I've had such a beautiful day, I'm feeling all loved up and full. Full in the sense the old shamen women used to use... I am full.
Where do I start?
On Thursday I spoke to my sister Elise and found out that she was going to be driving down to Sydney with the three girls, partly to surprise Mum for her birthday and partly because she got asked to participate in a screenplay reading. What a great surprise for Mum. As soon as I got off the phone from Elise I was back on the phone to book another ticket for the lunch cruise. I didn't mention any of this on here before in case Mum got some mad urge to read my blog.
Anyway, the girls arrived in Sydney about 11 am and my sister was straight over to pick me up to rush over to the Quay. On the way there we had a great chat. One of those great spontaneous talks where you manage to say so much in so little time. And my much, I do mean much. I found out why marriage is so important to my sister... why she wants it so badly. I also found out that she has been making serious plans to move back into her house in Bangalow so that Mum can have a proper home. She wants Mum back up there. You have no idea how happy that made me... that she really is doing something about the situation. I guess she really did take me seriously because I'd never called her before and told her what she had to do. I'd never asked her for help before when it came to Mum. But I can see that Mum's situation is really putting horrible stress on her. Her health seems to be deteriorating fast and it's such a huge load off my mind to know that Elise is going to look after her when I'm gone.
So that changes things a little for me too because now I'm gathering all the things of mine that will them have a better home. I will not be selling my bed or my hanging rack anymore. I'll be sending them up North for Mum's nest. I've already started gathering all my bits together so that Elise can take some stuff back with her on Tuesday when she leaves.
So all of this happened in the car over the space of about 20 minutes. Then Elise told me how proud she was of me that I was doing this despite the circumstances.
Oh yeah... I forgot. Elise also gave me my 30th birthday present early. A lot of people - family and friends - seem to have the inclination to call me Tasha Bear. Well Elise got me a beautiful collector bear whose official name on the tag was Tasha Bear. She said that was too uncanny for her not to get it and to top it off this bear holds a blankie just like I used to when I was a tadpole. I used to have a purple blanket with purple satin binding... I carried it around everywhere.

We got to the Quay a little earlier than scheduled so I called Mum and asked her to meet me at a little cafe tucked away on the wharf. Elise and I sat at separate tables and waited for Mum to arrive. She cried so much when she saw Elise there. She couldn't stop laughing and crying... my beautiful mamabear. She was so happy.
When we got on the boat we got told we'd been seated in the exclusion Captain's lounge. What I didn't realise is that we'd be the only ones seated in the Captain's lounge. It was great!! Top deck surrounded by glass windows so views all around and complete privacy.
Sheesh, I'm writing so much now and I'm so tired it's all jumbled and simplistic but I want to try to get it all down to retain some detail. Some things though just don't translate well unless you take the time to tell the story properly and I feel like I'm rushing through. Ok, I'll just get it down any which way and that way I'll have markers for the memories later.
We ended up missing our stop. Yep, we were supposed to get off at Circular Quay... Elise had to meet Patrick there so they could go to the play reading together and Mum and I were supposed to meet Steve there. The thing is, we were so deep in conversation that we didn't realise we were supposed to get off the boat until the boat had reversed way back into the harbour. After the initial panic we of course thought it was hilarious. Meanwhile, Steve and Patrick were still waiting for us on the wharf and were definitely not impressed. We ended up having to get off at King street Wharf and getting a cab back.
Mum and I planned to go over to Tamarama for dinner so we could spend some time with the kids. Tahlia and Tessa had decided they wanted to cook so Mum and I ended up on grocery duty.
It was so great to see all my cherubs. Rani has her pixie haircut again and she's starting to grow up now so even though her personality is still really full-on she's softened a little. She turns 5 next month! She doesn't like her haircut because she says she's the only girl at school with short hair. But it looks gorgeous :) I remember the first time she got a cut like that she was much younger and Elise had decided to cut her hair at home... the pixie cut was the only way the hairdresser could find to fix the ensuing disaster.
Tahlia is really growing up fast now. She'll be 13 this year. And Josh, well he was master of his domain. He had 11 females in the house and he was the only male! Every 16 year old's dream :)
We had a great night, playing, laughing, singing, hugging, and all that great stuff.
So in a nutshell, that's the story of today :)
Let's see what tomorrow brings. The clocks go back an hour tonight. I need to be down at Bondi Beach at 9.30 to meet the tribe for breakfast.

Ninite! :)

It's been a while since I've written. As you can imagine there has been a lot of activity surrounding the trip. I've learnt a lot about myself and the world lately, seeing how much I've changed in so many ways but I guess I've been more of a 'surface' dweller and not really feeling the urge to write about anything. Just being driven to get things done. I have a sense that a lot of things will become clearer to me whilst I'm away and so I'm just going along for the ride. I'm also trying to be very careful of what I say to people right now because I'm so 'charged' I'm not sure I can trust my own feelings about things.

Where am I at with the plans?
Well yesterday I managed to sell all of my furniture save for my bed and hanging rack - though I'm sure those will go too and if they don't they will go to a shelter and still serve their purpose.
I have my ticket, I'm waiting on approval of cover for my pre-existing condition before I can finalise my travel insurance, I've got pretty much everything I need for the trip so I guess I'm set. All that's really left now is to finish this site, organise copies of paperwork and important documents, trip to the dentist and optometrist, pick up my French passport, change my address everywhere, change all the bills and the lease over to Trace's name, ensure my mother is an agent on all my bank accounts, ensure all my bank accounts are linked and all cards linked to net banking... hmmm... quite a few things eh? Well I feel it's all under control. Oh yeah, I also have to sell my books.

Aside from that, I had started by planning out my trip to Hawaii and now I realise that's quite futile. The most important thing is to book the first couple of nights accommodation in Oahu and Vancouver. For the rest, flexibility is the key :)

How am I feeling about it all? excited, exhilirated, ready. Scared? not really. I can deal with it all so long as my health holds up.

This Friday is Mum's birthday. On Saturday I'm taking her on a lunch cruise and afterwards I think Steve wants to see us. It's been a while since we've seen him so that should be good. Sunday morning Carla wants to meet up for brunch so that should be nice also.

Oh yeah... I still also have to organise storage for my stuff, and my farewell