Another crazy week: but I'm thankful

I'm starting to realise that having a few less responsibilities means I'm more flexible! So I'm able to take up short-term opportunities more easily and have the space to recover from them.

This last week I've done a few not-usual things and it's been crazy busy. In fact this is the first time in seven days that I've actually sat at my desk.

David's office where we spent several hours on
Friday sorting wrestlers into weight classes,
recording their names, and setting up the
 initial bouts.

Friday and Saturday were crazy busy, but fun. David and I did the admin side of the school's wrestling tournament. We had 250 wrestlers on campus (a large number for our league). The gym was packed to the rafters. We held a middle school tournament, as well as a full raft of male and female weight brackets for the high schoolers. It's very hard to easily describe what we did because it included so many moving pieces and a lot of copying of names. As bouts happened we had to add those results to the tree diagram (called a bracket) and then create the scoring sheet for the new matches with the relevant wrestlers. We problem solved and answered many questions. One of the most satisfying things personally was solving problems by tracking down wrestlers whose bouts had slipped through the cracks somehow. We've benefited from others doing this for our sons over the last 13 years, so it was great to be able to serve others in this way. I'm thankful it was just those two days, though!

The busyness didn't stop after Saturday...but here are some photos to show you something of the weekend (see more about my week after the photos).

CAJ campus was stunning over the weekend...
but I spent most of my time inside!

No filter here (or in the one above)!

Wrestlers, coaches, and supporters everywhere!
The noise level was very loud...for 12 hours.

I got 20 minutes out of the gym
at lunchtime and I went for a short 
walk around campus. This
ginko tree was stunning.

This was admin central: where we spent about 12 hrs on
Saturday. We had several helpers, including the veteran
coach (Dan Rudd) who did announcements
until he ran out of energy mid afternoon. Coach Rudd
is the one who taught our eldest son in the earliest
days of his wrestling career (and answered so many
of our early questions).

I didn't see much wrestling...we didn't have the 
best seats in the house! Past all the people in
this photo is a CAJ wrestler getting his gold medal, he's
a former long-time teammate of our youngest son.

And the days moved onwards: Sunday morning was our usual time at church with lunch afterwards, then chatting to our sons over an hour or two. 

We had overnight guests on Sunday night, but due to their short stay (34 hrs) in Japan they had limited data on their phones to communicate with us as they travelled from the airport and a lack of on-hand cash meant they had difficulty buying train tickets. We live 1 ½ hrs from the airport, so it isn't an easy drop-in, but they were determined. We waited an hour for them at the train station. Thankfully we could pop into the cafe there for some warmth as the temperature was around 5C. It turned into a late night! The next day I showed them around the school and our neighbourhood and they treated us to lunch. We've had very few supporters visit us in recent years, so it was a delight to have this couple visit.

Another great Japan Harvest issue completed!

On Tuesday I went into the Japan Evangelical Missionary Association (JEMA) office to help pack magazines. A friend from CAJ-parent era met me there and we caught up while stuffing magazines into packets. That was an excellent use of time and I felt refreshed afterwards. I left a little early to get back to school for (you guessed it): more wrestling! Just an hour as a spectator, this time.

Yesterday I had another new thing going on: I'm hosting a short term worker and I met her for coffee and to talk about her involvement with social media, her weekly schedule, etc. I then took her to meet a Japanese friend of mine at the JEMA office, we ate lunch and packed more magazines. Another really good use of time because while doing a manual job like that there is much time for conversation.

It's been a lot. I ended up on my bed before dinner on both Monday and Wednesday. I'm really tired! Today is an office day (and a short grocery run). I'm grateful for the peace here at home and that while I've been gone things have been chugging along in the two teams I work with.

Thankfully it looks like the coming weeks aren't quite so hectic. It's just under three weeks till we travel to Australia for our son's wedding, so hopefully we'll be a bit more rested and able to enjoy that time.

From the depths of a Thrift Shop week

A quick post from the depths of CAJ's Thrift-Shop week (in photos).

These are the chief organisers of this year's Thrift Shop. Of course there are hundreds of volunteers not shown, we've just got more responsibility. This was what the "shop" looked like before shopping started this morning.

But back to Tuesday night, it was raining as I walked home after the initial set-up of the hardware (tables, racks etc.). I've walked this road more often this week than I usually do.

My job is the highfalutin sounding "Facilities Manger". It boils down to management of rubbish and signs. I've also kept an eye on traffic-flow (i.e. making sure that walkways are clear).

Here's some of the rubbish bags we've filled, plus a couple of other things.

Many signs! It's a temporary shop operated with a troop of volunteers. So we have what seems like hundreds of laminated signs that are easily put up and down and many of them are giving directions to the volunteers as well as the public.

Here's some of the views of the shop in pristine condition before shopping began this morning.

This is the "girls" aisle. Clothes on the left are separated into sizes.

 This is part of the men's section, with boys clothes in the background.

Toys: a very popular section.

A small "corner" for baby clothes.

On Wednesday afternoon I got a bit flat, so decided to spice things up a little with an Elmo hat someone donated for sale. Things got a little out of control with a few other Elmos from the toy department. It was worth it, hearing the giggles. There are a lot of these photos floating around now, lots of people wanted photos!

I haven't bought much, but did find some good books for only a dollar or so each.

Today was a gorgeous day. Thankfully, because it was the annual middle school science event. This year: egg drop. All the middle schoolers had to create a biodegradable container for an egg that got dropped from the third floor (or second, depending on how you number your floors). It was all quite scientific. You can see my husband here entering data about how long it took them to fall and whether or not the egg broke.

This time tomorrow Thrift Shop will all be over for another year. But we still have our hardest day ahead of us. Tomorrow the public is invited in (today was only CAJ and PTA members). It's four hours of frantic shopping (and "operating registers" for those of us doing that)! And when it's all over we get to clean the whole mess up and turn it back into a functioning gym! 

And I'm already tired! 

Gotta go and rest!

Thrift shop fun

Here is my traditional post-Thrift shop post about some of the things we found to buy. At the end I've added some things I didn't buy, but were fun anyway.

Actually we didn't acquire as much as we might usually. Part of that is due to our kids getting older (most of the toys aren't so appealing), part is due to none of us being present during the "free shopping" time after Thrift Shop and just before packing up.

But we did find some useful stuff (which really should be the aim).

These aren't useful so much as whimsical. They've moved onto the window shelf in our downstairs toilet. The boys were mystified as to their purpose, but I explained that it was just a touch of decorating (something I haven't done a lot of in this house aside from pictures on the wall).

This has an amazing story. Literally the night before Thrift Shop our stick blender broke and I picked this up the next day for a pittance!

Already stowed on a high shelf—a puzzle for the Christmas break.

A pile I found in the corner of some things that our eldest bought. Seems as though he's planning to teach himself piano?

A picture frame for a certain graduation photo that's been lying around.

This was another huge bargain. Priced at something like 3,000 or more yen on Amazon, I bought a camera for our youngest son for 500 yen (AU$5.64). He's developed a recent interest in photography, what a great way to test and develop that interest!

That same lad explicitly told us what clothes he wanted, but not to buy them without his approval. Well, I didn't have a chance to get his approval on these before I bought them, but I scored approval later.

I found a new single self-inflating mat for camping. Practically new!

These I got for free in the five minutes of free shopping I had on Saturday. Three "new" shirts for winter. Skivvies are my staple clothing throughout the cold months of winter in Tokyo, I'm stoked.

Our eldest son bought this outfit (plus a "Sven" moose hat) for a dress up event at the middle school youth group he's a leader at! The boys could hardly stop laughing when he tried it on on Saturday night.

Our youngest son's purchases
Typically he found a brand name shirt!

This he bought for the family. I don't know how useful it will be...

Add this was his youth group dress up costume, complete with a leery wig and oversized sunglasses.

He also found Adidas pants!

This boy loves loud colours. Love the words on this.

And yet another shirt...

He's decided recently to collect key rings and Thrift Shop was a great place for finding them.

This kid is an artist and found some nice tools.

In case you're wondering, as far as I know our middle son didn't step inside the gym throughout the entire span of Thrift Shop. Too many people...hates shopping...and then he got a cold. But I did find him an insulated mug for hot chocolate consumption while camping (and any other time he might wish to use it).

Fun

The fun to be had at Thrift Shop is not just buying things cheaply, but having fun with people, particularly when you volunteer for hours and hours it's great to insert some fun into the time.  I enjoyed "modelling" a couple of fun hats on the two preparation days, call me an informal "moral booster" if you like.

Jessie from Toy Story. I wore her hat much of Thursday...it's been a long time since I've had a pigtail this long. It caused a little bit of an internal dilemma, though, when I had to go over to the school's business office to do some photocopying...should I wear it or take it off? I ended up wearing it over and got some giggles over there too.

These are the tireless workers of the Thrift Shop committee. Of course there were many other volunteers, but these are the ones who held most of the responsibility over the 4 ½ days we were in operation.

Making sense of today

It's been nearly a week since I've had the time and energy to write here. A typical Thrift Shop week. I've had lots of ideas floating around in my thoughts, but no time to write them down. 

Drying out the content of David's backpack after the Spartan Race.

And now today's had a weird start: a typhoon blew through overnight and school had a late start (10.30), so we slept in and didn't have breakfast until about 9. Add to that my husband, who's flying to the US today (a first for our family). He was only planning to be at school in the morning and then taking off across town, but the typhoon messed with that a bit. Thankfully it's passed and hasn't messed with his flight, though.

The weather has me on edge too. We started the day with grey overcast, gusty conditions and now it is a typical post-typhoon sky: bright blue, but the wind is still gusting at times, which always makes me unsettled.

I did a car trip for groceries yesterday, instead of riding, because it
was raining steadily. This shop had three older guys working hard to
 manage the traffic flow in and out. I love the way Japanese take care of
customers and the public in general.

So now I'm sitting at my computer, trying to make sense of it all and settle down to work. Because I haven't sat here for days, and only vaguely monitored email via my phone amidst the organised chaos that is Thrift Shop, so I'm struggling to get my head back into my usual work.

Though maybe it's partly my head that's the problem. I've felt a cold coming on these last few days and, typically, after relaxing yesterday afternoon, my throat flared last night and the cold is moving in. So, as I type, I'm sipping a honey and lemon drink.

I'm going to try processing the week a bit here in writing to see if I can get an handle on the way forward.

Conversations at Thrift Shop
Thrift Shop is hard work, but also full of wonderful (and random) conversations. On Tuesday, when we began work, I was only remembering the work, but was wonderfully surprised by the joy at working with others and getting to know them better. Here are a few conversations that I remember:

• Working with an Australian on Saturday all morning who is slightly ahead of us in the sending-kids-to-uni-in-Australia stakes. It was good to hear and share some stories. And with the sharing of stories (this goes for a number of conversations over the week), be reassured that the behaviour we find disturbing or annoying in our teens is well within the normal range of what parents-of-teens experience.
• Working with an Englishwoman on Friday and hearing her story, of how she met her south American husband and what they're now doing in Japan. Also starting to set up a Boxing Day morning tea with other fruit-mince-pie enthusiasts!
• A quick conversation where I put my publishing hat on. Getting a quote for a third printing run on our 31 Days of Prayer booklet.
• Getting to know a Japanese mum, who's spent quite a bit of time in Australia with her Australian husband. It was great to talk about some TCK issues (where do they feel most at home, etc), but just generally get to know her better.

The week was wet and cold, unusually so for October, so it was good to be busy and occupied inside where I didn't have time to brood over the unseasonal dip into winter.

Spartan Race

Saturday, while I worked at Thrift Shop, was an unusual day for the rest of our family. One stayed home with a cold (he gave it to me!) and the other three went to the Spartan Race. A private sponsored obstacle race that you enter like a triathlon or marathon. It was wet and muddy. Apparently that adds to the fun? It certainly makes for interesting photos and stories. 

Our eldest and youngest competed. The race for the 12 year-olds was a little low on challenge and our son was disappointed. He thought it was longer, so was pacing himself. Nonetheless, he came third and got a substantial medal for finishing. Our eldest, with his teammate, took 2 hrs 17 minutes to compete their much more challenging race. They came equal 5th in their age group. Great memories. It was a very wet day and there was no shelter. Even the spectators got thoroughly wet and muddy. Though we ran the heater all day yesterday with my husband's leather wallet on top of it, when he put notes back into it today, they were still getting damp!

Tiny's gone

The other surprise of the weekend was that on Saturday our pet turtle, Tiny, went to another home permanently. We'd put up a sign at Thrift Shop saying we were looking for a new home for him and I got a phone call five minutes before the end of shopping on Saturday (12.55) asking about him and could they take him straight away! It took some quick action, but I managed to get him to his new owners and he was whisked away to adventures at a small Christian school south of here. I hope that he brings much joy to the students there. I discovered later there is a bit of a backstory here. The pastor who's involved in running this school had been looking for a "cool reptile" for the school and so Tiny was just what they were looking for! Though perhaps a little larger than they'd bargained on. We're thankful that he's been taken off our hands. Our boys had outgrown the joy of having a turtle and so he was really just another job on the list of household things we had to do (not to mention that I've been bitten twice this year—I did warn his new owners).

That's enough for now. Tomorrow I'll have Thrift Shop photos for you: bargains and fun moments.

Thrift Shop thoughts

Last week was as busy, as predicted. As one friend put it, you put your life on hold for four days when you work on the Thrift Shop committee. 

So, I walked away from my usual work, I organised a string of left-over meals for home, and paid less attention to my kids. Of course it was all waiting for me after Thrift Shop finished on Saturday. The dust bunnies are accumulating because I skipped my once a week vacuum on Wednesday. I'll get them this week! The emails and editing accumulated too, but I'm gradually tackling them today. In the weeks prior to Thrift Shop I said many "no"s, in an attempt to preserve space after Thrift Shop to catch-up.

It's tiring and stressful

What makes Thrift Shop extra tiring and stressful is that we're overseeing a huge amount of work in a very short time with a volunteer workforce of varying understanding of what they're supposed to do.

(Mostly) high school boys who helped us with the heavy lifting of
set-up. Most of the Thrift Shop infrastructure is stored under the cafeteria
in a poky basement accessed by steep stairs. Think: tables,
coat racks, coat hangers, shelving etc. We need these guys!

Thousands of second hand items come into our care in the first two days and then we sell the majority of it over just 10 hours over the next one and a half days and finally, after the shop is closed, we give away the remainder to a charity and second hand store then clean up and restore the gym to it's former state. It's a huge job that runs remarkably smoothly because we do it the same way every time, twice a year.

My view from behind the "register" before
the customers turned up.

I get people overload. One day I came home and hid in my bedroom for a while till I'd calmed down. On Friday in the middle of the day I "hid" in the workers room for a bit too. It induces visual overload and decision overload. 

Dust overload too! Many workers wear masks because they struggle with the dustiness. I'm okay, but my eyes were gritty by the end of the day and nose a bit itchy. I cleaned my glasses on Thursday at lunchtime and just a few hours later they were covered in dust again.

On Saturday I worked on the registers for four hours, about two hours in I was struggling with a furry head (possible headache plus fatigue) and then a stomach ache. It truly is exhausting. This morning I really struggled to wake up.

But it's worth it

However, despite all this, I continue to do this. There are a couple of reasons:

I laughed with a Japanese lady from church over these tags off things
she was buying. Most things are tagged with just a price and a PTA
number, but this artistic seller created art on hers. What was even more
special was that I got to have a conversation with someone I don't normally
connect with.

• It is a great way that I can support the school within the job that I do. My schedule is more flexible than many people's so I can make the time to do this. But it also is a job that only happens twice a year, so the commitment isn't so big that it stops me taking on other things. For most of fifty weeks in a year I can forget that I do this job.

• It is one of the key ways I've gotten to know people at school. I look at a number of friends that I have and realise that Thrift Shop was where I either first met them, or took big steps towards knowing them better. Working alongside people is a much less awkward way to get to know people, especially when there are cultural barriers. When I walked in on the first day to start work last week I was greeted like a long-lost friend by the key people who I do this with each time. Friendship is so important in sustaining us, and volunteering at Thrift Shop is a key way to invest in other people.

Another reason that I don't mind being on the Thrift Shop committee is that it gives me a defined job to do. I find that easier to manage, especially at the big set-up and take-down times.

Grand finale day of Thrift Shop

I'm done in! Feeling frazzled. Quietly quivering on the inside! It was the grand finale of Thrift Shop today. The day when anyone can come and shop from 9 till 1. 

It was exciting to hear people excited to see what the campus looked like. I heard one mum explain to her daughter that it was a place where a lot of people speak English. I heard of another couple of ladies who were found wandering in the neighborhood who wanted to come but had trouble finding the school. They weren't interested in shopping, just seeing what the inside looked like. Thankfully my friend was able to show them where to go. Another local lady I served at the register said it was her first time, she seemed very impressed. 

One of the families I sold goods to had a little boy who was intrigued by my "register". We use old fashioned calculators that provide a printout of your calculations on a long strip of paper. I made his day by allowing him to type a few numbers and then giving him the printout!

It was also great to see a number of new parents at CAJ joining in as volunteers during the day. It's a great way to get to know other parents, especially if you have older kids. 

We spent the afternoon restoring the gym to its former state. I'm glad it's finished. But it was and almost always is an enjoyable and definitely worthwhile event. 

I'm also thankful for friends who helped me personally. One brought me coffee at 11, just when I was waning. Actually I was so tired at breakfast that I messed up making my toast, I was concerned about how I was going to manage handling other people's money (and speaking in Japanese) for four hours and not make some big mistakes, but it actually went fairly well. This morning I missed going to our sons' second-last cross country meet for the season. A couple of friends assured me yesterday they'd cheer extra hard for my guys. Gotta love having friends!

People everywhere you look. These are the registers.
 I spent most of four hours there today. And almost six
there yesterday. 

The view straight over the head of the register. We served people continuously
for at least three hours straight before we got to the end of the line
and had a break.

This was the foyer of the gym where the seniors were selling hot food.

Fun while working

Thankfully I had a great sleep last night and enjoyed my day much more. But I'm still tired. I'm typing this on my phone while sitting in my "lounging" chair with my feet up and ice on my knees.

So, today I feature a couple of fun things about Thrift Shop.

1. Silly fun with other people.

Half of the Senior (Yr 12) class came in to help us this morning. They were in fine spirits. They did do some work, but there were some hilarious moments. Especially when one of the guys put on this tiny, sparkly shirt (it took help from a couple of others to get it on). He then added a black wig, a furry shoulder shrug, and picked up a guitar. The effect was stunning!

This is my son with a transformer mask.

We asked this friend, and fellow hard-worker to take the "triplet" photo below but first he tricked us by taking a selfie!

The red aprons indicate "responsibility". Thrift Shop committee members wear them. I thought three of us in red shirts was a fun coincidence and tried to get a photo with all three of us together but it was surprisingly hard to get us all in the same spot at the same time. Running Thrift Shop is a big job but fun moments like these help it to be a joy too. 

2. Crazy/interesting/unusual things that you find.

I think these are self-explanatory. 

I also did a bit of sign-work, especially late this afternoon. I couldn't resist taking this photo as an example of someone taking signs into their own hands. She obviously got a bit frustrated with what had been going on with the set-up of this table.

So now we rest and tomorrow is the fun, social day of Thrift Shop, when the CAJ and wider missionary community come to shop from 10 till 4. I get to sit down most of the day too as I work the registers, a great contrast to today. My knees will love me!