So babes,

I’d really love to show you this super picturesque scene of where I’m filling out my workbooks this year.

Like a picnic or a bushwalk to some secluded forest glen where I blissfully meditate for hours.

Or a chai latte by the beach. Toes in sand.

Moments and hours spent dreaming and meditating and collaging.

But here’s the situation I’m in right now:

Things are freakin’ full to bursting.

  • We’re just recovering after a really full on launch and dealing with the Mailing House From Hell (luckily, that’s all finished now, and all our books are shipping everyday without issues! HOORAY! So if you’ve been waiting for things to be all clear before you order – they are! And we have sold out of about 75% of our stock and we won’t be reprinting again this year. Just so you know!)
  • I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this but I’m moving across the country in a week? LOLZ OOPZ.
  • I’ve got a very spirited, rambunctious almost 5 year old and a very cute 10 month old who is going through that whole awful sleep-regression/teething/separation anxiety/waking every 2 hours thing which is totally important developmentally but is really crackin’ my balls in the meantime.

Consequently, my workbook isn’t getting filled out the normal way.

I’m not dedicating full days to it.

But I’m making sure it gets done.

And how that’s getting done…

In those five minutes of mamatime…

babysplashes

Like when the girls are in the bath, playing with bubbles and I can sit beside the tub, having a glass of cheap dessert wine, filling out my workbook one step at a time.

And this will crack you up…

It’s all been happening here too:

sacredhangout

Damn straight.

In the loo. The toot. The lav. The dunny.

My #2015workbook sacred dreaming zone.

I’m keeping it beside the toilet and every time I get to have a 30 second bathroom break, I fill out another section.

I mean really, why the fluckitty fluck do I care so much about filling out my workbook?

dreamdream

(Oh look, here’s me in my studio scratching things out for five minutes!)

Well, coz I was doing my review over the 2014 workbook.

I swear, that’s one of my favourite things in the world.

Looking back at the words I wrote a year before, and seeing what worked and what didn’t.

Anywaysies, I was looking through my 2014 workbook, and I didn’t finish it.

And I completely understand why.

This time last year I was still in the throes of being horrifically ill with Beth’s pregnancy with hyperemesis gravidarum.

I don’t really quite know how to explain the illness to anyone who hasn’t experienced it, but it’s bad, man.

You basically lose yourself + all time and get swallowed up into a debilitating, depressing world of chronic, debilitating nausea and unstoppable vomiting. (P.S. It is NOT morning sickness. It is a severe, serious allergic reaction to pregnancy that can be life threatening. #passionateaboutthisobviously)

Anywaysies, I found myself really, really missing the places I didn’t get to fill out for 2014.

Like there were unwritten insights + miracles that could have happened there.

unfurledflowers

So yeah, dude, I’m full on COMMITTED to getting it finished completely this year.

Even if it needs to happen on the dunny.

In the non-dunny-workbook moments, I’m:

packing

Packing. Or, at least, attempting to.

Packing with kids is like trying to clean with a Tasmanian Devil tornadoeing behind you.

#disasterzone

date

Our lovely nanny has meant we could have our first super-romantic date together.

We went to the post office. Chris helped me carry all my super heavy packages (nope this is NOT INNUENDO). We stood in line without kids starting to whine and touching everything and getting hungry. We were able to have a conversation with each other that didn’t have 3848487777766737r67 interruptions (roughly). We completed sentences. It was INCREDIBLE.

Then we went home + continued working/packing.

pies

And baby cuddling. Baby wrangling.

10 months is REALLY cute. It’s also super full on with the whine/bite/sleepfighting/sleepregression/wondermonthbullshit.

It’s funny how such duality can exist.

How much you’re blown to smithereens with love.

And how freakin’ hard it is.

How much you want to inhale their sweetest smelling miracle heads, and then you want to run… run far away to a place where it is quiet and soft and nobody needs you every moment of every day.

lovelovelove

Duality, yo.

We’re packing up and saying goodbyes to all our favourite places.

Saying thank you to this magical forestland where my chubby toddler has turned into a longlimbed kid and my second baby came to me.

This place has felt like a dream come true in many, many ways.

And a lot of those dreams were written down in the workbooks of past years.

bloomingland

I am grateful.

And I’m crafting out moments to write down the next dreams…

this life we’re making all of our own.

One step, one moment, one page at a time…

that’s how all miracles get made.

L O V E…

sparkleleoniedawson