Bonzer Weekend

Warning - Longish post. May/may not update and add links later.

I had a bonzer weekend.

There was nothing stressful that made me feel overwhelmed or regretful of going. On Friday it poured torrential rain all the way from Armidale to Sawtell. The road had been flooded, or blocked with falling rocks, on and off all day, but we managed to get through without even knowing that. Others, who were going to the church camp, were held up for 45 mins and still others went home to try again later, or not.

Unlike last year, DH and I got to sleep in the same cabin, and all the kids were calm and happy. Despite the overwhelming stink of antibacterial bin bags, toilet perfume and whatever they washed blankets in, we managed to get through the weekend without too much brain fog - the kids played well, ate well (mostly) and slept well.

Gerald Bray spoke brilliantly. His 4 messages Faith, Hope, Love, These Three, were profound and simple at the same time. Refreshing and, of course, convicting. I think the messages will be up on the St Pete's website soon (I hope) and they are well worth listening to - even if you are not spiritual, religious, or even if you don't believe in God. They're the best! {Updated: You find the sessions here.}

Saturday and Sunday were clear warm days that belied the fact that it had rained ridiculously the day before. This has been my experience for 3 church camps now. We went to the beach Sat arvo in the free time and the kids swam - not me - not my idea of fun.

We stayed a little bit longer on Sunday arvo cos Neil P and fam had mistakenly booked Sunday night as well. That worked well for us (and possible them as well). I cooked up a bag of potatoes for lunch - the only thing I had left to eat besides rice crackers - while the kids played in the bush.

The bush proved to be dangerous!!! Reuben was stung (or is that bitten?) by a huge ant (don't know what type - maybe this one) and you would've thought he was being murdered - yelling at the top of his voice "Aaaaah. There's another one. Get it off me. Aaaaah. Get it off." Running to the rescue I found him writhing and bellowing, with the other kids in various states of panic spotting more ants all over him. As it turned out he only had one sting (bite) and after putting ice on it and an application of some "Special Cream That Stops The Pain And/Or Itching" Reuben was better and we heard no more about it.

We arrived back in Armidale just in time to drop Sophie-Lee off for music practice (she was playing piano at church) and head to a friend's place to feed ourselves before church.

As we arrived at church Malachi showed me a spot he had on his chest - little reddish lump with black spot in the middle - like 1.5 mm diameter. Didn't think anything about it and said that we'd look at it later. But Mal was not happy about that and started complaining bitterly about the irritation. So I took him out to the bathroom to take a closer look. Now the spot wasn't black, it was white. Someone else 'just happened' to be there at the same time and told me it was a tick.

My brain clicked into Google Search mode bringing up what I knew about ticks - NOT much. The lady said "Just get some tweezers and pull it out." It just so happened that I had some tweezers in the same place as the "Special Cream That Stops The Pain And/Or Itching" so dashed out the the car to get tweezers, removed the tick head, and headed back into church.

When we got home I decided to check everyone over. No one else, it seems at this point, had any ticks, but Malachi had another one on his back. I then actually Google Searched and found conflicting information about how to go about removing a tick. I went with my previously successful tweezer removal, relying on the lady's calm personal experience of ticks and tick removal.