like a wet rag

The last week has wrung me out like a wet rag.  Some weeks are like that.  But somewhere inside comes the strength to keep going, to smile and be one more second patient than your children can nag.

I have had two funerals - one a work colleague and one lady I knew who was beloved.

I have traveled to Armidale and back to Brisbane in 24 hours.

I have camped with my small group from church, who are a diverse bunch of people with Christ in common.  A small camping trip involving a lot of packing for one night.  But worth it.

I have traveled to Pomona and back to sing with choir. The beauty of a team of voices and the hotness of a theatre in country Queensland with no air-con dressed in concert blacks with the sweat pooling in your shoes.

I have cried with a friend.

I have continued planning my trip to Krygyzstan and China next year.

I have worked and taught RE and cooked and made sure some clothes were clean.  I have helped write a speech for leadership positions in grade seven and I have driven daughters to piano.  I have made sure a daughter is ready for a ballet exam next week with new stockings and three dancing lessons.

I have played with children at a funeral, and tried to answer their questions about the absence of someone.

I have held my husband and dreaded the day when we may be parted by death.

I have laughed with my girls and fed them cereal for dinner.  Because some weeks are like that.

I have continued to read Les Miserables and reflect upon the grace that can transform a life.

I have ......

alto buddies in choir

Pines in Armidale

camping set up at Boreen Point

This is how you flatten a tent to fit back into the bag - use a handy 9 year old.

friends

renovations

We have had to renovate the chicken pen.  With some netting.  Now the pen is completely enclosed.  It feels like a blanket fort when you stand inside it, and it looks like a Cirque de Soliel set up for possums.  I think I will need to check it each morning in case the netting catches more than leaves.

Lovely handy husband helped me put it up.  He hates compost and food scraps, and is not too fussed on chickens, but he pitched in and did the netting - he knows I love having chickens.

And why did we need chicken pen renovations?  Last week we came home to a scene of chicken massacre - feathers everywhere, headless chooks in our yard and the neighbours, and two chickens completely missing.  We think it was a fox.

I was pretty sad for a time.  I miss their clucking and self important fluffing.  I have too many scraps and I had to BUY eggs.

I am going to get some new chickens in a week or so.  Myself and my two elderly single lady neighbours miss them very much.

look out it's a black dot in the water!

No it's a whale!

Today the girls and I went whale watching off the Gold Coast.  I had very high expectations of seeing whales.  Very high.  I had staked a trip to the coast with children on it.  And the boat guaranteed whale sightings (or you get another trip).  I also did not have the telephoto lens of a professional photographer, so I have many shots of a black dot in the distance.

It was an awesome day to be out on the water - mild swell and 10 knot winds.  Some of our fellow passengers used the sick bags, but not us.

chirpy whale watcher

Then we saw the tell tale spray of a whale!

This was my photo of a breaching whale.  Just a bit too slow on the uptake with the camera so I got the splash.

But it was an impressive splash.

Yay - here's one breaching!

Happy whale watcher!

Whale tail.  Apparently all of the whale's tails are different like fingerprints, and that's how you can tell them apart.  Although it would be difficult to ink a tail, and keep it on file for when the whale was brought in for questioning.

Double whale backs.

Returning home.  Thanking God for such a great time to spend with the girls to see such amazing creatures in natural wild creation.
 

And having had a whale of a time.

camping

For the past few days we have been off the map - well out of internet range - camping at Girroween near Stanthorpe.  The weather was great - except at night it was FREEZING.  I slept in my beanie, gloves, polar fleece and several other layers and also tucked a warm husband into my sleeping bag.

Our tent at 5.30 in the morning.  That's quite early, but my bladder won out over my warm sleeping bag.

 We kayaked.  Be 'we' I mean the kids.  I was the on-shore crew.  Chris even went so far as to call me 'Base Camp Mamma'.

Scooter came camping with us.  She loved it, even when we put her ball in impossible places.

We went on, as it was described in the ranger information, a 'strenuous' bush walk to the pyramids.  The rangers were right.  It was strenuous - so much so that I didn't make the top of the pyramids and had to recover sitting NEAR the top eating a chocolate muffin and an apple.

Sisters at the top of the Pyramids.

Chris  went up with to the top with the girls.

They found a geocache at the top of the Pyramids.

Gab waved to me from the top.  That's me - sitting and recovering down the slope.

It was quite steep to climb.  My legs got the wobblies a bit.  I chose not to climb right to the top.  I didn't have to prove anything.

Doesn't everyone do the 'I'm pretending to hold up a big rock' pose?

I made a scavenger hunt for the kids one afternoon.  It had items like 10 brown leaves, 2 feathers, a signiture from someone not at our campsite, and a tadpole.  Catching a tadpole in the dam took about an hour and a half.  I actually though it was not possible.

But they did it!  And the shrieks of excitement over this tadpole in a plastic bag echoed off the granite mountains around the campsite.  Tadpole catching was also under a strict catch and release scheme.

There was a beautiful dam right next to the campsite.

photo by Annika

photo by Annika

photo by Annika

photo by Annika

photo by Annika

 Annika took the camera and went around taking hundreds of pictures.  Some worked out really well.

We wen 4WDing in the national park - fun times.

 Scooter felt she needed to help us navigate and negotiate the bumps.  She was on the job and loved standing looking out the front window.

Berry farm icecreams - mmmmmmmm.

Mucking around in the dam.

I caught up on a lot of reading.

And we did lots of geo-caching.  We found about 15 geo-caches this trip.  It helped there was a big run of them (37!) near Stanthorpe on the fruit run.

Loved camping.  Loved being with my family and friends. Loved coming home to my warm bed.