Next week our kids will return to classes at school, except for the eldest who only has her HSC final exams to go.

My husband and I return to the office in December, but I’m already out and about quite a bit – there were ordinations to the priesthood on Monday and a meeting at my daughter’s school formal venue yesterday.

I know that nearly four months of strict lockdown felt like torture for some people, but not for me. It took a couple of weeks to adjust but there were some lovely benefits. A more manageable pace of life, mainly, which meant there’s been a nice mix of work and family time, more time outdoors and for exercise and some creative pursuits.

I revived this blog, wrestled with a book introduction, planted my spring garden (although I would have done that anyway), and took a liking to painting by numbers. That’s the work in progress pictured above, a first attempt I’m sharing with three of the kids.

We all enjoyed observing a wide variety of birdlife literally in our backyard. Over these weeks as winter ended and spring began we’ve seen kookaburras feasting on lizards and magpies on crickets, cockatoos ripping fruit and the occasional branch off trees, cockatoos and currawongs, minors, lorikeets, rosellas, a spotted dove, crested and non-crested pigeons. And Sunday family bushwalks became a thing.

Obviously it’s better to be out of lockdown though. Last weekend, the first time we went to a place other than grocery shopping or the doctors’, we visited grandparents. I just have to figure out a way to make time for some of the other things we enjoyed going forward.

There are things I’m happy to leave behind with the lockdown conditions though:

Wearing my parka in the house all day, which is always freezing-to-cool except for peak summertime.

Spending lunch breaks cleaning the kitchen and stacking the dishwasher. And occasionally going somewhere to eat further than our back verandah, with people other than our kids

Online meetings, so many of them…

Having work calls interrupted by the sound of a neighbour’s lawnmower or a leafblower starting up

The weird feeling of having no transition between work time and home time. Even in the days when I was freelancing I would end the day and go and collect the kids from school, and that driving time would feel like a bit of a commute I guess. Here I just stand up from my desk – and that’s it – I’m home! Which is nice, but also strangely mentally draining. Since my ‘home’ time is more intense than work time it’s nice to have a break between them.

What about you? Have you endured a lockdown? What got you through it?