South Coast break.

Tuesday to Saturday were here with G, B, and E. Lovely water to watch, so much sun.

We had decided beforehand to make it a relaxing spa type holiday. B gave each of us a massage, and E brought some facial masks from Japan.

And we did bits of exercise, so E and me went for a 4km jog each morning, gradually jogging more of it as we got fitter.

There was thermomix food! I was impressed with steamed buns.

By God's goodness, another friend was staying nearby and it was really nice to catch up a couple of times with her and her baby.

None of us brought a DVD! so we didn't do much screen-watching, which we survived well. We chatted quite a lot about life issues, and we listened to Mindy Kaling's audiobook, and there was a bit of cross stitch, and napping.

We had a stopover at Berry on our trip back on Saturday. I didn't buy anything there, surprisingly, but I had a trove of books and earrings from Goulburn and Bowral.

So that is the end of that big week. It was all lovely. Still feeling refreshed. Holidays, travelling around, are important for lifting your head up and getting a fresh perspective on life other than routine and work. Getting a break from the urgent things to contemplate other potentially important things.

Haircut and travelling.

Had one night in Goulburn by myself, which I filled with another lovely walk, and listening to an audiobook in the sunroom.

I decided I would get the long anticipated Autumn Haircut, so here is the before and after shots. I walked into town first thing in the morning and got an appointment at the second place I tried. I'm happy with the cut and if it's not too hard to maintain I might keep it short for a whole year!

Then I walked on to the Argyle book emporium and asked for some old detective books, I bought 3. I'm into this one which I bought because of Percy. So far one parrot has been murdered but 2 are still OK.

I drove to Bowral to buy earrings and stop for a hot chocolate and cake at the Elephant Boy cafe which is another book related place. I started reading a Jungle Doctor book and found a really good example of praying for a plan you want to succeed, "if our thoughts are right in this matter, help it to work out." I think that's good.

I think the drive through Kangaroo Valley is one of the most beautiful. Winding roads down and up mountains with stunning farmland.  I stopped at the Fitzroy Falls lookout for a look out.

Then I waited at Bomaderry to pick up Elsie. After lovely Goulburn and lovely Bowral, Bomaderry is pretty uninspiring, sort of industrial and drab, but these stag horn plants in the station are beautiful.

ANZAC Day.

On Sunday I drove down to Goulburn and arrived for lunch with parents and Grandfather at the food court. Dad and I had sushi bento boxes, and it was Dad's first wasabi experience.

The Goulburn house is rather beautiful in places, because nobody lives in it and it's full of old furniture but stuff is being slowly removed, so it's a hipster minimalists dream house. But also sad. I always want to take a lot of photos of it when I'm there to preserve the memories.

The Autumnal weather was stunning. I went for a walk with Dad and he showed me a park I hadn't been to with a rose garden, and he found the best rose.

Oh exciting news, I'm trying chickweed ointment for my xma. It was working, but the test is, does it keep working.

This is a hilariously wrong prophecy which proves beyond all doubt that astrology is stupid.

We helped Grandfather get ready and wait for his taxi to go in the march.

Big amazing Saturday.

Quite a lot of photos and life to catch up on.

JK had a 10th Anniversary Prayer Pancake thing on Saturday morning. I went and helped by cooking pancakes, and then led her prayer time and finished with Amazing Grace. It was really special to gather with brothers and sisters and thank God for his faithfulness. It's grace that brought me safe thus far and grace will lead me home.

Denise came up for it, and we also went back to Maitland for the Olive Tree Markets at MRAG, and checked out the Shaun Tan exhibit and other things.

After popping home for a cup of tea and a spot of packing and car washing, we went back to JKs (she fed us pork belly!) for the music highlight of my year, Luke Thompson. K did a lovely job smothering the garage with fairy lights. The support act was great.

And LT was everything I remembered from last time I saw him, even more.  Beautiful simple sad songs, witty self-deprecating banter, let us sing along to the easy songs. Did the song I requested https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w7Hhfz6CII (even though he said last time he was asked to play it he said No).

It was the sort of day I'm still thinking about a week later.

3 picture summary of my life.

I've been very lonely sometimes because it's school holidays, people are away. But I still have Percy.

All that time on my own was well spent, I drew this commission for a friend to give as a gift. I'm happy with it apart from one area. 

E suggested I take Friday off to cheer up, so I finished work early and went for a jog with C, then swam with Dad at the bathes. Which was so nice I made mum come with me again on Saturday. This is a photo of a guy taking a photo of a woman for social media which makes me go heh.

Found selfie.

Women's retreat.

Here are some cupcakes made for my birthday at home group.

Last week I had Thursday afternoon off, I played piano at a funeral, and then went to the cafe near my house to read. I'm on a roll with reading now. The book I read and also finished now is Time for Every Thing by Matt Fuller. It's really good.

An order of iris from a colleague's iris farm came in the mail. I planted them. The pea planting happened and I have a few sprouts but not enough so I planted more today.

Friday night till Sunday was church women's weekend away. There were almost 70 women and we were at Toukley. We had a few easy get to know you games on Friday night, 2 talks on Colossians Saturday morning, heard a few testimonies and book reviews, free time all afternoon. I was on sound which was difficult and gave me a headache although by the end of the first session I solved one issue (I got control of the volumes!) and the other issue I couldn't fix so just let it go (mics randomly stopping working). So after lunch I took panadol and stayed inside doing easy things like foot spa, nail painting, colouring in, reading my book.

This is a bible verse design I drew.

The thing I'm finding about camps as an introvert is when it's free time, and there's heaps of people, I know I'm supposed to be there with the people, but I often can't latch into something, so I'm stuck between going off to my room for an introvert recharge with nobody at all, or hanging around with the people but not even talking to anyone. So I ended up staying in the main area, but doing nails and stuff isn't hard, and it was a good afternoon. It was better than other camps.

There was a panel on foundational topics (e.g. prayer) on Saturday night, and one talk on Sunday morning.

I have Monday off just because I have the hours accrued and have had a lot of weekends away so I've got the tiredness accrued. Seemed like a recovery day after a weekend away would be good. This morning I had brunch with JK and then dropped in at R's for Jillian. Then managed to shop at Coles and collapsed when I got home. I had a muffin for lunch, and shortly I will start making a soup or do cello or something productive.

I got to have a think today about how to use my leave this year, and I think I've got two good plans, subject to actually arranging them. Visit my sister in Brisbane and visit friends in Mudgee.

I wonder if I'm "friending down" a fair bit, e.g. befriending new women, being one of the older single women (not old-older, but older than the girls in their 20s) and I have a couple of equal friends, but am not "friending up" at all, like any women older than me or people in families. I'm pondering who and how.

Prayer 5.

Your word created the universe and your breath gave us life. You sustain the earth day after day, year after year, from the biggest storms to the smallest cells. We can’t even think about your power, or imagine how glorious you are. We actually choose to ignore you as if you don’t matter, use your name to swear, and do what we think is right regardless of how it dishonours you or ourselves or other people. We know that we have said, done, and thought things that are evil, and our evil leads to death. Sin is incompatible with life.

But, you gave of yourself your only son to die in our place. Every evil thing is dealt with and cancelled on the cross. We have a new life, a new song, a new relationship with God as our father. A family of believers. We think of our friends who do not know you and we bring them before you now, asking for opportunities and courage to share the gospel with them……..

Thankyou for our church, and for the fellowship of churches around Australia. We pray that each church will stand firm in the gospel, in unity and love.  Thank you for the school that lets us meet here and east maitland public that lets us run Fusion and Maitland Alive. Thank you for this weekend that women were able to go away and hear from Jenny Salt and learn together.

Thank you for the children and youth of our church, and may they learn how to follow Jesus with their whole lives. We pray for all the young people at this church and involved in various ways from the community. We pray for Fusion, Disciplemakers, the vine, JOLT, and ask that young people hear about Jesus and commit to following him as the only king, the only wisdom, the only satisfaction in the world. Thank you for all the leaders who are making it a priority to share their time with young people over the bible. We pray for the provision of a youth worker on our staff team, someone with skills, wisdom, and a passion to see youth living for Jesus. We also thank you for the opportunities to teach SRE in schools and for the Christians in our community preparing for term 2 SRE classes. Please soften the hearts of the children to hear and respond to the gospel.

We pray for our pastors taking leave during the school holidays that they have refreshing times with their family and rest in you.

We pray for the Katherine Christian Convention in a few weeks time, for the people from distant indigenous communities who travel there from all over the top end to learn from your word, and for the team from our church traveling up there to support them logistically and fellowship with them. We pray that it’s a blessing and encouragement to the indigenous church of this country, and we thank you that we can be a part of it.

We forget how blessed we are to live here, so we pray for the global church, for Christians who live as persecuted minorities, or in areas of conflict. The church in Pakistan mourning after the recent violent attacks. We beg you to keep them strong in their faith and strengthen them to love their enemies.

We pray for our governments, federal and state, and members of the oppositions, and our local councils, that they use their authority justly and to bring about your good purposes in complicated situations. We pray for wisdom, humility and generosity, and that you protect our governments from the corruption of power.

Help us to love without hypocrisy. To hate evil; and to cling to what is good. To care for each other with brotherly love. To act with honour in all situations. To be diligent; to be fervent in spirit; to serve the Lord. To Rejoice in hope; to be patient in affliction; to be persistent in prayer. To Share with others in their needs; to be hospitable. To Bless those who persecute us. To Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. To Be in agreement with one another. To not be proud; but, associate with the humble. To not think we are wiser than everyone else. To not repay anyone evil for evil. Try to do what is honorable and If possible, live at peace with everyone. Rom 12

Now may the God who gives endurance and encouragement allow us to live in harmony with one another, according to the command of Christ Jesus, so that we may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ with a united mind and voice. Rom 15

Autumn, Easter, family weekend.

Last week I was hovering on the edge of a cold. The long-awaited change of the seasons has come, and maybe it's too much of a shock! But I'm happy for Autumn anyway, I sleep better under blankets.

Speaking of sleeping better, my back is pretty much not complaining in the mornings anymore. I have adjusted to the new mattress, done some experimenting with pillows, various things. It's still a tiny bit crook maybe 1 or 2 days a week.

Despite all this wonderful sleep, and cold weather, I was feeling tired and almost sick. I think just the busy weekends have caught up with me. I thought every second weekend away alternating weekends at home was a good balance, and it did work really well for a while. I have squeezed so much joy out of life! And invested in important relationships. And avoided boring things like grocery shopping. 

Here is the good stuff going on.

My garden! I made ready and planted autumn seeds. I am glad my garden is small, as I am happy with the amount of work it requires, and I can keep it nice easily, but this is when I want more space because if I had more space I would plant so many sweet peas.

My birthday! Well, it's depressing to get older and all that, the 30s are going to be birthdays of sadness as my window for motherhood starts to close. I'm considering removing it from facebook and sort of denying the existance of birthdays all together so that nobody is sure how old I am (...about 30? mid-30s?... as I say about some of my friends!). But I have had joy from friends buying me an overnight bag. 1) it was on sale, = frugal, 2) they went halves, = frugal, 3) I got to track the shipping and collect it from the post office, 4) I can use it right away on the weekend!

Here are the struggles. 

There's a few new couples around, so I'm reminded of my solo status. I'm making an effort in particular with my housemate to be happy for people and not rain cynicism all over the joy of a new relationship. It's silly, I know all these people don't have perfect easy lives, but especially with young people it's like they don't know how lucky they are. That's self-pity.

I'm kind of bored of food. I have been for weeks. I'm bored of shopping, cooking, and eating what I cook. So in the spirit of not wasting energy on this area, I've cut down on shopping and cooking. I figure it's a good opportunity to eat through the contents of the fridge and pantry right to the back. Defrosting frozen meals, eating carrots, opening expired packets of biscuits. And then one day I'll do a Big Shop and restock all my staples. The meal that is suffering most from this approach is lunch. The best meals are breakfast and dessert. I've always got cereal and connoisseur ice cream!

And here are the photos.

My parents decided to get us all together for a weekend in a holiday house. It will now be an annual thing, probably close to a different persons birthday each year, which is a lovely tradition to start. This year the available weekend was Easter and it was my birthday. J brought the little boy she has been fostering for 3 weeks (and until he finds a forever home). He was good most of the time except for one bedtime. The rest of the time cute but demanding.

We stayed at Eaglereach at a house called Valley View run by Destiny Haven. It was very comfortable, also it was 45 minutes from home which is quiet easy, and also there were bush walks and kangaroo feeding and a spa and table tennis and different things to do at the site so that people could easily wander off and do something outdoors. But we also slept, read, and watched Castle season 1. I am PROUD to say I finished the Cross of Christ by John Stott. Not having a lot of phone signal was sad because I would have liked to put a lot of these photos on instagram, but really I'm trying to check on Facebook less so it was probably good overall. I could often receive and send texts.