For a few years now I've been using this last week of the year to write a blog post that reflects on the year past. In particular, I've been using questions to help me focus my thoughts and keep me honest. I've done the same today.
You can vaguely see Mt Fuji in the
centre of this photo. I took this photo
today near our house.
The last sunset of 2025!
1. What makes this year unforgettable?
In January our eldest son got married to a very special lady in a God-honouring and beautiful celebration. In December they had their first child, our first grandchild, and my parents' first great-grandchild. And we got to meet our granddaughter too! It's pretty hard to go past these things for making 2025 an unforgettable year.
2. What did I enjoy doing this year?
Same answer as 1?
I also enjoyed continuing to settle into our life-as-two again. It's different to do this as older adults. After so many years of cooking for teenage boys, I've been exploring different menu items that are better for our health, rather than affordable ways to fill up hungry boys in Japan.
Continuing to settle into our new church has also been good. This year for the first time, we have been a team leading worship: David behind the mike and me at the piano. That's been very satisfying.
I also ran a five-day writing retreat in May. That was very enjoyable, but also challenging.
I enjoyed baking for church events and hosting friends at our place. These two things that I hadn't been able to do for many of the last few years and it was good to pick them up again.
We enjoyed a couple of camping trips: one on our own (for the first time ever) and the other with our camping friends.
Mid-year we spent several a month or so in Ipswich touching base with our kids, as well as friends and other family. It was new visiting our kids when they were settled in their own lives there, but we found plenty of ways to spend time with them.
3. What/who is one thing/person I'm grateful for?
Of course it's David. He's solid and reliable, loving and kind, flexible and considerate. We've been married 28 years now and I'm so grateful for the man God lead me to all those years ago. We continue to share an enjoyment of following cricket and supporting wrestling at CAJ, this year we also went to another live sporting event in Tokyo: World Athletics Championships. Playing Scrabble remains an ongoing pleasurable challenge between us (we played 2 ½ games yesterday!).
4. What did I read/watch/listen to that made the most impact this year?
Looking back at what I've read and written about this year, I don't think there was one thing that especially impacted me. It was a year of (continuing to) discover who I was apart from being a mum with kids under my roof. That journey happened via various books, songs, articles, podcasts, conversations, writing, and even reading things I've written in the past.
5. What did I worry about most and how did it turn out?
Hmmm. I felt like I worried less this year, but that's probably due to circumstance rather than me being better at handing my anxieties over to God!
6. What is my biggest regret?
One big thing I tried was the networking trip I did to Singapore in June. In retrospect I wasn't terribly satisfied with how that went vs the amount of effort and expense that went into it, and I won't be repeating it (at least not in the form I did this year), but I'm glad I had the opportunity to try it out.
7. What's something that has changed about me?
I'm definitely more looking towards the end of my career than I have in the past. My focus has shifted a bit and retirement is much closer than it seemed in the past. Moving forward into 2026 is the topic of my New Year blog post, so I won't go there now.
I also find myself "one of the more experienced" people in the room far more than I used, I think that has meant a change to how I view myself.
8. What surprised me most this year?
Becoming grandparents. This wasn't something I expected in 2025, but it's been a joy!
9. What Bible truths impacted me this year?
Hmmm, a hard question. This is the first year that I've actually read through the whole Bible in a single calendar year. I used an audio version and probably didn't listen as carefully as I could have at times, but I made it through and it was a good way to spend my energy!
One theme has been allowing myself to relax into a quiet stage of life. At the women's retreat I went to in March the speaker talked about how life often resembles a white-water rafting trip. That there are times in life that you are holding on for "dear life" and other times when the water is quiet and you're moving along peacefully. She reminded us that it's okay to be in the quiet period and to be trusting God through that as much as through the rough times. I've thought about this often through the year. Rather than wondering when/what the next rough time will be, I've been trying to relax and trust God, but also to be thankful for the peacefulness we're currently experiencing in our lives.
Also, been recalling again that my value as a human is fixed. It isn't flexible according to how much I do or accomplish, how talented or successful I am. My value is fixed by God: he created me and that gives me worth.
In October I had the opportunity to give my testimony at church. I spoke on the theme of a lifetime of learning to trust God. It was much harder to do than I'd anticipated, but also a joy to have the opportunity to share a bit of my story.
10. What meta-themes have I thought about this year? (in no particular order)
This question overlaps with so much of what I've written already...
- grandparenthood
- being a parent to adult kids
- what is God calling me to do for the remainder of my time in Japan
- investing in writers
- writing a book
- looking back at 25 years in Japan
- networking
- telling God's stories
- the ongoing challenge of farewells as well as investing in new relationships
- the joy of being involved more deeply in a church again
Highlights
- meeting our granddaughter
- travel to see our kids (three times in the year, a record for us for travel to Australia)
- not moving house
- retreats: women's in March, writers in May, social media team in October, and an OMF conference in June
- helping the CAJ wrestling team
- World Athletics Championships
- seeing our closest friends in Australia
Lowlights
It's been a pretty good year really, I can't actually remember much in the way of lowlights.
Concluding thoughts
I'm going to end this year with the words I spoke in my testimony in October:
I would like to be able to say that I have learned the lesson of trusting God. He has held me and walked with me my whole life and yet still I struggle to trust him completely. What I know in my head, I am still learning to lean on in my heart. But regardless of my failure to not worry about my life, Jesus still loves me and I am so grateful for his persistence and daily grace. By God's grace I continue to "say of my Lord, 'He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust'" (Ps. 91:2).
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