Poppins, Aroma, animals, moving the furniture around.

Maitland had another food festival, this one called Aroma. It was fantastic weather, the carpark at the river was really well decorated and there was a lot of good food. I went for a couple of hours with 2 women from church.

We discovered a room with cats to cuddle.

I decided to rearrange the furniture. This is the new layout which I love. The table was in the other room to the birdcage, which meant I never ate at it, because if Percy can't see me in the morning he screeches. So I used to sit next to Percy eating breakfast off my lap and watching the Today show. I realised I don't like morning TV and decided to get rid of the second TV completely. It will go to the church office eventually. Moved the table into Percy's room, and now I can eat breakfast while reading the bible and Percy can see me so it's pleasantly quieter.

And where the table used to be, in the nice sunny part of the house, we put this half-couch which was leftover at my parents house. And also the piano. It's the reading couch.

This is Percy having a cuddle. I have now owned Percy for a year.

JK and I saw Mary Poppins in Newcastle. MP was my first favourite movie, and it is still a classic with Julie Andrews. I had also read the books. And I had heard good things about the Sydney musical. And while the singing and sets and costumes were very good, I actually found the play itself pretty bad. The story was a mishmash of movie, books, plus some modern elements like a song which, I joke not, went "don't reach for the stars, reach for the heavens and you'll get the stars too". That was the main song they climaxed the story with. Ughhh. I am without words. Also they left out Mr Banks song which is very funny and Mrs Banks got a new song, not about being a suffragette but about being in a difficult marriage or something.

One of my colleagues brought their puppy Ted to work. 3 months old.

In a surprise election on Monday, I pulled a Julia Gillard on Nathan and was democratically elected Pretend Office Manager.

I have sweet pea flowers! Mostly rampant vines, but the first flowers! And they are pretty and they smell AMAZING.

I'm going to remove the curtain completely and just have a window of green.

Prayer 2.

I reused my other prayer last time I was rostered to pray at church because it was a long time in between, but then I had a short gap in the lead up to this prayer so I didn't triple-dip, people might catch on. Wrote a new one. I'll get a bit of rotation happening. I never used to be keen to do prayer because it takes a lot of time to do it well, but now I just set aside a lot of time well ahead of the deadline and enjoy it.


Almighty heavenly father,

You are the awesome creator of the universe, so holy and glorious that nobody can stand in your presence, so wise that that your plans are beyond understanding, so perfect in goodness and righteousness, so faithful to your word, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

We praise you for revealing yourself to us in the bible. Every word you have spoken shows us how good you are, and how much trouble we are in. We reject you from the very beginning, and the world you made for us is wrecked by wars and injustice and suffering, and the ultimate curse of sin, death. Death that separates us from each other and from you. But, thank you that you have not left us alone. You promised to make it right, and when the time was right, in your great mercy you sent your son Jesus, God born as a man, to live with us, and die for us. Only the death of your perfect son in our place could break the power of death. Nothing we can do will fix this world, and so we put our trust in Jesus who rose from the dead and will one day come as the judge of all people and make all things new. We pray that he comes soon, but we also pray for your patience so that many more may turn to you and escape the judgement they deserve.

Father, thank you that we have freedom to worship Jesus in this country. There are many places where our brothers and sisters in Christ suffer for his name, must meet in secret, are forbidden to own bibles, or are caught up in religious conflict, and you have told us to remember them, so we pray for them tonight. We pray for North Korea, Somalia, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Sudan, Iran, Pakistan, Eritrea, Nigeria, the Maldives, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Yemen, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, the Central African Republic, Qatar, Kenya, Turkmenistan, parts of India, Ethiopia, Egypt, Djibouti, and Bourma. Please help your children to be brave, and to show love to those who persecute them. May the church everywhere be filled with your power, to bring you glory.

We pray for university ministry at Newcastle. Thank you that many students are meeting up with their friends one to one to read the gospel of Luke, and we pray that through your Holy Spirit this simple act of reading the bible will have a powerful impact on many lives. Please be with the staff team M, J and R, and the trainees H, M and A, for the rest of the year. Sustain them physically, mentally and spiritually. We pray for A and H as they both come to the end of their apprenticeships and consider what to do from next year onwards.

We pray for the CAP Money course running this month, that it will be helpful for those who come along to develop self-control and wisdom so that they can use money prudently and for your glory. We also thank you for the opportunity to serve the wider community through this course, and to connect with people who need to hear about Jesus even more than they need to hear about budgets.

We pray for KL, who has left Newcastle and is just arrived in France. We pray that amongst whatever homesickness, excitement, exhaustion or whatever she might be feeling, that she will rely on you completely. We pray that she learns French very quickly, so that she can begin to enjoy building relationships, and sharing the bible with people. We pray that the church planting organisation she is going to join will be able to use her skills to grow the gospel in France, both in numbers and in knowledge.

We bring before you those of us with sickness and pain for healing: K, and G, and others we don't know about. Help them to trust you on their journey of suffering, knowing that you work all things for our good, and may they use their suffering to focus on Jesus, the one who will take away every pain, wipe away every tear.

In the words of Jude:
To him to is able to keep us from falling and present us before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy… to the only God our saviour be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and evermore, AMEN.

Campfire, work fun.

I’ve been waiting to get the internet at home. Because that will make blogging and photo uploading a lot better. So the gaps between blogs are getting longer.

Here are some photos from nightchurch weekend away at Tahlee. 

 Perfectly constructed fire.

Jetty pool getting more and more dilapidated each year.

The weather was actually great! A local pastor who used to be an MEC member preached on Unity, Love, Confessing and Forgiving. The first talk was the foundation, we are united to each other and to God in Christ. But then that’s hard, so the next 3 were about how we do that in terms of cultivating genuine affection to motivate us, confessing to each other and to God, and forgiving each other. The question times were good. There was a standout book review from a woman who read a short book on conflict by Ken Sande, and she had even applied the steps to resolve a work conflict. More engineers should do book reviews.

I also played my first ever games of Mafia. It was something I wanted to do this year, and it turned out to be a good way to break the ice a bit with the yooths.

I’ve been enjoying a new luchtime walk with my new office sharer J. It’s a longer walk but more interesting, hills and swamps and through the homestead cottages. I should take some photos. J has been in our office for a few weeks. Some of the old fellas were warning us about her, "oh she’ll get you lot in line, you watch out", and we were just "pfffft. We have our own office culture and she will conform to it." And she’s very nice and she has conformed to our lovely office culture. So last week I made a certificate to formally celebrate her acceptance into the Crawford Court 6 Centre for Excellence, as N calls it. She very much appreciated it. We played a fanfare and presented it to her, and she hung it on her wall. 

The other office fun is that a native rodent called a phascagale has been into our office, eating the biscuits and chewing through the phone lines, and one night it ripped the head off a taxidermy rosella. We had a funeral for it in the garden outside our office this week, N dug the hole, I dropped it’s head in the hole twice, we all threw a handful of soil onto it, M spoke a few words and laid flowers on the grave. It was hilarous.

I scored snapper that N caught on the weekend, because his family don’t eat fish so he distributed his catch at the Centre for Excellence. I really enjoyed eating the fish, and Maddie and I shared the eyeballs. It’s 6 months since she moved in, and I am so happy she lives with me.

Percy has decided he likes Maddie and will climb on her not to attack her face but to permit her to tickle his head. 

My pea harvest is almost finished, but now I am delighted by my sweet peas, which are growing in front of my bedroom window, as high as my head. I know all the flowers will face the other way but it’s still very romantic. I’m tempted to throw some money at my garden and get raised garden beds.