The Wet Season gives Peter the opportunity to do things around the house that he cannot get to in his busy work season (the Dry). This year we set out to be purposefully and not let these two months disappear on us.
The mornings are to be spent with the kids available for family projects. The girls have helped me declutter and organise some cupboards – we really still have some more to do. The boys have been outside helping Peter.
The first project was to build a picket fence gateway leading to our front door. Though Joshua enjoyed being out with Dad it was Daniel who has come alive with this project. He would claim early every morning, “I’m sorry Mum, can’t do my jobs, Dad NEEDS me!” Emphasis on the “need”!!! Of course, most mornings this worked, as the opportunity to work with Peter doesn’t come his way very often. After a couple of days he was confidently using the power drill as they prepared for nails etc. He was very proud of himself – and so he should be.
He also learnt to reset the lawn sprinklers to manual which is a great accomplishment considering he can’t read and it took me months to be sure I was getting it right!
The second project Pete is working on is paving a path from the front door down through the gateway to the driveway. Pete and the boys went to pick up a little Kanga Digger to do the earthworks. Daniel’s eye’s gleamed as much as Peter’s did – boys and their toys!
Installing the gateway was great timing for Joshua. That morning he had just worked on “Levers” in his science and in the afternoon Pete needed him to help him with levelling this gateway – lifting things with a lever! A great application for something he had just read about that morning.
