Half-term

Swim, hazy-eyed, through the vibrant globes of water-coloured evenings.

Curl around the fluent curve of shoulder-blades,

And drift in the warm, buzzing hollow of lavish sleep.

Wine-soaked nights brim with the clinking of expectant glasses.

The glowing piano spills out its sound in pools of light.

Misty hours slide by behind closed curtains and blushing walls.

Mornings lose themselves to soft murmurs, slow breakfasts.

The throbbing contrast of orange on teal seems uncanny in the lamplight.

Bright heather, stretching along hillsides, is a vivid streak across the eye.

Aching yellow fields against the morose, darkening day –

All etched across the bustling world in silent, blistering lucidity.

Sometimes the bleak evening hides its hushed perfection

Sometimes a weary chill veils the silver joy of frost on branches.

The steady pulse of day and night beats on and on –

Half-term means a well-deserved rest. Of course, it used to be more peaceful than it is now. Before we had children, I wrote the above about it. When we were younger, it flew by in a daze of late evenings, trips away, friends, bars, wine and sleep. But it was a break when we had time to really take things in – we were, and still are, often too busy during term time to really pause and enjoy the things around us.

Needless to say, a lot of what the poem describes is now consigned to the past – particularly the sleep! These days, making it to 7 am without one of us having to get up for at least one of the children is our ultimate lie-in.

The message I was trying to convey when I wrote the poem still rings true though, particularly now that the children are here, and the seemingly endless routine means we rarely get time to pause. It’s important not to get so caught up in the details of life that you forget to savour it. So here are my plans for this half-term’s ‘pause’:

Spend time with the family. We have a few trips and visits planned. Working during term means I have to sacrifice more time than I would like. Catching up on quality time is always an important goal during the holidays. We plan to visit a few National Trust sites and maybe look into membership. I will be posting about our trips later in the week.

Create a new header for the blog and all my social media pages. The current painting was always intended to be temporary, as much as I was pleased with it. I hope to draw or paint something that says more about me and what I write about. Look out for it!

Catch up on a lot of marking.

Write several blog posts and other writing projects so that I am ahead of the game when school starts again.

Date day – The husband and I have a whole day, child-free. This happens about once a year and we plan to have a meal, spend some time together and generally do lots of sitting quietly and using the bathroom alone.

And my last goal- Pause. Take a breath.

When you have small children, a demanding job, concerns about money, problems in relationships – whatever responsibilities and stresses fill up your hours – it is sometimes easy to forget. There are always wonderful things happening all around you, if you take the time to find them.

My baby girl just learned to walk. Every day, she adds two or three more steps to the number she can manage. She’ll be chasing her big brother around in the space of a few months.

I see my son make progress with so many things every day and it fills me with hope for his future.

I am in awe that my most recent posts about autism have reached so many people.

The world is astonishing. And in between the sleepless nights, the marking, the parents’ evenings, the nappies changed, the laundry washed and dried… it’s easy to forget to remember it.

So I might be little quieter on social media this week while I take the time to catch-up, rest, and savour the things around me.

25 Comments

Beautiful poem. I agree with you when you wrote that it’s “important not to get caught in the details of life that you forget to savour it”, especially when it comes to little ones. Time flies so fast, too fast sometimes, I want it to slow down just a little bit. x

Enjoy the break! Definitely think pausing is often forgotten. Some days there seems to be so much to do and not enough time to do it in, we cram in more and more and miss the simple things going on around us. A pause is always good.

Aaah, beautiful poem, so descriptive and lovely! everything you said is so true! Especially getting bogged down by the everyday worries and stresses of life, it’s so easy to forget what is really important, and miss incredible things that are right in front of you. I also think about the old holidays my husband and I used to take… On the one hand I miss them, but I know that the next time we can have that back again, it will mean that the children will have moved out, and that makes me sad too… I like that you’ve made a very practical list of things to do during your pause! It took me ages to sort out a blog header, and to plug into all the social media required for promoting a blog! Have a great break, and thank you for linking up to the very first #bigpinklink!

I really hope you get your chance to pause. It sounds like you are set up to do just that. We have booked a holiday today in two weeks which will be our unofficial half term as Monkey starts school in Sept so we are not constrained yet. But we will have a baby too in a couple of months so I feel its important we spend some time together now and take it all in before the sleep deprivation and life gets turned upside down again 🙂 xx

Lovely Poem, we never did much in the half term before kids (unfortunately where I worked didn’t take half term :p) but now I enjoy the half term with our little monster playing fun, games and duvet days!!

I have been feeling the same as you when you point out that the day to day can overshadow or make us forget about how amazing the world is! It’s so easy to get caught up in the cooking, cleaning & laundry. Congrats to your little lady! Those first few weeks of walking are pure magic! #anythinggoes x

I hope you managed to have a lovely half term break. A whole day without children sounds divine! We are still yet to do this and my boys are 5 and 3 – must try harder! Quality time with your partner is important isn’t it?

Thank you for linking up to #KCACOLS and I hope to see you back again on sunday x

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About Someone’s Mum

I am Danielle and I am an ex-English teacher living on the border between Gloucestershire and Worcestershire. I have two children, a boy, aged five, who is on the autistic spectrum, and a daughter, aged three… read more