Tag: memories

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#blogjune family anecdotes momentous events Random thoughts

#BlogJune Day 25

Yesterday was a red letter day. I finally succeeeded at something I’d been unable to do: finish dessert at The Pancake Manor.

Eating there is a pleasure I share with my Mum. Not sure why, but whenever we’re in Brisbane for the day we make a point of eating a meal there. And although I ensure my stomach is growling prior to entry, I’d never yet made it through a meal AND dessert due to the huge meal sizes.

So yesterday, Brisbane bound with Miss16, the challenge again was to consume the entire dessert. And we did it!

(Admittedly, we shared one dessert between us, and both of us were wise enough to only order the ‘entree’ sized meal… but we did it!)

And it was DELICIOUS!!! and so decadent 🙂 🙂 🙂

In case you’re intereseted, I had the Chicken crepe (chicken and mushroom filling on a bed of mashed potatoes) and Mum the seafood crepe, and our dessert was the Macadamia Madness. And even now, writing about it, I can feel my tastebuds watering behind the smile playing around my lips.

It was truly a memorable day!

Here’s hoping yours is as well, dear Reader 🙂

  • KRidwyn

[Also, sorry for the shocking photo quality. But we all know how badly I take photos…]

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#blogjune Blogging challenges momentous events Random thoughts Writing

BlogJune #1

Better late than never, amiright? Truth be told, it wasn’t until the early hours of June 2 that I decided I was going to do the #blogJune challenge again this year. And 2024’s theme? Daily photo.

So apologies for being several hours late, but here was June the first’s:

Hope your day was similarly festive, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn
Categories
Life Random thoughts teaching Technology

20/52 On accordions

I think I was about 10 when I decided I wanted to play the Piano Accordion. I did for a while, too! It was pretty cool 🙂

The other day, I was completing some online planning for work when I unintentionally hovered over a heading, prompting a notification. “Click to expand or collapse the accordion” it read.

Blink.

Accordion? What?

Since when is a menu, or downward facing arrow, or three dots (usually vertical, but not always) called ‘an accordion’?

But how apt! I love it.

I’m going to be using this phrase a lot more from now on. ‘Click to expand / collapse the accordion.’

Have an expansive week yourself, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn

 

 

Categories
family anecdotes

18/52 Thoughts on parenting and creativity

It’s been a week. Hard to really get a grasp on just how much has happened in the past 7 days, however as I said to a friend just yesterday: priorities. Get these right, then everything else falls into place.

When I consider my own responsibilities, my first priority is to my three kidlets. (Hence the ‘parenting’ in the title, btw). They didn’t choose to be born, so I’ll try my darnedest to ensure they have the best life I can give them. Now absolutely, there’s times – many, many, MANY times – when we don’t see eye to eye, but again, I’m the parent and I need to shoulder what needs to be shouldered to ensure that our relationships are as good as they can be.

The way I see it, that means taking an interest. Miss19 in our roadtrip last year wanted to talk ‘The Owl House‘ for 12 hours straight? Sign me up. She convinced me to watch it and was so glad to be able to share her passion with me. And really, who could pass up a conversation about King that cute little Titan?!

Then ‘The Owl House’ finished and interest morphed into ‘Arcane‘ and – via Schnee – Studio Ghibli.

Recently, it’s become ‘Purple Hyacinth‘ with Miss16 – check out this artwork! –

 

and (of course) Fortnite with Master15.

I regret nothing. For realz. Both my daughters want to work in the Art sphere – you know, the one being taken over by AI? – but I don’t care. I’m going to support them and their choices and their decisions no matter what. Because I’m their Mum. And because this post I shared on Fb the other day is *really* how I feel:

Screenshot

Have a great week, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn
Categories
Random thoughts

17/52 On waiting

We wait for lots of things.
To be old enough to join the ‘big kids’ at school.
For that first tooth to fall out so we’ll be like our friends.
For Christmas morning.
For the high school bus.
For the weekend.
To be old enough to get our driver’s license.
For the boss to give us more shifts so we have enough money for that thing we want.
For that University acceptance letter.
For the right date for our wedding.
For 9 months to be finally over.
For the kids to be old enough to go to school.
For the ‘lack of school lunches’ that holidays bring.
For the kids to graduate and live lives of their own.
For…

Are we wishing our lives away?
And what happens when our final day comes?
How much will we look back and regret?

And will realising this, be enough for me to change a so-far-lifelong habit?

That’s what I’m pondering this week, dear Reader.

And, as always, I wish you an amazing and wonderful week 🙂
⁃ KRidwyn

Categories
family anecdotes

14/52 On social media memories

In spite of my not liking it, Miss 19 uses the BeReal app. For me, it’s the ability to potentially track someone through the app that I hate. I love my daughter, and the idea that someone could be finding her by her location – because she’s telling them! – is just plain ol’ foolish, to my way of thinking. However, she’s an adult, and if she chooses to get and use BeReal and TikTok (which she doesn’t use much, I’m glad to report) then that’s on her.

It *was* interesting though, to hear that she uses the functionality of BeReal as a form of online diary. ‘Where was I / what was I doing six weeks ago?’ Scroll back to that date and ‘bam’, there’s the answer. So that was a less-nefarious way of seeing it, I guess.

And let’s face it, who doesn’t smile when the “Your memories on Facebook” posts pop up. Here’s one of mine from the other week:

 

And reading it took me staright back to that day. Eight years ago, my middle child, determined to find the tooth which she’d just discovered was no longer ‘hanging by a thread’ in her mouth. We were at Kings Beach as a family, and it was farily heavy surf that she’d just been swimming in, with Hubby and the then Master-7.

She was so earnest! She would find it, she was sure…

Needless to say, the tooth was never found.

Have a memory-full week yourself this week, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn
Categories
Life Random thoughts teaching Work

11/52 On marking

It’s a lovely feeling when it’s done! But my current marking is still firmly in the ‘present’ tense, so when it comes to writing this blogpost I’m rather time-poor, I’m afraid.

So here’s a photo Mum found the other week – me when I was 5, in Bristol, England – for you to smile at:

and I’ll see you next week, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn

 

 

Categories
Life momentous events

10/52 On yodelling

I would imagine that yodelling is difficult. I’ve never seriously tried it, but to change pitch that quickly and accurately seems confounding to me. And yet people do it. And learn it. And now I can proudly say I know one of them!

Yesterday, I took my Mum to watch the Matthew Flinders Anglican College performance of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It was astoundingly good. And I’ve been directing musicals since 1996, and been in them since the mid-1980s, so I’ve had quite a lot of experience.

Honestly, I haven’t seen that level of well-nurtured talent since my time in the music department at John Paul College in the mid-1990s. And JPC used to book out the Queensland Performing Arts Centre for its production week, so that’s saying something!

Seriously though, the levels to which these students were guided was simply incredible. There are some definite future stars at that school. And one of them is only in Year 8, and not even yet a teenager!

Which brings me back to yodelling. You see, she was one of the principals (all the others were Years 10 – 12, from what I can gather) and was cast as Augustus Gloop. [If you remember the story: he was the sausage-loving 9 year old boy from either Germany or Bavaria – depending on the version – who was the first to find a Golden Ticket. He was also the first child to depart from the tour of the Chocolate factory when he fell into the chocolate river and was sucked up the tube, precipitating the first introduction of the Oompa-Loompas.]

And in the Hal Leonard Australia version which I saw yesterday, Augustus and his Mum yodel. Quickly! (I mean, of course quickly. Who’s ever heard of a slow yodel?) And they yodelled brilliantly!

I don’t think yodelling is something you can do half-hearthedly. It’s probably like abseiling or bungee-jumping – you have to commit. And commit they did. It was brilliant!

As was the whole production, honestly. The staff at Matthew Flinders should be proud of themselves, with the amazing standard of singing, acting, dancing, instrument-playing, lighting and follow-spotting, stage-crew movements – even the email prior to explain car-parking! The whole kit and kaboodle was extrememly impressive. And I’m hard to impress.

So well done, students and staff. An achievement you can all be justifiably proud of.

And I doubt I’ll try my hand (or voice) at yodelling anytime soon! I’ll leave that to those with more talent…

Have an inspirational week yourself, dear Reader!

  • KRidwyn
Categories
family anecdotes

8/52 On sadness…

Hubby and I have had dogs for many years now. Late last year, we lost our beautiful Aksel, our 14 year old German Shepherd. Like most shepherds, it was his back hips.

Last Sunday, we lost Rocky, our 14 year old Australian Cattle dog. He had cancer 🙁

Meaning we have one dog left, our kelpie puppy Kiya.

It’s been a hard week on all of us…

See you next week, dear Reader. I hope it’s a good one for you!

  • KRidwyn

 

 

Categories
Christianity

6/52 on celebrating a life

I spent quite a bit of yesterday afternoon with tears in my eyes. Together with what felt like hundreds of people, we celebrated the life of this amazing man, Richard William Whittington.

I met Richard and his beautiful wife Colleen on their return to Australia from South Africa, in 2002. We attended the same church – Chesed – on Friday evenings in Nambour, and he quickly struck me as an amazing man of God, one who ‘walked’ the talk.

It was a beautiful service, full of touching memories. And so uplifting! The thought that Richard is not dead, but alive and with our Father, whom he served so faithfully while here on earth. A true ‘celebration’ of a life well lived.

And to celebrate this life with old friends, some of whom I hadn’t seen in person, in well over 18 years! What a blessing they all are to me. Sure, we’ve kept in touch via Facebook, virtually witnessing life events and the like, but to see them again and feel the warmth of their hugs was to be transported back in time again.

What a special afternoon; one which I have stored up in my heart. I am so blessed to have known Richard – and blessed still further by my God for his putting such amazing people in my life! I treasure them dearly.

I wish for you a week of remembering, and catching up with, such precious people in your own life, dear Reader.

  • KRidwyn