teasing and the whining; because none of that is enjoyable for anyone.

So now, I suppose I should go and do what I really love to do (and it is true, I do really love putting the food together)… get The Lunchbox in order.