Sunday, 23 April, 2017

What a wonderful week it's been!  It started out with me having an aromatherapy hot stone massage with the lovely Helen - she always does such an amazing job and I am always so relaxed afterwards.  That was followed by dinner with Robyn and the missionaries.  We love having them all over and especially love the spiritual message which the missionaries leave with us each time they come.

Tuesday, we drove to Nambour (about 2 1/2 hours south of HB) and set up our new camping trailer (which we have named 'Sylvester') for the first time.  Can I tell you that we LOVE our new camping trailer!!!  It's so spacious and we especially love the couch (which is separate from the seats we sit on at the table - we used it a few times while we were away (from Tuesday afternoon to Friday morning) and it was so relaxing and comfortable.  The best part of our time away was that Dad completely relaxed once we got the camping trailer set up.  The campground was pretty average, but clean and situated in the middle of lots of beautiful vegetation.  There was a pool there, but it wasn't heated and it was too cool to go in - I was disappointed about that as we had planned on doing some aquafit exercises in there.

Our first stop on the way to Nambour - we stopped to have a snack here

We spent most of our time at the campground reading, playing games, doing puzzles, knitting (me 😊) and playing on our ipads.  While we were sitting outside one of the days (in our luxurious new camping chairs), a woman who was camped in a bus up the road from our campsite, came over to chat with us.  She saw me knitting and mentioned that she does a lot of knitting, so I asked her if I could come up to her campsite and she could show me how to sew up something I had finished knitting - she said 'sure'.  I have been knitting a lot, but haven't been happy with the way I have been taught by a few people how to sew up my creations.  Camping people are quite friendly and we said 'hi' to a few people at the campground and waved to a few as they were driving in and out of the campground.

Rainforest Holiday Village - our first campground with our new camping trailer

 Dad sitting eating our lunch at the campground before we set up the camping trailer

 Our camping trailer set up and me reading (I am wearing my bathing suit as we had gone down to the pool to do some aquafit exercises, but the water was way too cold)

 Dad eating our first dinner at the campground - Dad insisted that we had to have weiners and beans 😊

Dad eating breakfast outside - note the beautiful rainforest behind him

 Me knitting (doesn't it all look so relaxing) in our new luxurious chairs

 Dad relaxing doing a puzzle in our new luxurious chairs

 Wild turkey in the campsite next to ours

 There were three wild turkeys there

 Dad cooking bacon and eggs for breakfast on the cooktop in the camping trailer

 The final product

Dad, the scruffbucket - he forgot his shaver and so went the whole three days without shaving

While we were camping, we drove in to Maroochydore (on the coast) to visit with our previous Bishop and his wife, Diana (the Browns).  They moved from HB while we were in Canada last year.  Last week, we ran into them at a mall here in town (they had come up just for the day) and they told us to call them when we got to the campground so that we could come and visit with them in their new place.  They live in a cute little unit right across the road from the Paynter River - what a magnificent view!  We chatted and they served us a delicious lunch (curried egg salad sandwiches - yummy!).  It was great to catch up with them again.

 Diana, me and Bishop Brown

The view from the Brown's unit - isn't it beautiful

It poured rain the night before we were leaving which meant that the camping trailer wasn't conpletely dry before we had to pack it up to come home.  Fortunately, yesterday was a decent enough day that we were able to put it up in the backyard and dry it out before we packed it away again.  It is now parked in our back yard up on cement paving stones until we figure out how we are going to permanently store it.  We were going to go away camping again this coming week, but the forecast is for more rain and, since we are going to Melbourne on Friday and the trailer has to be completely dry before we come home from camping, we didn't want to take a chance on it.  So, it looks like we won't be taking Sylvester out again until August.

As soon as we got home from camping and we had brought our stuff into the house, it was time for me to go to see Helen again for a facial.  It has been seven weeks since my last one - way too long! 😊  It was as heavenly as always and I am looking forward to having another one next week which will have to do me for three months.

Yesterday, I met up with my teacher friend, Luise, for another iced chocolate and catch-up time.  Both of us can yak up a storm, so we had no problem filling up the hour and a half we were together.  I am meeting up with her and some other teacher friends again on Thursday. 😊

Me and Luise

Today at church, I saw Scarlett who is one of the little girls who I babysat just before we went to Melbourne - that was the day I jumped on the trampoline, made cookies and read with her and her sister, Indiana.  Scarlett's mom, Lisa, is pregnant with twins and I was just talking with her last night and let her know that I will be here this week if she and her hubby, Ben, would like to go out or if she would like me to take the girls while she rests.  I told Scarlett that I had asked her mummy about looking after them this week.  She was quite happy about that, so hopefully Lisa will call and I can go over there to hang out with the girls again - it was nice that Scarlett wants me to come over and do that.