It's been more than two weeks since my last post, which is much too long in my opinion. It's starting to feel like a cold turkey detox...And besides some work for DaVinci and proofreading translations, I have only commented a few times here but was 'away' for the rest. There are a few reasons for that, nothing that has anything to do with all of you people here or Steem(it) in general, but more with some things I had to deal with and my state of mind.

About a two weeks ago, I got the request to do a translation for a company I do some freelance work for sometimes. It's actually a friend of mine, and sometimes he'll 'throw' some work my way when the assignment is either too large, or he doesn't have the time to do it. The day he contacted me was one of those days... A day when I just started to panic a little more than usual about the state of my finances and what I was going to do about it.
So this job came just at the right time. It is not going to solve all my problems, but it gave me just enough time to breathe to be able to work out what my next steps will be.

The job was assigned to me on a Thursday evening and needed to be finished on Tuesday by noon.
With 7500 words to translate, this should usually not be such a problem, but this project was a little more complex.
I won't bore you with the details, but the translation was for a famous shipping company, and I was translating a virtual course regarding corruption from English into Dutch. Because I was to translate the course, it was compulsory to take the course, which took some time in itself. But it was much more interesting to see all these different examples of corruption that can take place in a company like that. It actually inspired me to write a post about it at some time, because there were some interesting points, and I found some things that didn't stroke with reality. But more about that another time.

Routineless routines

After I finished this job, I needed some time off. My head needed some rest, and so did the rest of me. Not that this really happened, because having 4 kids running around is really demanding...and challenging. Besides that, I still have one active translator on the team at the moment, and she will not rest (hehehe, @soyrosa). Which is perfectly fine, because proofreading requires a different kind of concentration, and it's often a welcome change.

The fact is, since our visit to Holland and the tragedy that was the reason we were there, none of us has been the same. I've been slacking on the 'time to go to bed' department, and they have been taken full advantage of that.
It was almost like I fully emerged in the radical unschooling world like the one Dayna Martin describes, but I soon realized that if I were to implement that here, that the kids run all over me and there'd be a chance that I'd lose my mind. I need some 'off time'.

So since the beginning of last week, I've started to get them back on quite 'normal' routines. At least, for us.
I've even tried to get them to do 'school work' at regular times, rather than spreading this out during the day.
We're not quite there yet, but we'll get there.

But the most important thing that I've started to do again, is getting back to 'normal' bedtimes. The past year, there have been times when I was just too exhausted to really argue too much about this. It's not that I didn't care, but I just wouldn't check up on them as much after they went to bed. This resulted in my ten-year-old still up at crazy times, walking in at those crazy times, talking about things that could definitely wait till the next day, you know, those talks about absolutely nothing. Just something to say... Like the colour of the jacket of one of the characters in her book. Or the fact that she just went to the toilet. I will probably never understand this. They do so many things without asking me, and then they inform me of things like going to the toilet, or putting their shoes on. All useless information that no one needs to know, unless they're really in a hurry to get to the toilet themselves. But OK. She's quite good at finding the exact moment when it's the least convenient to talk about these things too. Part of me applauds this trait because it means that her mind doesn't rest and that she wants an answer right that moment, rather than to wait till the next day. But the other part of me remembers my parents' annoyance to the fact that my inquisitive mind would never rest, and with that - they wouldn't. Yes, she's a mini-me. Not quite as much as the youngest (help!), but still quite a lot.

Anyway, for weeks now, I've been trying to help her understand that there's a time for everything and that the question or remark she has, although important, can be asked or said the next day and not at 2 a.m. "But you were still up..." is often her rebuttal but what she doesn't realize is, that once I am working on something and in a 'flow', a seemingly harmless question (or the statement that she had a she's making a trip to the bathroom) can have my mind wander, and it's very hard to get back to the point after that. If not impossible.
So in response to her argument that she would forget if she were to ask the next day, I gave her a notebook and pen to be placed beside her bed. This has helped. It helps her to put it down in words, 'let it go' for a while, to come back to the subject the next day.
Of course she doesn't have to write anything about her toilet visits. We all know that those are inevitably part of our day.

My nine-year-old son, fortunately, has no problems with more regular bedtimes, as he is an early riser, unlike the rest of us, so he really needs an early-ish bedtime, or he'll be like a dragon with three heads the next day. And not a little cute one like the one below either...

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Then there is the youngest sprout, whose arguments could put Albert Einstein to shame. I know that it's quite early to call him a genius, with his 4 years in this world, and one could argue that I hold some kind of bias because he is my son. However, I think I am quite a good judge when it comes to my children, and although they are all very smart in some ways, this little man has me stunned more often than not when it comes to his wits. To him, nothing comes unnoticed and even though this is a very good characteristic to have, it's not always so great for me.
Besides this, he is possibly the biggest night-owl in the family, which causes its own issues. He can go to sleep at 9, and wake up in the middle of the night, ready for the day. Usually, this happens just when I decide to hit the hay, and it can be difficult to convince him that playtime is not in at 2 a.m...
Since nothing seemed to help get this little monkey to sleep, and stay asleep, I came up with an idea the other day.
I still had a few credits left on Audible, so I decided to find an audio book for children. And OMG!!! Why didn't I figure this out sooner? It works like a charm!
The first time he was quite surprised there was nothing to see. Nothing on the screen, and no book with pictures. So I turned off the light and we both got comfortable in bed. I explained to him that with this, he is supposed to just listen, nothing more. I thought he would complain, but he didn't. He did exactly like I told him, cuddled up with me and listened to the story. I had chosen a book from an author that I didn't know. But later, I learned my eldest had read his books.
David Walliams. The Ice Monster. My son loves monsters and dinosaurs, so I couldn't go wrong with this. However, I never thought we'd make it past the first chapter without at least five questions or remarks from him, but he stayed quiet. I liked the book myself as it was narrated by a few people who spoke with a strong East-London accent, which made it more fun to listen to. I asked him if he liked the story, and yes, he did. Usually, he won't let me leave the room until he sleeps, but this time, I listened to a few (short, fortunately) chapters with him and left the room. Ten minutes later, when I checked, he was snoring...
WHAT a great find! The Ice Monster, by the way, was nothing more than a woolly mammoth.

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Weekly day out

Last week, we had three days of rain, three days of cold, dry weather with a lot of wind and one sunny day.
On the sunny day, we drove to a town about half an hour from us, and because we were about 10 minutes from the beach, I decided to take us on a little detour after the shopping was done.
It was needed. The car hadn't come to a full stop yet, and the doors flew open. Two of the kids were already on top of the hill-path leading to the beach before I could get my safety belt off.
It was still bitter cold, and of course a bit more windy due to the ocean winds, but it was fun either way. The sun was still shining, so it made the whole thing just that little more enjoyable.

The kids started running around like the wildlings that they are, and it gave me the chance to play with my new gadget a little. Gadget you say? Yup, you've heard me right. Mommy's got a new phone.
At Steemfest I was still carrying around my old, cheap ass phone, with a cracked screen that made the touch screen pretty untouchable...
In fact, I had to literally hit the screen hard with my fingers, a few times, before it would even respond. And even then I wasn't sure if it would do what I wanted it to do.
Since I was due a new one, I never got it fixed. So just before Christmas I scoured my provider's website for a new offer.
Usually I don't give a damn about the make and model of a phone. If I can send texts, get online with it, and also make a phone call every now and then, then that's fine by me. However, this particular phone had my attention right away. It seemed to have an extraordinary camera. No, three cameras. And a Carl Zeiss lens...
Common', that's not a phone, that's a camera with a phone functionality.
Of course, the quality can't be compared to a SLR camera, but damn its functions come pretty damn close! And it has some nice features like 'slo-mo'.
You hold it up to shoot a photo, and as soon as the sensor detects something moving, it takes a slow motion video! NEAT! Of course I had to try this out, and what better moment than at the beach? The kids loved to be test subjects...

Any way, here's an example. No worries, there will be many more! Oh crap...I forgot that it's video...Ah well, I'll post those another time through Dtube. A photo will do.
I'm loving my new gadget, because this means that now I don't have to drag my heavy camera everywhere and can still take reasonable quality photos. This will surely come in handy when I'm going to the Twenty One Pilots concert with my eldest in March.

taken with my Huawei P20 Pro, I'm not getting paid to promote this phone. It's just a pretty nice thing to have as an alternative to heavy photo equipment....

What a day at the beach can do...

Well, it got the children tired and ready for bed pretty much as soon as we got home.
Dinner was half-eaten, a five minute shower and off they went, to dream land.
We decided that from now on, we'll take one day in the week to do something like this. Beach, lake, mountain, whatever. But out of the house and something other than walking the dog around the area, dodging tractors.
The winter here is long and depressing, and being indoors a lot doesn't make it any better. So at least once a week is good...

Now, it didn't solve my problems. The money didn't just come flying in because I spent the day at the beach. But it made me think more clearly. I've been looking for jobs outside of the house for the past few weeks.
Now, there are jobs for those who really want them, even here in the West of Ireland. However, well paying jobs are a little harder to come by, unless you are able for night-shifts, which is really not an option for me.
There was an opening here at the local gas station in the deli. However, this would mean I would have to find day-care for my homeschooled kids and that kind of defies the whole homeschooling idea, doesn't it? I work from home because it gives me the option to homeschool... Also, if I were to take up a job like that, I would have to work around 25 hours a week just to pay for day-care... It's not that I am too good to work any kind of job, but working most hours just to afford the child-minder is a bit much I think...
So, today I decided to keep my eyes and ears open and actively look for freelance jobs online. There's bound to be something that comes on my path.
I need to let the stress and fear of not knowing go, and just go with the flow.
And who knows? Something will come up...It always does...

ANYWAY...I'm BACK!!!

I am going to leave you with this piece of art that I made at the beach. I hope you like it.😂

It's a rocket...I know, it looks like a jellyfish, but there's not much to work with at a beach...

Thank you for reading!