As I am sorting through photos of Congress, I found a few pics of some great tee’s I saw around the camp ground in Brisbane.
I love a good t-shirt… but you already knew that from here, here and here. :)
I scored one of the above t-shirts from my friend Anna. I love it! It is advertising Adventist Employment in the South Pacific.
Soul Sisters represent!!! Love your work Val :)
This week we’re thankful for our family who have loaned us various big ticket items.
My Dad lent us his car to drive to Queensland after mine blew up on Christmas Eve Eve.
Thanks Dad! We love you!
Thanks also to Barge & Aunty Nerilye for dropping their air-conditioned caravan up for us to sleep in at Congress.
40 degree nights doing youth ministry never felt so good!
Thank you! We love you!
Can’t wait to hang out with our friends and family this weekend – starting from tonight :)
I am particularly excited to hang out with our Kville Church family at our church picnic at Fagan Park. It feels like months since we’ve been there.
Hope you have a Happy Sabbath peeps!
P.S. These two cheeky Siberian Huskies belong to my In-laws. They are still very young and extremely naughty, but by the time I had left their farm last Friday, I had a soft spot for them.
“My breakfast is very important.”
Sonia Rykiel
Mine too Sonia, mine too.
Thyme Square Cafe, Hornsby
So here you have it… this is my last StormCo post for 2012.
If you ever have a chance to go on StormCo, you should go. It was an amazing experience and a fantastic opportunity to serve others in a community less fortunate than ours.
My absolute favourite part of the trip was getting know the awesome teens and my local church family better.
Also how can I forget washing up duties singing and dancing to “Footloose” and hearing “Call me, maybe?” on constant repeat.
Below are some of the sweet t-shirts the kids were wearing during the week. I particularly love the “Caution Extreme Awesomeness” shirt.
Enjoy your weekend!
It’s our Pastors birthday today – her Sweet 16 actually. The poor girl has to spend the day with us on StormCo. So the girls threw her a little soirée to celebrate. Plus she got a Latte from me this morning. Good times!
Happy Birthday Lyndelle!!!
How cool are these shoes?
It seemed like all the cool kids were wearing them. Even Wayne Marsden got given a pair by his well wishing “Secret Friend”.
They came in about 5 or 6 colors and could be bought from one of the local clothing stores on the main drag of Nyngan. They are all fluro colors and would really suit the road-works guys who do the graveyard shift. But the kids love them!
The coolest of the cool kids, mix and match their colors like my little mate Kayne from Kids Club. He will feature in my final Nyngan “Fashion in the Fields” post due in the next few days. :)
Funny of the day: Steve Jack racing 13 year old local Nyganite around the field on a skateboard. Not surprisingly, she whipped him. But, he was pretty good for an old fella from the big smoke who drives a Range Rover.
Oh, and then we came home to this…
These are our lovely cooks breaking the “No Girls” rule sitting in Nath, Zac and Mick’s “lounge room”.
Breakfast: PJ’s and Ugg-Boots
This past weekend was jam-packed full of festivities. Despite todays Mondayitis, it was all worth it.
Friday night dinner at Ferndale with the Parentals.
Church on Saturday at the Greater Sydney Adventist Youth Rally.
Sabbath BBQ Lunch at Oakleigh.
Dinner with friends at Ferndale on Saturday night.
Sunday morning selling – once the deal proceeds it will be another outstanding result. I’m ecstatic for the owners.
Hello Tennesse!
Sunday Hair by Sam – one of my favourite people. Been friends since I was 3 and she was 5 in Playgroup!
Glee’s Wedding at Wahroonga Adventist Church. Galina + Lee = Glee
Isn’t she lovely.
Post-Ceremony/Pre-Reception snack time at Paddington.
Posing in the hood in Centennial Park, Sydney.
4 x Happy Wives in the Photo-booth at Glee’s wedding.
This is one of my favorite photos taken in the last 7 days…
It was taken somewhere on Parramatta Road on Sunday afternoon.
As our friend Lyndelle said, you can almost see the drool.
*Image found here
I just stumbled on this great video via this blog here. Talk about cool.
One day, I want to create sick videos, like this one, to inspire people – hope you love it :)
The Holstee Manifesto Lifecycle Video from Holstee on Vimeo.
Photo taken somewhere before Cooma on the Snowy Mountain Highway, NSW.
A massive thanks to my friend Tamsin for nominating me for the Liebster Blog Award.
I love awards!
So here are my nominations:
The aim of the Liebster Blog Award is to recognise and support blogs* and to help people find real gems out there.
The rules are :
1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you
2. Reveal the five blogs you have chosen and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog
3. Copy and paste the award onto your blog
4. Request that people you have sent the award to forward it on to their favourite bloggers
*This originally states “with fewer than 200 followers”, however, Tamsin would like to point out that unless you can see their stats, you don’t know that 
-> and I agree with her.
Spread the love People!
What a random sight to see a Black Hawk sitting on one of the playing fields around the corner from the Cream Fibro in Thornleigh!
This last week, the Australian Army were flying from Richmond Airbase up to Williamstown and had to perform an emergency landing due to some instrument failing.
They ended up being there for days and sleeping in their swags under the chopper. It was so much fun going to visit every few days and see what had changed – it was always nothing.
This was my very first visit. It was like the chopper was a UFO.
The locals loved it.
When VP and MP first saw it, they were able to walk right up and have a chat with the crew. But then the local Police sent a few Police-ladies down for crowd control…
“Get off the oval” they warned us and all the Thornleigh locals.
I’m not saying who, but you could hear someone claim “This is our blinking oval. We pay council rates. We’ll get off when we want to!” ;)
These lads asked the pilot for a ride. He casually responded with “None of us are getting a ride for a while, Boys.”
Reinforcements arrived on the first night and they really didn’t seem to do all that much. According to some of the locals, the footy came out and the lads got to have a kick-around.
See the local nana up in the distance with the dog? Her response to the “Get off the oval” warning was… and I quote: “I’m taking my dog for a walk and you can’t stop me. I don’t care if you don’t like it, just go ahead and shoot me!” Classic.
On the Sabbath after church, I had high hopes of having a picnic on the oval with the magnificent view of the Black Hawk. My dream of people-watching and Black Hawk-watching was smashed when all my crew thought it was a dumb idea and vetoed.
We had finished lunch around the corner and heard an almighty roar which sparked a major exodus leaving everything out for the robbers and we high-tailed the two-minute walk up to the oval. Getting the low-down from one of the locals, this first initial take-off was just a test. Once all instruments proved reliable, they had planed to leave forever.
It was beautiful.
But it was sad too.
The pilots were super excited to get the heck out of there to have showers and grab new clothes after the week-long stint at the oval. Even though the local Mum’s all offered them cups of tea, a warm bed, the use of their bathrooms, clean clothes, roast dinners and even desert… I think they were over being the centre of attention.
“Get to the Chopper.”
Farewell dear Black Hawk – it was great while it lasted.
P.S. Watch the boys wave goodbye in the video – I think they secretly loved being there and feeling apart of the neighbourhood. This was really our own Pasha Bulker
On my first night alone last week while Richie was in Tonga, I found this spider on the floor of my kitchen.
At first, I looked at it and thought “meh, it’s no biggy.” Vanessa and I grew up on the bush and had frequent Huntsmen spiders occupy our hallway wall and more than often our bedroom wall. We called “Charlie” even though they were no-doubt different spiders every year.
With this Old Mate though, when I got closer to put this glass over the top, he got a bit nasty.
So Richie said that I had to kill. As an obliging and obedient wife, I put him to sleep with some special stuff from a spray-can.
I was kinda happy just to put the glass over the top and leave him there for the night. But Richie’s reasoning behind “YOU NEED TO KILL IT NOW, WHILE I’M ON THE PHONE!!” was because he predicted that I would back-flip if I came up the next morning and found an empty glass.
My 5-minute research on Google says that it was a “Black House Spider”. One website found here it says:
“The bite of the Black House Spider is poisonous but not lethal. Some people report severe pain around the bite site, heavy sweating, muscular pains, vomiting, headaches and giddiness. In any case, should you be bitten by one, don’t try to drive to the hospital. Call an ambulance.”
Have you got any spiders hanging around your place at the moment?
We had a great, but busy, weekend.
Big congrats to Jono & Janelle who tied the knot on the weekend.
It was a lot of fun! One of my favourite memories is listening to Denise (the Brides mother) describe how her 86 year old mother, Lorna, reacted in their first few hours of their stay at the Four Seasons Hotel, in Sydney.
Nana is such a gem and just tells it how it is. The last time Lorna stayed in a hotel was 40 years ago. Between the ceremony and the reception, Denise checked them in and took Lorna upstairs for a little cuppa tea to re-coop. Everything Denise told her to do or say she would respond with “Oh well, that will cost you” or “They’ll charge you for that”. i.e. The door-man opening her car door: “Mum you need to get out of the car, the man will help you.”… “They’ll charge us for that.” The bell boy bringing their luggage up to their room “Where did they get our luggage from?”… “From the car Mum. They’ve brought it up for us.” “That’s going to cost you.” Having an extra cup of tea in the room “Mum do you want another cup of tea before we go across to the reception?”… “They’ll charge you for that.” Denise telling you the story will have you in hysterics. Oh Bless.
We stayed down at Bondi on Saturday night and woke up to this view.
I ran half way to Bronte Beach and back along the coastal walk-way passing a ton of celebrities out walking their dogs. What a life the “beach-life” is!
What did you get up to on the weekend?
Over the last few weeks, I’ve had a few packages arrive I’m the mail.
Shoes… dresses… shoes…
and now this:
Talk about exciting!
This is the real love story of Pioneer Woman and Marlboro Man – how her life was tipped upside down when she went from a black heel-wearing slick L.A. lawyer to tractor wheels as a farmer’s wife in Oklahoma. If you don’t have a clue who these people are and what I’m talking about, you need to check out her blog.
PW’s love story has been signed to be made into a feature film and Reese Witherspoon has been asked to play Ree. I read the first 40-odd pages back last year which is available on her blog, and I couldn’t put it down. That girl has talent – she will suck you into her world and will have you laughing and crying at the same time.
This is in perfect timing for our Western Australian adventure beginning in the morning.
