Hi there! It’s a beautiful sunny Sunday in Sydney: the coffee is hot, it’s a rest day after a busy work week, and we’ve got a 20 YEAR OLD with a birthday to celebrate. Around here, that means I’ve already made my best, easy chocolate cake and I’ve chosen a theme for birthday dinner.
We’ve decided to go Mexican…recipes linked below! Chicken enchiladas, nachos, Mexican rice and something green. (I always have trouble figuring out what veg to serve on Mexican Night. Do you??)
Time seems to be running, but also there’s always so much to do. I can’t believe the days of being a mother of teens is now behind me.
All those weekends of picking up skateboarders at 10pm, loading them into the car, bringing them home for a poolside barbecue and cannonballs and laughs that went late into the night.
Regular sleepovers for five of my son’s mates…and all those air mattresses from Kmart and the matching duvets spread across the floor.
The spontaneous dinners of homemade mac and cheese and burgers and hastily cut-up carrots and hummus.
That’s the old season, and now, with a twenty year old uni student doing his second placement in Sport and Exercise Science…we’re onto the new.
It reminds me of an important lesson for us all.
It is so, so easy to want to hang onto the past. The life we have, the job, the kids this age, the perfect holiday, perfect health, our own youth, a family home.
But…we’re swept along by the tick of the clock into something new.
That was then, this is now.
And though it takes a little effort, reality tells us that we have to move on. It’s best to embrace it with excitement and dreams of promised joy.
I hope you have a beautiful weekend — with some peaceful moments to consider where you are, and where you’re going next.
Love, Catherine x
P.S. The Fun Stuff
All about amazing Grace! My dear friend Jenny has an incredible granddaughter — smart as a whip, so pretty, and waiting for help from the most brilliant medical researcher we can find. Grace has a rare genetic condition, ADCY5, and we’re raising $120,000 so a brilliant young Aussie researcher can help. We’re so close now at $86,178. (Our shortfall is $33,000 AUD but just $22,000 USD). If you want to help, Grace’s story is here.
Trying these Chicken Enchiladas tonight.
The nail polish I’m loving lately. Dries so quickly — you can swipe it on as you head out the door.
Those $8 Kmart single air mattresses are fantastic.