Category: momentous events

25/52

I wrote last week about my operation… well, kinda.

So I had surgery on the Tuesday, and had Wednesday and Thursday off work, and returned Friday – which also happened to be my birthday.

One of my incredibly wonderful colleagues decided she’d make me a cheesecake – both to cheer my up after the operation and for my birthday.

Made.

From scratch.

Using Oreos – SOOOOO scrumptious!!!

And all for me 😀

Wasn’t it pretty? And it tasted even better than it looked! I am so lucky!

Here’s wishing you a blessed week too, dear Reader!

18/52

Hubby and I were given two of these ‘Burlingbrown’ water bottles last year. I promptly fell in love, and to mark it always and forever as MINE and not his (or anyone else’s!) I taped purple stars around the outside, above the logo.

Then took it to work and promptly lost it.

Sigh.

A fortnight passed. Lucky Hubby didn’t mind too much when I appropriated his for my use…

Months passed. Still no water bottle with the pretty purple stars. Double sigh. I had abandoned hope.

Then just the other week: cue elation! I found where I’d left it: on a co-worker’s never-used desk!

And that’s my story for the week. Here’s wishing you a ‘found it again’-ful week yourself, dear Reader 🙂

– KRidwyn

 

11/52

I know, this year I decided to challenge myself on the blog by taking photos and posting them here – in an effort to shame myself into taking better photos. So this post is a bit of a cheat – the photo was taken by a colleague of mine.

It’s my son. 9 years old, on school camp where he was away (by almost 200 kilometres!) from home, for a whole school week.

He has autism, if you have been reading this blog for a while.

So this was hard for me.

His first ever more-than-one-night sleepover away from me.

And here he is, on a giant swing, and having the time of his life!

I’m so incredibly proud of him.

And also teary. It’s a bittersweet thing.

How about you, dear Reader? What made you emotional this week?

– KRidwyn

8/52

So I’m pretty impressed with myself:

I’ve managed to keep this happening since mid-January! According to the 21-day rule, that’s a new habit now, amiright?

It sure feels like a good habit to have 🙂

Have a fantastic week yourself, dear Reader!

– KRidwyn

It’s fast running out…

My middle child graduates from Primary School in a few weeks. I’m not ready for this to happen.

She’s ten. Young for her grade; she was bright enough to be accelerated a couple of years ago, and she’s been blossoming ever since. And I’m immensely proud of her for that.

But I’m also aware of the potential problems. She’s small (and cute! Mummy bias here) and possibly more naive than her peers. And yet, mature, for all that. She continually surprises me, with her reactions to events and the considered approach she takes to life. She’s an amazing kid.

And she’s graduating Primary School. Entering the big bad world of High School. Although not really. She’s entering the Middle School which I’m Head of, so it’s not too bad. And it never will be, as long as I have something to do with it! I’m looking forward to having her in my school, even though it means I personally will have more offspring in secondary than I’ll have in primary school, and I’m not particularly comfortable with what that says about my age! But I’ll need to suck it up, I guess. Cos I can’t stop it, no matter what I do.

Sigh. Carry on, one day at a time. Realise that there’s a milestone here to be celebrated… one that’ll never happen again.

Enjoy, and remember. Be like Mary, the mother of Jesus, who “treasured these things in her heart”.

Amen, LORD.

And have a memorable week yourself, dear Reader!

— KRidwyn

Best night EVER!

Friday night. The not-too-distant past. Sons of Korah, Australian Christian band, playing at Lifepointe Baptist church at Buderim.

SOOOOO worth the almost-20-year (yeh, you read that correctly) wait to see them live.

They were BRILLIANT! Their technical expertise was beyond compare. Such timing, such accuracy – they were so ‘tight’, it was – truly – incredible. As in, the “real” meaning of that word. Beyond belief.

It’s been years since I’ve been so ‘swept up’ in the moment. But that concert did it for me. I was alive 🙂

[I wonder if that’s how God feels, looking down on us with such delight?! A beautiful thought!]

Anyway, I just wanted to share this memory with you today. And if you’re interested in their music, try here. I’d recommend their initial album, ‘Light of Life’ as a great starting point!

And here’s praying that you have a inspired week, dear Reader 🙂

– KRidwyn

A little apprehensive…

What feels like aeons ago now, but was only decades (ha!) I played violin in an orchestra. The South-West Regional Youth Orchestra, as a matter of fact, which changed its name during my time there to the Brisbane Regional Youth Orchestra. I was a member for the majority of my teenage life, and made friends there who not only came to my wedding but with whom I’ve kept in contact for the many years since.

Which brings me up to recent days – in which I received an invitation. To join their massed orchestra, with all their other alumni, for their 35th anniversary celebration concert.

Aiieeeee!

I’d love to go, to play… but I haven’t played (truly ‘played’, as in, played well, with technical proficiency) for well over a decade now… and I’ve never been to a reunion in my life!

Hence the apprehension.

It’s this Sunday.

By my next blog post, it’ll be all over.

Wish me luck!

– KRidwyn

In which I contemplate how amazed I shouldn’t be

I keep telling people how amazed I am at my quick recovery from the evil back injury I suffered recently.

Monday 25th June, 10am. The last Monday of term. The doctor who was treating me said he thought I’d be immobile for two weeks, and he’d be able to get me back to ‘normal’ (mostly pain-free) mobility by the end of 5-6 weeks.

Shock doesn’t even remotely describe how I felt. But then again, I was also in childbirth-like agony at the time, and my brain cells weren’t firing anywhere near their usual capacity.

I left the doctor’s office and called my boss, relayed the news, emailed my colleagues. Put the diagnosis out on Facebook. Then I received message after message after message, from friends and family near and far, who offered their support – and their prayers.

I was touched. (And in agony. And tears – many, many tears.) But determined to do everything I could to aid the healing process. The doctor had said ‘ice’? I’d be the ice queen! He’d said ‘horizontal’? I wouldn’t move a muscle!

(Admittedly, the phrase ‘off work for the rest of the week’ did *not* mean that – ask my Mum, who watched me plough through marking paper after paper, responding to email after email, proofing and writing report after report, all in a horizontal position either facedown or face up, ten minute interval changes, non-stop, from 5am until 9pm-ish!)

And wouldn’t you know it, but by Friday 2pm I was back at school. On crutches, but vertical. Yes, you’re probably thinking, ‘stupid!’ but I’d missed the kids terribly and wanted to see them before they left on two-and-a-half-weeks holiday, pray with them and for them, and testify to them just how amazingly their prayers for me had worked. That I was vertical, and walking on crutches, and was amazed at my recovery – but SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN!

Because I’d been holding fast to James 5:16. Especially the second part:

“The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”

Because I knew what the doctor didn’t – that the God who had made me, and who had let me go through this experience for His own good reasons, was able to heal me as well, for His own good reasons.

And He was doing exactly that! I should not have been able to be mobile – and yet, I was. And now, two weeks later, I should be starting to achieve pain-free mobility – and yet, I have it! Sure, sometimes it’s uncomfortable, but I’m just happy to be upright and without crutches 🙂

And in conversations with many, many, many others since then, I’ve been telling them how amazing my recovery has been – and then realising, over and over and over again, how amazed I should NOT be by this.

Wow, our God is an incredible God, isn’t He?

I hope you too, dear Reader, are having an AMAZING day today 🙂

And see you next week!

– KRidwyn