Never Enough...Probably!

Golly it has been a while since I have visited my little blog and I have missed it. As ever, it has been busy with a poorly Isabella yet again coming under the onslaught of a nasty bug. Yesterday I read Nina's post and recognised my own voice in her writing, my relief at the reprieve from illness in the house being short lived as yet more arrived to take the last lot's place.

It has made me think a lot about how frustrating life is sometimes. I am busy - very - with work and that is good; we try where we can to make the family side of life good too and I think we do pretty well with lots of games being played, meals shared and so on, all the normal things that go with being part of a family, but things which actually require much time spent to achieve nonetheless.

Add into the mix the fact that our children are people (though at times I wonder!) and therefore require nurturing and caring for, the need to give to each of them that most precious of commodities - time - so that they can talk about their feelings, worries, hopes.

And then there is being one half of a couple and all that goes with it: the sharing of laughs and cuddles and company; the listening when the other needs to talk; the being able to talk knowing the other will listen, truly listen. The loveliest of situations and again one that needs time to keep it working, to nurture it so that it remains the special relationship it has always been.

These things are surely what it is all about, this manic ride we call life? How easy it all is when the planets align in the right way, when health is good and work is managed within the natural time constraints of a large family (or indeed a small one if that is your lot). How hard it is when one element falls out of kilter and your nights are full of a child who had just recovered from a week-long illness and now is battling a painful ear infection that turns her into a screaming wreck, poor soul.

Still the orders are there, still the others need you, though thankfully they are all so brilliant with their little sister and just want to help her get better. Still I am aching and exhausted from the remnants of the flu-like bug of recent weeks which made me feel more ill than I can remember - I even took to my bed at some point for heaven's sake!

Now we are on the other side of it with Isabella ready to return to school tomorrow I am, as I said, left feeling how frustrating life can be. Despite all you do it seems it is never enough and there is always some area which you cannot do properly, someone who feels you are letting them down, though thankfully never the kids and that's what is really important. They come first don't they?  I am notoriously hard on myself and forever feel I could do more, but just now I feel I have done enough and that in itself feels good.

I see the pile of orders finished and ready to post and I can smile; I see the messy, falling-down-around-our-ears house with its tiny rooms and know it will be done one day when time and money allow, and I love it for all its faults because it is ours and full of love; I can think of our children and be proud knowing they all feel how much we love them and appreciate that we try, no matter what life throws up, to be there for them.

And as for the rest? Well, I am only human after all! A little uninterupted sleep has brought me back to myself and I am once more excited by life: spring is coming, the garden awaits and I am desperate to get out there, there are new games to play and a pretty boat to sail with fishing trips and camping ahead (groans quietly at that one). Commissions have popped up and I am so enjoying the designing of them.

And on that lengthy ramble which I am not sure actually had any point I shall leave you. Perhaps the point is this: don't be hard on yourself because you are probably doing the best you can and it is more than good enough!  (Plus there is always someone out there who will be hard on you whatever you do!).

P.S. Just so that you know how hard we make the children work:

Lucy making caramel cupcakes.
Tom cutting down six foot of holly.
Elias sanding down the boat.


P.P.S. Please note the pretty cupcake holder made by the lovely Diana for Lucy's birthday - more on this next post!