Re-emerging

Hi.  Yes, I am still alive over here.  Just been in hibernation.  Well, hibernation from blog-land at any rate.  Real life has been it's usual crazy, busy self.

There's been the technological issues.  Getting used to a new android phone, along with all the strange things it can do.  Do I really need to update my Facebook profile from my phone, for instance?  And yet I've found it quite handy, refreshingly different from having to use my computer which is my 'study' space, and so much easier to do short emails and uploading of photos directly from my phone, so I guess time will tell on where I end up drawing lines and making boundaries with this ever encroaching technology.  Trying to work out how to get it to back-up my photos automatically has cost me many hours.  Still a work in progress, but finally halfway there at least.  We are trying going camera free, you see.  Gulp.  Boyo and me, without an official camera.  The thing is, I've realised lately that mobile phone cameras are taking, for the most part, nearly as good photos as our 'good' camera.  Without the fuss of then having to download, rotate, cull, and email out to family.  I can do it all in one go, in five minutes.  Right then.  In the moment.  (Or perhaps leave it for the day we get home from holiday to send my family over 10 awesome pics of our awesome time away!).  I'm not fully convinced about the no-camera status.  It was my idea.  But the mobile phones lack a few areas: a decent zoom, and a good flash.  But hey, the convenience of having the phone always on me is a good incentive.

Getting my phone a good cover has also cost me hours.  And I'm still not happy with what I've ended up with.  Ugh.  I thought I wanted one that leaves the screen free, but was heavy duty enough that it would hopefully protect from a fall (as I'm a clutz and drop my phone with alarming frequency).  But now that I've got it, I'm finding it is really chunky (which I could put up with) and that I'm still trying to stuff my phone, cover and all, into the spare sock it had been residing in!  I think I'll be heading back to get the flip-cover.  Sigh.  More time used over the silly phone. But I use it a lot and I don't want it broken, so I guess it should ultimately be worth it.  Just hope hubby isn't too annoyed at the needless expense of two phone covers instead of one.  Bigger sigh.

The last three weeks have been mid-year break for me.  That means NO STUDY.  Nada.  Zip.  Zero.  Bliss.

You'd think that might mean a wealth of bloggy titles winding their way through cyber space to ya'll.  But no.  I've been a bit flat, bloggy-wise.  Just needed a break.  I needed to be here, in the present, in the real life, in my day to day existence.  I needed to sort my recipes out (been trying to do that for about a year I think now!), spend time with my family, and relax.

I've even had the most agreeable and novel experience of reading a few novels (pun fully intended!).

I've been on a bush walk.  And been to the beach.  I've weeded a small patch of our overgrown backyard and a larger one at my parent's Big Garden.  I've had a week childfree while my 'baby' enjoyed sightseeing with his grandmother.  And we've been on a family holiday.  Our first proper one in over three years (and how that came about is a pretty special story all in itself). 

So here I am. On the threshold of another semester.  A lovely classmate text and told me that it's only four months and we will have finished the study year.  I wanted to strangle her!  But she does have a good point.  Four months.  Surely I can survive just four months?  Even if they are probably the busiest, fullest, craziest ones of my entire degree?  At least Boyo isn't studying too.  He can hold the home fort while I bury myself in the office with my laptop and a pile of research books, only to emerge from time to time for more supplies of water, chocolate, and sunlight!

Squeezed into the semester is also another family holiday.  Oh my goodness, three years without one (weddings in Australia on a budget-budget with a preschooler DO NOT count as holidays, people!) and now we are having two!  This next one is a couple nights with family, then a couple nights at the 'snow' with some good friends.  Munchkin hasn't been to the snow before.  He is very excited and has been asking about it.  A lot.  "Is it this week?  How many nights till the snow?"  Along with, "When is Christmas?"  Arggghhhhhhhh.  Don't get me started on Christmas!!!!

I'll also be squeezing Live Below the Line in again this year and encouraging my church to join me in this crazy eating adventure of empathy with the extreme poor.  Definitely going to be staying occupied.

So, that's a brief synopsis on life at present.  What I haven't talked about yet, but I guess will come, is the deeper stuff.  The questions over the future.  The values we hold dear that we are trying to outwork in the now.  The decisions to be made, the waiting to be done, the lives to be lived amidst it all.  I hope that your lives are filled with peace and purpose as we head into the second half of 2014!

Amy