My mom’s only gonna be here for a fortnight I feel like I gotta make the most out of our time together. Squeeze as much activity as I could to make her stay worthwhile.

But between work and chauffeuring Raven to her extra-curricular activities three days out of the week, there’s not really much time or energy left and I feel guilty that she’s home by herself most of the time with only Facebook to keep her company.

But, boy, is it nice to come home to a clean house!

So today, on my day off, I made up for it by taking her out to breakfast. A glorious sunny day spent with her and Jeff (who also had the day off) at Stella’s Kitchen in Lysterfield.

Driving around the corner to the cafe, two kangaroos hopped out of the bush, officially welcoming her to Australia.

We enjoyed our coffees and conversations in the sunshine. Jeff, always the jester capable of making my mom laugh with his dad jokes and witty comments when he’s not talking about whatever topic he wants to raise at any given moment so there’s always a steady flow and exchange of ideas and opinions.

He’s good at that, Jeff. Although I notice that most of the time with my mom, he talks about how awesome Australia is. I’m starting to suspect he’s secretly on a mission to convince her to move here. So much so that my mom starts joking about marrying an Aussie bloke and the joke starts to sound half-meant and I butt in with “If he’s rich, I’m calling him ‘Daddy’ straight away!”

She said she likes Australia, though. Said that if given the chance, she’d be happy to live here but she’s too old and it’s too late so her next goal is to visit “Switcherland” while she still can while keeping Philippines as her home base where she has her driver and her Garden Club friends and her freedom away from three daughters who probably does her head in every now and then.

Which is what happens when your daughters grow up to be exactly like you. It’s annoying.

Except me. I’m the chill one. Ha!