item #1 - sanity and kids safety in light of school closures...we're doing all right. thank you for asking.  i loved a quote from a mum in the south china morning post the other day which essentially said, "who cares about my kids' health? what about my health?" love it.

so i am packing up our flat. it's going well but every once and a while i stumble upon something that makes me sit down and go "awww. wow".

i found a picture of charles that he pasted to a book he gave me in 1998. we used to be creative and thoughtful and crazy like that. we were poor like churchmice, but we came up with other ways to show our love.

fast forward 11 years and four children, and there isn't a lot of the opening a book and finding pictures of my boy in there. i used to write him love letters and slip them into his suitcase. now those love letters are more like "TO DO LISTS".

am i less of a lover now? i think so. is he? not really. i think i have beaten all his romantic impulses out of him.

i understand stages of life, but it did make those love letters and pictures i found so very special. and i felt sad that i had thrown so many away over the years.

then i remembered that every valentine's day charles makes me a photo collage of the year gone by, a reminder of special moments we have shared. and i felt better, thinking his creativity, like our love, has changed and expanded.

and, now i blog of my love for him. i probably should slip in more private notes (and i might) but i do announce it.

changing and growing.

back to packing.

Comments

[Auntie Pammie]

Very sweet post Tess :-)

[Mo aka Maureen aka Grandmother aka Mum]

Lovely to read, sweetheart.

Blessings,

M xox

[Mel]

Winner husband, wish mine was romantic...

[odila]

My dear photo album partner.
May I suggest you to collect the collages Charles has made you through the years, get an album and make each page a year and call your album something like "Pages of our love"? If his collages are bigger than album sizes, take a picture of the old ones and print them the size you wish them to be and then, suggest him to make you new collages in the new size. This way, he does one part and you do the other, therefore a Team work, like a good marriage, like yours is.
Love, Odila

[JoeInVegas]

So, are the kids as much help with the packing as imagined?

[Charmaine]

What an incredible blog Tess.

Actually, I have words really, just an appreciation for you and the love you and Charles share.

[Boulder]

Oh, I love Odila's idea!

Tess, moving is horrid - no matter if it in the same building, or around the world. It is a constant state of undulating, if you ask me. Highs, lows, misery, joy, discovery, loss. Ugh. Done it 8 time in the years we've been married, and know we have more in us to come.

Take a tiny bit of advice. Unless you are moving something that is age specific (like something Seb has had that your younger kids are quite ready for, but you'll want), take a look at the things and think, will I want to move this at the end of this lease if we're meant to move again?

There is nothing worse that taking things that have been in boxes and moving those same boxes time after time, because you might want them. So much easier to give to someone needier and then *if* you do need it, get a replacement - from a friend's box of unused things, or the market.

Also, so many momentos can really be "space-saved" into scans or photos of the items, rather than keeping the actual items. I'm thinking artwork, school paper awards (Kindest Kid of the Week - that sort), etc.

Enjoy the highs of discovering sweet things, and endure the sad bits, and try to strike a middle ground, because it is exhausting. I'm horrified that the kids are suddenly 2 weeks without school, on your behalf!

xoxo