I'm Back, Baby!

So, it's been almost one year since I've posted on my blog.  And I stopped feeling guilty about it.  When I was blogging regularly, I had a lot more time on my hands.  But working 4 days a week, and a full time mum, wife and many other things, I realised that blogging just wasn't a priority, so I didn't even keep thinking about it, let alone feel guilty for not writing.

However, circumstances have changed and I'm hoping to start up my blogging again.

When I last wrote, I was living in Cairns, working for MAF.  My family and I are now living in Melbourne and I'm not working at all!  Big Spring took a call (he's a Lutheran Pastor) to a new position within the Lutheran Church of Australia (LCA).  He's no longer a pastor of a particular parish, but a pastor involved in families, children and youth ministry Australia and NZ wide.  He was able to choose to be based out of Adelaide or Melbourne and with all of our families located in Victoria, it made sense that we chose to be based in Melbourne.  We moved down two weeks ago, today!  We are currently in temporary accommodation while the LCA go through the process of purchasing a manse (house) for us.  It's a little frustrating not having all our things (currently in storage), but we did get about 10 boxes of extra personal items to use while we are in this place (a fully furnished house), so it feels a little more like 'home'.

At this stage, I'm not looking to get back into a paid job.  I'm actually looking forward to being at home a lot more; I'll have more time for baking and experimental cooking, which I absolutely love doing, but wasn't able to as there just wasn't enough time or energy.  It also means that Little Spring will get the best of me, instead of a tired, busy, grumpy mummy after school.  I never felt that she got any quality time out of me.  I'd be getting home from work (picking her up from after school care on the way home) and just when she wanted to play with me, I'd more often than not have to decline as I needed to clean, cook dinner or collapse on the couch and just relax for a minute.  It wasn't ideal and I felt horrible.  But now, I can get a lot of that done during the day, ensuring that when she gets home from school, we can have quality time together.  And I just LOVE that and our relationship is blossoming more and more!

Basically, this means that, although I might not be blogging on a daily basis, I do hope I can blog more regularly than I have in this past year.

So, welcome back to me and more importantly, welcome back to my regular readers... however many or few that may be!

Retreat

Retreat: Yes, I went on a women's retreat last weekend, but I'm not talking about that retreat in this post (I hope to post about that another time though).

I'm talking about a personal retreat.  I'm longing for one.  I need one.  I'm desperate for one.  This past week has got me thinking about many, many things.  Assessing my life and realising how ridiculously busy it is.  Realising the unrealistic expectations I've placed on myself.  And realising that I don't think I actually know who I am anymore.  I have no doubt about my role as a wife and a mother, but beyond that, I've been thinking a lot about who I actually am as a person.  Who I really am and assessing why I do the things I do.

I want to go away for at least 24 hours and spend time in prayer, meditation, devotion and answer some tough questions I've asked myself.  This morning when I woke up (well, when I got woken up by darling Little Spring - no sleep in for me!), I started to write down all the questions I want to answer... 4 A4 pages worth of questions.  I'm now in the process of trying to track down some sort of resource that will help guide me through all these thoughts swirling around in my head.  If you've ever come across any sort of 'personal retreat' resource that you can recommend, I would really appreciate you passing this information on to me.  My focus really is "who am I".  I need God's guidance through this, but if you have any suggestions for resources, specific bible readings for me to mediate through, etc. that would be super helpful!

(image credit: taken by my Aunty Ellen)

Not Recommended

I don't recommend attempting the following:

In one same week:

• starting a major diet/exercise regime (12WBT) AND
• having your husband overseas AND
• having a job that is new in itself, so getting ready in the morning is still 'interesting' AND
• having to get your daughter ready for day care for the first time (when your husband normally does that) each morning, whilst trying to get yourself ready, and deal with her separation anxiety AND
• starting that week with a weekend away at a women's retreat, so you're already behind before you've even started your week

Nope, totally don't recommend it!

Yep, totally experienced it!  How did I 'survive' (I've put that in inverted commas, because because I don't feel I really survived it, but I'm here on the other side, still breathing, so there is some element of survival):

• being kind to myself, first by stopping the exercises.  I forced myself to do exercises on Monday, even though, after a very long day, I really didn't want to.   I decided on Tuesday that exercise wasn't going to actually help me this week: just stress me out, make me feel guilty if I didn't do it and take up precious time that I didn't have much spare of.  I'm not saying that exercise isn't important, but I am saying you have to realistic.  Even Michelle Bridges acknowledges in her preseason tasks - "external excuses outside of your control".  While sticking to just the diet aspect of the program, from the Monday morning weigh to the Wednesday morning weigh in, I'd lost an amazing 1.3kg!  By the end of the week, however, even trying to stick to the menu plan was stressing me.  With so many extra factors lumped on my life this passed week, not having flexibility with what I was eating was having me stressed.  Where possible, I tried to move the menu items around to fit how energetic I was, therefore, what meal preparation would suit.  A kind friend that I debriefed with yesterday had wonderful words of wisdom to share with me.  Be kind to myself.  It's okay if I don't stick to the program.  My expectations of myself were too high and I needed to drop them.  As long as I make sensible food choices, it doesn't matter if I don't stick to the plan.  What a weight off (pun not intended!).
• there's not much I could do about Big Spring being overseas, but obviously if we'd realised everything that was going to happen this week and how it all fell together (or fell apart!), then a few months ago, we might have reconsidered agreeing he should go to the States for a conference (the 20-20 vision of hindsight is amazingly clear!).  However, having WiFi/internet available, has been a blessing to talk to him for free and the invention of Skype is so amazing.  Every night Little Spring and I chatted with Big Spring and we had our nightly bedtime routine, including blessings and prayers together.  Such commitment from Big Spring to do this though: he had to get up at 5am to match Little Spring's bedtime.  And he's not a morning person!
• again, there's not really a lot I could have done about my new job.  If we'd realised how big a week this was going to be, perhaps we would have reconsidered me accepting the position, but for just such a short period, it doesn't seem a very realistic way of making that decision.  We maybe could have deferred my start date for a further few weeks, but I don't think that would have been very realistic for my employers.
• in regards to getting Little Spring ready in the morning, it was a matter of getting as much ready the night before, which was quite difficult at the end of an already long day!  I had teed up with work, however, that I'd be getting into work late while Big Spring is overseas, so it took the pressure off getting out the door on time.  Addressing Little Spring's separation anxiety has been stressful and emotional.  It's unfortunate that we were dealing with it in this particular week, but no matter when she started day care, we'd have to deal with this and push through.
• I could have cancelled the retreat, but it was something I was really looking forward to and, although it had me starting my week on the back foot, I was SO glad to have gone... I really appreciated the bible study and it was wonderful to bond more deeply with some beautiful women from the church.  I had so much fun!

Dear Friends in Adelaide

Before coming home after our trip to Brisbane and the Gold Coast, we travelled further south to Adelaide, SA so we could attend our 18 month review/debrief (wow... it's hard to believe that we've been in Cairns for almost that length of time).

Because the wives of the graduating pastors for 2010 are so close, it was a wonderful time of fellowship and catching up, even though it was a 'requirement' and 'facilitated'.  It was helpful to share our struggles, challenges and praise points at our respective parishes as a group.  On the Wednesday night, we organised a gathering of the husbands, wives and kids (where applicable).  Many of us hadn't seen each other since the husbands were ordained; a lot had change, obviously, in those 18 months!  Here's what we captured on the night:

The Pastors from the Graduating Class of 2010 (minus one)

The Wives of the Pastors from the Graduating Class of 2010! (again, minus one)

And we attempted to get the kids all in one shot... but that was never going to happen:

 All the kids at least in one spot, even if not ready for a picture, so I attempt to take a quick snap because I don't know how long that moment will last... but someone's butt got in the way! (I won't mention who the guilty party is... lets see if the rightful owner recognises their own derriere!)

 Samuel and Little Spring staying put while the rest of the kids go AWOL before we get a chance to snap a formal picture

Almost all the kids gathered, but Micah and Grace not happy (brother and sister) and Eliza takes the opportunity to make a break for it

I give up on a group shot and try and snap some individual poses so we at least have a picture of every kid to look back on and compare at our next reunion...

Poor Samuel, he just sat patiently throughout the whole ordeal wondering what the big deal was.  He stayed in place and posed, ready for the camera!

Micah now happy as he was free from the torturous horrors of having to sit and pose for a group shot!

Unfortunately we never got a picture of all the kids together before we left the Sem in 2010 (I'm saddened by this, but wanted to make up for it with the group shot attempted above, but at least we tried this time!).  Anyway, here are the group shots of the adults from their respective ordinations and graduations (Sem Wives Graduation Celebration - an annual event for the departing wives):

 2010 Ordination Class

Sem Wives Graduation Class

Pastors' Wives Unite!

After Pastors' Conference was finished, we headed further down the coast so that Big Spring could attend Synod on the Gold Coast.

That night, I headed out to a Pastors' Wives Dinner that we are hoping will be a regular event each year (this is the second year that it's happened and hope to continue that tradition).
 

 

It was only a small gathering, but our little group are hoping to grow the awareness of the Pastors' Wives gatherings and set up a network for all the wives whose husbands are pastors.

The "Class of 2010" reunion (unfortunately missing Kim as she traveled to Adelaide early). (I'm annoyed that Blogger is mucking around with my photos again!)

Coordinating Easter

It sounds horrible - "Coordinating Easter". After all, Easter is all about celebrating the death and resurrection of our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Full stop. That should be enough. But as a family, it's not simply a matter of just going to church and celebrating that victory and coming home and having family time together to mark this occasion. It should be as simple as that, but it's simply not. Unfortunately.

Yes, Easter itself is really just about Christ and what He has done for us, but there are other elements of Easter as well... the family time to celebrate together, the chocolate aspect of it and the Easter Egg hunt the chocolate entails. I grew up with that and I don't want to deprive Little Spring of memories like that either.

I'm proud that we have the true meaning of Easter understood:

Little Spring the other morning when I was warming up hot cross buns: "Mummy, cross. Died."
Me: "That's right, Jesus died on the cross, but what does Easter mean?"
Little Spring: "Alive!"

So, with that taken care of (!) I need to coordinate our family time over the Easter period. Last year (our first in our first parish), we didn't actually think about it and celebrated it on Sunday... but it (egg hunt) didn't happen until after 4pm, when Big Spring got back from his last service and was very exhausted from the long day.

In light of that, this year we decided to celebrate on Easter Saturday. That's Big Spring's semi day off so thought that would be perfect. Except that that didn't happen very well. Even before we'd sat down to breakfast, he received his first phone call... which then turned into his second phone call shortly after. Not to mention all the other pastoral things that sprung up during the day including a requested hospital visit plus his Easter service final preparations.

After that experience, we decided that next year we are going to try for Easter Monday instead. He takes the week off after Easter, so Monday will definitely be his day off as we'll be on holidays, and we'll be able to have a full day of family celebrations.

Let's wait and see if that finally works!

I'm very curious to know what others of my readers who are in the ministry (or who grew up in the ministry) do over Easter to celebrate as a family, coordinating around Easter services? What works/doesn't work for you? I'd love to get some new and different ideas to see what might also work for us!