Every morning my husband gets up early, before 5am, which is dark during these Winter days. He makes sure the fire is still burning, or he starts it again, so that when we get up later the house is warm and cosy. This is what he does almost every morning, for us - his family. He also likes the quiet time in the house, all on his own. 

He makes me coffee every morning, and wakes the kids up. He mostly makes breakfast for River, and sometimes the big two if they're communicative about what they actually want (sigh - teenagers / pre-teens!). All five of us somehow each morning manage to get everyone ready and out the door, lunches made, bags packed, dramas and lost notes and unbrushed hair, and unwashed faces. Mostly almost on time every day. 

Sam does the school drop off. Every day, while I've been writing my book, he gathers the kids into the car and takes them to town. Monday and Tuesday are preschool days, so he drops River off too. Some days he'll check the post, go for a skateboard at the park, visit the hardware, or the healthfood shop, or the op-shop, or library, or get some more milk for our elevenses coffee. 

Then he heads home (it's a 20 minute drive from our house into town). It's lucky he likes driving, because he does the trip into town often two times every day, for drop-off and pick-up.

When he came home today, me writing the final words on my book, pushing to get it sent before tomorrow's deadline, he cleaned the breakfast and lunch making stuff. He washed up - the epic mess from yesterday's meals (six people in one rainy day create a LOT of washing up). Then he made the coffee, which I drank while still writing. He drank while sitting down for a moment. 

Before he left, to get the kids again, he brought me tea, and spilt extra firewood. I'm here writing a newsletter, and blog posts, and checking my emails to see if my editor has received my words yet (of course not because I live in Australia and she lives in UK, which means she's still asleep, or only just waking up right now... having her morning coffee). 

Sam will take the big kids to drama class, he'll take the small kid to feed him (pre-school is hungry work for a three-year-old), and then do the shopping, visit the library, deal with a tired child, and the time frame of a kids' drama class, before he has to come home again. 

Meanwhile, here I am... writing words, wondering about how to continue generating an income, tending the fire, and pondering my second cup of tea, perhaps a spot of sitting on the couch with some stitch work; my fearless quilt.

I ponder again and again life -  the usefulness we each have, for our family, our community, what we give and what we get. Do we remember to say thank you, to look at someone when they bring us tea, or run up our goods at the supermarket, or re-new our overdue books at the library, or fill our car at the petrol station (yep, we have one of those local petrol stations in our town - amongst about 4 others that don't), or teach our kids be it in school or after school. The way that what we contribute has nothing to do with money, in a family or a community or society, or the world. What we contribute is more than that, bigger than that, outside of any financial countings. 

And yes - there I said it. I sent my words to my editor today. 20,000 words. It will be some time before it becomes a book. This is the first edit, so I'm sure there'll be rewrites and such necessary. But there.... I'm on the way to becoming an author!