Waking up this morning was like dragging my eyes open after someone had dropped a bag of plaster of paris over my head during the night and then unceremoniously hosed me down to set it! Yes, I woke up with a cold. Not one of those really bad ones, just one of those full head, sore throat kind of ones. Yukky. Fortunately for me, my husband made me a lovely warm bowl of porridge with honey and brought it to me in bed, then he set a steaming cup of honey and lemon drink next to my bedside and little plate containing a banana and a Tim Tam. He then organised both dog and child, and they left the house for two and a half hours on a bike riding, park visiting tour while I slept. I feel very loved. 🙂
What have we been doing this past week? Well, we decided to extend the school holidays by one week after OT camp week and have a little family getaway. We visited a place called Gold Rush Colony in Mogo NSW. Our son loves everything about gold mining…well everything except of course anything that requires him to stand and listen to a tour guide giving him information about the gold mining town or methods. Or for that matter the actual process of mining because it was a lot of panning with not so much success.
That being said, we had a lovely time. We stayed on site at Gold Rush Colony, which is set backing onto a lovely national forest. They do have a very informative and interesting set up and they allow pets to stay, which meant we could take the giant white not-so-much-a-puppy. We spent the first afternoon settling in and doing the tour. We then set straight to learning how to gold pan and we did find some real actual gold, albeit very tiny little flecks. There were geese and chickens, and kangaroos and all sorts of lovely birds. Our little cabin was clean and comfortable, and we did a LOT of walking.
They had a little steam train and a track and our son spent countless happy hours chugging along the track pretending to be a train himself! On our last afternoon, we decided to take a long bush walk. It was just so lovely and peaceful, with only our own crunching steps and the birds to break the silence. Oh… and the incessant talking of our son of course.. but we are quite used to that by now!
The boys had fun throwing rocks into a gorge and learning how to throw further and more accurately each time. The white puppy and myself had a lovely time looking at all the interesting flora and finding quartz rocks in interesting shapes. Daddy found a very nice stick and we returned to camp to sit on logs while Daddy smoothed the stick and the whittled the end so that it made a lovely ‘Harry Potter’ wand for our son. It was then that Daddy noticed a leech on a nearby log. He thought it would be prudent to lift his trouser leg and check himself for leeches. He had one sucking his blood just above his sock line. Naturally, the boy and I freaked out appropriately, but Daddy was calm and told us all about leeches and how it’s better to just let them fill up and fall off etc. We weren’t so sure, and wouldn’t let Daddy come near us with that on his leg, but we were happy to look at it and treat Daddy as a curiosity for a while… until…We went back into the cabin and sat down to wait for Daddy’s leech to disembark. Daddy pulled off the boy’s gumboots and there was a very full and very large leech just above his sock line! Well, naturally the whole experience was a lot less interesting when it was on his own leg!
I must say that he was actually very brave. He squealed and screeched “Get it off! Get it off!” then covered his eyes while Daddy got it off with the back of his pocket knife. I was naturally very supportive, and not so quietly glad of my very high gumboots and my tight leggings tucked securely into my socks deep down in my high gumboots! With everyone out of danger from blood loss, we got ready to go out for dinner.
On the way home, we visited a cousin on their lovely block of land and finally got to see all the cool stuff they have done and are still doing to their house. It was so lovely to catch up with them and hear all their news and see the new lifestyle they’ve created on a gorgeous bush filled block of land.
We then stopped by and visited a school friend of mine that my husband and I lived with for a few years after school. It was great to see him again and have a good laugh over some of our happy times together. Interestingly, our son took to him immediately! This friend is over 6 feet tall and we call him ‘Bear’ so perhaps that has something to do with it, but our son was determined to hold his hand when we walked to a cafe for lunch, and then use him a climbing/cuddling frame later. It was actually quite lovely to see actually.
So with all that done, we have had a lovely little holiday, and now I have a cold… and some gold. Monday we start back at ‘school’ again and I haven’t sorted out the school room yet or written the new schedule, which is a bit annoying, but what can you do when you are sick?
Sadly, I can’t put any photos of our time away up because the footage went to another good cause that I can’t disclose at this time. 🙂
Day in the life... 