Fathers....

Always the thinker....

As we all know it was Father's Day on Sunday and this may seem like I'm a bit slow on the uptake but honestly this is the first spare minute that I have had all week t write this down!

As it turns out this was the first Father's Day that I truly realised the value of my father!! I'm guessing it's because we are now living so far apart and it's been so long since I've seen him, but on Sunday night, I was a mess!!

It all started when I attended the Willow's Presbyterian Church, Father's Day BBQ, mainly to help out with cutting and stuff. Standing there the reality and the meaning of the day started sinking in. When church started it got worse, the minister started the service with what he called a "guilt trip" to all fathers. He proceeded to play a song and then tell a story about a father who, wanting to provide his family with the best things in life, worked instead of spending time with his family and eventually lost the only thing that was of any worth to him, his family.

I couldn't help but recall the speech that my dad made on his last Sunday in Townsville. He spoke about how being a minister affected his family and how our family structure was slightly different. He recalled not being able to spend Saturday nights with his family and apologised for the times that he was away or at meetings or stuck behind the computer for hours. I remember thinking that there was never any need to apologise as Dad ALWAYS made time for his family and always had an active input into the lives of his children.

With the love of his life

My father always took his God-given role of parent and guardian very seriously and made every effort to raise us in a way that gave God honour and glory. He stressed the importance of family on us all by always making a time during the day to spend with us. Dinner time was family time and there are only a few times that we DIDN'T have dinner together. Even when all my siblings had moved out of home and mum was working dad and I still sat at the table and ate dinner together. When we were all home on a Saturday or holiday afternoon we would have lunch together and Sunday afternoon was reserved for watching Land-Line together and enjoying a roast lunch. Dad always chose to have his office in the house instead of working at the church offices which meant that on most week days Dad was home when we got there. So many times I recall working in the same office as him, him preparing a Bible study and me doing school work and he would always take a few moments to help me proof read and edit an assignment.

Then there were the times that we worked on the garden together, washed the cars together, critiqued adds on TV together, played the piano and sang together, or sitting in complete silence in the car for hours on end.

No Dad, there was definitely no need to apologise because you were the best earthly father that anyone can ever dream to have. not only were you a major part of my life growing up, but you continue to be a big part of my life. You encourage me to be a better person and to continue to grow as a Christian and in my knowledge of and relationship with my Heavenly Father. Through your guidance and teaching I came to know the Jesus as my Lord and Saviour, because of your example I know what it takes to be a good parent and thanks to you, the man who I marry is going to have some pretty big shoes to fill because you also showed me what a good and godly husband is like!

Rudi and Rudi Jnr

Sitting in church on Sunday my tears flowed freely and all I wanted to do was run to you and tell you all of this. I was so thankful for the abundant blessing that God lavished on me through you and my heart nearly burst with the joy that this knowledge brought me. I suddenly missed you so very much but was comforted in knowing that I will be able to see you soon (only 2 weeks to go!!!).

I love you so much Dad and I can't wait until I am able to see you again and spend some more quality time around the piano, or the BBQ, or the garden, or the car! Thank you for taking parenting so seriously, for being such a great example and loving me completely and unconditionally! You truly are the best!

The University Blues...

Well here I am again sitting in the freezing cold computer labs at university killing time. It is the second day of my last semester and I am having mixed emotions about it.

Firstly because this semester consists entirely of intensive subjects, modules and group assignments which means that I will be unable to have a set routine or schedule (which I seem to need to function normally). this is evidenced by the fact that I have time to kill on my second day of university thanks to mixed up timetables!
However on the up-side I have a fair few days off and was even lucky enough to get an extra week off in the middle of semester (gives me a the perfect opportunity to do those group assignments!). Unfortunately this doesn't give me longer holidays it just breaks my semester up into 4 chunks of varying lengths and workloads and come the week AFTER a big assignment is due... oh the irony!

Secondly it is because at the end of this semester I will be a fully qualified Occupational Therapist and quite frankly the thought scares me! You see I have just come back from a year's worth of practical work and have found that, in some cases, my passion and drive to work well was just not there. I thought long and hard about this, even thinking that I may not be suitable for working as an OT. I then came to realise that this is not the case, it was just a matter of low self-esteem (having your every move watched and analysed and assessed didn't help with this), low energy levels, a bit of a negative attitude (seriously though, working full time hours for no pay and then being required to pay for all your travel and accommodation.... it kinda sucks!) and poor supervision, I was never challenged to take up the responsibility for myself as my supervisor always stepped in before I had the chance. Why didn't I say something? Well I suppose that's part of the learning process and if I were to go through the same thing now (please kill me if I do) then I would probably speak up, but at the time the only thing that is going through your mind is the fact that the outcome of the rest of the year is dependent on this person's opinion of you! So now i am sitting here contemplating the future (well at least the near future) with what can only be described as trepidation and a little bit of anxiety! Come November I will be expected to go out into the real world and know what I'm talking about. Suddenly I will have responsibility and I wont have the security blanket of a supervisor of university lecturer that can help and guide the way.
Once again though there is an element of excitement. To a certain degree I'm looking forward to the extra responsibility, to being pushed beyond my limits and being forced to step out of m comfort zone, which for the past 3.5 years has been within the grounds of the university. The opportunities and the initiative will be there for the taking and I am looking forward to seeing what I am made of! Of course the full-time pay will be nice too!

Finally I am a little bit excited about the end of this year as I have come to a little bit of a realisation... out of the girls in my family, that is my sisters and my cousins here in Townsville, I will be the first to finish my university degree before getting married! So, despite all my claims that university was only a time filler until I found a husband I am excited to finish in 12 weeks and embark on a mission that no Schwartz woman (in Australia) has been on before.... full time work as a single woman! I feel great!

Why I love Townsville

Yesterday I woke up to a crisp and fresh Townsville morning. The sky was blue and clear after the un-seasonable yet welcome rain and there was a soft breeze blowing. It was one of those mornings that tells you the rest of the day was going to be great! and it was!

After a good sermon, a successful Sunday school lesson and a free lunch a few of the guys from Willows Pressie and I decided that the day was far too nice to waste doing stuff inside. So off we went together to the Strand where coffee and frozen yogurt from Juliette's was enjoyed by all (thanks guys I will pay you back soon!). While the others walked up Castle Hill we (Gum, Phil and I) spent the rest of day at my 2 other favourite places in Townsville... Castle Hill and Queen's Gardens! (There are more favourite places but we ran out of daylight!)

To put things into perspective I have added some photos from a day where the weather was very similar... blue skies, blue oceans and good company!

Because of the clear air the view from Castle Hill was spectacular and we ended up sitting on top of the bunker for quite a while and almost lost track of time.

Eventually we decided that Gum was getting sun burnt and went for a walk in Queen's Gardens. There we chatted to the birds in giant aviary (when I first called it that Gum thought I had said it was a giant ovary!), smelling the roses and acting like complete kids on the swings. Because of my height (or lack thereof) I almost got lost in the mazes and had the crap scared out of me when Phil thought it would be funny to hide in the corner and jump out at me, if I could I would've crash tackled him for that!

After night church Scooter started playing the piano and I couldn't resist singing along. Pretty soon it turned into a jam sesh with Phil and I calling out requests and singing at the top of our voices. It almost reminded me of the family sing alongs that we used to have around the piano at home and having a tenor to sing with made it all the more enjoyable! (I miss you Dad!)

While to some this may not seem like an awfully exciting day to me it was a great way to spend a perfect Townsville winter day and one of many similar days that made me fall in love with this town in the first place. The weather, the scenery, the coffee and the people are just some of the reasons that I love this place so much and it is days like yesterday that makes the thought of ever leaving very difficult. It is no wonder that when people move to Townsville they stay!

It is hard having my family live so far away from me but every now and then I am reminded that, at least for now, this is home!

Wian and Skye's Wedding

Ok so this is almost 2 weeks too late but as you can tell, I've been lazy!

(no... this wasn't a posed kiss, what gives you that idea??)

Wian and Skye got married on the 12th of July and it was a beautiful day and not just because it was the first wedding since forever that I didn't have a job or role! They were able to do everything on a budget but when you look at the pictures you really can't tell. And everyone could see that their day wasn't about how good the church looked or if they had the best venue in town, it was truly just a day that reflected their personalities perfectly and the emphasis was where it was supposed to be, on them coming together and joining their lives under God.

Well it couldn't have been a Schwartz wedding without music and a lot of laughing and at least one person being picked on! All of this happened! Janel and my Dad both sang during the ceremony and the wedding favours at the reception was small music boxes (that drove us all insane by the end of the night!) Poor Wian was picked on all through the speeches and rightly so as he never asked Skye's dad for permission (!) and has almost succeeded in killing his best man and brother about 5 times! and of course the day could not be complete without Dad's signature "Well Wian, now Skye truly is the limit!" joke!

Of course, because I talk too much and take too many photos I am not able to load all of the photos onto this page, which is probably a good thing cos at the night wore on and as the amount of sugar and caffeine filled drinks were consumed the photos and the dancing just got scary! However I do hope you enjoy the selection of photos that I have provided.

Michael Buble Photos

Here is a small selection of pictures from the concert for you all to enjoy!

In case you were wondering, no I wasn't sitting that close I just zoomed in on the big screens that were on either side of the stage!

Sorry for those waiting to see photos of the wedding, they are comming soon!

For Marli...

Well considering that my sister has been checking my blogs and has been complaining that I haven't updated I thought I would sit down and force myself to write something.
It is a particualrly gloomy and rainy day in Townsville and a few things keep going through my mind....

1. yay for rain!!
2. It's raining in Townsville in the middle of winter, how strange!
3. Crap my washing is hanging out on the line!
4. Being on holidays while all your friends have full time jobs sucks!

I have just entered into my second of 3 weeks of holidays and so far I have finished the last 3 books in the Chronicles of Narnia and have made a fairly large dent in my new Francine Rivers book. I also seem to be spending an unhealthy amount of time on Facebook and have memorised the daytime television lineup... I think I need to get out more!

However I can't really say that my life has been totally uneventful in past weeks. Since my arrival back in Townsville I have....

• officailly moved out of home and am now in a very cool share house,
• been to my cousin's wedding
• gone to the Cowboys vs Broncos game and...
• become a second cousin again!

Well that is just a simple catch up and I suppose that, now that I have said all that I could simply add photos, but that requires energy and right now I want a coffee. Well that and Dr Phil is starting soon.... just kidding!

That being said I am going to put off adding photos until tomorrow simply cos it takes so long and facebook is once again calling for my attetion! So Marli, I hope you are happy, you have finally gotten through to me, and I promise that there will be photos up tomorrow!

When old friends become new friends once again

I have recently come back from a very short visit to Adelaide. While I was there I had the opportunity to catch up with a good friend from the past whom I haven't seen for almost 6 years. I walked away from the visit uplifted and encouraged.
In high school we were good friends and got along like a house on fire, but like most male-female friendship relationships in high school a lot of our friendship was based soley on the fact that we went to the same school and shared EVERY class! We both knew that the other was a Christian but the conversation never went further than that, although I do believe now that it is our shared belief that has kept us connected for the past 5 years despite living almost 3000km apart.
I have often heard my friends and parents tell stories of their old high school friends who they used to attend church or youth group with who have fallen away from the Lord or have drifted from the church. These stories always sadden me and always made me afraid that one day I would have to share the same story.
So when I caught up with Simon I was so excited to see that, not only was he still a Christian but he was a stronger Christian and more on fire for God than he was when I last saw him! For the first time on our 7-8 year friendship we talked openly about our faith with each other and shared experiences. I was so happy when he asked me things like "So what have you been learning in church lately?" because not only did it show me that he cared about my relationship with God but it also showed me that our friendship, through our shared faith, was continually growing. It showed me that unlike some of my other high school friendships, ours wasn't stuck in high school!
I am going to make a very big generalisation now, and please feel free to leave a comment and correct me if I am wrong but this is simply based on my personal experience. Of all my past high school friendships I have found that once school has finished, those friends who aren't Christians have drifted away no matter how hard I have tried to maintain the friendship. However my Christian friends have not just stuck by me all these years but have also grown with me.
I find this both encouraging and frightening at the same time.
Its encouraging because I know that God has provided me with a wonderful base of support and I will always have someone there to talk to and who in return will pray from me. I can do the same for them and in this way our friendships will only grow stronger.
Its frightening because it means that my non-Christian friends are having less and less Christian influence in their lives and as we move on and forget (which we as humans do) they have less and less people praying for them. It also makes me ask the question, why are they pulling away? Is it because they feel like they are being judged by me and my friends? Do they feel left out when I start talking about church and youth activities? are they really the ones pulling away or am I the one who is pulling away?
So I am rejoicing in the fact that my faith and God and our shared salvation through Christ has cemented and strengthened my relationships with the wonderful people in my life but I am challenged now to find another way to build and strengthen my relationship with my non-Christian friends. To find a way to make them feel like they are welcome to share in my life, to help them to see that I love them regardless of whether they come to church or not. and most importantly to share the love of God with them and pray for them so that one day they too might find the joy that I have found in being called a child of God.
I leave you with the challenge to do them same. I encourage you to pray for and strengthen your Christian friends by sharing your faith with them and allowing them to share their faith in you. But further I challenge you to hold fast to your non-Christian friends, pray for them, share your lives and your love with them, show them the love of God and take every opportunity to share the gospel with them so that one day they too may be able to be called a child of God!

A real winter...

My family doesn't do things by halves. When we move we move far! For example the first move that I can remember was us moving from South Africa to Warren, NSW, Australia! After this we moved to south east South Australia and I am now semi-settled in Townsville North Queensland.
This means that I have experienced almost all the different climate zones and come across some of the extremes that Australian weather has to offer.

Our biggest inter-state move was from the southern tip of Australia (Naracoorte, SA) to the northern tip (Townsville, QLD)! This does not only involve an approximate 4 day drive (which we did in 3 weeks instead) but it meant shifting from an area that had roughly 9 months of winter a year to a place that only has about 1 week of winter a year!

In Naracoorte, SA I spent many cold blustery nights on the couch or on my bean bag in front of the fire listening to the pounding rain on our old tin roof (I preferred this to watching the AFL). Not surprisingly, this is what I miss the most about the southern areas of Australia. Especially when I am sitting in the sun in Townsville when it is 35 degrees outside with over 80% humidity! So in my first year in Townsville I would often laugh at my friends when they started pulling on their jumpers as soon as the temperature dropped below 25 degrees, so you can imagine my shame when I did the same the following year!! However, I still remain strong on my opinion that a Townsville winter isn't a real winter, that Townsville doesn't actually run in 4 full seasons but rather goes from summer to summer to autumn then straight back to summer.

That is why I plan my trips to Bathurst to be during the June/July holiday, right in the middle of winter! My fellow Townsvillians call me mad and insane and some go as far as saying suicidal but to me it means that I actually get a real winter! And besides, I love the cold! I love all the things that come with being cold! I love stepping out of the house and getting that biting cold feeling and the fresh breeze in my face. I love it when, after just a few minutes outside, the tip of my nose, fingers and ears go just a little bit numb! But most of all I love getting rugged up in warm fluffy jumpers and jackets, I love snuggling in under a mountain of blankets at night and watching TV with slippers, a doona and a cup of hot coffee.

Of course I wouldn't like it to be like that all the time, but I do like the thought of having 4 full seasons. I still love Townsville and for now it is very much home in my heart, but who knows, maybe the call of winter will draw me back south one day....

Visiting Family

I am a very proud auntie. I am always ready with a huge stash of cute stories about my adorable nephews and nieces and will always rather show you photos of them than show you photos of any of the numerous weddings that I have been to lately!

I live about 2000km away from these little bundles of joy which is why I take every opportunity to come visit them. Extended mid-year holidays is just such an opportunity! So after a very brief visit to Adelaide I hauled myself and my 25kg suitcase stuffed with jumpers (turns outs I'm actually using them all!) onto a train and huddled down reading The Chronicles of Narnia (thanks Sarah!) for the next 4 hours!

Since arriving I have already fallen into a routine of being jumped on by little people (Mr. T and Miss. A) in the morning until they get a response out of me (usually a grunt followed by pulling the covers over my head). I eventually give in and rise and we read a story together. Finally my sister (Ansia) will emerge and I will get a brief moment with Miss A. Jr. while Ansia tries to convince the others that they should get out of their pajamas.

Lately it has been seriously miserable weather (coming from the tropics however, I'm loving it!) and it has meant that we have to stay inside a lot. Today was no exception but we soon discovered how fun a couch and a blanket can be! Mr. T and Miss. A thought it would be fun to lay down under the blanket that is acting as a couch protector and soon got me involved in the game. A moment like this could not be passed up by my sister and we ended up taking about 10 photos of the occasion!

Miss A. Jr is now the ripe old age of 4 months old, yet her brother and sister adore her and is as inquisitive about her as the day that she came home from the hospital. It is very rare to have a moment of peace and quiet of holding her without the other 2 buzzing around wanting to have a "little look"! I was having said rare moment when the munchkins raced in and plonked themselves on the couch next to me, not wanting my attention but instead doing all that they could to get Miss. A giggling. Once again the camera was whipped out and the next 10 minutes was spent smiling up at the camera trying to get everyone to look at the camera at the same time! This is the best we could do!

Another game involved Mr. T taking my hand and dragging me off the couch which I was attempting to have an afternoon nap on. This led to much tickling and giggling and squealing and resulted in the creative little creature pulling off my ugg boots and blowing raspberries on my extremely ticklish feet. Towards the end my sister wondered who was having more fun, me or Mr. T?

Needless to say, after all my fun of the first few days here I have given up on the idea of sleeping in and afternoon naps!

Michael Buble in Adelaide!

After spending more than I can and some of my good friend Chiara's money, after sitting on a plane and in airports for over 4 hours and after absolute months of excitement the Michael Buble concert has come and gone! and you know what.. it was all worth it!!
After only sleeping fro 3 hours and attending 2 church services (oh how super spiritual I feel lol) I got on my plane to Sydney and an overnight stay with my mate Tim and his muso buddies (yay for good food and jam sessions!)
Our first day in Adelaide consisted of me and Chiara dragging my friend Simon (poor thing didn't know what had hit him) around the city of Adelaide in what turned out to be a 4km walk where nothing but food and coffee were bought! Over the next 24 hours, thanks to my new found friend Sasha (who is awesome!) more food, giggling and girlyness was enjoyed in amongst a heck of a lot of factory outlet shopping! Admittedly Chiara did most of the purchasing but I did score some $20 Wranglers!
A tub of 2 minute noodles, some playing around with the hair drier and a heck of a lot of make-up later we were dressed, looking fantastic (or so Sasha said) and ready to hit the concert!
Traffic was awful and the lining up for the bathroom with only 5 min til the start of the concert was nerve wracking but we made it inside just in time! The starting band, Naturally 7, were INCREDIBLE! 7 guys from New York who don't use instruments, but instead use their own voices to provide the instruments. They had voices ranging from the highest notes that sounded exactly like and air guitar to the bass that you would expect to hear coming only from the electronic sounds of the clubs! if you get the chance check them out YouTube, Naturally 7 - Wall of Sound. I kid you not those are their voices!
Righto on to the main part of the concert! I'm getting all excited and bubbly just thinking about it! Michael was amazing! He is not just a great musician but an awesome entertainer. He sang with such ease that, had he not woven such intricate and complicated melody changes into his songs you would have thought that he was lip syncing it all. But as I said he changed small things here and there that can't be lip synced cos the timing was just.... *mind blows up*. He is not only a musical genius he is also pretty damn funny! There was the usual starting jokes that had us in stitches and then there was the banter between him and the band that just makes every musician wish that they were part of his band! (well I did anyway!)
His interpretation of the music was just so perfect and when he sang songs like "Sway" and "Save the last dance" you couldn't help but get up and dance along. Then he did songs like "Lost" and "Always on my mind" that brought a lump to the throat and again when he did songs like "Everything"... well that song just makes everyone want to fall in love so that they have someone to play/sing it to!
I mus say this, Adelaide, you are a boring crowd! Chiara and I were the ONLY ones signing and dancing along (we know this cos we were close enough to the back to see). it payed off tho! Towards the end of the concert he said "And don't think that when these lights are off I can't see you, I can see all of you and I can see you guys shaking your thing up the back there!" Chiara and I nearly DIED!!!!!
There is so much more that I can say but I wont. Other than saying to my Townsville friends, we invited Naturally 7 to add Townsville to their tour dates in November and you better be ready cos they are worth seeing. We met them and they are such nice guys!!
Lastly I want to say that I wish I could've added photos but the lack of technical equipment means that you will all just have to wait till I get home and get the stuff on my own computer.
For now though I must sleep for tomorrow brings another day of playing with nieces and nephews which I will be talking about more in future blogs. But for now its "Good night" from me!

God bless!

Lessons.....

I'm sitting here, its far too late to still be awake and I'm thinking about what I could talk about and I'm getting absolutely nowhere!
Of course I have my options but I don't particularly feel like talking about any of these topics! I could talk about the injustice of making university students who don't have an income pay for going on prac. Or I could talk about the large amount of terrible drivers that I have encountered in the past 6 or so months, but that would be complaining and whining and I'm trying to do less of that these days. Then again I could talk about my friends and my family, how much i have missed them abd how much I love them and the love that they have shown me. Or I could talkk about home, but these are all emotional topics and could end up making me sound like a complete hippy and a sap or could just send me to tears, in which case the blog would never be finished!
Instead I am going to outline a few things that I have learnt recently. Some of these things I already knew and other things came unexpectedly but all of them have one thing in common, I learnt them the hard way:

• There is no point in feeling like you are losing control of your life because the control was never yours to begin with
• If you want others to love you as you are you have to love yourself as you are
• God has the ultimate control, He is Sovreign and He knows what He is doing
• Trusting and having faith in God is something that has to be worked on everyday
• Trusting and having faith in God isn't always easy, in fact, at times it will feel like its easier to simply panic
• Praying does work!
• It isn't easy to be a Christian
• It isn't easy to be a uni student
• It isn't easy to be a Christian uni student
• You have to work at finding joy in the little things in life
• Joy is not the same thing as happiness but it does help it along
• Once you've found joy your job isn't over
• When you've found joy you can survive anything
• When you have faith in God, you have found joy
• When you have faith in God you can do anything
• God gives better bear hugs than any created man ever could
• God's hugs DO solve the problem
• Through the strength and joy that can only come from God life really isn't that hard

Hopefully one day I will find the words to explain everything that I have just said but for now that is as much as my mind can do.

God bless

Getting started.....

This blog is the result of being at home sick with whatever.....
In the past I have wanted to start a blog but never had the energy or the time. To be honest I still don't have the energy or the time but I had the opportunity and I'm taking it!
Those who know me well know that there are many things in this world and life that irritate me or get under my skin. I am hoping that by ranting and raving in this blog I wont rant and rave at them so much.
Here's hoping that i actually update this thing every now and then huh?