When the Fish are jumping...

When I think of adventure I think of doing the daring things that make your stomach drop to your kneecaps and cause an adrenaline rush that keeps you going for hours! The oh my goodness you've got to be kidding me kind of things.

Some of our most memorable adventurous moments have been born out of seemingly ordinary situations. There we were plodding along when out of nowhere Whammo! We found ourselves in an adventure guaranteed to curl our toes or at the very least fall about laughing hysterically! Amazingly that is a common by-product of the A-D family's adventurous escapades. The laughing!!!!

Before I had children I was a Cub Scout Leader, looking after a Cub Pack of 20 or so boys and girls between the ages of 8 and 11. My Husband at the same time was a Scout leader. When we found ourselves expecting our first child, we continued to do all the things we did previously with scouts: abseiling, canoeing, bushwalking, mountain climbing, camping etc.

When the opportunity came up to take 30 kids and a few adults NIGHT canoeing we both jumped at the chance, despite my being nearly 8 months pregnant. And it was amazing. So beautiful out on the water and peaceful....well as peaceful as it can be with 30 kids. I am so glad that we did it because it was truly memorable! The water was a wash of silver in the moonlight and our canoes were the only boats on the river. All you could hear was the happy banter between kids and the splash of paddles, all under a blanket of glorious stars. It was just magic.

The thing is...when you are 8 months pregnant you do tend to be quite big, and wouldn't you know it but a mullet (startled by the ominous black shape of the canoe) jumped into the canoe landing immediately between my legs and flip flopping madly around my nether regions!!!!! Might I remind you that at that point in my pregnancy anything below my burgeoning belly was out of my immediate sight and reach. What ensued was nothing short of hilarious...a life and death struggle for the fish and a logistical nightmare for a very pregnant woman in an unstable canoe with two 10 year old boys too polite to even go there!!!! Eventually after nearly capsizing multiple times I managed to flick the fish back into the water, but not without quite a lot of excitement and noise and side splitting laughter! It was sooo funny, I still laugh out loud even now as I recall that moment.

In this case the adventure whilst quite startling, was absolutely hilarious! And I have discovered that whenever we have been faced with anything that's even remotely adventurous...or frightening...it ends up being hilarious!

I have been caught in a flash flood whilst driving through a causeway, mock-charged by an African Elephant, nearly lost my Husband after an extreme 4wd adventure thanks to Google Maps, I have been all over the Sunshine Coast with the Cub Scouts with my babies in tow, I have abseiled with my two eldest girls when they were tiny tots!

But nothing compares to the daily adventure of being a Mum. From the first moment you find out you are expecting, to the 40weeks of carrying that little miracle around inside you, to the moment you hold your precious child in rapt wonder...Now that's an adventure. The adventures in Mothering will curl your toes, give you a surge or two of adrenaline when you least expect it and turn your hair gray! I encourage you to celebrate the fun in those daily adventures and earn your stripes as a Mum. Stuff will happen anyway so strap yourself in and hang on!

You are in for the ride of your life!

Here's to another year of "Adventures In Mothering".