In which I sleep my way to next week...

Hi, I'm Natalie, and I can't stay awake after 12 noon.

But I can't go to sleep until 2am so I guess I'm even on the sleep stakes in some twisted universe somewhere.


I used to be all over sleep deprivation.


The baby years were a breeze. I just slept when she slept and used my total lack of social tendencies to deter visitors so I didn't have to do the housework.

And I've been stressed for a long time. There is not really any difference in the level of stress because as more piles on, I stop giving a shit about what I was stressed about before so I can't say I'm any more overwhelmed than normal*


*Normal being described as about four feet under the level of the metaphorical water at any given time...

I've forgotten some quite important stuff over the last few days. Like Friday, when I had an appointment to finish some paperwork at my new job. And which I remembered yesterday afternoon about 6 minutes after they shut.

Oh smeg.

In my defence Frog and I came down with a nasty cold Thursday night. WonderMan was out doing a nighttime driving stint so it was no sleep for over anxious, breathing deprived me. 

But I feel SO DAMN STUPID.


It was even written down in my pretty Kikki K diary from my secret santa, in which I write everything and which has never let me down so far this year. And to be fair, I let it down by forgetting what day it was, which way my head was supposed to go on, and how to speak real words.

The hangover from the cold is sticking around so people in my new community will think I am a flame cheeked, glassy eyed, sloth type creature with a voice like a chain smoking old woman with tissues stuck up her nose.

Way to go with making an impression. At least they will remember me. Because I'm quite sure I will not remember them.


I'm quite smegged off about this cold actually, because apart from the brain melting, memory erasing symptoms exhibited... I was actually invited out for coffee, by a real person, which is like telling me I've won tickets to Disneyland... and I had to say no, because I would never forgive myself if I gave her or her darling baby my germs. I detest people who bring their sniffly, coughing, runny children to my house to ruin our immune systems willy nilly and was not going to do that to someone I've just met.


Rats.


So anyway, I'm off to tint an industrial jar of gap filler, so I can trowel it on under my eyes and fake it til I make it.

So so tired...

My god I'm tired.

Why can't I stay awake past 1pm?

Why do my eyes feel so sore, like they are permanently bruised?

Why is one load of washing and making the kids breakfast enough to reduce me to an exhausted, weeping mess?

If I force myself to do some housework or go to the shops I am in danger of falling asleep where I stand.

If I sit in front of this computer for more than five minutes my head keeps dropping on the keys.

I know we've had a long few months. I've been solo parenting, working, keeping house, running around after an ungrateful and demanding family, organising a move that changed every five minutes.


I know everything's changed and we're in a new place, with new faces, a new house, a new life to get used to.


But I would like some energy now. I would like to be able to play with my kids, or get to the bottom of the washing basket... or simply get through the day without falling asleep on my lounge room floor all afternoon.


I don't know whether starting work will be the cure or the killing stroke. If I'm tired now how will I work eight hours and not become a blubbering mess?


If I'm not sleeping I'm eating... which doesn't do much for the old self esteem, or the attempt to get anything to fit my thighs.


But most of the time I couldn't care because all I want is a giant bucket of m&m's and a pillow please.

The Moving Update - We're Here!

Hi from Wine Country!

We're moved in... and all the boxes are unpacked... with the exception of my sewing space which I need some design mojo to get started on...

Kids are finally settling, after a much needed phone call from Super Granny. She's been sulking since we left, and I've been fobbed off by my father with explanations of not enough sleep and what not. The truth is, she's been trying to make me feel bad for going but I'm not buying into that crap. So after getting the idea that I wasn't going to play the game she had a chat to the girls on the phone this evening and Frog toddled off to bed without a peep. 

I'll take you on a virtual tour of the house later in the week, including the awesome view.

We're looking forward to exploring all the lovely towns in the Valley... I know this is the right place to be because there are convenient coffee shops and what not for me to distract WonderMan while I duck off and poke through antique and craft stores!

We are way too excited about having a Woolworths AND a Tah-jey. We feel like we're on holiday a little, but I'm sure we will get used to it. Although I never want to take this view for granted... it takes my breath away when I stand outside with my coffee each morning. 

Tiger starts school Monday. We're off to visit her school and meet her teacher tomorrow. 

Hopefully I start work soon, it's the kind of job that lets me meet new people without all the social awkwardness I normally exhibit. 

Tonight I baked in my new kitchen... now it really feels like home.

And it's nice to be back here, letting it all out for you to share.

Talk soon x

Almost There!

Three more sleeeeeps!

I am up to my arse in boxes (well, probably my neck as WonderMan points out most boxes come up to my short arse.....)

Mum has offered to cook us dinner for the rest of the week, and I told her we were staying Friday night because I aim to be leaving at the crack of dawn on Saturday so we can get our arses out of here.

We have hired a moving truck, WonderMan picks it up tomorrow morning and heads down.

The kids are trashing the house faster than I can get things in boxes but I'm hoping to out do them today.

I will be out of the blogosphere until Sunday no doubt, but you will no doubt see me on Twitter moaning about cleaning the intricate wood paneled kitchen and giving you an excruciating and no doubt mind numbing countdown in my excitement.

My next post will come from Wine Country.

See you there!

Trying to Navigate Blindfolded

5 sleeps until the move. Well five naps masquerading as sleeps really.

I have been looking forward to this for so long and it's as exciting and relieving as I hoped for the most part.

But it's tainted now and I just can't get the taste of worry out of my mouth, or the trickle of fear out of my heart.

You see, WonderMan's boss is a bastard after all.

Everything discussed or promised pre-Christmas is now as substantial as dust in the breeze.

The bright shining light marking our new beginning has been dimmed.

And now he will most likely be moving on to a new job soon.

Mostly this doesn't bother me. We are going forward, and we will keep on going come hell or high water.

But I will become a trucker's wife, and it's cutting me to the core.

It's been a much discussed thing in our household. I swore I would put up with anything but him driving a truck for a living. He knows why. He respected it, for a while.


But he's discovered his grand passion for driving, and he finds himself a job where he's driving locally, he's home every night, no long haul, no night drives.


We compromise. I lock the fear away.


Then it all falls apart and what is the answer? Another job, driving a truck. This means nights away, long hauls, being at the mercy of "the company", daddy always late to the kids birthday parties, missing the family holidays....

This means a broken wife, and bewildered children, left alone in a town we have just arrived in with no friends, no family.

This means nights of terror and fear for me.


Of long lonely mornings watching the sun rise and hoping against hope that today the police will not need to knock on my door.


Right now I don't know which way to turn. It's like trying to navigate through hell with a blindfold on.

These last few months have been tough. Really fucking tough. 

I'm living in a place I hate, with people I hate, who treat me like dirt because I exist, with a family falling apart, a mentally unbalanced sibling threatening to kill my children, and I've been doing everything myself. Holding up the family, caring for my kids, running the household, running around after WonderMan ringing four times a day interrupting me and finding irritating ways to waste my time from 600kms away.


The move I've been dreaming of is so close, and I'm so overwhelmed but I've kept going because I could see the hope shining for me.


I'm losing my light. 


I'm losing the momentum that has kept me going over the last few weeks.


I feel like I've got so close and now I've lost my way.

I'm groping in the darkness.


I need the curtains to fall from my eyes, and the light to guide my way. 


5 broken sleeps to go.

FFS Friday - the Moving Edition

FFS Friday is being hosted by the lovely Georgia at Parental Parody who shares my disgust at Dear Baby G and Hippy Brad for taunting us with cocktail photos and toilet spider wars episodes from BALI while we are stuck at home drinking out of the cask.

Join up, have a whinge. It's good for your soul, and cheaper than MOFO therapy.

What's given me the shits this week?

Well I'm moving. Which is the biggest head fuck known to civilisation for a start. FFS.

 

No matter how hard I try, packing is never neat, just one great big enormous mess. FFS.

I don't have enough boxes. FFS.

I have a garage sale planned for tomorrow, and on Wednesday I realised I forgot to put a note in the paper. Cue scramble to stick posters literally EVERYWHERE! FFS.

I opened the door of the storage room that I have been asking WonderMan to sort out for six months now, and a box fell on my head. FFS.

So I am selling his slot car set AND his Playstation and will no doubt have to explain why. FFS.

WonderMan's boss "remembered" two days ago that he hadn't registered the truck he was letting us use to move. And he insisted we pay for it to be registered to use, because he didn't see why he should. FFS.

So eight days out from a move we are completely committed to now, we have no way of moving our stuff. FFS.

This has meant the demoralising and embarrassing beg, borrow, steal round of the family so we can hire a moving truck. FFS.

If this had been known right from the start, we would have had the money, instead I used it to pay my bills ahead and give us a little less pressure, BECAUSE I WAS ASSURED WE COULD USE THE TRUCK. FFS.

I can't get my house clean and there's so much CRAP everywhere. FFS.

Frog spent over two hours dancing the Hokey Pokey on her bed last night after I put her to sleep. And if I left the room she followed me. I have no way of locking her in so I spent the two hours curled up on the floor playing games on my phone and telling her to get back into bed one hundred and fifty three million times. FFS.

That number is not as much of an exaggreation as it should be. FFS.

I am dusty, cobwebby, sweaty and cranky. And guess what arrived today to top it all off??

F.F.S.

UGH.

The House On The Hill

So we have a house - a beautiful house. A house on a hill. Where I can look out over wine country from my little terrace/balcony and sip my cup of coffee in the morning sunshine.

I look forward to waking up in this house. To the possibilities that seem to me to be bubbling just below the surface as I dream of it.

This house wasn't on our list. We found it after a long day of house inspections, sighing at the sight of pre-fab courtyard homes butted up against one another. Squares of instaturf and even smaller squares of sunshine.

Buoyed by the news that I had a job waiting for me as soon as we moved, we went on a wander and stopped in to one of the real estates we hadn't seen.

And here we found our home.

WonderMan fell in love before we even drove up the driveway. And then he found the bar in the loungeroom. 

He insisted we must rent this house as soon as he spotted the dishwasher. I hadn't even got in the back door.

He was right though.

Aside from the fact that there are two living rooms and two bathrooms.... which I know means more cleaning but makes me feel oh so grown up...


I can see my kids dancing there.


I can see friends gathered around us.

I can feel the sunshine of our new beginning and this is the perfect place to start.

The best part? I may fit into those size 10 jeans after living there a while... that hill is a KILLER!

January Photo A Day Challenge - Week One

I am not any kind of photographer. I would dearly love to be, but at the moment my aging digital is causing me all sorts of hassles and it falls to my iPhone to pick up the slack.

Here are my pictures from the first week of iPhoneagraphy!

Day One : Me : In all my sweaty dusty packing glory!

Day Two : Breakfast : The most awful instant coffee ever. But typical of me forgetting about breakfast until lunchtime.

Day Three: Something I Adore : The Manna from Heaven that is coffee at my local cafe.

Day Four : Letterbox : I took this to remind myself that soon we be "Others" instead of "Local"

Day Five : Something You Wore : Finished work and immediately drove north to see my man, so I wore my sunnies.

Day Six : Something That Makes Me Smile: My tea trio, complete now as the kids gave me the spotty pot set for Christmas, and it makes me smile every morning.

Day Seven : Favourite : My favourite cousins children playing with mine. So much LOVE!

You can follow me on Instagram : @nat_sob

I'm hoping to complete a year of challenges... but I'm pretty sure I will be playing catch up every now and then.

The Move Update - Two weeks to go

I assume you have noticed I have been away for the last few days.

And when I was here so much was going on I have been in a social media blackout with out even trying!

I tripped up north Thursday evening to stay with WonderMan for the night and start the moving process from that end. 

I'm exhausted so the bare facts will have to sustain you - I'm not up to much else today.


As of Friday I have a job, and we most likely have a nice house to live in.


WonderMan arrives the Thursday before we move with the truck, and we will move on the 21st.


I have our non-essential belongings packed and aim to finish the rest this week, with the idea that the week after I can clean the house and yard, and have it ship shape and ready for the next mug who gets sucked in to renting it.


I've been happily enjoying the company of my cousin and her gorgeous kidlets this weekend, as well as spending most of today at my grandmother's house, receiving guests and helping out at her 90th birthday. And of course cuddling my #1 niece and keeping the tetchy two under control.


A little tired but overjoyed that the final pieces of this move are falling into place.


I will be back into my blogging next week in between boxes!

The Move Update - "M minus 16 days"

That's right. There's a teeny tiny sixteen days between now and moving day.

A lifetime, and no time at all.

The Move we have been dreaming of, sacrificing for and working towards for the last couple of years is here, right on our doorstep.

I'm up to my eyeballs in packing boxes, and every one I fill is a light in my heart.

I will be leaving work at 5:30 tomorrow afternoon and settling myself in for the four hour drive to Wine Country. 

I'll be touring around rentals, including one that looks as if it could have been made for us. I hope it is.

Chance, or fate, or blind good luck (given a push by some damn hard work) has let a job interview fall into my trip. For some reason I hesitated over applying for this one, but it suits me, and our family, just right. I know the job inside out. There's no steep learning curve, no convincing someone I've never met before that I'm a fast learner, that I do my job well, that this unknown will be a good bet.

I've been refusing to hang my hopes on anything much - I've been burned too many times before. I keep looking for the kick in the arse I know should be around the corner but so far, so good.

There's this feeling that is so hard to describe to anyone. When they say "Are you excited? Will you miss home? Are you nervous?" I can't explain. I am reduced to stammered half sentences, and fall back on "Yeah, we're excited, looking forward to it, yeah."

I feel like I'm sitting on my board in front of the rising swell... energised by the sun... calmed by the sparkling waters around me... but alert, ready to act, to paddle like hell through the waves to ride the perfect tube... the one I can feel building.

The one I know is there because I have built it.

That's it - right there.

WE BUILT THIS.

We've paddle through oceans of shit, stabbed all the sharks in their godamned piggy eyes, and CLAIMED THIS WAVE.

I hope you will be there when we come pounding in through the surf, grinning like madmen and waving you in to join us for another ride.

Arsenic Hour ran into overtime

TWENTY SEVEN TIMES.

TWENTY SEVEN trips up the hallway to return Frog to bed, after feeding bathing and sending her off at 6:30pm.

TWENTY SEVEN patience cracking, mind numbing attempts to get her to listen to those simple words "It's bedtime".

I have done precisely no housework, no washing, no dishes.

And I'm exhausted but I can't sleep.

Will this child ever let me dig my eyes out from the pits they have sunk into over the past few months? 

Will I ever have my evenings back?

Will I ever kick this damn "Bedtime" record off vocal chords.

I really hope so.

If not I'd like to see the nice nurse with the kind smile and the sedatives please.

I Made a Resolution for 2012 - Yay For Me.

Actually I made three.

ONE: Stop wasting time and heartache on bitches who need a bullet.

TWO: Find a hairdresser who knows what they are doing and get them to fix this thing I suspect is meant to be hair on top of my head.

THREE: Hurry up and get married.

Short and to the point.

I like.

The first I have struggled to manage in previous times because there is this overwhelming "politeness" within me that means I must smile, say hello, observe the social niceties... when all I want to do is punch them in the face. 

I won't actually punch them but I will just walk away. And smile while I'm doing it. No point giving myself a depressive slump because a random feral wants to play some kind of childish power game, for reasons only a mentally unbalanced two year old would ever understand.


The second is a hope more than a resolution but I will just keep on trying and hopefully it doesn't take all year. Anyone know a fabulous hairdresser in Adelaide who knows how to do something with baby fine, mousey brown hair?

The third is purely and simply because I have been avoiding it long enough. And not because I don't want to get married. It took us until now to realise but neither of us want "the wedding". I was all for fully eloping, but that's selfish and doesn't include our kids, who truly are an integral part of our marriage. So we are organising a mini (and I mean teensy tiny) wedding party and booking a cruise for our honeymoon. DONE.

Mostly I just want to find some happiness again.

I want the sourness to go from my life.

My saviour can only ever be myself.

So I'm putting on my shiny tinfoil and galloping to my rescue. 

Up up and away!


PS - Move is T minus three weeks... I can feel the freedom!