Beyond the Edge of Adventure

Wow, haven't posted anything in over a month!! So, I'm starting again with a bang on two big topics: Santa and Jesus. And I'd like to be sorry for the forthright nature with which I write, but in this age of namby-pamby political correctness, I just can't. So I'm sorry about that!! :) So here it is, my deliberately politically uncorrect and completely truthful, forthright post. Enjoy! The Santa thing is an interesting phenomenon, isn’t it? His origins lie in tales of jolly ol’ St Nicholas, leaving presents under trees for poor children……but sadly, also in Coca Cola wanting to boost sales, so portraying him in the world-famous red-and-white suit. As a child, I never even questioned the whole Jesus v Santa thing. Yeah, OK, I was extremely easy-going, quiet…and yes, gullible! I found out Santa wasn’t real when I was six. We were standing there in a group and one little girl said, “No, Santa’s not real!”. And being the innocent, gullible little person I was,

....a spiritual war, that is..... For a while now, I've been reading a very interesting and inspiring blog. It's written by Bill Muehlenberg, an American who's now living in Australia. Bill has an amazing mind and stands up to the ridiculous political correctness and the hypocrisy of what he calls 'The Party of Death' (The Greens, pro-death and pro-euthanasia). He writes a variety of stuff which is incredibly fascinating. Bill is helping to spread the word that our society is changing - not necessarily for the better - and we need to be aware and be educated about it. If you are a christian, then you need to read it. If you aren't a christian, you need to read it. I'd be very interested to hear your feedback on Bill's writings...... http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/

I'm posting a link here from Robyn at Slightly more depth than a teaspoon - it's on the wonderful concept of intolerance, which isn't used or liked much by folk these days......and make sure you check out the other articles on Robyn's blog - they're very honest and very funny! Enjoy...... J :) Slightly more depth than a teaspoon: Be intolerant, because some things are just plain ... : This post may be a little full-on for some. I hope it doesn't offend. But I can't help it. I have to write it. The fact is I am intolerant...

I shouted out this question in my head the other day. And no, I don't shout out loud most of the time, but I shout lots in my head when I'm frustrated or upset......it's a sort-of prayer - venting at God, then stepping back to look at myself and hear myself.....and laughing at my ridiculous self-pity, whinging or completely untrue babbling. Prayer is so good for being objective! Anyway, so this week has been a little more full-on than the rest. I had medical tests on Tuesday (they're all normal normal normal, there's no need to worry, etc etc....), J-man has had temperatures for two days and has now come down with a chunky cough, Miss D has a yucko cough which started last night AND on top of all that, my husband had appendicitis and was in surgery last night to have it taken out. He's home now and thanks to my prayer warriors and the great team at Toowoomba Base Hospital, he's doing really well. In the midst of all this, I have, like I do every week, tr

My friend, Grace, is an artist and one of the best things about her is that while being incredibly talented, she's also very cool with giving little tutorials on her blog. I'd recommend a visit to her gorgeous blog http://www.arthousemum.blogspot.com/ for inspiration in art, photography and motherhood. An awesome read. Waaay back in September Grace posted a tutorial on real life sketching. And me, being a big-picture person, usually has no patience or time to pick up a pencil and make little marks on a piece of paper with it. Normally, I hate details! But for some reason, Grace's post just grabbed me and I knew I had to give it a go. To focus on something that would take my mind of the exhausting whirlwind of my big picture thoughts. So, first I had to find a suitable object. Not easy - I went through heaps of objects before I was sitting with Matthew this morning supervising his homework (and being a very attentive, focussed mother of course) and noticed our salt shak

In twelve days' time, it'll be ten years since I was married. We've had a rough time the past few years with family stuff, but it's made us work harder at being a team and relying on each other for support. I've now come to a point, after many ups and downs where I'm starting to work out who Julie Lawson really is. That's a story for another day. But tonight, I would just like to share about how God brought Ben and I together, despite the wrong choices and sloppy mistakes along the way. If you'd asked me during the years from 1998-2000 while I was at uni what I wanted to achieve during my life, I would have said, "I'm going to be a teacher and travel!" I mean, I wanted to get married, but much later. It was on the back burner! And I knew I'd have children.....eventually. I knew I wanted four, but...y'know, whatever. Life was going to come first. Then I met an exciting, talented and gentle young man called Ben. We were both 19 w

I'm a bit shocked that my last entry here was a whole month ago! Wow! But so much has happened since then .....so you'll need to excuse me :). We are FINALLY, after 16 months of planning, in our new home! It's SO delightful. I'll tell the story behind it in another post one day, but it's a story of God's complete and unstinting faithfulness to our family. Anyway. We moved house. Again.....but for the last time! And now I'm sitting in bed (yes, BEDDDDD!!) at 11:30 on a Wednesday morning because I'm sick. My body has completely packed up from all the packing, lifting, cleaning, etc I've been doing since October 12th! I've learned from six years of mothering to recognise that getting sick means TAKE A REST, GIRL! So, I am. Master J is down for an early nap and Miss N is asleep in the car (it's no longer my policy to wake babies up when they're asleep in the car if I can help it...it's taken me four babies to realise this. Oh well.)

I'm SO excited to find this fantastic blog.....I've only checked out the birth control and motherhood links so far, but she's right on the money. Check it out if you want to learn how to have joy! How I learned to love housework by Jennifer Fulwiler

I love the song by Portishead 'Glory Box'. I have no idea what it means or what the lyrics are. I just like the sound. And the bit where she breathes, "I just a-wanna be.....a woman..." I've spent a lot of time lately thinking about what it means to be a woman. I grew up really confused about what a woman was supposed to be like. Dolly had an article once that had a bit in it about how guys 'don't like girls to be like one of the boys'. That confused me big time. So, I'm meant to throw out  my skirts, get angry/loud/bossy, 'contribute to society' by having a career and making lots of money, do what the boys do (eg, play footy) but I'm not to be like a boy. Huh? Being a girl when I was a teenager (not THAT long ago, ok??) meant wearing a very short skirt and enough eye make up to make me look like I lost a fight with the black Crayola! At that stage in my life, I had no Bible knowledge and no wholesome teaching or guidance to fall

I can write about this now because I'm somewhat refreshed, thanks to my gorgeous husband who has sent me to bed early this week, made me a bath and has stepped in to help out around the house. I've been a bit tired lately - I usually cook myself fried rice or scrambled eggs with veggies/leftover meat for lunch each day as I'm sensitive to gluten and milk so I can't have sandwiches. This doesn't seem like a big thing, but when you do the school run, get a few loads of wash out, get the toddler to eat, put the toddler in his bed for a sleep and feed the baby - it's hard to fit in cooking a hot meal. So when I get tired, I don't really eat all that much. I've stopped eating conventional breakfast food recently. I'm a big breakfast fan and I believe if we all sat down to a HUGE breakky every day we'd hardly need to eat for the rest of the day. Well, it works in theory. The reality is that I'm so tired and busy in the mornings that I can barel

Our new home is almost ready! I am just about beside myself with excitement....and I don't mind this little house we're in (an old farmhouse next to the weir in Oakey) BUT I can't wait to have my own bathroom where my toothpaste and toothbrush will remain unmolested by little fingers......I can't wait to have my oven OFF THE FLOOR for the first time in 10 years and actually inside the kitchen, as opposed to outside the U-shaped bench we have here.....I can't wait to live inside walls that are insulated.....I'm so excited to be a house where I can't see the ground through gaps in the floor......and I can't wait, above all, to unpack all of our belongings and FINALLY be organised - I'm starting to get really tired of seeing all my belongings strewn throughout our house in boxes..... I reckon this is God's way of reminding me to be thankful for our new home! The house should be completed by Sept 26th, but then we have to have inspections and the

http://www.aboverubies.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=444:a-garden-home-no-183&catid=105:womens-devotional-archive&Itemid=400038 I mentioned this devotional in a recent blog post - an awesome read (as usual) :)!

We've had a lot of changes in our family lately which has been exciting! First of all, we have number of additions to our hobby farm: Jessie and Pinky are two Ingham Hisex chooks who live in Ben's home-made 'Taj Mah-Chook'. Ben spent about a month making it, all on his own....except for one Saturday when I helped him for a bit. Whilst it was mostly successful, I managed to slam the wire cutters shut on my thumb creating a huge blood blister! I gave up after that. Ben can make a chook cage for a month, but get me near tools for 30 mins and I injure myself! Sheesh! So, we're very excited to have the chookies and Jessie's started laying already! I lost my beloved Fendi sunglasses from Saks in New York, a special gift from my husband during our trip to the USA last year. They're probably now in someone else's handbag, been worn on someone else's face.....I know it seems like a stupid thing to be so upset about, but it's like losing a ring or sp

I want Ben to go back to shift-work!! HA! If you'd asked me that question 4 1/2 years ago, I would have immediately chosen for Ben to work 9-5, Monday to Friday, with every weekend off. Now, I'm so tired just getting the children to school every day (violins, please) that I'm aching for the weekend. I don't know how 9-5ers do it! Ben's been in the QAS for 5 years now and although I HATED it at first and struggled to adjust to shift work (it took about a year for me to work out how it worked), I'm now in a routine with shift work. Huh? Routine? Shift work? How do they go together? Beats me. All I know is, two days off in a row is SO not enough (keep those violins going!!) and I can't wait for shift work to resume in a little over a week's time! So, my dear friends who are following my blog - you are the ones who are to hold me accountable - next time I complain about Ben working on the weekends, or doing a 12-hour shift + overtime: REMIN

I'm a cross Mumma today. Been a long day of multiple challenges. And I'm cross about the fact that secular environmentalist-type folk look down on me because somehow my work isn't 'work'. I don't 'contribute' to society and even worse, have given birth to four carbon-producing, footprinting, rubbishing little suckers. Well. Apparently raising the future teachers, doctors, check-out chicks, mechanics etc isn't important to them, but it sure is important to me. And more importantly, God makes it very clear that He loves children and loves families ("Let the children come to me." Matt 19:14, "Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them." Psalm 127:5). To be quite honest, I reckon that most of the children of today will be so bound up in grief about their lack of identity in God and the hopelessness of a painful existence lacking in love that they won't give two hoots about how polluted the oceans or sky are. The pain

With each of my babies, I'd hit a point in my journey with them when I would realise that suddenly things were getting easy. I was no longer slogging up a hill, head down, working really hard. Needless to say, I hit that point a little earlier with Matthew (who slept through the night from 10 days old and breastfed with almost no trouble at all) and Denna (slept through from 8 weeks old and was a breastfeeding nightmare for 8 weeks, when it finally cleared up) than I did Joseph (who slept through FINALLY, aged 9 months old after 4 months of battling oral thrush....and moving our family to Roma when he was 10 weeks old)! Anyway, with the plateau thing: I'd realise that I hadn't spent a majority of the day bouncing the baby in her hammock, or I'd had a day without one painful breastfeed, or I'd do a 'rush hour' that didn't involve the baby bellowing while I scrambled to get dinner on the table or children bathed, or my personal favourite, I'd put the

We went to Brisbane the other day. It was a nice day....but I was hit with a severe case of 'the grass is greener on the other side' with all those lovely-looking women dressed up looking swish and very important. They were everywhere! And there was me, in my 'uniform' of jeans and a t-shirt and stained shoes and hair that I'd forgotten to brush that morning. It's so completely immature and I'm sure if I did do paid work at the moment then I'd hate it.....but I came home disillusioned about how wonderful it must feel to be validated by a salary. And wearing clothes that don't have breastmilk stains on them! And this is me, Mumma Julie, who never dreamed of having a job, but used to dream about having a lovely husband and multiple children to have around my legs, read stories to and make birthday cakes for. When I made up stories, all the families had twelve children (twelve is my favourite number!). I named all the children and imagined how aweso

I've been dying to share this idea for ages now.....but I'm also a bit nervous about putting it out there. It's been such a huge blessing to our marriage and family life. It doesn't happen so often at the moment, but when it does, it's so fantastic! It's also quite radical and completely the opposite of the usual concept of a wife's job description. Be prepared to feel uncomfortable :)! A few years back I had a life-changing experience. A lovely Titus 2 woman held a Bible study at my home and a few of the more mature ladies from our parish came along which proved to be such a blessing! The other blessing was the teaching in the series called 'Philosophy of Christian Womanhood' which was rich and wonderful teaching on being a godly wife and mother. One of the simplest and most effective tips I gained from that course was this: When your husband walks in the door from work- Look Sweet, Smell Sweet, Be Sweet. When I heard this from PCW, I imagi

I can't believe it's been almost a month since my last post! Time's gone fast. This is just a general catch-up on what us Lawsons have been up to lately. I had a refreshing night out on June 3rd - Ben and I went to the RACQ Careflight Ball and had a ball. It was so nice to be out doing something different. I commented to Ben on our way into the city that it was strange driving at night! Instead of paying someone to do hair and make up (which is still fun and I'm not against in any way), I had to do it myself because a) we're putting all our extra $$ into the house and related projects and b) Ben was going to be working until 5 that day and therefore unable to watch the children for me. But in the end he had the day off as it was the end of 'hell week' and if he'd worked, he would have been ridiculously tired. The next morning we dragged ourselves out of bed. Oh, alright - I dragged myself out of bed after Ben had fed and clothed the children. He was

My Joseph is a delightful boy. He was by far the hardest baby.....but what made it so bearable when he was a baby who woke up multiple times a night for a year was that he had such a beautiful personality . During the day time, I'd forget about the grinding fatigue and how I just wanted to scream at 3am when he woke up for no reason. He's just a caring and gentle little person. He's at that gorgeous stage now where he's walking proficiently, but it's still a bit of a toddle. He LOVES holding my hand and while he speaks sentences, it's still a bit of baby talk. Reflecting on what I love about Joseph, reminds me of when Matthew was two and how much I loved that, too. He was a serious little man who would play for hours on his own and had a peaceful, serene countenance whilst still being playful at times. He was a true blue home body and was happiest when at home, whether inside examining his toys (he never 'played' as such) or outside throwin

My day today has had big highs and low lows.....it's been weird. Doesn't happen often, but when I get a weird day, I really get a weird day! Low: I woke at 7:50am after being up with Neve from 2:30am-4am this morning. Late again. Ben thought he set an alarm for me, but for whatever reason, it didn't go off! Rushed off to school with no breakfast. Came back, attacked the washing and had a late breakky. High: Big highlight was that Ben rang to say that our builder needed about half the amount of piers they thought they needed for the foundations of our home and so we were getting quite a bit of money to go towards other variations on the contract. Hooray! Thought I'd lie down about 12 as all the children were sleeping...ahhh.....BAH! Woke at 3:24pm with a start, realising that I was 24 minutes late for school pick-up and that means my boy would have been stressing for 24 minutes about why his Mum wasn't there to pick him up! Raced over to school, apologised

I've hit the wall today. Denna was up with vomiting and a temperature throughout last night, so I only got 4 1/2 hours sleep. My usual policy is if I get less than 5 hours sleep, I go into 'light duties' mode which means I stay home and only do essential child care and housework for the day. However, I've been finding it hard to make friends (it takes a long time and I'm not good at it) and really miss mummy-friend company and this morning was my fortnightly MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) meeting. I was a bit disappointed to not be able to go, until Ben came off night shift and said he'd watch Denna for me while I went to MOPS and then did the grocery shopping. So, I saddled up, got out the door and off we went! However, Neve was unsettled because I had breadcrumbs on home-made chicken schnitzel last night and was windy the whole meeting. She proceeded to fuss through getting in the car and heading to the shops, me scoffing lunch and then through shopp

I have the most wonderful husband. He is amazing! He'll help me with anything around the house, loves spoiling me with surprises and makes sure that I have a bath all to myself every couple of days.... However, I'm concerned that others may think that he does all this because I 'trained' him. Ahem. I dislike this term. It reminds me of how we treat a pet. My man is not a pet! We took a turning point in our marriage (I believe) in 2007. I was unhappy and not really enjoying all the benefits of marriage. Thanks to Above Rubies and Philosophy of Christian Womanhood (say that ten times fast!), I made a conscious decision to think of my man as how I wanted him to be, not pick on him for all his faults. I made a point of thanking him and praising his efforts instead of picking on his mistakes. And I literally bit my tongue when we were driving somewhere and let him decide what route we took! This was one of the HARDEST things I have ever done. Every single time I th

I'm inspired by two women who have blogs.....and my brain is so full of thoughts about marriage, raising children and God that I thought a blog might be a place to get all these ideas and thoughts out as some sort of processing and perhaps a little therapy as well! The title of my blog comes from how I feel about my journey in life so far. I've been irrevocably and extremely extended past the ends of what I would have classed 'adventure' as a young adult. And this is me, reporting from the outside the realms of my expectations from being married, having four children and having a relationship with God. So....a brief introduction. I have known God my whole life, but really met Him in a real sense when I was 19. I've been married to my husband for 9 1/2 years. He's a paramedic. My children are aged 5 1/2, 4, 2 and 3 1/2 months. Before Children (BC), I was a primary school teacher, youth worker and sometimes chaplain. I am passionate about marriage, family