Corona Diaries #1: Your Guide to Home Hair, Home Beauty, Home Schooling, Home Cooking & Fake-Away

Well that escalated quickly didn’t it. One minute I was in Mt Isa for our Wild Spark event and the next I am back at bum truck nowhere, flying the boys home from boarding school. Then next minute they have closed the QLD/NT border. We got the boarders over the border just in time! See what I did there.

Covid-19 has closed the world.

If you are new around here hello and welcome! My name is Dan and I live on a remote, 1.7 million acre, cattle station in the NT with my husband and 3 boys – Tom 15, Harry 13 and Clancy 8. Tom and Harry go to boarding school down in Brisbane and Clancy does his school here on the station via Mt Isa School of the Air.

Town is a 5 hour drive, 12 gates (ok maybe a few less now because they have put some grids in), 195km of dirt, 188km of bitumen and in a different state kind of affair. I am an extrovert living in an introverts world and this blog helps keep me sane and connected to the outside world. With the whole Corona pandemic I feel like everyone is finally living my life. I hope my remote existence can provide you with some light humour and hot tips.

It feels like I have gone back in time to January when our roads were wet and I couldn’t go anywhere – seriously I just did 2 months of lockdown, are you kidding me.

Crazy crazy times! I feel like someone has pressed control-alt-delete on the world, the reset button has been hit and we are going back to basics. But I also feel like the rest of the world is finally living my life – homeschooling, stockpiling stores, having to do their own hair, can’t get to the gym, can’t go to the pub, using pantry basics for cooking and not going anywhere or seeing anyone for weeks on end – welcome to my everyday. My biggest fear living here in the middle of nowhere has always been running out of toilet paper so I guess you could say I have been “panic buying” that for the past 13 years! HERE is a post I did way back in 2015 about our stores.

But I also feel super lucky to live where we do at this point in time. We are in lockdown here on the station, as I said, the borders are shut so even if I wanted to go to town (Mt Isa – over the border) I couldn’t. I can’t even visit my little blonde friend from next door because she lives over the border! Might have to say hello over the fence (which is 100km away) – first world problems. The company we work for also has restrictions in place meaning no one can leave or come onto the station. At least we all have each other here, there are 11 of us and we have 1.7 million acres to roam, so I reckon we are doing ok and we are very grateful to be here and still have a job.

When the boys arrived home from school I made them stop, drop their bags in the sun, go straight and have a shower and put their clothes in the washing machine, then I wiped their phones and laptops over with Pine-o-Clean, wiped everything down and then gave them a hug. They whinged and moaned and thought I was being silly. But – look where we live, we are in an ideal position to stay safe and healthy – but that means we can’t risk Coronavirus slipping through the cracks. We don’t want to compromise things here, and I am now really glad I did that.

I keep thinking about all of my friends who own small businesses – and can’t stop thinking about them! Now more than ever we need to remember to shop locally and support those who usually support us. To anyone in the North West QLD and NT who is still lucky enough to have a job and needs outfitting for work please call my friend Hannah at Worn Out West on (07)4743 2406 or go to their website. For anyone up in the Kimberley area please call my friend Sally from Kimberley Country Department Store on (08)9191 5316 or jump on their website. Before you buy anything stop and think who you can support when purchasing anything – phone a local business, I bet they will be happy to post or deliver the goods.

Home Schooling

With so many people in lockdown I keep seeing stories of people trying to homeschool their kids. Oh sweet baby Jesus – may the peace be with you all. Our kids are ACTUALLY home schooled (well we still have one left – Clancy – doing school of the air) and it is one tough gig. To all the women out there who successfully teach their own kids and do everything else I salute you, I am not one of those people – we are very fortunate to employ a Governess to teach Clancy and I have only ever had to spend a few days at a time in the school room. It isn’t pretty when I do have to and I usually end up in tears. If you are homeschooling at the moment (and don’t usually live this way) I have a few blog posts, that I wrote years ago, that might make you feel better about yourself. They involve me crying before school even starts and not knowing how to do year 4 fractions…

School Room – Teaching
Our Outback School Room

To anyone who has found themselves at home with kids trying to work and teach – please don’t stress. They WILL be ok, everyone is in the same boat and if trying to do it all is causing you to lose your shit “STEP AWAY FROM THE YEAR 4 FRACTIONS”!!! And just ask yourself this question – has anyone ever asked to see your year 3 school report? No – they will be ok!!!!

I have seen quite a few posts on facebook from teachers and school principals telling everyone not to stress about schoolwork at the moment. When the schools do shut that may be the time to homeschool but until then please don’t panic. You are doing the best you can.

Home Hairdressing

Ok lets move onto hair care. Being a blonde and living 5 hours from my closest hairdresser means I have learnt how to do it myself over the years. At the beginning of this year I found myself watching way too many You Tube videos about dying your hair at home and now I am basically a fully qualified hairdresser. I did manage to get to the hairdresser when I was down in Brisbane in March, but it had been 3 months between visits. I looked like a ten dollar hooker which is why I had to take matters into my own hands not once, but twice. If I can do it anyone can!

After having my first baby (who is now 15) I used to do my own blonde dye at home and it worked really well. This was back when my hair played nicely…

But I feel like my hair has changed over the past few years and now if I try to do it my roots go orange. But, thanks to You Tube (and advice from my hairdresser) I have figured out how to sort that out if I do need to do it myself – toner! I got onto Tint Department and bought some Wella Toner. It works an absolute treat. If you have found yourself at home and unable to see your hairdresser why don’t you give them a call – they might be able to put together a home dye kit for you with instructions. They still need your business!

I found myself stuck here on the station for around 2 months over January & February this year, meaning I couldn’t get to the hairdresser. So I used the home dye kit from Woolies and then popped the Wella Toner on the roots.

I used T18 with a 20 volume developer, because that is what everyone on You Tube used but I don’t like it – T18 is more of a ash blonde colour and I am not into that look. You pop it on wet hair, to the roots and leave for about 15 – 20 minutes.

But, having said that it did turn out ok and didn’t go grey. Here is the before and after. See: ten dollar hooker, or skunk stripe! Not attractive my friends. It really can get a girl down!

I just did an order with the Tint Department and got myself the T35 which is a beige blonde. After discussing this with my gorgeous hairdresser down in Brisbane – Nadine from Cheveux Design and Espresso – she has suggested when my roots need doing again I just use this toner with a 30 Volume developer and forget about the home dye kit from Woolies. I will leave it on for about 20 minutes. I will let you know how it goes.

You can also pick yourself up some Olaplex from the Tint Department.

Here is a blog post I wrote a few years ago about doing my own hair (I wrote this 5 years ago when my hair used to play nicely)…

Home Hair Dye

I also have purple shampoo on hand in my shower that I use regularly.

Home Beauty

Ok lets move on to home beauty. Sometimes when my hair is gross and my eyebrows have disappeared I feel really down. I find that doing my hair and popping a bit of make up on can really lift my spirits. I need to get my eyebrows tinted because they are non existent otherwise. Eyebrows really help frame your face and they make such a difference! If I can’t get to town I do them myself and have for many years. I have always used this, which you can get online from Chemist Warehouse – $17.99:

I also have this wax stick on hand if I need to give my wild brows a tidy up, you can buy it online from Chemist Warehouse – $14.99:

Fake-Away

At the beginning of this year I taught myself how to make Pad Thai. You see I was really looking forward to taking the boys into Mt Isa to put them on the plane, back to boarding school. Not because I wanted to get rid of them but because I was looking forward to a night in town – after being on the station for nearly a month of not going anywhere. You can read all about that time HERE. I was looking forward to ordering Thai takeaway, putting my pj’s on and kicking back in the hotel room with a glass of wine, binging Netflix and eating my Thai – Pad Thai & Chicken Penang!!! Anyway, it rained and I wasn’t able to go.

I decided to take matters into my own hands and found a recipe for Pad Thai and made my own takeaway. When I posted it on Facebook it turns out that so many other people around the country were also making their own takeaway and they were calling it “fakeaway”. So from there on in we have called it Thai fakeaway – “Fakeaway Friday”. Our crew love it and we have been having Friday night fakeaway. Turns out Pad Thai is super easy and so yummy, even Mr Chardy loves it!

Home Gym & Exercise

Right, lets move onto home exercise. Yep you guessed it – we obviously can’t just pop into our local gym because it is 5 hours away. So the only thing to do is exercise at home. For me I either jog around a paddock or exercise in the comfort of my air-conditioned bedroom when it is too hot and the flies are disgusting.

If you would like to join a virtual gym then I have the perfect suggestion – Off The Track Training. Designed especially for people who can’t get to a gym, no matter where you live. Owner – Joy McClymont – lives on a remote cattle station near Longreach in western Queensland. When you join Joy’s Fitness Hub you will get heaps of support from a fabulous community, training program to get you healthy, nutrition advice and access to live workouts on facebook or recordings on the website. You don’t need any fancy equipment.

There are so many options to exercise at home. I have found some great workouts on YouTube. During January & February this year I have not only turned into a hairdresser, failed author of a cookbook and a Thai takeaway owner, but, thanks to YouTube I am now a kick boxer! There is a YouTube channel called Pop Sugar and my favourite workouts have been with Christa DiPaola (just type “Christa” into the little magnifying glass on the pop sugar page and you will find her workouts). HERE is a link to her workouts. You feel so good after doing these! I just use good old tinned tomatoes as my hand weights.

So there you have it my friends, I hope that helps with your current situation. I will be back here regularly for the Corona Diaries – more of a journal for myself because this really is going to change life as we know it and I want it all noted down.

Now over to you – what is your current situation? Where do you live and how are you going – we want to know EVERYTHING!!!