Not me monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I am not constructing my second post for the day just because I have some great material for NMM this week... nope not me.
Oh and i have not taken nearly a week to actually finish and post the previous post either. I am not that busy and over extended that I couldn't complete one blog post even though I really wanted to... nope, not me.

I did not spot a mysterious object in amongst our 'clean' washing as i was opening the machine only to realise my daughter who happens to put everything the undresses from in the washing basket, apparently had added soiled nappies to that list. If i had though, I most certainly would not have just re washed the load a few times until there was no trace of said 'object' and then rewashed 3 times with napisan and hot water... nope i would not show such blatant disregard for the sanctity of my washing machine! or the environmental cost of so many rewashes. No, not me!

I did not ignore the obvious fact my children were playing instead of sleeping after I put them to bed in hopes they may sleep in a little later that 545am... I was not highly impressed that it worked and considering doing it again even thought my nearly four year old couldn't keep her eyes open and 5 in the afternoon the next day... Nope, not me! i would most certainly put my children's well being ahead of my own never ending desire for more sleep...

I also did not leave my daughters 4th birthday party planning, including invitations until the week of her birthday... NOPE! not me, I am always organised and plan elaborate celebrations with hand crafted invites and matching name cards at the table set with each child's personalised party gift along with matching decor and .... oh, alright, we are having a BBQ at the park... i mean Nope, not ME!

I almost forgot... I did not in below mentioned emergency situation dial '911' when he emergency number in austrlia is 000, even though i have dialed 000 5 or more times before, and had the number drilled in since kindergarten... nope, not me. (luckily, you know, if i had done that, the call would play a friendly little message like "you have dialled emergency assistance, the number is 000, putting you through now" thus making said dialer realise their error.
This would not prove that i spend to much time reading american cops and cops wives' blogs :) and watching american TV... NOpe, certainly not me!

first day at school... public v private?

One happy little kindy kid... She has been counting the sleeps until she could go to school


She absolutely loves getting dressed in her 'nuniform'...

Unleashing the poser with in!


One more bonus of havin a shift workin cop daddy is he gets to come for our first day of school!
And pick up too! (In the background is mrs groves who i am trying to teach grace to stop calling Mrs gross, but i think the whole class has got her name wrong as i have heard others doing it too)



I made the decision a long time ago to send y kids to public schol at least for primary school (first seven years). Finances has a little to do with it (about $60 a year vs $4000) but mostly it comes down to the options available. The best performing schools in our state are the private catholic schools, but I cant stand the religious factor. I mean i am a Christian and i love going to church but there are so many rules and regulations and routines in catholicism that i dont feel bring us any closer to God, but anyway that is a whole differet topic. Digressing... for that reason idont want to send my girls to a catholic school.
The Christian schools in our state whos beliefs are most aligned to ours are all strictly christian enrolments only by pastoral reference and i dont feel that segregating my children from the world they will evenually have to interact with will benifit them. I truly belive when our beliefs are challenged we are sharpened and grow, and the opportunity to share Christ and our testimony with friends is paramount in our walk with God.
There are baptist schools who's doctrine is good and enrol all students but the ones in our area don't fare much better academically than the public schools and i just cant justify so much extra money when i feel i can teach Christian values and lead my children in finding a relationship with God at home...

So we have done our research and got grace into a great schol in our area, and i plan to chec out their teachers each year and keep up with the programming so i can make sure we discuss any conflicting things that come up values and beliefs wise and plan to make a decision about highschool a bit further down the track. that said, If being in that environment has a negative impact on the girls we will find the money to send them to a Christian school.

I would love to hear what you all think/what your experiences have been

Some belated photos

For some reason I couldnt get these to download the other night so i had to save copies elsewhere on my harddrive and it worked.
These photos where taken by an officer who goes to our church(the uniformed officer in the group pic below), who happens to do a bit of photography on the side. Many thanks to him as my camera had nither the zoom or resolution to get good shots where we could actully pic D from the crowd.

I have not included some shots as too many other officers where visable. I have also blurred any other officers in close view and some details for obvious privacy reasons as although you would really need to be directed to find this blog it is technically a public forum.

Funnily enough in our fairly small church there are 4 regularly attending cops, i am yet to decide whether our church is appealing to a particular personality type that includes alot of cops or if there are just alot of christian cops out there.

Academy days are over...

I cant believe about 2 years ago my husband, then a qualified tradie started throwing around some talk about joining the police. 6 months of think about it, more than a year of tests, exams and qualifying, appointments and tryouts, and 6 months of academy you think i would be used to it right...well no, i still cant believe he just went and became a cop...

The Gradution was great...although the newly appointed constables were very hot out on that parade ground. Our girls watched their daddy march and even tried a bit of marching themselves much to the amusement of those seated around us. A few guys from church turned out too which I think D really appreciated.






We had the celebration ball that night which was nice...

we landed up on a fairly quiet table, but the table next to us, the younger recruits more than made up for our table. D made a great speech for his squad and the high ranking officers and supervisors made a point of coming over to tell him their table were placing bets on how long (or not) it was going to to take him to be promoted to their ranks.
While i am on a boasting role, D picked up 2 out of 10 awards distributed over the 2 squads, the good samaritan award and the professional conduct award.

So we were stuffed and so keen to get home at the end of the night and we pulled into our drive way and D slows down to make sure a couple who are fighting, shouting and pushing and shoving each other are Ok, and because we were driving slowly (thank God) i noticed something on the road. It took me a second or two to realise it was a girl face down in the road. So the couple are really screaming it out at this stage and the girl is sounding very frantic so Duncan and I quickly figure the girl is passed out, get her to respond and move out of the road and he heads over to check if the girl who is screaming needs assistance and i do my best to keep the girl, who is absolutly tonked, off the road. Long story short the two things were unrelated, everyone on our street just had a bad night at once.
I just praise God we had slowed down because of the couple because we would have otherwise probable turned into our garage just short of where the girl was lying, leaving her exposed to anyone driving down our street.

Oh and my apologies to the call centre, as i had dialed 000 when i noticed the girl in the road and we had trouble waking her, but once i was talking to the dispatcher she had responded and was adamant about not wanting an ambulance, but at this point i though the female screaming may need assistance, so i started to outline that situation, and then things there calmed down and they went their separate ways so i sort of had to explain that while i had half described two potentially emergency situations, i actually didn't need anyone to respond. I wonder what she thought, maybe that i was just reporting things for my own entertainment or something, at least that was what her tone of voice suggested.

I am pretty sure D enjoyed "having" to tell the girl that he was an off duty police officer and couldn't just leave her in the street as she suggested we do. (not that he would have left her regardless of his occupation).

Thanks wa police!

...so D spoke to his squad supervisor and he has organised for duncan to work monday at a station instead of on saturday night so he can come to Graces concert... I cant believe how much effort they are willing to go to. Today i am very glad the WA police promote and actually live up to being a family friendly career choice.

Today i am not so stoked to be a cops wife...

The first real downfall to being a cops wife strikes. We have just realised that Duncans squad have been assigned to an event on the 19th of this month, which is the same night as our (nearly) 4-year-old's first dance recital/ballet concert, which the whole family has already bought tickets for. She is so excited and dances around the house after every saturday practice.
How are we going to explain the empty seat where her Daddy should be. "Daddy has to work so we have money to buy all the things we need" just isnt gonna cut it on this one :(

umm... huh? did that just happen?

So we made a decision. We applied for Duncan to be posted at the town that is just 45 minutes out of town. Started making plans and all. Duncan heard a perfectly timed post for a probationary constable (what the recruits are) was available just as their squad finished training. Only one other guy from his squad applied, and as squad leader Duncan knew this guy has only done average in his assessments and didn't pass the driver training so wasn't even qualified to do high priority and pursuit driving so we were totally sure we would get the spot.
One week passes... so the other guy got the spot. Come again...how does that happen.

So here we are, at plan B. Knowing God is in control and its not his plan B.

So i will sign off with a few photos from our suprise trip to Sydney

Some family highlights

With both of us on shift work, we really try to make the most of out family time together as it can be a sparse at times,
Pose much?
Super golf. i have a theory, anyone really good at anything says they started at 3. So we are starting Grace in everything so she can be great at anything she wants! No but really, she likes golf, like her Daddy...

Guess what else they like...

Especially when they get to make them for themselves...


(self explanatory really, that one)


We have been practicing writing letters for Daddy when he is not at home.


Hanging out in the pool at home with poppy (or the spa coz its warmer)

And Nan,



At the park...



with Aunty Tess



And Uncle Andy and our friends



And attempting to get some photos for christmas cards...

but hiding in the ferns was aparently much more amusing, so we tried again



and again



And again



and again



and again



i guess we will just have to try again

Walking a while in my shoes...

not quite a mile, if i disappeared somewhere and there was noone else to cook and clean then maybe he might have to walk a mile but for now i will settle for a little while... I will explain.

These last 3 weeks D has been doing weapons training at the academy and as all the police a required to retrain once a year, the training facility is booked up during day hours when fewer officers are working so the recruits train in the evening. So for three weeks D has been hanging out at home during the day until 3 with us and then off to work until 11, much the same as I do on my non overnighter week at work. I think he kind of gets it now. You see who ever is on the afternoon "shift" at home has 3 hours with the kids until they go to bed then 4 hours down time. being at home with the family until 3 (when said family is made up of preschooler and toddler) is pretty full on, and then with no break off to work.

Now i am the one who gets the 4 hours down time to chill with no one else requiring attention or entertaining, and I get why he asks what i did all day. that is soooo much time to have nothing occupying your time. I dont think he will ever ask again "what have you done today", with a look that says why is there still dishes on the bench.

disclaimer- i do have to say as much as he is still male, i have to be honest and say i really dont have a leg to stand on when complaining about my husband. He has praobably changed nearly as many nappies as me, often is the first to get up for the kids, feeds, baths and dresses them after he gets home from work and will help around the house if I ask.(He does have that inate male quality of not knowing what needs to be done even when the washing pile is a metre high and there are no dishes left in the drawers or cupboards) He opens any door for me and is very willing provider of back rubs, foot rubs, gifts,encouragement and compliments, cute messages, prayer and Godly direction and even cups of tea recently. So even if he 'forgets' to take out the rubbish or conveniently 'cant' remember how to use the washing machine or dishwasher (even though he can operate machinery, power tools and model aircraft), I guess I have to admit i am absolutely blessed beyond measure in the husband department.

peaches- part II

As much as leaving is pretty much tearing me up inside, going somewhere new, well sounds pretty peachy to me. The PRO's

• outdoor living in the country, and a (pretty nice from what my cop friends tell me)house with a yard (rent free thank you very much).
• A break from the crazyness of late that has decended on my life/schedule.
• Not having to work(because of the extra pay for country cops and other perks) but having the oppertunity to look for and only take a job i really want to do, like the rehab centre that is in one of the country towns we are considering.
• Days at the beach
• A new community to discover
• New oppertunties to serve a small country church/youth ministry if they have one.
• (our senior pastors are thinking about church planting wherever we go, that would rule out my nice little break theory but if that is Gods plan i will make it through i am sure.
• fresh country food- maybe growing a vegie garden or fruit tree or two.
• Catching up with country friends we know down south (where we are mostly looking at posts)

Among other things, it is all quite exciting. One of my favorite things to do is setting up house so moving doesnt really faze me particulary when the police are provided with all expenses payed removalists when going country!

Also, Mrs Fuzz was asking a bit about how police employment/academy etc works here. Conditions and perks for police here are very good and even the hours are very flexible in what shifts you work, whether you do 4 x 10s or 5 x 8s, where you are stationed etc(all within reason of course), you even have the option of being payed 80% wage and taking the 5th year off payed at 80% wage. 6 weeks annual leave ,unlimited sick leave and that is all before country perks. Anyway my point is that it is incredibly competive to become an officer in Western Australia and you are subjected to more than a year on and off of intense testing, scrutiny, phsycological evaluations, physical challenges etc at your own expense before joining the academy. You are employed the day of beginning academy and are fully sworn in, given badge and everything, and officers even begin doing event policing/security towards the end of thier 6 month academy time.
Duncan is due to finish on the 6th of January.

I hope that all makes sense :)

movin to the country...gonna eat me alot of peaches

i dunno if they were an Australian band- they were called the presidents of the USA or something like that but they sang this song
wait let me see if i can find a clip...
PEACHES
there you go. So this song has been in my head for like the last 2 months.
So this is how my life took a dramatically different course, leading me to be unable to get this song out of my head. 5 years ago i married i man...a tradesman with a pastoral gift and leadership abilities. We served in the youth group and we ran the youth group. We became the youth pastors and I figured we would pastor eventually, full time. Maybe he would pastor a church and I would use my social science degree and social work experience to set up a ministry for the down and out, maybe teenage mums, maybe drug rehab clients maybe all of the above... this was my plan.
Well since we got married anyway. My original plan was to serve with the leadership of my old church in a paid ministry role, but then we got married and he didn't feel right about moving to my church...in hindsight I see that That was my comfort zone, not Gods plan, but i left my friends and spiritual family and everything i was aspiring to then, and well 5 years later it is like de ja vu(figuratively speaking, coz I don't really believe in that kind of thing).
I have a job and a plan and dreams, and i really don't see how any of it fits with where we seem to be heading now. I am discovering what really is meant by walking by faith. I have a peace about all the decisions we have made leading up to this point. Now we need to decide where we are going in just 12 weeks time.

When D signed up we(I) was convinced we would do country posting MUCH furthur down the track and D would work local to our church, my work,family, friends, our lives. Then came the nearly perfect compromise, a country posting just 45 minutes from where we live now. i could still be involved in ministry and wouldn't have to work because of the country pay perks. Then that did not work out as they are not going to take on a Probationary officer. Now i cant seem to backtrack with D and country seems to be the only thing being considered...hence...this song.

I am quite emotionally attached to my church, my ministry and youth group. It is such an exciting time and I am finally finding the time to connect with new leaders, i know that leaving is going to be devastating for me...again. All the reasons i have to stay though are my own selfish ones. I don't feel like we are meant to stay, in fact i think God has been very deliberate about moving us out at a time when others will HAVE to step up and out of their comfort zones. I just doesn't seem to make it any easier though...
I will part II this post later with my thought about where we are going.

Not-not me monday

I dont much feel like a funny Not Me Monday post. There really have been a lot of things i have not done which i probably should have (or definitely) so in the spirit of not me Monday, i did not...

not take out the rubbish all week resulting in a bin unable to be seen under the rubbish pile covering it...

not turn off the kids dvd after it finished resulting in it playing over again and them watching it over again...

not cook dinner on at least 3 nights this week...

not give sick hubby any sympathy, seeing as he has been sick for the last 6 weeks on and off and if not sick, tired and sore from the acadamy physical training, either way he cant take out the rubbish for me

not plan games for youth until the last minute or tell hubby it was his turn to preach this week until say... that afternoon,

not leave the spilled weetbix on the kids table and conceed that it is in fact cement with brown food colouring therefore I should not waste my time cleaning it now that it is dry...

and not write a blog post for like 2 weeks!

I AM tired, emotional, a little overstretched and i think my eye has a permanant twitch at the moment like one of those cartoon women about to snap...*cue extreme eye closeup and scary music*.

i assure all though I (probably) wont go off the deep end just yet. I am greatful for my family who are with me to cause stress, thankful for the provision of my (time consuming) job, prayerful my husband will be on the mend for real this time, hopeful for our future and excited about the growth of our ministry. Most of the time...

a little time out in the country might be very necessary by the end of this year though!

DONT READ THIS-seriously just an emotional rant

Lately i have been reading alot of police/police wife blogs, you know just coz, and i am on overnight shifts with some time to kill... and just recently i was thinking about this program we usually do called red frogs- sort of a chaplaincy program for all the school levers who go on massive road trips and have weeklong parties, the call it leavers or schoolies here(for American readers). So D wont be able to do that with me this year coz not only will he have work commitments, it would be a conflict of interest... got me thinking.
For at least a while know we seemed to be headed down the pastoring path and i just imageined i would be a pastor/pastors wife you know with a church and stuff eventually. i dont know how that fits with this new path he has choosen. Since ministry is very much what i have lived for for years, a different future is somewhat daunting.
The more i read cop blogs the more i realise we are in for a very different reality to what i thought and for the first time i feel like i will be laying down some of my dreams for his. But i know God is in control and when we decided he would apply, this is the path we felt he should take.
I now face the prospect of country time, leaving my youth, our church and all the ministry roles I exist in. I face the very real possiblity that his shifts will conflict with youth commitments and church commitments even if we can stay in the city. In ministry I am the organiser and facilitator but he is the pastor. He is the shepherd, where I sometimes lack in the relational side of ministry, and i dont know where the ministry would be if i were in it alone.

His shifts on top of my shift work is beginning to take a bit of a toll on us, and we are struggling to find someone to look after the kids during our shift overlaps. I cant begin to see how our family will look like what i imagined even 1 year ago

So now i will stand in faith, and hold onto the the prophesies and dreams God has given me, knowing He was fuly aware i would be married to cop and His words will not return to Him void.

Forgive me if i get a little emo on everyone, life is just a bit raw at the minute and i dont really mind sharing because i feel quite on edge, so atleast if people who know me read this they might understand why.

On a different subject but part of i guess what is making me really raw is this month. I dread the beginning of August. August brings with it the count down to 1 year passes, until my birthday. click on Joes Legacy to understand. i really dont want to actually write any of that out. This sucks actually. I dont want to have a birthday but i cant figure out a way to avoid it. i dont want a birthday gift or card. Actually all birthdays are difficult because of the memories and thoughts but i havnt figured out a way to avoid those either.
so if you knw me, dont wonder why my phone is off on my birthday and im not home and i delete happy birthday messages off facebook.

dude i should not blog at 4 in the morning while emo and after 1(apparently too many) red bulls...sorry if you had to read that

Career Move

and this time its not me... although now in addition to being a youth pastors wife i am a police wife, which i am quickly finding is like its own little club. So our kids are not only pks (pastors kids) but cops kids too. I dunno if this makes him Constable Pastor Duncan or Pastor Constable Conradt. so far so good, seeing as he is still doing the training, and very good when it comes to the uniform, there is something Quite interesting about a policeman getting dressed/undressed in my bedroom ;) i dunno about two of us doing shift work but here goes, we will see how it pans out!
I would post a picture but he has issues with internet pictures in the uniform or something, so I guess I can keep him all to myself...