"if we took a holiday"

Remember that sweet Madonna song? What a week! Last week, me and Amy packed our bags and headed up to Lancelin, which is an hour and a half north of Perth. We stayed at a cozy backpackers and made lots of friends from Germany, Israel and Ireland. On Wednesday we took a day trip to New Norcia, Western Australia's only monastic town and we visited the monastery. It was beautiful. We also took a tour of the town and got to visit all of the historic buildings and churches that were around the monastery. On Thursday, we took another day trip out to the penacles, which are sand and salt formations that look like giant penacles. It was pretty interesting, but a bit far to drive for just an hour visit. We spent the rest of our time in Lancelin vegging out on the beach, riding our bikes around town, hanging out with our foreign friends and staying up way too late watching the world cup. Everyone is crazy about it here! Unfortunately Australia and America are both out, so I'm not sure who to go for now.
The Lipscomb team came in late Tuesday evening and this past week has been dedicated to orientating them around the city. Wednesday morning we met in King's Park to discuss plans for the month and then we headed to the Swan River and went sailing on yachts. It was incredible, I've never done anything like it before and now I understand why people become so addicted to yacht racing. Thursday we spent time in Bankshia Juvenille Detention Center preforming skits and ministring to the kids in the center. It was such a humbling experience; they were so happy that we would take time out of our schedules to hang out with them and they were encouraged by our skits. We were able to speak openly about God and our relationship with him and encouraged them to be good examples to the other kids inside the center. Today was a more relaxed day, as we caught the train into the city and let the team do some shopping! On Monday we will begin our school program at Shenton College, so we've got a busy week to look forward to.

why do we make our lives so busy?

My life can be crazy at times, and yet, I continue to pile more and more things on. It's like I feel I'm not productive unless I am busy, going from one thing to the next, until I come home late at night and crash in my bed. And I hear that this condition worsens with age. So much to look forward to, I mean, I love stretching myself too thin. No realy, it's just a good reality check to see what things are piling up in your daily schedule and what things you can go without "doing", and how amazingly your life is still ok. At the moment, I feel as if I am Super Woman, balancing these many jobs on my shoulders. And the sad thing is, I bring it all on myself. This type of behavior would be normal for me under any other circumstance, but these next weeks in particular, we have American students coming out to Perth, which I will be for the most part, leading around the city. So Amy and I have decided to run off to Lancelin(1 1/2 north of Perth) and veg for three days next week. All of my important business will be put on hold for a mini-holiday, which I'm really looking forward to. Sorry world; Super Duty needs a vacation.

Ok, I probably exaggerated a little bit, but this past week has been pretty, as they say in Perth, chocker blocked! I've done a lot of babysitting at odd times during the day, and meetings on top of meetings, and errands on top of errands, etc... Last Friday night we combined youth groups with Mt. Lawly, and had a get-to-know you night at my friend Rob's house. It was such a great night, full of pool, ping-pong, cards, and lots and lots of pizza. Oh and we managed to fit in a devo somewhere in the mix of things. Saturday, Cath and I decided to go on a massive run, all the way from Trigg beach to Hillary's, we were spent afterwards! Saturday evening I had the priveldge of participating in a progressive dinner and then I met Cath for a movie. Sunday was the most hectic out of the weekend with church, then lunch together, on to Lipscomb plans, and back to church for a combined singing night with several churches. And this past week has been a balancing act to say the least. Tomorrow night we're going bowling for youth group, Saturday I have a dinner with people I went to Exmouth with in December, Sunday is church, and afterwards is babysitting the rest of the day. But things are great, they really are! Josh and I are getting super stoked about the students coming out, but we know that the month of July will be draining. So enjoy the posts! I'll try to keep them up, but if I am slack, could you cut me some slack?

Oh...I almost forgot to mention...I found a Borders bookstore in the city! It's amazing, just like the ones in the states. It's like my little sanctuary in Perth. I plan to move my office into Borders and camp out there during the week. If you need me, I'll be sitting on the floor in the travel section, reading...

all work, and lots and lots of play!

In the mist of mass chaos and confusion, we still managed to make our way down to Bunburry for State Youth Games 2006! What a great weekend, we had a blast. Unfortunately we had about 10 people drop out of SYG at the last minute, so the week before the big weekend, we decided to join with Warwick church, and be a part of their team. It was so much fun. Their team was "Warwick United", which took on the Power Rangers "look". Each church had to have an action hero theme for the weekend. We already know lots of people from their church, so it was good to just go and spend time with them and play on different sports teams with them. I played ultimate frisbee, indoor beach volleyball and bowling. It was the greatest weekend of my life, filled with pizza, snack food, and cards. The Bunburry church put on a bbq for all of us on Sunday night, so it was super encouraging that we were able to spend some time with them. They were so kind to us while we were there, and took great care of us. Hopefully next year, our Westchurch team will return and we'll win the Small Church award, as we did last year!

This week has been hectic, a lot more than I thought it would be after coming back. It's really starting to get crazy here, Lipscomb will be out in Perth in less than 3 weeks. Friday night we're combining youth groups with another church, Mt. Lawly, just for a little bit of a change. We're really wanting to reach out to not only high school ages, but also accommadate all the young adults that we have. We'll see how it all pans out. On Wednesday, Amy, Helen, Lisa and myself all went and saw x-men 3 in the afternoon. Nothing too special about that. But, over here in Australia, they have gold class seating at the movies, which is like a level above regular seating. We had our very own theater and our own lazy-boy recliners to seat in during the movie. And waiters would bring out food and drinks for us whenever we wanted them to during the film. It was glorious, I absolutely loved it! Cath and I got up for an early morning run, which was sooooooo cold, but also very refreshing. And most of the morning I've spent finishing up some work on the computer. This afternoon, I'm going to visit my friend Anna and then I've got volleyball. The life of duty never stops, even in foreign countries.