Saturday at Capers

So.... I still haven't finished my outline so thats on my to do list. Last night we watched Despicable Me and then some of us walked to the Briars for the Friday night Live music. I kind of wanted to have some cake but $10.50 is a little too much. After that Jamie REALLY wanted to go to Mackas (mcDonalds) and was quite set on it. Since Woodsy didn't take anyone to the movies, Jamie asked him to drive us. He agreed and the guys wanted to keep it a secret from everyone, but then Regan invited Seth. Of course it was really an open invitation for everyone so once we piled into the van, Woodsy stopped back at the conference Hall to make sure no one else wanted to come. So Jamie, myself, Seth, Rega, Olivia and Dustin went to Mackas in Mittagong.

We got there and ended up meeting up with OneLife youth group and Emily, Kyle and Brittany who had gone there. I had some fries and a hot fudge sundae, I probably should have just settled for a .50 cent cone, since nothing else is that cheap. Here when you shop at any grocerystore, there are coupons on the back and I had one for Mackas but forgot to bring it... Kyle ended up buying me an ice cream cone as well.

We returned to Capernwray and entered the conference Hall to a dance party, I didn't participate but it sure was entertaining to watch.

This morning was a flexi Breakfast, so I had to be there before 8:30 to set up the lunch meat so everyone could make sandwiches, as well as to make toast for breakfast. Lots of people skipped altogether and a few guys had asked Olivia and I to make them sandwiches.

Today, almost everyone will be heading out at 3:45pm for Hillsong. I'm not going because I made other plans to hang out with Krissy. I think there is a total of 5 students staying back, so it should be an interesting Dinner ;).

Rainy Days

The sky cleared for a bit today, the sun came out and now its back to being cloudy. Last night at Family night was fun, we played Ticket to Ride Europe and I won! I've never played before and its was alot of fun. The Saabens made us SO much dessert so I ended up eating some of everything. Puffs, brownies, date cake, and jelly. We had a speaker on Evangelism today and that was pretty good, I had heard pretty much everything he said before but it was nice to hear again. He's a pastor in Goulbourn and during Prac Week he will be on one of the teams. Next Semester all the students will be splitting up into three teams and going with Woodsy, Haldane or Neil to a differnt part of Australia to do evangelism and some other outreach things. I'm looking forward to it. Tonight I have a prayer meeting at 7pm and once I get back to the school from town I am going to work more on my outline! I'm finally starting to get a little bored during my freetime, mostly because its rainy and we can't be outside. Rachel and I figured out what one of us will be teaching on Sunday, Jacob and Esau! I'm looking forward to it, I think I will probably teach this week and Rachel next week. With the memory verse every week I've decided to teach it to them on Sunday and if they can recite it the following week they get a lolly, hopefully this will encourage them to memorize scripture. SO important.

Workday wednesday

So yesterday I started research on my Bible study outline! I should be able to work on it for awhile before dinner as well and potentially get it done by Friday!  Last night I played the bowl game with a group of Capernwray students, everyone has to write 5 nouns on individual pieces of paper and throw them in a bowl. Two teams. The first round you can use any word to help your team figure out what is on the paper, 45 seconds to get as many slips as you can. Second round you can just use one word and the third round you act them out. I put pygmy goat as one of mine and it was really funny for people to try and describe it ! There were some really difficult ones from other players as well. My team ended up losing but it was lots of fun.

We are learning about the Beatitudes' in lectures and it is really interesting. Today was workday and I was in charge of cleaning the kitchen and SN @ C room/ student lounge.  I took all the dress up clothes out of the closets and reorganized as well as did some decorating in the student lounge. It has been pouring outside and the people who were scheduled to work outside had to be given different jobs.

 My family group went to breakfast at Garth and Cass' and then had the bible study, tonight we are having a games night!  I finished my job early and there weren't really any jobs so I spotted for Randy (made sure he didn't fall of the ladder) while he cleaned the light fixtures in the conference hall. He keeps trying to get me to do a secret handshake almost every time I see him, I think he just wants to hold my hand haha. So as of last week he also says, "You look so fancy"  when he sees me. It doesn't matter if I'm wearing a dress or sweater, I apparently look fancy or as Shelby pointed out it just means that I always look good.  The "All about Brianna" statement has pretty much worn off and no one mentions my proposal so that's good. I was  asking Morgan if he knew Karissa and I was showing him a picture, it was one of her wedding pictures. Then Randy who was also standing there asked why I wasn't married since my cousin was. I told him it was because no one has ever proposed and he answered back that I could propose to any of the guys here and that there were even three in the very room. Today is apparently the only day women can propose to men.

Lots of fun, lol. So free time for 2 hrs, then supper, and games night. Wednesdays can be pretty fun, too bad it's raining or we could have done something outside for Family night!

Meeting #2

WOW, I just came back from a Hong Kong meeting and have so much information in my head right now, I don't even know where to start. Emily has been coming to all our meetings so far to support us but Woodsy has decided that we really need to learn and grow together as a team so she will probably just be joining us for prayer on Thursday nights.

 So Woodsy told us a lot about what we'll be doing in Hong Kong. I would be lying if I told you that what he said didn't make me uncomfortable. Granted as a girl I will not ever be alone with a New Boy, for which I am thankful. We all are going to be taking shifts with the new guys that come in. This is an all day thing and they are spiritual babies so for the first little while that they are at New Man House, we are to get them whatever they want, whenever they want it. The guys actually have to go in the bathroom with the recovering drug addicts to make sure that they aren't hiding drugs on them. I am SO glad that I'm a girl lol. Woodsy also said that all the people there will like me immediately whereas for the guys it will take time. Not surprised about that too much I guess, girls aren't'as intimidating as a general rule.

He talked to us for about an hour on what we will be doing and gave us a chart that is supposed to help us out. A little overwhelmed right now, but It will be okay.  I'm still looking forward but am realizing how big of a role we are taking on, of course we are not alone so that's great, well tomorrow is Tuesday and I'm planning on starting my outline as soon as possible so that my weekend is completely free! Ciao

Sydney Opera

Went to the Sydney Opera House last night! It was amazing! The whole evening in the Opera lasted three hours. There was an accident on the way there so we were stuck in traffic and didn't get to eat before going into the Opera. There were two intermissions of 20-30 min. During the intermission there was the opportunity to go out on the terrace and overlook the Harbour. There was a fantastic view of the Harbour bridge and all the buildings across the water, you could see sailboats, the birds, and other ships on the water. Everyone took lots of pictures, I didn't bring my camera to the Opera though so I'm hoping people put them on facebook.

There were twelve of us students that went, along with Woodsy. We had the back row on the first level. Therefore we couldn't see the subtitles that translated the Italian singing. We read the synopsis however so we caught on to what was happening, it was a tragic love story about Princess Turandot.  At the end of the performance there was clapping for at least 5 minutes straight. It was so funny to see who people clapped for the most, depending on the character they played. Suffice to say that Turandot was not as celebrated as Liu , Calaf, or even Timur! The performance was long yet it didn't seem lengthy at all.

 I felt really important being at the Opera like in books I've read. Everyone got dressed up and Jamie did some girls' makeup. I had bought a dress in town weeks ago and it was perfect for the evening, I was the only one wearing a reddy, pink dress! After the Opera and more pictures, we walked to McDonalds for our late dinner. Two 1$ cheeseburgers for me. Of course walking there and back to the Opera House I stuck close by some of the guys since any city at night is a bit sketchy.

 On the ride home we got pulled over by the police that had set up a checkpoint and they warned Woodsy that we all needed to wear are seatbelts properly, I was of course ;), Thanks Mom. He could have got a 2000$ fine if we weren't wearing them. They are very strict about traffic laws here and they are very keen on enforcing them!

 I'm quite exhausted since we got back to the school at 1am, however me and a nap are not compatible so I'll probably just be tired for the majority of the day and drink some cappuccinos at church! haha There is a community dinner at the church after the service tonight and they are bringing in pizza, Rachel and I have to be back in time for SN @ C which starts at 7:30, but I think we'll be okay. I really want to be able to stay for it. Everyone else gets the opportunity to go out for lunch with members of their congregation and since ours is an evening service, we don't. Hopefully Pastor Mark get the go ahead from Garth (in charge of SN @C and missions)

Fun times!!

So yesterday I thought I had a prayer meeting at 2:00 so I went to Woodsy's and he informed me that the meeting was actually at 7:00pm... oops.  So instead I went into town to get money out of my bank to pay for my flight to Hong Kong. Woodsy entrusted me with his bank card and said that all I had to do was go to his bank, they would swipe the card and then I could give them money to deposit. I was a little surprised that he just gave it to me, but then again I am pretty trustworthy. All went well and my flights are paid for!! I also got the chance to Skype with my family and had a pretty great laugh at Tias song :). I also went and bought some chocolate, they have Vanilla Mars Bars!!!

Then today it was 24 degrees out so I made time for some sunbathing. We had classes in the morning and then the rest of the day to do whatever we wanted. I am running out of internet time and since I don't have any cash... I'm not sure when I will get the chance to buy some more. So if all my time runs out, I won't be blogging until I get more internet, just a heads up.

 Olivia went to the Street Meat tonight but and it goes until 1:00am so I didn't go. The Opera is tomorrow!!! We are going to dress up and then take a bus to Sydney, on the way we will stop for Dinner, I'm not sure where though. I'm really looking forward to it but don't want to be exhausted for it so I'll probably go to bed earlyish.... I think that's about it as far as activities go, in going to the Opera I'll be missing out on a church baptism that follows with a swim and BBQ... Figures that it would be on one of the only Saturdays that I'm busy! I might look into trying to get a few babysitting jobs on weekends, since the work that there is doesn't really appeal to me (raking for 5-8 hrs).   Apparently there is a babysitting agency and they charge 25$ an hour, WOW if I made that much at home I would have that as a career haha.

The Briars was awesome, there was live music and Pastor Mark and Coby came and joined us. We were sitting there for quite a while and the people behind us were leaving. They saw us eyeing their cheese and crackers so they said we could have them :). It was really good, Brie is my new favorite cheese! Time for bed for sure...,

Bible study and work day

So, yesterday was workday and every two weeks we get assigned a different workday task as well as a different priviledge. I am now inside on workday and am working with Adam in the conference/lecture Hall. Technically we each had separate jobs but decided that it would be more fun if we worked together.

So we cleaned all morning and Sally said that if we got our tasks finished we could decorate a lost and found box.

Lunch was kind of gross, we had hotdogs but the "hotdogs" had a red covering on them that u were supposed to eat with it and they smelled like wet cat. yuck. I ate them and they didn't settle well with my stomach...

Anyways after lunch we finished the rest of our assigned jobs and got to work painting the toilet paper box so that it could be the "Loser Box". Adam had joked earlier that he was going to get paint on me but i figured I was pretty safe..

He ended up flicking water at me with the paintbrushes a few times but I got him back with a cup of water. The box is VERY colorful and I'm pretty sure no one will miss it lol

My biblestudy was afterwards and it didn't go as well as I had hoped but it wasn't at all bad. I had wanted an A on both components and ended up getting a B on presentation and an A- on content. Thats actually quite good for my first one!

Well other than that I am trying to decide what to do for the march travel weekend and although I originally didn't want to go camping, I think I might. At least I'll be able to hang out at the beach with a bunch of people from the school and also it will be pretty cheap!!