Bundeena

Mel invited me to come along to visit her good friend who was on holiday with her family not far from Sydney.

We stopped at a lookout on the way up! So beautiful!

Smile Mel! We did a bit of exploring / geocaching along the coast of Bundeena!

Caught a really pretty sunset on the way home after stopping in Mel's old stomping grounds for dinner and church.

Boxing Day! Dec 26th

Cricket on the beach!

A BBQ at Matty Gibb's w/ more cricket in the background!

Yum Sausages :-P

Dec 16-20

Straight after the bush hike,we got back just in time for showers and our Shoalhaven Christmas party at a nearby beach / park. Dan and I took prawns for dinner - very Aussie :-P

A day at work then I was back up towards Sydney for vertical rescue abseil assessment - I passed! The next day was the Youthworks Christmas party in Sydney at a nice resturant on Bateman's Bay.

From there Alison and I caught the ferry to her house to spend the weekend with her family as they celebrated an early Christmas. Here, I had my first encounter with rubarb!

Cooked rubarb - often eaten with ice cream. It has a unique, almost sour taste, but I thought it was good.

Geocaching with Alison and Dave (married)!! I found an Australia Day hat in the Cache!!

Dec 14-15 - Bush Walk Training Hike

So I should be preparing Christian Discovery right now as I am leading it for a year 4 and 5 girls school upon my return to camp / work / Nowra / "home," but instead I am taking advantage of this wonderful wireless internet connection to catch everyone up on my life the past month and a half!

Dan and I planning our training hike. We had to detail our course, where and when we would stop, locate emerency exits points, and plan our menu. This hike would be just Dan and I and our trainer Shell!

Shell and I at Jelly Bean pool after some "bush bashing" / navigating / walking on a compass bearing. I was a bit disappointed to discover the pool was not full of colourful jelly beans :-P Thank you Mel for loaning me your gators! Just wish we had thought to put them on sooner as we all suffered several scratches before remembering we had them!


A "bush cockroach" found at our campsite in the morning. Had to pick it up for size comparison so you could appreciate just how big it is!


A quick detour to "Lost World Lookout"

It was a wonderful, enjoyable two days out the in the Blue Mountains!!

Day 1 Term 1 2009!

So today marked the beginning of Term 1!
It has been way too long since I have last blogged in detail and I'm not goignt o try to catch up on all that has happened! Instead I'll give a glimpse of what is coming next!
We have a year ten group in this week and we are headed on an out trip tomorrow. I'm going to be hiking both ways (usually you would conoe one way and hike the other but one of the girls here is having issues with her knee so I"m going to hike with her group tomorrow while she canoes with mine).
Getting back on Thursday then Flying out of Sydney to Melbourne for a four day weekend and Jacqui & Aaron's wedding (who I have worked two summers with at Sandy Cove!!) SO really excited about that!
Next week I am running Christian Discovery (CD) for a year 4+5 private girls school so I still have a bit of preparation for that, whcih will hopefully happen at some point on the way to and from Melbourne :-P
I've been taking a Preliminary Theology Course by distance education "Introduction to the Bible" and it has been really good!! I'm learning heaps! It gives pretty much a basic over view of the bible but really ties it all together and points out thinigs that you wouldn't necessarily know or think about. I'm nearly done all the studies from that (there are ten) but then I have to study study before the exam, which will be somewhere btwn Feb 11-25.
Yeah, so that's a brief update on my life at the moment.
All is well down in Nowra! I'm on the work computer at the moment so can't load any pics but will have to do that soon.
Miss you all,
Sending some sunshine.
<3 <3 Laura :)

HAPPY 2009!!!

January 17, 2009

Wow! It has been over a month since my last post. I suppose that is evidence of how busy my last month has been! Although this is meant to be the relaxing “holidays,” they have been pretty full; especially my last couple weeks.

I led on a holiday camp here (sort of like summer camp back home). The camp was here where I work but I was a counselor on it so I was staying on site with the girls in a cabin / room. It was lots of fun but also busy as I was a counselor but also working at the same time – yeah so kind of weird.

So that ran from Sat-Sat then I had Canoe training Sun-Tues with an overnight camp on Monday and back to work on Wednesday.

Now it is Saturday and I sit at work overhearing the worship music pouring out of the meeting hall from the group that is in. It is so cool to experience all different groups and they ways they interact and worship. We had an African group in last weekend. It’s just interesting how ppl worship in different ways, and so cool to work at a place that provides people with the opportunity to come away together to grow and learn and worship God.

Although I may want to, there is no way I can possibly fill you in on all that has happened since I last blogged. And you probably wouldn’t want to read that all anyway so I guess I’ll just put some photos up of highlights.

I have been missing everyone from home A LOT this past month and have been thinking of you guys and praying for you. MISS YOU ALL and hope all is well. <3>