Party Day

Today we had the goodbye brunch.  Actually more accurately, it was a goodbye breakfast that stretched through lunch to dinner.  It started at 8am and ended about 6pm!  An extravagance of well wishing!  I am going to start doing more on birthdays I think.  It seems a pity to wait until people are going away/getting married or being buried to tell them how much you appreciate them.  It is lovely to hear how much you will be missed.  I think that employee would be less likely to leave if they hear things like that more often too.  I saw people today that I haven't seen for years!  It is just fun to catch up like that.  Levi played with kids all day, they changed faces and ages but he had people all day as well.  He had fun running and playing and jumping on the trampoline. 

 

At one point he started to fade and as there was a lull in the kid numbers, I told him to just go downstairs and have a bit of quiet time.  He grateful and went and played with his Legos for a bit.  There isn't much left down there for him anymore, as most of the toys have been either sorted or shipped, but there are enough to keep him happy.  I am glad that he had a chance to rest because soon after there was another group of kids to play with and it meant he happily had a second wind.

 

I had a great day and one of my friends had organized for all my friends to write in a book that I can take with me and read on darker lonelier days! 

Packing

It continues to be pretty wild around here.  The company that is relocating some of our stuff is coming tomorrow afternoon and so my time has been, goodbye parties, packing and collapsing onto the couch.  As Blogger still won't let me load photos, I haven't bothered to come and update much.  There has been way too much other stuff going on!  I am just too tired tonight to pack more and not quite tired enough to go to bed early.  I think that sometimes there is so much to do it all blurs into one big thing.  I hope that I can get it all organized for transport tomorrow but frankly, don't really care if I don't!  Much of what I am taking is for sentimental reasons alone and I can always pick it up on subsequent visits back here. 

 

I had Mim here helping the other day.  Her job, and Levi's was to go through the toys and decide what was going and what he had either grown out of or lost the pieces to and put them in piles.  I looked over at one point to one huge pile and a modest little pile beside it.  I laughed because I assumed that the big pile was the 'take to USA pile' but instead it was the give/throw away pile.  Levi again amazed by his maturity, deciding that he could live without many of the toys.  His decisions were made easier by the fact that we are taking all the Lego and all the Playmobil, so he didn't need to sort that.  The best thing about all of that is when he complains that he can't find something and goes to get mad at me, I can remind him who in fact made all those decisions!

 

There is only nine days before we are going off on the big adventure.  Today was the last day that we would ever be at Samford State school and I had mixed feelings leaving it behind.  It has been a pretty good school but I am excited that Levi will have the chance to try something new.  He has some good friends behind it's gates but he will keep in touch with most of them!  The teachers from Vacation Care were definitely sad to see him go!

Beach Day

Today we went to King's beach Caloundra.  It was just a gorgeous day and I took lots of really fun photos that now won't upload to Blogger no matter what I do to it.  I think soon I am going to switch to something else so I can load photos and do what I want.  I can't complain about the price because it's free, but still it is months now and getting pretty annoying. 

 

We went to the beach because I'm so tired of packing and other things and I just wanted a day off.  I wanted a day to just play in the sun and and spend some time with friends.  Levi had a blast and was just supremely happy all day.  He laughed a bunch.  He ran around and swam in the ocean.  He was just happy and carefree and unstressed for a day and as close as was possible, so was I.  The day and the weather was perfect!  I am feeling refreshed and recharged and because of it, I might just last the next two weeks and not say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing. 

Unsettled

I am feeling unsettled and so is Levi.  As an adult, I can mostly hide it and just feel a bit 'off my game', but for Levi, it is a little more obvious.  Moving schools at any age is stressful, moving to a school in a different continent, that much more so.  Moving house across town is stressful and across the world, that much more so.  I actually don't have a whole bunch to do at the moment.  I have pretty much chosen what is going and what isn't.  Given that the moving company is packing it all, I can just stack it in a corner and stop worrying about it.  I can leave the pictures on the wall until they pack them up and take them away.  I will miss them until I get them back and I think that the next place will become truly home when my pictures arrive to make it so.  At least I have an excuse for the house looking like a bomb has hit it!

 

Levi has four days left of school here but is begging me to stay home for 'just one day'.  He is tired but lies awake at night struggling to sleep because he can't switch it off.  Tonight he went to sleep with the big main light on, and about an hour after his bedtime was still fairly fitfully attempting to sleep.  Poor sweet thing.

 

The next three weeks are busy but not crazy.  Levi has a week of school and then two weeks of vacation and I have to work for all of it.  At the end of the three weeks we fly out. 

Art and Math

To make Blogger allow me to upload photos, I have to clear my browser history; every single freaking time!  It is starting to get a bit annoying and I am hoping that they are doing something about it behind the scenes but in the meantime, I am getting good at clearing my browser history!  I continue to be really pretty busy, trying to get things finished and organized in time for; transport of our stuff in two weeks, goodbye brunch in two weeks and leaving work in three weeks.  We fly out thirty eight hours after finishing work.  In the meantime, life goes on.  Levi had some art work in the Samford State School Art Festival.  He and his class made Australian animals out of clay.  Levi made a koala and I think it's fabulous!  He also made a Black Cockatoo out of his hand prints.  He was very proud and really wanted to go to the Art Show to show it off. 

 



 Today, Levi was playing with numbers again and I am reminded again why I am leaving this school.  He is playing with fractions at the moment.  He has worked out that 1/2 and 2/4 are the same and all the way to 8/16.  Then he plays with the numbers.  Tonight going to sleep, he wanted a sum and I gave him 45 + 77.  He had no difficulty and then wanted fractions.  I gave him 7 1/2 + 1 3/4 and after thinking a bit, he gave me 9 1/4.  Levi's math homework this week?  Adding in tens to 100 + 100.  Really?  He has been doing that since he was, oh I don't know, I don't remember.  It will be nice to get him to a system that may be able to give him reading at one level and math at another.  I don't have the luxury to be able to fully school him at home and I don't think that I would be very good at it either, but I am getting tired of stupid homework.  Levi has been tired of it for a while! 

There be Dragons!

Blogger is being a pain in the bum again.  I am never sure if it is them or if it is our Internet.  Either way, loading photos has become extraordinarily painful and slow.  I am finding myself less on the computer and more getting things organized to move to USA.  In fact, I am pretty sure that Levi has been on the computer more than I have in the last week or so.  I am feeling a myriad of emotions but mostly I am just feeling exhausted.  I wake up and go to sleep exhausted, but I am thinking that this will only be for a finite time and then it will all settle down again.  Levi is very very excited, but is showing signs of the stress as well.  He is needing more time to go to sleep at night and after one frustrating night I went in and discovered that he had needed to be guarded by his wonderful stuffed dogs; Icy and Kiedy.  He had propped them up on the edges of the bed.  even in his sleep he has a slightly stressed expression on his face.  I am thinking that it will make him stronger in the long run but is a bit of a struggle now! 

 

He is seeking out small places to put himself in the day time and covering himself in blankets.  He is doing what needs to be done to ground himself and keep his emotions where they should be.  Mostly he is excited but I think sometimes he is a bit scared; at least nervous anyway.  Truthfully that is what I am feeling too.  I see his stress in the toys he plays with and the way he interacts.  he is building and drawing dragons to protect 'people' and on a couple of mornings built this paper dragon that is the size of the desk.  It is complicated and intricate and designed to 'be strong and look after people if they are scared'.  I am sure that he is doing exactly that!  There are some live dragons around now too!  There are baby Water Dragons at the creek.  Hundreds of them!  They scurry away from the car as you drive past and sun themselves on the rocks.  It is a joy to watch them!

New Things

We are moving.  Finally it is all public knowledge enough that I can talk about it.  Levi and I are moving back to USA.  We are moving out from under this house and 8500 miles north and east.  I have a new job in Roseburg, Oregon and it works on the school schedule.  It means that after years of feeling bad about how much time I am not bringing Levi up, I can actually have a work schedule that coincides with his school schedule.  We will get vacations together and even though he will need to spend some time in After School care, he won't be in there until close to closing. 

 

I am leaving much behind, and that is killing me but I think that the long term benefit for both of us is worth all that in the end.  Levi is excited.  He will be in shouting distance of his brothers (or an hour and a half in the car), but at least within weekend/birthday/Christmas distance.  I too am getting excited but only in between bouts of nervousness and fear.  I feel bad leaving my kids here.  I care so much about how they are fairing but know that I can only give them tools and I can't be that tool.  I need to do what is right for Levi and I and yet I will try to help from a distance.  I don't know!  Now even my writing is sounding like drivel. 

 

I have so much to do but everything is fraught.  Everything.  Staying here.  Going to USA.  I don't even know where to start 

Levi Being Clever

Levi had a 'Good Day' at school today. The class had to perform at assembly and sang a beautiful song about things that stick to walls.  Before your mind goes where mine did when he told me that, it was about animals that stick to walls.  His part was about geckos and he also remembered the part about Green Tree Frogs as well.  If I can get the videos to upload, I will put them on.  I wasn't able to go and watch him perform it because I had to work, but he was as happy to sing it again after I picked him up from After School Care.  The last video he laughs because (being a boy) he did manage to add a bit of noise from another orifice in time with his singing.  Only boys, and you know what?  They never grow out of it!

 

Once Again I am having trouble loading things.  Maybe I better check out Google again!

Look Who's Clever!

I managed to make Blogger do something!  Actually, I only followed old instructions from a friend.  Her advice and it is very good advice is; "If you are having a problem with something, generally someone else in the world is also having the same problem!  When in doubt Google it and ask!"  Well she was right.  I think it is very funny that she (and her husband) work writing code and fixing hardware/software problems but their go to option is just to check out Google!

 

My eyes are starting to ungum and Levi actually went to bed without Ventolin tonight.  I don't want to say anything too loud to tempt fate but I think we might actually be getting better!  I went back to work without problems and then helped tape up a friend's chest where she has strained muscles from coughing so hard!  Yes, the office is pulling itself out from under a wave of illness as well. 

Goop and Grossness

This has been an interesting week, to say the least.  It has pretty much been one thing after another and we are just crawling out from under it.  One illness after another meant that I worked little this week.  I think it was Monday, half of Tuesday and a few hours on Friday.  Levi was having problems with his asthma and we stayed home Tuesday morning but I took him into work to do some things that afternoon.  I went to bed early and was feeling 'fuzzy' but it wasn't tiredness.  I woke early and pretty much kept half a glass of Sprite down between then and the next day.  It took a while to shake that off and I went to work Friday but didn't see kids because I felt it was too risky.  As I was driving home, my vision kept blurring, which was a bit odd but I figured that the contacts were getting old.

 

The next morning, I couldn't open my right eye at all, it was completely gummed shut.  The left eye was better but still pretty goopy.  So Saturday was a write off as well.  I could see again once I started to use the antibiotic eye treatment but I was still pretty light sensitive.  We had a bunch of things that we had to do that day though.

 

Levi had his soccer breakup and I would love to show the photos but in the last week, haven't had time to even to start to look at why Blogger is being such a butt about the photos.  I haven't had the strength or the eyesight!  Levi's breakup was really fun.  I stayed mostly in the shade chatting to one of the Dads.  They had a fun park, and Levi is now at an age and Samford is such a place that he could run off and play on the jumping castle and mini golf without my watching him.  They had a Laser Skirmish and lots of kids playing soccer all over the place.   Levi just found his friends, got $10 for a stamp on his arm to allow him access and then was gone until lunch time.

 

This morning I am finally on the computer, interspersed with Levi needing it for homework and all the things that I have had to do last week and for obvious reasons didn't.  I can only hope that next week we crawl out of this hole that we have inadvertently crawled into.  Because, you know what?  This isn't much fun!