Bark, chat, work

1. The satisfying CRUNCH of a thick piece of bark under my foot.

2. A friend comes over for tea and a chat, and her kids and my kids play together beautifully as usual.

3. Earned some freelancing money today.

Time, strawberry, trellis

1. My youngest child, Aiden, is starting preschool this week. He started at his new childcare centre last week, and in total I will now have FOUR days a week, 9-3, with no children at home. I say 9-3, but of course with travelling time it is a bit less than that, but anyway it is a wealth of time. I have my freelance work, of course, but nothing on hand today; so I have had time to do a little housework, a little gardening, a relaxed morning tea. Shopping, a cafe. Nothing exciting, but I was by myself with no one to look after and no time constraints. Yay!

2. Half a strawberry, warm from the plant. I avoid the half that some other creature has taken a bite of. So incredibly much better than bought strawberries. We haven't had a lot of strawberries in the plant's first year, especially when shared between four people, but they are already spreading vigorously ready for next year.

3. I put up a trellis in the second vegetable bed which is still almost empty, ready for the peas to climb up. The sun is too hot to put in the pea seedlings, they can sit in the shade until later. The first vegetable bed is a riotous tumult of corn, tomatoes, lettuce, chives & squash. A butternut pumpkin plant spreads its arms over all, winding between everything else. A single pumpkin, now bigger than my fist, swells over the side.

Knees, rest, fragrant

1. I walk up and down a steep hill for exercise and an elderly man passes me in the other direction, walking his dog. "Is up or down harder?" he asks. "Up," I pant. "I think down is harder, it's hard on the knees," he replies. I'm glad my knees are still young enough to cope with down.

2. I'm tired so Tim gets in the pool for Aiden's swimming lesson and I get to sit on the side and read.

3. Beef bourginon is in the slow cooker all day and the house smells yummy. Tim makes mashed potato to go with it, so I have nothing to do at dinnertime but relax.

Better, healthy, underwear

1. I had a cortisone injection in my shoulder yesterday which, as expected, made it a bit worse for a few hours - but now it is feeling quite a lot better which is wonderful.

2. Grocery shopping with the kids (last week of school holidays!) and I buy them morning tea but decide that I am not hungry, only thirsty, so I buy a juice instead - which of course I share. I am proud of myself for not buying junk food that I don't even really want. And the kids have a cheese roll and a sushi roll (each has one thing) so nothing too unhealthy there either.

3. I recently found some underwear that I really like, so today I bought two more sets of three and I can now throw out some of my old pairs.