Sometimes I find myself in adult situations and am completely stunned that I am actually a grown up. In these moments, it’s like someone uprooted the shaky foundations of an insecure sixteen-year-old girl and transported her into adulthood. How did I get here?
Sometimes the situation is innocuous like covering the Big Sister’s school books and being surprised that they’re not mine: that I’m not the student, but the mum of a school aged child. Other times I realise I’m actively participation in conversations about stain removal and politics and am stunned.
Other times, its more significant, like standing on the side of the harvester a week after we moved to the farm, feeling incredulous that someone would loan us this much money, that we were now farmers with (then just) three tractors and a massive mortgage.
Or the time those fools at the hospital let us walk right out the front door with a tiny life form that we had no idea how to raise.
Being an adult has its advantages of course. Sometimes I get to decide what we’re having for dinner. I can wear fancy-coloured not-very-sensible undies if I like. Grog shops have stopped asking for my ID. I’m allowed to stay up late (which is comforting to know as I stuck myself in at 8.30pm). There’s a lot less eating ice cream for breakfast that I anticipated, but I’ve been known to give it a burl every now and then.
There’s a lot of sitting still and being sensible that goes along with being an adult, and sometimes you just have to make the best of it. Like by combining two of the best things about being an adult: being able to buy grog and being allowed to help yourself to ice cream from the freezer whenever you want.
Ladies and gents, I give you the quintessential celebration of being a grown up: rum and raisin ice cream. (This is a cheat’s version of homemade ice cream - perfect for those of use who don’t own an ice cream maker!)
rum and raisin ice cream
Ingredients:
- 3 litres good quality vanilla ice-cream
- 370g raisins
- ½ cup + 2 tablespoons of rum
- 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
- 2 tablespoons golden syrup
Method:
Mix the vanilla bean paste with ½ cup rum, add the raisins and allow to soak for two - four hours. Remove the ice-cream from the freezer and allow to soften.
Place half of the rum raisin mixture into a food processor and blend to a paste. Add the golden syrup and the remaining 2 tablespoons of rum and blend until smooth.
In a large bowl, combine the ice-cream, rum raisin puree and the soaked whole raisins and stir to combine. At this point you can shape the ice-cream as you like. If you’d like to make an ice-cream cake, then you can place it into a cake tin lined with cling film before returning to the freezer to set. 
Bearhands tells me he's never surprised to be an adult. Maybe I'm the only sixteen-year-old person masquerading in a showing-signs-of-wear grown-up body?
eliz a buf says
after nearly 13 years, i STILL cannot believe that anyone put ME in charge of two innocent children.... eeep!
Megan says
The worst part of being an adult is that there is no responsible grown-up around that I can rely on to point out why making 3L of delicious icecream would be a bad idea...
Nicole- Champagne and Chips says
Nope, you aren't the only one. I regularly am surprised that I have to make the decisions I make or that I'm allowed to drive a car!
In fact, at the moment the only thing I am enjoying about being an adult is picking my own food and being allowed to drink booze. But then, I realise that I must be an adult when I make sensible decisions about those two things (ice cream is a sometimes food and one glass of wine is enough....sometimes).
MrsDplus3 says
If being an adult means you get to have this, then I'm all there!! Seriously though, how did we get here - I find myself wondering the same thing at the moment (especially as I tackle the budget)!! x