Six Pandemic Christmas Wreaths

As the pandemic hit Australia I submerged myself in learning to crochet and making six Pandemic Christmas Wreaths. I finished them when I was forced into lockdown due to a broken ankle.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of Connection and Optimism

Remember those first weeks of lockdown early in 2020, before we got jaded and screened out? That’s when it was still fun to do zoom calls. I hadn’t yet done 8 weeks of telehealth as a psychologist and wondered how many tears I had missed.

Like many others we connected with family overseas, particularly my nephew and his wife from Wellington, New Zealand. They had visited us in January 2020 with their gorgeous baby son. New Zealand entered a harsher lockdown than we did in Australia at that time so we supported each other by catching up on Zoom, playing trivia quizzes, sharing lockdown stories and Covid-19 stats. It was during one of these zoom calls that I launched my Christmas Pandemic Wreath project. I stitched love for my New Zealand family into to this wreath along with my hope that, as they hang the wreath each Christmas, they would look back at 2020 as a year of connection and optimism.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of Grief and Love

The impact of the pandemic hit my son and his fiancé with an unexpected ferocity. She was unable to return to the UK for her mother’s funeral and her sister’s wedding was cancelled. The ease of living overseas, where a trip home is just a day and some hard earned money evaporated overnight. If she went home for the funeral, she would not be able to return to Australia. I’m so glad she stayed. I’m also glad they had travelled to see her mum when she was ill earlier in the year.

There is no way my son and his fiancé will forget 2020. As they hang this wreath each Christmas  I hope they honour their grief and remember the love they share together, with others who are not always present, and that we share it with them.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of Grit and Thankfulness

Christmas wreathI worried more as I stitched this wreath.  My daughter and her partner were locked down in Melbourne. Basically they’d been in lockdown since 21 March 2020 and restrictions didn’t begin to ease until November 2020. I worried about their mental health, their relationship and their jobs. While they found it tough they also flourished creating art, furniture and gourmet meals. They embraced a buy local strategy and our birthdays were celebrated with bundles of gifts found within a 5 km ring of where they lived.

The Melbourne lockdown saved Australia from a rampant attack by Covid-19. This wreath embraces the thanks I have for all Victorians who kept the rest of us safe. I hope when my daughter and her partner hang this wreath each Christmas, they look back with pride at the intense time they spent together, the determined grit they displayed, and all they achieved and created.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of Family Resilience and Caring

This wreath is for Ms Forgotten Australian’s youngest daughter’s family who hold a special place in my heart. The family underwent 4 Covid tests this year, whereas I had none. Like any family, the kids, 4 and 6 years old, bought home coughs and colds which resulted in multiple tests. I don’t know any child who looks forward to having a stranger stick a swab up their nose! It takes fortitude and integrity to turn up for yet another Covid test with fearful children, who probably just have a cold.

Families like them helped keep Brisbane safe. This family, like many others, coped with disruptions to their home, work, school and leisure routine  and yet they continued to care for the vulnerable in their community. They got on with the task, complaint free, resiliently adapting to the changes. As they hang the wreath each Christmas I hope they remember their collective resilience and the way they cared for each other through this time.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of New Beginnings

Our nephew, his pregnant wife, their 9 month and 4 year old daughters started the year living with us as they made the move from Sydney to Brisbane. Then they bought a new home, he started a new job, she upstaged him by giving birth to a new  baby girl during Covid, and of course were separated from interstate family. Its been lovely watching their excitement and joy at each new adventure. As they hang their wreath each Christmas, I’m sure they will remember the many new beginnings of 2020, not just that they lived through a pandemic.

A Pandemic Christmas Wreath of Friendship 

As I stitched this wreath, I thought of the times we have shared with these friends this year. We started this year together in South America, a lifetime ago. While there we watched the fires burn in Australia, never thinking that this would be just the beginning of a year like no other.

As the Covid-19  raged, we were separated from family and supported each other.

As family members broke bones, we checked in with each other! Thanks for the loan of the crutches!

Together we snuck a brief holiday to Caloundra, not a destination we would normally have chosen, usually planning trips much father away.  As we walked and talked, it helped eased the stress of the year.

As they hang this wreath at each Christmas, I hope it reminds them of our friendship, the good times we’ve shared and how we survived a pandemic!

Inspiration

My wreaths were inspired by Lucy at Attic 24. She’s amazing.  You can find her patterns and inspiration here Attic24: Crochet (typepad.com)

Merry Christmas to all

I could make more wreaths, as I am blessed with family and friends who have helped me endure the devastation of the Australian bushfires, the pandemic and now a broken ankle, but I think I’m done.  Lets hope 2021 is remembered as a time we all paused, focused on what we want for our lives and made some lasting changes.

I hope you all made the most of Christmas, wherever you were, whoever you were with.

Estranged mothers and adult children

woman sadIt’s Mother’s Day this Sunday in Australia. A day when many families come together to rejoice in the loving bond between mothers and children. A day to celebrate the blood, sweat and tears that ooze out of mothers while raising children. But for some families, it’s a day of heartbreak. There will be no bunches of flowers or boxes of chocolates. Adult children and parents can become estranged to each other. That’s tough.

Those that choose to break the relationship with their parent or child, often see it as a move of self-preservation. For some reason, the family dynamics have gone awry and the person, unable to stand the emotional turmoil, chooses to leave. A broken attachment can feel calmer and safer Continue reading

Celebrating Contraception on Mother’s Day

It’s Mother’s Day in Australia today and I have just finished reading The Birth of the Pill by Jonathan Eig. It made me realise how this contraceptive profoundly changed the experience of motherhood for me and for many women across the world. The book is truly fascinating and reads like a thriller.  Here’s the blurb from the cover:

the-birth-of-the-pill-1In the winter of 1950 Margaret Sanger, then seventy-one, and who had campaigned for women’s rights to control their own fertility for five decades, arrived at a Park Avenue apartment building. She had come to meet a visionary scientist with a dubious reputation, more than twenty years her junior. His name was Gregory Pincus. Continue reading

Breast really was the best

My favourite breastfeeding photo.
My favourite breastfeeding photo, graduating university and feeding my daughter

About 28 years ago I was privileged to become friends with a fantastic group of women.  We were all new mums, learning the tiring, challenging and beautiful art of mothering together.  We were passionate about our role as mothers and were all members of the Nursing Mothers Association, now the Australian Breast Feeding Association. I can’t remember what I learnt at our regular meetings but I well remember the support, understanding and bond I shared with these women.  On the days that I doubted my ability and when I felt as if I was going crazy from lack of sleep they were the ones that made the tea and passed the tissues.

We all breastfed our babies.  The five of us suckled 14 babies.  We weathered Continue reading

In my daughter’s home

P1080269One of my greatest pleasures is staying in my daughter’s home.  I love that when we arrive she has cleaned and tidied the place, bought the food we like to eat and made arrangements to explore Melbourne. Best of all is that, at 26 years old, she clearly enjoys spending time with us. None of these actions are in themselves profound, they are the sorts of things that we all do when having guests to stay, however I notice and cherish them all.

P1080267If you ask parents of young children what future hopes they hold they will inevitably answer Continue reading

More than a family barbeque

P1070662My niece Melissa was born when I was 19 years old and working in Queenstown, just before I headed to Australia. I remember queuing up to use the pay phone in downtown Queenstown so I could ring home and find out whether my sister’s baby had been born. That’s how you kept in touch before mobile phones. I was very excited to be an aunty for the first time. I had been diligently knitting a baby jacket and booties in a soft mint green. In those days you had no idea of what sex the baby would be so mint green was a safe colour, appropriate for either a boy or a girl. For some reason I thought that the beautiful and delicate layette should be finished with a hard dark brown ribbon. Maybe this was my clumsy gesture towards hoping that Continue reading