Autumn leaves and monkey mittens...

I think I'm in love with Autumn. My long affair with Summer has fizzled a bit. A couple of years of being either pregnant or worried about hot, miserable babies has taken the shine off. I never used to feel the heat much. I could happily sweat my way through most of Summer feeling cheery and sun drunk. But, lately I've been as happy as a pig in muck with all this new season has brought. There's no hype or expectation in Autumn. Every beautiful, sunny day is a bonus as we stare ahead apprehensively into the cold, bleakness of Winter.
Family time and sucking in the glory of the great outdoors feels like top priority at the moment. We've got to make the most of the space, colour and warmth before we find ourselves confined to musty indoor zones with grey window views, tripping over each other and jostling for personal space.
Hooking the caravan on and heading to Hall's Gap has been just the thing for our last outdoorsy hurrah, and we scored magnificent weather for all but one of our five night stay, too. We deliberately chose Halls Gap as our pre-Easter getaway destination because there's very little to do. It's the ultimate low-fi place without being completely disconnected from convenience and comfort. If we wanted an ice-cream or a shower we could have one, but other than that, our entertainment consisted of walking, reading and knitting (super cute monkey mittens, no less!) with some marshmallow toasting thrown in for fun.
While firmly parked in my synthetic, blue, collapsible camping chair I started to ponder camping etiquette. Caravan park communities fascinate me in the way they allow people of all kinds to live for extended lengths of time, side by side with little more than canvas and aluminium separating them. Adding a few kids to the mix only serves to complicate matters further. Especially my kids. Having grown up as a shy child I'm finding it very challenging parenting two of the least shy children I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. Within minutes of having released them from the clutches of their car seats after unhitching our caravan, my son and daughter had thoughtfully introduced themselves to our nearest neighbours and begun enlightening them with all manner of details about their lives. Stranger danger? Foreign concept. Luckily the type of crowd attracted to the caravanning lifestyle tend to be like minded and (I hope) good people.
Our neighbours turned out to be great people and luckily our children seem to have the ability to charm the socks off anyone. Including the older lady and her husband over the road. After introducing himself to the couple our son proceeded to invite himself in and help himself to the slice container. Now I love a good slab of Nanna slice as much as the next person, but this is crossing the line isn't it? I'm still not sure where that invisible line is in a caravan park. The boundaries are merely vague lines between number markers. No eight foot colorbond here. And there are no doorbells, and to my two, no difference between playing on our foam jigsaw flooring to that in the annexe next door.
But, maybe that's the charm of camping. It allows us to be a part of a community that shares space and responsibility. A kind of community where all kinds come together to meet, chat and create connections. While I was busy worrying about our children overstaying their welcome with the people camping alongside and over the road from us, they were busy making friends and building trust. While I was frantically scanning the landscape trying to get a location on my wandering two, I laid eyes on a friendly, helpful fellow camper or older child conscientiously ushering one of my children back towards our caravan. It's reasonable to have an eye on your kids and to know what they are up to, but in our modern, hyper vigilance we've lost something. So, I'm going to resist the urge to succumb to self contained holidays where I can lock my kids up and not worry about them. Instead I'm going to start plotting and planning the next adventure in the great outdoors and eagerly anticipate my son or daughter introducing me to some new and interesting, like minded campers.

Another benefit of happy times spent in caravan parks is new ideas and enthusiasm for the buntyandsars caravan range. And after a sunny Saturday at Daylesford Makers Market I'll be needing some inspiration to replenish my stock of "Pull-along" cards because, once again, they've been rather popular. I'm even starting to wonder if it might be worthwhile adding some new products to this range. Some framed illustrations maybe, or what about a caravan colouring book?? Buntyandsars is very child focused with products inspired by and aimed at the younger set, but I speak to lots of grown ups who are besotted by her charms too, so I'd like to design and create some things more suited to the mature fans in the audience. As always, stay tuned...the ideas keep coming! Now, with my chocolate addled brain I think I'd best post this one before I continue with anymore scattered rambling!
p.s... http://www.imaginelovely.blogspot.com/ ...:-)