about

Im Kelly,a 21 year old girl living life in the body of 38 year old woman. When i started this blog i was 8 months pregnant with baby no. 3 , on maternity leave and decided to blog primarily as i was dying of boredom but couldnt go out and do all the interesting things i usually do. This No.3 bean was rather large and made doing anything that involved moving more than my fingertips rather unappealling. Also, im a bit of an anally retentive order lovin' freak and i like the idea of being able to blab on about whats on my mind and have it look good at the same time. Im an epidemiologist (when im not on leave) at a well known research institute where Im currently also trying to finish my PhD ( year 5 and counting), which has the rather droll title of 'Performance of a prediction model to triage access to priority public dental care in South Australia', Angelina Jolie eat ya heart out! What was i thinking when i moved over from the social sciences?? So if prediction models are your thing, drop me a line, i need some motivation.

Prior to being an epidemiologist i was a nanny, a cleaner, a research assistant, a tutor, a waitress, a data entry mole and human guinea pig. Ive lived and studied overseas and travelled to all corners of the globe and I still love an airport. My other career research work has involved more exciting subjects than teeth and involved the foreign sex trade in australia and tobacco control. Although having said that, teeth can be quite interesting if you know where to look! ( i think that might make me a nerd). I had my first daughter (B1) at 24 while all my friends were off exploring the world and partying hard so to stop myself going nuts I went back to university to do a Masters degree in Public Health (what was i thinking at 6 weeks post partum!?). This changed my life course and led me to space the Im in now. Somewhere along the way a had another daughter (B2) and started a PhD. Nuts.

I share my life with a husband, two daughters in addition to new boy bean and 3/4 of a cat- 1 leg removed due to feline occupational accident. i ran over the other cat, accidently. The kids still dont know it was me. In a previous lifetime i was married to a man who is not my current husband but is the father to B1 and 2, lost lots of weight, took up running, kick boxing and weights, took on a mortgage whilst supporting 2 kids on a PhD scholarship and internet dating! In same previous lifetime i also had 2 whippets, great running companions but not a lot a brain power in a whippet, but then you dont need a foot warmer to think... Then I met my man, sold the house and dropped the mortgage, moved into his amazing Japanese inspired house that he built in the hills and we have been traveling the world and creating new things since we met.

Simon is Jaspers' dad and my partner of nearly 5 years and is lifes' eternal optimist and my zen master. Its his second round at life now too, having lost his first wife suddenly to meningitis after 25 years of marriage and a step daughter in an accident 4 years prior. He spent his early adult years cruising the world sailing other peoples' yachts to port and living in Paris supporting himself as a nanny, a busker and an artist. He moved to Australia from California and eventually settled in Adelaide where he built our amazing, inspiring and eclectic house and garden. He constantly challenges me and I love him to bits. He's a very generous and open soul who can pull some very funny faces. He is now a full time activist and volunteer, having retired at 38 to devote himself to the environmental cause and is about to become a full time dad. The bastard. Having waxed lyrical for years about gendered roles, having to go back to work next year and leave him home with the boy will put my politics to the test (and my trust!!). We're a family of crunchy feminists from 2 lines of hippies who try and live simply with sustainable principles and life is pretty cruisy around here. Cruisy but not mindless...

We have some pretty awesome vegetable patches, a creek with an island, lots of bonsai, solar power, a 'recycled' biological house, (called Pandragon) half a boat ( Simon is yet to finish the other half), a cellar full of homemade fruit and vegetable wine; even beetroot, a forest of blackwood, a shrine in the dining room with a gravel garden, a hole somewhere in the roof, lots of fun and a grand plan to sail around the world in five years (NOT in the boat simon is building) taking the girls and boybean on a 3 year family building, life enhancing adventure.

This blog is about all that.