Weekend Happenings

Sunday was quite a good day. Woke up early and went to church, where PJ spoke about becoming a somebody from a nobody. He was quite amusing, he peppered his sermon with loads of lame jokes and stories, even more so than usual. Then again, maybe that was cause most of the couples in church went down for the couple’s retreat over the long weekend and he was speaking to mostly the J-Life crowd. I had to give a little blurb (that’s a short speech, for all you who don’t know) about Found, the Women’s Ministry running in church.

Gen had asked me to speak when I swung over to her place on Friday night after cell. So then I gave it a bit of thought and then I SMSed her the next day saying that I won’t do it, just cause I didn’t know what to say. So Amanda SMSed me back encouraging me to do it. So by then I remembered that Amanda was with Gen cause they had worship practice that morning. Then Amanda rang me up and encouraged me to do it, saying that I could send her a draft and she’d review it that night. In the end, I wrote up what I was going to say and sent it off.

I can say honestly that I was not nervous about speaking in front of church. I was excited maybe, but wasn’t scared. Because it was a J-Life led service Joe was the MC and when he introduced me to come about and speak he was so amusing! Part of his intro was,

I really like this particular group but unfortunately I can’t be part of it. As much as I want to, I just can’t but I do support this group the fullest

By this time, the congregation must have been wondering what group he is talking about that he cannot be a a part of. So he introduced me and I spoke about Found. What I said:

When Found was started about 5-6 months ago, it was envisioned to be a place where the young women of J-Life could come and gather to discuss issues that are pertinent to our walk with God as women. I look back during the past 6 months and I asked myself, what have I learnt by attending Found?

I sat and I gave it quite a bit of thought. See, I’m not a person who does things for no reason so if I go every fortnight to Found, there must be reasons why I go. I look back and see Found as a place where I have found rest, acceptance and love the person I am. Once I realised God loves me unconditionally as His daughter, only then did things begin to click.

Found is a place where it empowered me to grow as a woman of God, to find my purpose as His daughter. The culture we are trying to cultivate is one which celebrates each other as God’s daughters. There was a time where Gen shared about the women that God used and honoured. There were many women of all sorts of characters, but God used them all the same. That brought home a powerful lesson for me: Never underestimate what God can do in your life.

It is these life’s truths that keep me coming back to Found. Each time I attend, there are new lessons to be learned. So I encourage all the young women of J-Life to come along to this week’s meeting. We will be talking about Queen Esther and who knows, you might learn something about yourself that you have never known! Found is on this Wednesday at 7.30pm at Pastor Jason’s house in Monash Avenue. Hope to see you there!

Towards the last part my cheeks were heating up but I was happy with what I had said. What I had written came from the heart and I think that nothing can beat what comes from the heart.

It was PJ’s birthday last Tuesday and Evan’s birthday yesterday. Some smart person decided bring cream and smear it all over them. That was probably the worst creaming I’ve ever seen, was such a crack on Sunday.

PJ looking to get Evan right after someone creamed him

Evan sneaks a chance to cream PJ

Proper picture of the birthday boys

We went out for lunch at Penang after that and Amanda drove us up to Orchard Glory to say hello to the kids who were at the couples’ retreat with their parents. It was quite a bit of fun. We got there in time to help transform the hall into a restaurant, set with a centrepiece on each table as well as arranging the cutlery to restaurant standards, with 2 sets of cutlery. They even had the kids waitressing for them, cause they were having a dance session during dinner. Unfortunately we didn’t get a peek into the session cause we went over to see how the kids were doing. Glorz and Cel had to leave cause they had uni the next day so Amanda and I went to lend a helping hand to Kristin to take care of the kids.

Now I would say that I am patient and am not too bad with kids, but I think after my encounter with a whole bunch of girls under the age of 7, I’m scared. We managed to leave at 8pm after getting the kids to play games civilly, between the boys and girls. I never went through the stage where I thought boys had cooties so I definitely did not experience wanting to lock the boys out from the room. I was thoroughly amused by all the girls’ antics in regards to the boys invading the chalet. Let’s put it this way: I won’t have more than 2 kids. And Nic, if you are reading this, your sister thinks I’m a jelly bean. And she is parsley. Very long story :P). Had some really good chats with Amanda during the trip, managed to dig up our childhood meanderings. I remembered that I used to write so much when I was younger, though most of the time the stories I wrote about were fan fiction about *N Sync, there is my embarrassing fact for the day. Though I did and still do plan on writing lots of stuff when I get time, I think that will be my next project: To write short stories or at least chronicle my life in a bit more detail. It was great having time to spend with her, its not often we get to spend something like 3 hours in the car together, just talking about things and thinking about lots of stuff.

Got home at 10pm and promptly showered and climbed into bed and crashed. It was a really great day but I had lots of things planned for Monday. I had finished summarising my bank statements for my tax, just waiting for my PAYG so I can finally submit my tax and get it over and done with. Its really frustrating to not be able to claim my money back and the deadline is creeping up day by day. It is October tomorrow, which means I have 30 days to do my tax. Instead of having 4 months, my tax window has been narrowed down to roughly 3 weeks. It’s terribly annoying and I think that is partly why I’m so short tempered these days. I don’t like feeling out of control like this.

Yesterday was a public holiday in Perth, Queen’s Birthday so I had the day off prac/work. So I put it to good use by cleaning up my room. It was in a very errr…interesting state prior to this, but suffice to say that it is looking the best it has ever been Having the spare mattress out of my room made the whole space look bigger. It feels rather weird having so much space now Anyway, room cleaning aside, it was Evan’s birthday yesterday so there was a party over at Gen’s place. Oh boy was it an interesting party. We had a smorgasbord of food that was lovingly cooked by the various talented chefs. I am not included in the list of course

Unfortunately I didn’t get as many pictures as I would have liked but I was too busy being involved in “Operation Evan”. The mission was to throw Evan into the pool. Joe came up with the idea and ran it past Gen, who gave the green light and then proceeded to get his mobile off him. So Cheryl, Cel, Michelle and I manhandled Evan to the outside area where the pool was and it took the rest of the party to lock the door and took what seemed like eternity to drag him outside. He managed to give us the slip a few times but we promptly jumped and got him to hand over his wallet, watch and mobile. I was prepared to go into the water just in case so I got my mobile out as well. I was quite close to actually falling into the water by mistake but managed to dodge it. Since Joe was the instigator of this, he had to lend a helping hand to throw Evan into the pool. Then everything went a bit off plan.

Evan grabbed Joe around the waist and tried to pull him into the pool while 4 of us girls tried to push him in. Somehow or rather, Evan grabbed Joe’s jacket and Joe tried to wriggle out of it and next thing we know Joe was shirtless and Evan had Joe’s shirt AND jacket. Poor Joe had to get his shirt back while us girls tried to chuck Evan in the pool. After that, I think he gave up and just dived into the pool himself. I doubt Joe would have thought that he’d be stripped of his clothes while trying to get Evan into the pool. Pictures:

Michelle and John. Michelle, you’re hiding the brownie there!

Michelle and I. Oh goodness me, I can see the brownie remnants in the corners of your mouth…haha

Renee and I. I look way too happy there

I’m looking at that and just wondering if that was from the epic battle. It was quite a fight to get Evan into the pool. But it was worth it

The bow from my shoe, victim of the epic battle.

It was a great long weekend. I really needed that day off to straighten things out before diving into my busy days again. I must say, the party was a great way to start the week.

Went to prac/work today and while driving on Mounts Bay I had a feeling that there would be a camera and lo and behold there was one. I was really grateful that I slowed down just prior to that cause I was doing 70 km/h just before that bend and that would have been a fine and demerit points. So far my driving track record has been great, so I didn’t want to mar it. It alternated between warm and sunny, and cold and windy today. It was such strange weather, was really nice and warm when I got out of the house this morning and then next thing I know I was driving through the rain.

It was a day full of dramas, being already short staffed at work, there were only 4 of us in today, including the manager. Then the manager had a presentation, which left 3. Then my supervisor had a dizzy spell and fell so we had to send her home, which left 2 of us still standing. While we dropped her off home, there was literally nobody in our department. We had to forward the phone to the mobile and take that along with us. Definitely not a day to be going out.

I think I’ve written a whole heap of stuff today, finding it a bit hard to get back into the swing of things after a holiday I’ve gotta read the book of Esther and get ready for the meetings and trips tomorrow and I’ve got to get a bit more sleep so I can function well tomorrow. That’s all from me tonight! Feel free to comment!

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