I went to the Brisbane Lifeline Bookfest yesterday, and picked up a backpack full of books… there’s still time to make it there for a look (although the rain might dampen things a bit..)
There’s something wonderful about reading a good book on a rainy day, with a cup of coffee by your side…
New year, new direction… I’ve started looking at my study subjects – my brain is starting to hurt 😀
Went to Centrelink to apply for Austudy – a stress inducing activity 😦
Here’s a photo of all my books –
Yayy!!!!!! 😀
I’ll be doing it online, with the option of taking some actual classes each semester. I haven’t done formal study for over 20 years, so it’s all a bit daunting… I feel like my brain has to stretch a bit to fit in the extra information, and I don’t even remember doing the referencing/bibliographies for essays last time. Last time was a diploma of Art, in the late 80s…my assignments were hand written on bits of foolscap… I’ll even have to figure out how to format the assignments properly so they’ll be accepted!
Nevertheless, I’m excited 😀 So far, I’ve tackled the first lessons for Chemistry, and Anatomy and Physiology… not sure I’ve grasped all the important facts yet..
My subjects for this semester are –
Chemistry
Anatomy and Physiology 1
Naturopathic Philosophy
Herbal Medicine 1
Iridology
Flower Essences
So, we are now in a permanent home! 😀 All my Facebook friends know the story, and we have called others to let them know, but just in case you missed it, here’s the story!
Part 1 –
Signed up for NRAS (National Rental Affordability Scheme – an Australian Government scheme) about two- two and a half weeks ago, after looking at a property, applied on the morning after, heard back less than a week later that we got it, scrambled about for rental bond/grant/paperwork etc, moved in last Friday (9th) (with final boxes etc Monday)!
It’s a 3 bedroom brand new semi-detached house in a new complex, back in the suburb we moved from in February…(from our bedroom window we can see the back yard of the house that’s directly opposite our previous house) We have air conditioners in every room, a dishwasher!, rainwater tanks, everything energy efficient… I don’t think we’ve come down to earth yet! (We have had to “evict” five jumpy huntsman spiders of varying sizes since Friday…) Still unpacking boxes so haven’t stopped long enough to celebrate properly (although we went to Sizzlers – the boys were ecstatic. And full)…Â Â
Here’s some photos – we’ve put in more furniture since then – and books! – lots of books 😀
The lounge
Dining area (now minus the futon 😀 )
My beautiful kitchen!
The stairs leading upstairs… and guest loo to the left. There are three toilets in the house – Practical Me had a bit of an inner grumble about three times the cleaning… Fairy Princess Me danced around Ms Practical, scattering glitter in her path..
Boys’ bathroom
Our bedroom…
….and ensuite (isn’t everything beautiful and white?)
Part 2 –
We were looking at a hefty debt for the mortgage of the last house – it sold a while back for about $185000, where the mortgage was about $285000+ …we’ve just been waiting for the final figures from the bank. We got the letter last Friday… seems, somehow, that on October 31, just over $96000 was repaid (how and by whom, we don’t know), leaving us with a debt of just under $5500… went to the bank Monday to check that it wasn’t all a computer glitch, they called up the home loans department… the bank’s wiped out the remaining debt – we are free and clear, with no black mark on our credit rating! I didn’t mention it on my Facebook status (because it was pretty obvious to me…) but God has been so amazing in all this, and we have been praising Him for everything! We would never have even thought to ask for all He’s given us just in the last week (furnishings and whitegoods that we needed at reduced prices, good things happening at the speed of light… 😀 ) but we have been abundantly and thoroughly blessed!
We went to two festivals a couple of  weekends ago – one on Saturday (a Home/Alternative type thing at Kangaroo point), one on Sunday (the re-opening of a park by the Brisbane River) The first one I found interesting, but the boys were a bit bored (littlest Bean got a free drawing class, though), the second was aimed more towards kids – we all had fun! 😀
 The computer’s not letting me write between the images 😦 so here’s a run down of the photos below…
1. Making a smoothie using bicycle power – you pay for your smoothie, then get to make it yourself! 😀
2. The wallpapered van – decorated with bits of material/wallpaper/whatever else seemed to be around…
3. Playing a cigar box guitar, with tamborine played with a foot – later a coke bottle slide was used, as well..
These were at the park opening on the Saturday..
4. and 5. My littlest bean decided he’d tackle the rock wall – he tried very hard, but didn’t make it much past the height in the second photo… not being able to feel the next foothold easily made him nervous. He kept trying, though 😀
6. There were free temporary tattoos… why not get a purple frog?
Littlest Bean went to a fancy dress party on Saturday. It was Disney themed, and he chose Dash from The Incredibles… we had to rustle up a costume that would withstand at least a bit of running around. It’s amazing what you can achieve with scraps of material, thread and a bit of glue 😀
Here’s our Superboy…
… and the action shots…
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We used a pair of his pyjamas, which had to be turned inside out to hide the tags/images (they were Batman pyjamas) but I think it worked OK..
Spent the morning with some friends yesterday, at Robelle Domain in Springfield… there’s a cafe there, too, which seems to be open late… might have to check that out..
It’s a lovely place. The playground is pretty impressive, and the kids all loved the water feature… after we’d explored the waterfall and the trails we went back to the play area, where they stripped off their shirts and proceeded to get drenched… Good thing kids don’t seem to feel the cold..
Here’s the  kids… I took a few photos, but I couldn’t get one with everyone smiling..
There was a grassed area further on; a sort of hill/tiered seating arrangement.. perfect for running up (and maybe rolling down?)
We stopped a bit further on for a snack of homegrown oranges, chopped up and eaten straight from the skin… there were water bubblers nearby to wash off the juice.. then it was back to exploring..
One of the highlights of the day (besides the water play) was the mostly dry stream running alongside the trails. The kids scrambled and climbed along the rocks, testing their “parkour” abilities 😀
If you look closely, you may see small people… There they are! 😀
 More climbing…..
Littlest bean wore his nice boots, so I was not overly impressed when he slipped into the muddy stream and got soaked up to his knees… he didn’t seem too worried..
My camera battery ran down, so I didn’t get any photos of the water feature… they played there the last half hour or so, while the adults had coffee… it was a fun morning.
We will be back!
I was talking to a friend yesterday morning about the dream of creating a Christian healing community, and to another friend yesterday evening about my plans/dreams to do a naturopathy course (which would eventually fit in with the community plans…) The way I feel today, it seems ridiculous. Out of reach. Undoable. I do feel a bit old and decrepit today…
The dream keeps growing, in my head. I am unable to do it on my own.
Fortunately, I am not on my own….
I still believe God has placed the dream in me… so He will send the resources and abilities to realise it. Don’t know when… but I suppose there’s no point worrying about it.
One foot in front of the other.. identify the next step, and take it.
Got back yesterday from the road trip – we had a great time! We didn’t end up camping – way too wet – but we explored the back roads, and had fun 😀
The main purpose of the trip was to pick up a trailer my friend had bought online, so we headed for Grafton to do that… I don’t know New South Wales particularly well, so I left the sightseeing itinerary to my friend. She’d been wanting to check out the Lions Road over the mountains, so we went that way.. Up the top there’s a lookout called the Border Loop Lookout, where you can see the railway line as it spirals round the mountain (and, presumably, trains, if you’re there at the right time..) We stopped there for a cup of tea and a look… we’d been hearing the bellbirds from the car as we drove, but they were louder when we got out.
The other sound you hear would be rain…
We travelled the rest of the way to Grafton… the Lions Road is winding and climbing and bumpy. Normally I would be quite travel-sick… this time, my boys prayed specifically for me to be OK, and we had a box of liquorice allsorts in the car there and back – I didn’t even have a twinge of nausea, so I figure the combination of prayer, liquorice and sugar must have done the trick 😀
Picked up the trailer about half an hour out of Grafton.. the sellers also bred puppies, so we squeed over gorgeous puppies (how do their tails wag so fast!?) and were also gifted with some fruit from their trees (grapefruit, guava, passionfruit,oranges and a grapefruit/orange cross)
Back to Grafton for some lunch by the river..
From there we went straight to Maclean, where we were booked in to the Maclean Hotel for the night..
We were by the river but couldn’t really see it too well from the balcony, so we braved the drizzle to have a walk by the river and up the street lined with old brick buildings..
Maclean is a fishing town on the Clarence River… it also calls itself “The Scottish Town in Australia”
The telephone poles are painted with different clan names and tartans, and there’s a map at the Information Centre/Scottish Shop where you can look up your ancestral clan… here’s mine..
 We wandered up and down the main street… there were some interesting shops and a lovely little teashop, but they were closed, and we left in the morning before they would have opened… we got hot chips for tea and settled back in the hotel for the evening. The Maclean Hotel is a nice pub/accommodation place, with a fire downstairs in the winter… the room had a lovely high ceiling, and doors leading on to the balcony – it would be nice in the summer… a little too cold for the winter… nothing a big woolly blanket couldn’t fix 😀
It rained heavily throughout the night, but let up enough in the morning for us to pack the car… the downpour resumed as we left Maclean…
We had planned to take the coast road back, but we both agreed that we’d always wanted to visit Nimbin, so it was back up the mountains again… still raining, and lots of potholes.. Nimbin is known as the “Alternative Capital of Australia”… it reminded me of the Montville/Maleny area, but with more hemp (of all kinds..) I’d love to go back and visit when it’s not raining.. I liked the vibe..
We passed the Nimbin Rocks on the way in..
… and encountered rainbows on the outskirts… This is the school at the other end of town..
We walked up and down the main street..
… checked out various clothes shops, as well as Happy High Herbs, and the Hemp Embassy, and then stopped at the Rainbow Cafe for lattes and rainbow chips (various coloured root veges, thick cut, fried and salted – perfect for a cold, wet, windy day!)
There’s a fair bit of drugs/paraphenalia at Nimbin (we inadvertently gatecrashed a couple of deals while visiting the public loos on our way out, and it’s the place to go if you want to learn more about legalising cannabis) but there’s also alternative lifestyle, as in sustainability and creativity. I’m not interested in smoking pot, but I’d be interested in checking that out a bit more..
We finally wended our way home, back over the range… the creek was noticeably higher and wilder after the previous night’s rain, nearly reaching the bridges at some points…
All in all, we had a fun time together… weary after a long road home, but – yayyy! Road trip! 😀
a bit of creativity, a bit of eco consciousness, a bit of inspiration.... hopefully not a lot of pompousness and blathering :D
i'm not entirely sure what's going on here... let's travel along and see...
1000 Fields of Roses 
