On our children’s birthdays, I interview them, asking them the same set of questions each year. This allows us to see how they’re changing and if they have interests that remain the same. I call these the Birthday Interviews. This is Calista’s third interview.

What are you going to be when you grow up?
A dancer.
What’s that going to be like?
Well, I’m going to wear ballet shoes and a ballet dress.

What are your favourite toys?
Unicorns.

Who are your best friends?
The little boy at the house with Rory the Racing Car because we went sliding down a mattress.

What makes you happy?
Tickling me because it makes me laugh.

What makes you sad?
Hurting me.

When you dream at night, what do you dream about?

You being a queen, Daddy being a king and us being little princesses.

What do you like to do with David?

Help him, like help him making stuff.

What do you like to do with Lauren?

Play with her. Because you do play. You have lady voices. .

What’s your favourite colour?
I have lots of favourite colours: pink, golden, red and purple, magenta, blue, green.

What’s your favourite book?
Hat in the Cat.

What does David do during the day?
Work. Like cooking.

What does Lauren do during the day?

Driving and packing up.

What do you do during the day?
Play with Uni [her unicorn] and her mother.

Want to see how she’s changed? You can read Calista’s interview when she turned three and four.

I’m relieved to have reached the decision to stop updating Sparkling Adventures on a regular basis. Dedicated readers will know that I’ve blogged almost daily for over six years, and yet I’ve struggled with maintaining the site over the past couple of months.

I have discovered that I am finding a beautiful and fulfilling energy exchange with those people I am around in real life. This means that I no longer have the time or inclination to go online and tell the stories that fill our days.

I am immersing myself in the moment and choosing to let it pass by, unrecorded. It’s been a relief to stop using the camera, stop researching the obscure details of our family’s adventures and to stop spending so much time on the computer. The creative energy that I previously poured into Sparkling Adventures is being used in other endeavours, including crochet, community art collaborations and an exploration of music.

I still have stories and photos to share up to and including March 11, and I intend to note some aspects of the girls’ development, specifically the birthday interviews.

So our adventures will continue, undocumented — at least for a while. As we travel around, you can catch highlights on Instagram and Facebook. As always, I am happy to meet new, old and online friends whose paths intersect with ours.

If there is anything I have ever written that I want to emphasise, it is this: The way of Love is the key to opening ourselves up to people, experiences and joys in the world around us. It starts in us — in our hearts. When we examine ourselves and stop the unloving self-talk, quit the judgemental assessments and turn with hope to each encounter, we start on the path of Love towards emancipation.

Today, we continued our exploration of the Mornington Peninsula and visited the Peninsula Hot Springs — real hot, deep baths that allow one to relax fully … if you’re not chasing after four small children, that is. The resort is a delight, the facilities are first-class, and the ambience is probably better without small children around. I love this place, but I wouldn’t go again with kids.

The girls are thrilled to be back in the water again. The temperature is fine, and the pools are mostly shallow enough for Calista to feel fully comfortable swimming around.

Delaney loves playing in the surrounding landscape. A "natural" creek drops down the slope to a little lake.

The girls play non-stop with the toys they recently received from David.

The facilities around each hot pool are finished to a very high standard with unique touches, such as round river rocks acting as hooks for towels or robes.

A friend who was working on the resort’s extensions told me that he used to come when the hot water was brought up from the underground aquifer into timber barrels which people would sit in. Now the resort boasts twenty pools with a reflexology walk, Turkish steam room, and sauna.

We didn’t explore the resort fully, as I truly didn’t want to disturb the experiences of the other guests. Our girls love to play and splash in water, and so we mostly stuck to one large pool that we had to ourselves most of the time.

Delaney lines up her pebbles in a row.

The setting for the hot pools is tranquil and perfectly finished. This truly is a beautiful resort for relaxing away the city stresses.

We ended our day by calling in at another homeschooling family who lives on the Peninsula. It’s always interesting to see how others live and to hear the stories that bring people to the place where they are when we arrive. Today’s host was a schoolteacher who — after she began allowing her children to learn naturally at home — found that the dichotomy between the school system and the ease with which children learn naturally was too hard to take. Now she makes extra money by providing sewing and music lessons from home.

Thanks, Jacqui, for hosting us. It was a real pleasure to connect with you in real life, and I’m looking forward to seeing how your vision for the rest of your property comes into being!