Taking Stock and Moving On

I'm having trouble coming down after all the excitement of the past week or so.

Last Tuesday our 14 y.o. returned from Guam after representing the school in cross-country. He brought lots of photos (though many were blurry because the camera's dying) and stories. Oh, and lots of washing too!

Beautiful Guam

Not-so-beautiful Guam. They went hiking along a dirt
road a couple of days after a typhoon ran past the island.

Along their route they found evidence of this country's
past: WW2 tank.

Destination of their walk: this awesome waterfall.

Ah yes, and American. Guam is American and they had
American-type stores to prove it. They also drove on the
right hand side of the road, which, amazingly, my son
didn't realise until I pointed it out from his photos!

Hanging up coats at Thrift Shop with
some middle schoolers.

Then from Wednesday last week I worked at Thrift Shop, which is a frenzy of an event. To efficiently sort and fill a school gym with thousands of garage-sale items, then sell them over 1 1/2 days, then remove all that hasn't been sold and restore the building to a functioning gym is quite a feat. Getting back to everyday life after that isn't easy either.

In the middle of all that I heard from our magazine designer that she can't continue doing her job for us. It is too stressful with two littlies (a few months old and a two-year-old) plus a couple of paying jobs on the side! Argghhh. I wish this was a paying position, then I could probably keep her, but it isn't. 100% volunteer. Magazine designers aren't just waiting around for me to ask them to take this job on. I'm feeling concerned, but trying to wait on God for this one.

My main editing team.

It isn't just that she's leaving, it is that I'm leaving too: next June we'll go back to Australia for home assignment for a year and I'd rather not take this managing editor's job back with me (although it is entirely possible because I do the whole job from my laptop in my house). Praying for someone special to take on this role for a year too!

Now, as I look at the calendar, we've got a bit of "down time" in November. There are no inter-school sports meets on weekends, our eldest son is training for wrestling, but the meets don't start until December. Phew. Some time to breathe before we run headlong into December. How did 2013 rush by so fast?