Beyond the Edge of Adventure

It's amazing. Two hours in the saddle - with brief periods spent bouncing in and out of it - has done wonders for my fitness (read: saddlesoreness!) and my spirit. Horse riding is something I enjoy doing and I've spent the last 10 years wanting to get back in the saddle, but have been pregnant, breastfeeding, too poor or too busy! I was even a little challenged by my instructor to try a canter (sort of a slow run, horse-style), which I'd never done before. I'd forgotten how good it to try something a little risky and enjoy the exhilaration. So, when are you off on your next challenging adventure? It doesn't have to be a horse ride. Maybe it's dancing. Or making a special dinner for your family. Going on a long bushwalk. Painting. Reading a certain number of books. Whatever it is, I dare you to get out there, grab the experience with both hands and shake all of the life-giving enjoyment out of it that you possibly can!

I'm a bit sad about the general attitude towards having babies these days. It seems that the concepts associated with having children are burdens, bondage (lack of freedom), expense, trouble, crazy and my personal favourite: something to 'do' or 'get' after you've 'had a life' or 'got yourselves sorted'. I think it's a pretty nifty trick of Satan to build a lie around a little thread of truth. Yes, children can be seen as those horrible things listed above. But only if you go by the standards of the world! God's standards or expectations of family life are ALWAYS referred to in the Bible in very positive terms (Psalm 127:5). 'Blessing' and 'joy' are two words that spring to mind off the top of my head. The Bible sees having babies as top priority for a family (Jeremiah 29:4-9). The Bible looks upon getting married and having a family as life , not a thing on the 'to do' list when you've finished doing all t...

I'm sitting here on my couch. I'm drinking a coffee (I'm a new convert to coffee with my low salicylate diet). Everyone's having a rest, including the paramedic of the house who's just come off night shift. The baby's asleep. There is no sweeter sound than the sound of a quiet house on a lazy summer Saturday afternoon. It's been a long week. Several times a day this week, I've had two and sometimes more children start to talk to me at exactly the same time. It does my head in - having a queue of little people who want to share something with me! I'm ready for a break. On Monday morning, I'm getting up early and driving about an hour from my place to go on a trail ride. It's my husband's christmas present to me and I'm SO excited to go! I haven't done any horse riding since 2003 at SU (Scripture Union) Schoolies and before that with my high school friend with whom I used to go riding with occasionally. That's almost 1...

In the interests of - well - staying happily married, my husband and I are launching a new little project. It's called 'The Date Night Box'. Isn't it cute? It's my husband's idea - we were always thinking of awesome date night ideas, then forgetting about them! So, the other night we wrote down our ideas. I thought we'd just get a few ideas down, since we were both really tired. But no, we got started and just kept going! We thought of 22 ideas for date night! That's over five months worth of weekly date nights! Wow! We need somewhere to store these wonderful ideas, of course. And since Ben's not using his index cards that he bought for his study, he suggested putting them to good use - cut them up, write our ideas down and store them in a cute little box. That way, when we book in a date night, we've got an idea ready to go, instead of falling for the usual "Oh, let's just watch a DVD." thing. These ideas are what we...