Bugs, Babies & Life Stories

Thursday 24th May, 2007







After a nice drive we arrived at Ballarat just after lunch and after we set up Caitie and I headed into town to by some grocery's and some warmer clothes as we were all freezing, (except in the bathrooms because the floors were heated!!!) while Andrew and Pip had a rest. Once we got back Caitlyn found the jumping pillow which as you can see Daddy and Philippa enjoyed too and we had a nice dinner and early bed. Pipi also learnt to stand up on this day as you can see she was very pleased with herself.



Friday 25th May , 2007





Off to Sovereign Hill, we walked up wandered through the gift shop while we waited for it to open as it took us less time than we thought. And once inside we had a great time looking at all the different things. The mine shaft, the gold smelter, the old fashioned lolly shop, the candle maker, the bakery (yummy lamb stew pies), the printers, and the all important panning for gold in the freezing water. It was a long day and by the time we were walking home we were all ready for a early night.

Fairy Park - Anakie (30km out of Geelong) (http://www.fairypark.com/)

Sunday 27th May, 2007

Off to Wee River we go, this was a very long and winding day but we arrived in one piece and it was time to wash!!!!!

Well as you can see this is the first blog since the last (obviously, der Jo!!!) what I mean is that I said in the last I would try and get this all up to date last week and it is now this week and I'm just getting there....

Andrew was sick all week, Pip was and still is cutting her first 2 bottom teeth and is not the happiest at night times and now Caitlyn is getting high temps and aching joints too. Hence I spent the week sleeping on the lounge, much to Caitlyn's distress. She said to me on Saturday " Why do you keep sleeping in the lounge room mummy?" so I told her it was cause Daddy was sick and I didn't want to get sick too, to which she told me "So when daddy isn't sick anymore then you can sleep in your bed again". I just had visions of her telling everyone at Church on Sunday that mummy has been sleeping on the lounge all week.

Anyway I have a spare time now (well actually I really don't want to clean up the kitchen, wash or fold washing or tidy my room so...) I will endeavour to at least finish our holiday blogs.

We got the car back on the Thursday before we left for Nyngan.

We are so very thankful and totally blessed by our church family as we were given 2 x $1000 cheques to help pay for the car and another $250. Thank you to those who are just so generous and loving to us!!!! GOD bless you.

We have been to and returned from Nyngan and had a great time. WDBC Missions Committee asked the church for donations to give to Nyngan Baptist and we were able to give the church a love offering of $1000, which they were totally overwhelmed by. The team was also able to say a huge thank you to the Montgomery's (who we stay with every year, the ENTIRE TEAM!) by giving them $1000, which they greatly appreciated as they had a cry for help the morning we left to the tune of $1200. God is so good!.
Thanks again to our Church family who dug deep and supported the team and the mission this year. We also hope to give them one of the many organs (musical instrument, not body) that we have at the church, as the organ they use (their only musical instrument) died last week. So Andrew, the girls and I are thinking of heading back out on the 5th Sunday weekend to deliver it to them, as it is our Sunday off (Andrew & Noel alternate) and to have a few days off which we all need after working 7 days straight.

I hope to update this Blog in the next week to conclude our holiday (if I can remember it all now!!!) to tell you all about Nyngan and our very quickly growing girls!

We had our meeting yesterday and it was the blessing that we had all been praying for.

We have a membership of 120, we had 4 members overseas or in the middle of Australia, so 115 that could vote, we had 1 invalid vote, 4 No votes, 12 proxy Yes votes and 97 present Yes votes, that was 109 YES votes, which means there was only 2 people that did not vote !!!!
Apparently this is so unheard of, our lawyer told Noel that we are a rarity (to pass a property or Leadership vote we need 75% of total Membership) this is so hard to get, that most churches have changed their constitution to not need such a high percentage. But that didn't matter yesterday as we had a 95% vote. Well done people for stepping up and taking interest in such an important event.

It was such a relief and now the place is just buzzing with excitement for the future and for the first time in 7 long years we can say yes we can look at doing that cause we are STAYING!!!!!!!!

The only sad thing about it was that Mum wasn't here to see it, but I know she has been watching over all of this from above, on her cloud with her angel wings (according to Caitlyn).

A BIG thanks to all our family and friends that have loved and prayed for us over this time. With out that support we would never have been able to survive.

Love you all, you are all very special people.

Please excuse this interlude to our holiday blog, however I felt this was a little more important than the other right now.

We would greatly appreciate your prayers at the time, on Sunday at 11am we are having a special Church meeting to finally vote on selling part of the church property, which will get us debt free, for the first time in 7 long years...... This been a rather stressful time over the few weeks. In previous meetings leading up to this vote things have gotten rather messy and nasty and we so just don't want that on Sunday. There have been many meetings behind the scenes to alleviate this, but until the 11th hour we will not know what is going to happen. As you can imagine this as made life very stressful for both us and the Edwardes, and this is where you come in if you could please pray for Noel and Anne and Andrew and I, but especially for the guys as ultimately their jobs and lively hood hinge on Sundays decision.

But this is not where it ends, actually this is where it starts, you see yesterday Andrew was picking up his mum to take her to the nursing home to feed Nana as David & Dee are down and had her car, when the power steering went on him. He limped it to our Mechanics (Our Car Dr as Caitie calls them) and rang for Noel to pick him up. We all thought it was just want had happened last time and it would be just a case of putting the belt back on and tightening a screw!!!! We were sadly mistaken. Step rang and said "Jo i have some bad news, Yes the pulley fell off cause the nut has fallen off (a common problem with our model apparently!) but the nut that holds the crank shaft has shawn off and the other piece is inside the bottom of the motor" Ah Ha says Jo and that means what? "Well we have to pull the entire engine out and strip it down" and cause it has done over 200000 and is leaking oil and the lifters have needed doing for a long time, bottom line is the engine needs to be reconditioned!!! So what are we looking at to do this asked Jo? about $6,500!!!!!!!!!!!!! AND EVERYTHING AFTER THAT IS A BLUR REALLY.
I just laughed, and Steph said " I'm glad your laughing" I said it is that or cry (that I did later)... So the up shot of all of this is, that they are reconditioning the engine and it is going to cost $6,500 and we won't have a car for 2 weeks. This is where our other problem appears as in 2 weeks on the 7th July to be exact we are leaving for Nyngan and were to be taking the van!!!!!

Praise God that this happened now, 5 kms for the mechanic and not 2 weeks ago on the Great Ocean Road with the van or half way to Nyngan

Andrew said to me last night, Do you think we are finally do the right thing in regard to the Church and Satan is trying his utmost to interfere, both with the congregation and with us personally, my response was, yeah well I can see that and deal with it, but did it have to be so flopping expensive!!!

So please pray for the following:-

For Noel as he chairs the meeting.
For Andrew that he keeps his cool and behaves in the meeting.
For each and every member at the meeting.
That the meeting will be holy and full of God' s grace.
That we get the car back before the 7th.
That we can arrange some other transport if it doesn't.
That we can find some more accommodation in Nyngan to alleviate taking the van.
For the team as they prepare for Nyngan (Us 4, Kimberly, Heather, Lizzie, John, Anthony, Adam & Sarah).

And praise God for our wonderful friends Marcus and Majella, without them since Mum's death, I know Andrew and I would not have been able to survive, they love our girls and are willing to take them anytime, they love us and do anything for us and most of all they have lost of cars, so every time we need a car, all it takes is a phone call and it is here that afternoon. We are so truly blessed by this family and we love them dearly as did Mum.

Tuesday 22nd May, 2007

Happy 32nd Birthday to Me!!!! I received 2 new books from my girls, one of which was finished by Wye River (now that's a holiday!!) and from my wonderful, thoughtful Husband I received my Motorbike Learners Course and if you have read the previous blog then you know I did it, I survived and I passed, Woo Hoo).

On the way we stopped at a rest stop for morning tea, where while Pip enjoyed her biscuit Caitlyn climbed in trees.

We arrived into Echuca at about 2pm and it this was a great caravan park, they were so helpful, the amenities were great, we were directly opposite the toilets as requested and Caitie loved the kids play area and feeding the ducks in the lake. After we were set up and had lunch we headed into town and to the wharf to book our ride on a Paddle steamer on the Murray River and buy some yummy fudge.
For dinner that night we went to the local club and had a nice dinner and then back to the van for bed.

Pip's sleeping habits were starting to change and she seemed to be waking more frequently than normal and would only go back to sleep with a feed.

Wednesday 23rd May, 2007

The next day after a leisurely breakfast we headed over to the wharf and started our tour and Paddle steamer ride. We were lucky enough to get onto the "Pevensy" which was the boat they used for the Australian 80's TV mini-series, All the Rivers Run were she was called the "Philadelphia". It was a great day and we all enjoyed the whole experience.
After some lunch we went for a walk along the main street, purchased 2 lovely photos/prints for our birthdays. mine is a picture of the "Craig Hut" from The Man From Snowy River with the 2 graves, this is a special place to me as I just loved the movie, You are not a real Aussie if that piece of music as Jim Craig goes over the end of the mountain, doesn't stir you!!! and also now since the hut was burnt down in the fires that went through Victoria late last year. For Andrew, we got a picture of 3 Paddle steamers docked on the Murray, very beautiful.
That night, we decided to put Pip to sleep on our bed while we sat up and watched a DVD with Caitie, the thing was when we went to move Pip back she woke and it took alot to get her back to sleep.

Thursday 24th May, 2007

We hooked up early Thursday morning and headed to Ballarat. Did you know that it is still dark till 7:30am, which is a problem when you are in a caravan and your children are up and 6am!!! you spend your entire morning saying SHHHHHH to Caitlyn and shoving either food or a dummy in the Pip's mouth.

This is the New Ducati 2007 1098S Tri Colore Very Nice!!!!! But lethal weapon - see specs below

We all survived, got back in one piece and had a great time.

On Monday we leave for our Birthday road trip!!!!!!

Monday 21st we drive to Wagga Wagga stopping at the Dog on the Tucker Box of course, then Tuesday 22nd for my 32nd birthday we drive to Echuca where we cruise the Murray or maybe roll in the mud....... and have a rest sightseeing day. Thursday 24th we hook up the van again and head to Ballarat where we do Sovereign Hill and Fairyland. On Sunday 27th we head to Wye River on the Great Ocean Road. We are planing to spend Monday going up and down the GOR and then Tuesday at Werribee Zoo. Wednesday 30th Andrews 40th Birthday we head to Phillip Island to watch the Fairy (yes I can call them fairy again!!!!) Penguins. Thursday 31st we head to Sale for a birthday dinner with my cousin Abbey who was born on the same day as Andrew only 27 years apart!!!!! Then it is the travel home Friday 1st Eden and Mogo Zoo, Saturday 2nd Batemans Bay and Sunday 3rd Home Sweet Home.

Please pray that we have no car or van problems (we just had to replace the clutch in the Pajero $1200!!!!!!) and that we are able to manage getting the girls to sleep at 7pm and us not going to bed till when ever, all of us in the little van!!!.

As we did Europe for my 30th, I felt it was only fair that we do something special for Andrews 40th and so this is why we are going on a road trip to VIC with a caravan and two kids...... hehehe I think I got the better deal.

I was very spoilt by my wonderful family.

I have come to the conclusion that we breed little ones........

Philippa 5 months and Imogen 2 days

Philippa 8 months and Imogen 3 months

Its started already!!!!!

Well, this was very disappointing day.

Oh well maybe next year