Family!

Over the last few months I have seen other families get so busy that "family" goes out the window.

In one, they actually gave away their kitchen table because they never had time to sit and eat together anymore, a sad thing when the children are only young (aged between 2 and 8).

I've seen life become so full of other "stuff" that the kids no longer have time to just go outside and play.

I've seen a mum who works shift work, who is at work from before the kids get home from school until late, and is still asleep when they leave in the morning, so if she works for 4 or 5 days straight then she doesn't see her kids (3 of whom are still in primary school) for that period of time.

Now I am not passing judgement, not at all, I know these families really well and they are just trying to make ends meet, and to make it through.  But when I think on it, it makes me extremely thankful for what I have in my life.

We seem to have been busy here too but we have been so blessed to have been able to wind things back a bit and still make time for family.

There are a lot of things that irk me about living in a small town, but there are also a lot of things that I love and I think the thing I love most is the size of our yard.  We have a half acre, and while it's not real flash...actually there's still a LOT of work to do...there is so much room for the kids to run and play and I take a huge amount of pleasure just watching them at this time of year doing things like...

having an after dinner game of cricket (and I use the word cricket very loosely...I think any cricket player worth his salt would NOT derive the same pleasure I do from watching)...

slip sliding on the slippery dip...

jumping on the trampoline...

playing in the sandpit...

or in the blow up pool.

And of course our recent purchase of the MacGyver box set makes for hours of family time.

Mahjong is also one of our favourite family passtimes, which has admittedly taken a little bit of a back seat this year with 2 toddlers in the house! (but I am planning on trying to dig it out this holidays)

I am looking forward to swimming lessons being over (which start next week) so that we can have a couple of weeks before school goes back just to be at home and I am extremely grateful for the time that we have together.