Dots.

This afternoon we spent a few hours sitting in the red dirt near the base of Uluru watching an Aboriginal woman draw pictures and maps and symbols in the dirt with her hands. She was so graceful and fluid with her actions. Unfortunately I wasn't allowed to take any photos but gosh I wanted to.

After her demonstration, we were each given a piece of parchment and some paints and sent on our way to paint our own stories.

Miss Jazzy.

This is a story of our caravan trip. The sun is the sunset at Uluru, the clouds are the freezing weather at our home in Daylesford, the green bits on the sides are where we skipped, if you look closely you can see us swimming in the blue ocean in a few weeks time.

Farmer Bren.

This is the story of our journey. Our caravan is driving along the road, there is the starry night sky where Indi and I went to an astronomy talk, the mines in Cooper Pedy, Uluru and the ocean we are heading towards.

Indi.

This is the story of our family's life. The green spiral represents our home in Daylesford and the muddy path leading up to our home, the green dots are the trees, the blue dots are people we know, the blue dots with red in the middle are us, the white spiral is the caravan, the white dots are people we are going to meet, the yellow spiral is Uluru and the rainbow paths are all the paths we are going to take on our adventure.

Miss Pepper.

This is the story of our holiday. The orange is the sunset at Uluru, the red bit is where we skipped, the white is the path we rode around the big rock, the red thing is Uluru, the black is night time and the white dots are people.

And mine. A simple little story of a family's caravan trip from their home to the great big red rock in the desert. The black lines are the roads travelled, the dots above the roads are the skies and the stars and those below are the animals and birds and flowers and trees. The symbols above the van are the four girls and one boy that make up our little gang of five.

Oh how I loved dotting those dots. I could have stayed there dotting with the back of a skewer all day long. There was something so relaxing and therapeutic about it.

I loved the whole experience too. Despite the fact that I'm sure the painter and her interpreter do exactly the same thing every single day for another bunch of tourists. Usually that bugs the crap out of me but today it didn't. When I started chatting to the interpreter and discovered she's just an ordinary Mother like me, for once it was a back story I didn't want to hear. I enjoyed getting lost in the symbols and dots and wiggly lines.

We have no grand plan for the girl's schooling while we are away. Their school seemed to think they would learn enough on the road and with reading, writing and some maths games they should be able to keep up to date. Even though its only early days, I do think about it sometimes and wonder how they'll slot back in next year. But after a day like today I feel confident that they'll be fine. They learn so much more out of the classroom today than they could ever learn in. Art, culture, social studies, geography, money, language, geology, English...

I hope you had a chance to get a bit lost in something you love today.

Bye. xx