Our Trip

Day Three

Ok, so where were we up to?

Oh, yes, on the last post we ended up in Halls Creek.

Now, the Canning Stock Route technically

starts at Halls Creek although the actual 'track' begins

at Bililuna, a small aboriginal community,

172km south via the Tanami Highway. 

Now, originally, I said I would give you some

info on the history of the stock route etc,

but, you have Google, so knock yourself out,

I am too busy right now to write a history lesson! 

Well, anyway, after tanking up on coffee (one

last time), we headed off to finally get off the bitumen 

and onto our 'real' adventure. 

After travelling on the Tanami Road for a while,

our first stop was Wolfe Creek Crater. 

It was pretty impressive and we were glad

to get out of the car after 23 km of corrugates

(visions of what was to come). 

Around lunch time we arrived at Bililuna community,

the start of the Canning Stock Route, and 

the start of hundreds of kilometres of corrugates!

After travelling a very short distance on the very 

bumpy road, the anti sway bar on the cruiser became

detached (sheered off really), so we pulled that off

and carried on our way. The first of many things to rattle

loose or fall off. 

We ended up setting up camp early at 

a beautiful lagoon called Lake Stretch. 

Being on Western Australian time now,

we hadn't really adjusted our body clocks so

we ate tea at 4pm! We were crazy mixed up. 

Here's a couple pics of the lagoon and 

also the lagoon and campsite 

through the lensball. 

It was very peaceful and relaxing down by the lagoon 

and it gave us time to plan our next days' trek. 

(Each night Dave and Kon would work out how

far we would 'try' to make it the next day. 

Of course I say 'try', as very often, things changed

and plans were abandoned. But that's the fun of 

adventuring into the great unknown. 

I enjoyed walking along the lagoon,

watching the brolgas and cockatoos

and photographing the reflections in the water. 

We finally got to have our first campfire 

and enjoyed our billy tea and damper. 

Once it got dark enough, I was able to sit

down by the lagoon and try and capture the 

Milky Way in all it's glory. Ahhhh. 

Wow! God really is a master artist.

Psalm 19:1

The heavens declare the glory of God;

 and the firmament sheweth his handywork.

Another day ended,

and a new one just over the horizon.

To be continued...………… 

BREAKING NEWS!!

Another Holmes Wedding!

Emilee and Laine are Engaged!

For those of you who are still out of the loop,

Emilee and Laine are engaged! 

So, it's all hands on deck here and mad wedding 

planning in the progress! 

After a romantic proposal today at beautiful 

Edith Falls (and a lovely picnic lunch),

on bended knee, the question was asked

and of course, she said Yes! 

As each of the girls prepares to leave the 

Holmes nest, one by one, mixed emotions

rise up inside of every member of the family. 

But for Dave and I, it's a time of soul searching,

"have we done enough training? is she ready to 

pledge her life and love to another? is she

ready to follow her man into the great unknown

and embrace whatever the Lord has instore for her?"

Sigh. It's always hard letting go,

but the decision is made easier when we know

that the future son-in-law loves the Lord

and wants to serve Him wholeheartedly. 

So as we start out on yet another 'letting go' 

moment, we are blessed beyond measure

knowing that this is God's will and that 

both Emilee and Laine want to follow 

the Lord in whatever He has for them. 

And for those of you girls out there

asking the question, "Where's the ring?",

well, here's a photo. 

Laine painstakingly sought high and low

for the perfect ring and it is beautiful! 

Our Trip

Day Two

Well, the second day of our trip took us 

from Kununurra to Halls Creek. 

Before we left Kununurra, we fuelled up

the drums and topped up the vehicles.

561 Litres later, you do the math! 

We made sure we drank more coffee

and bought some cold coke along the way

as pretty soon it would be a distant memory. 

Just a side note; I just wanted to play the 

newspaper reporter here and write something that 

gives credit to Emilee and her great achievement. 

If I was to write a rather wordy newspaper story title, 

it would go something like this: 

NEWSFLASH!!

18 year old, one-eyed P plater takes on

the Canning Stock Route in 

her trusty 79 series ute, on her first off road 

4WD adventure, and makes it through with flying colours,

despite having her 2 sisters riding along 

doing their best to belt out very poor renditions

of Old MacDonald had a Farm and Baa Baa Black Sheep

to various tunes, and fighting over who got the window seat

and why there was no more red snakes! 

No, seriously, Emilee really does need to be congratulated

on putting up with her sisters the whole trip and not 

kicking them out when they were distractingly annoying! 

This was Emilee's first off road trip and she drove

amazingly well! Traversing sand dunes, washouts,

dry river beds, rocky outcrops and corrugates that made your teeth rattle.

To tackle a trip of this magnitude took some guts 

and a whole lot of stamina and concentration,

but she did really well, and we were very proud of her! 

Anyway, back to Day Two.

We travelled to Halls Creek where we 

stayed in a Caravan Park and had our last real hot shower.

I didn't sleep well, with strange noises and goings on

throughout the night, including watching a police car

patrol the park and finally, climb a tree (not the car, the policeman), 

near our tent, and put up a 

surveillance camera, that they retrieved in the morning, 

not sure what they were looking for,

but it made for interesting viewing for me

while everyone else was sleeping. 

Well, the morning came all too soon, 

and once again we went in search of coffee

and headed off to finally get off the bitumen 

and onto some 'real' road! 

To be continued...………...

Canning Stock Route 

Our Trip

Day One

Well, I am finally getting started on blogging some of our 

trip details and pics.

Life here has been pretty crazy since getting back,

and so this will be a long and slow process,

which hopefully will not bore anyone to tears. 

Once I get to the actual Canning Stock Route 

part of the trip, I'll give you some history and info

on it all (for those interested), and if you're not

interested, then you can just be lazy and look at 

the pretty pictures and carry on with your ADHD. 

Well, we celebrated Territory Day on the 1st of July,

with Cam and Lauren, Abbi, James and Miriam, and Laine.

We enjoyed watching the boys light up the sky with all kinds of 

fireworks. And apart from one firework going AWOL

and hitting James (don't fear, no harm done), we 

had a good last night before our trip in the morning. 

After getting business attended to and last minute packing,

we headed off on our adventure mid morning, coffee in hand 

and ready for whatever our trip would throw at us! 

Emilee, Maddy and Chloe were all squished 

into the front of Emilee's ute, with plenty of music and

 lollies at the ready. (more on them in later posts)

Our friends that we were travelling with had gone on ahead

of us, so we met up with them in Kununurra. 

The only thing they confiscated at the border was our

unopened bottle of store bought honey. 

Our first night was spent in a lakeside caravan

park in Kununurra. It was peaceful and had nice

hot showers, which we would soon miss in days to come. 

The boab trees along the way were magnificent and 

abundant and came in every shape and size, ranging from

little baby ones to giant whoppers you could house a whole family in! 

The morning found us making sure we had 

our last minute coffees and fresh fruit and veges, 

and off we went! 

To be continued...……………...

Happy Anniversary

Well, as it was James and Abbi's 

wedding anniversary yesterday,

Grandma and the Aunties (and Grandpa of course)

got to babysit Miriam so Mummy and Daddy

could go out for tea. 

And as is always the case, Grandma

had to get her camera out for a very quick

photo shoot.

After a super quick and creative prop improvisation,

we had a brief little photo shoot,

quick photo edit and print out of a lovely

little gift for Mummy and Daddy! 

Happiness or Happen-ness

Recently, I was reading an excerpt from a sermon of Vance Havner's, where he mentioned this phrase, “happiness or happen-ness”. I've been giving it a lot of thought and come to realise that so much of our happiness is so often 'happen-ness'. Our happiness depends on what happens. We let our circumstances dictate our level of joy.

We know that true joy can only come from the Lord. We can fake happiness on the outside, but real joy in our hearts, can only come from God. And yet we 

let what happens become the joy decider.

We read in the Bible of Paul's trials and the calamites that befell him. And yet,

 he was still able to say in Philippians 1:12,

But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel;

Paul's joy was not dependant on the circumstances in his life. He was able to rejoice because he knew Romans 8:28 held true.

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

He knew that what men meant for evil, God would turn to good. And just a side note, it's interesting how often you hear that verse misquoted. Christians will often rattle off the first part, and neglect the part about loving God. That's a requirement of the promise. Loving God. All things DON'T work together for good if you

 are not loving and obeying God.

Paul was able to say in Philippians 4:4, (and from prison mind you)

Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.

What drives a man, beaten and hurting, sitting in a dark and probably miserably cold and smelly prison, to give praise to God? Joy. True joy, that's what! What the world calls happiness is not what God calls true joy. Paul was content in the lot God had given him and he knew what had happened to him was for the furtherance of the Gospel. 

What faith. What love. What trust.

It's a strange joy that fills our hearts when our eyes are filled with tears. When we don't depend on what happens to bring our joy. When we fully trust the Lord to bring us joy and we don't let our circumstances steal our joy away. 

We don't live in happen-ness, we live in happiness!

Intermission

Ok, so I know I haven't actually started 

on my pictorial journey of our latest

trip, but Miriam distracted me!

She has learnt to blow kisses and 

it's just too cute! 

I just had to post these pics first. 

First things first, you know. 

WE'RE BACK!!

For those of you who didn't know,

we have just returned from an epic

outback adventure! The girls, us and 

another couple with their 2 girls. 

We just got back from travelling

the awesome Canning Stock Route. 

So, over the next few weeks or months,

however long it takes, I plan to take you 

on the journey with us, through pictures

and words, and I hope you will 

enjoy the trip! 

Since getting home, as always is the case,

it has been super hectic, trying to catch up on all the 

things that need doing because of not being here for 4 weeks.

But with God's grace, we'll make it through!

We praise Him that we were able to have this opportunity

to take a family adventure (NOT a holiday, camping is 

always an adventure). 

We saw some beautiful country and travelled 6000km 

marvelling once more at God's amazing creation

and the blessings he showers upon us just in gazing upon

his marvellous handiwork. 

Well, keep an eye on your inbox,

too much to do, too many photos to edit,

too many catch up cuddles with Miriam,

gotta run! 

LUCKY?

I DON'T THINK SO!

As most of you know, this past week has brought its share of trials, with Dave going in for an emergency appendectomy and the girls and I taking up his workload in the milk shed. The Lord has blessed greatly, but there is something I felt compelled to write regarding all this.

It's this thing called 'luck'. This week has seen many well-meaning people, even Christians, I might add, say something to the effect, “Wasn't he lucky? Wasn't it lucky the surgeons were in Katherine when they're only there for 3 days in the month? Wasn't it lucky his appendix didn't burst? Wasn't it lucky you were able to take care of his milk run? Wasn't it lucky you were able to find drivers to make the deliveries?” And so on and so forth.

Now, I don't have to do any research to know that the word 'lucky' is NOT in the Bible. You won't find it there, so don't bother to look! 

It's not even in God's vocabulary!

The dictionary defines luck as: success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's actions. And the word lucky: something that brings good fortune; someone that has good fortune or something that results from good fortune and chance.

Now, I don't know about you, but I sure am glad God doesn't leave anything to chance. God is in control of each and every situation. He doesn't need luck. He doesn't need good fortune. God doesn't leave things to chance or luck.

There is nothing 'coincidental' or 'lucky' about the way things worked out this past week. God had His hand in every part. God orchestrated the whole situation. God knew from the beginning, even before we were ever born, that this particular trial would come on this particular week and in these particular circumstances. And because of God's almighty power and love, and the fact that He has proved Himself, time and again, we have been able to be in perfect peace throughout this whole ordeal.

I have been blessed and encouraged by the promises in His word and by remembering past victories and knowing that God would help us through this time of trial and would mold and shape us to be more like Him, if we would rest in Him and not resist His working in our lives.

In short, luck has NOTHING to do with it! The world has their lucky rabbits foot, their lucky horseshoe, their lucky wishbone, their lucky four leaf clover, and for some Christians, they may even consider the number 7 to be lucky!

As I said before, luck has NOTHING to do with it! And neither does coincidence. There are no coincidences in God's plan for our lives. He knows all about us and He knows exactly what will come into our lives and He even knows how we're going to handle it. God has a purpose for our lives and there is no event in our lives that is not part of His plan.

We don't need to leave things to chance and just hope we'll get lucky. What we do need to do is to put our trust in the Lord. Wholly. All of our trust. All of us. Surrendered to Him and His perfect will. What better hands can we be in than the creator of the universe, the Saviour of our souls.

We need to look beyond the raging storm and see God's hand. We need to search for those little blessings, those little overlooked treasures that God showers upon us. In the midst of the storm there is always a rainbow. It may only be a little splash of colour, but it is colour nonetheless. And we need to take the time to praise God for it. God always works things out for our good if we love Him and serve Him. He knows what's best for us and

He also knows how much we can bear.

Jeremiah 29:11

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD,

thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

Romans 8:28

And we know that all things work together

for good to them that love God, to them

who are the called according to his purpose.

Matthew 19:26

But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them,

With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.

We don't need the world's lucky charms or wishes of luck. We have a hope. We have the Lord Jesus and we have peace through Him. I love this verse in Isaiah.

Isaiah 26:3

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace,

whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.

See that? Perfect peace. Not just peace, but perfect peace. And if

you read the Greek word for perfect and for peace, they're both the same word!

So it means, peace, peace. Safety. Contentment. Tranquility. Quiet. Soundness.

And why does he have this peace? Because he trusts in the Lord.

What a blessed promise!

God has given us peace throughout this trial, and I pray that God

will refine us and make us more like Him.

So, the next time you're tempted to mention the word 'lucky', bite your tongue! Zip it! And remember that God is in control, and there is no

such thing as luck in God's perfect plan!

Miriam Turns 1 🎂

Recently, our beautiful little grandbaby,

Miriam, turned 1.

And as you can see from the photo, 

I don't think it really fazed her.

(or maybe it was her annoying Grandma

trying to get pictures of  her, that made her look so unfazed?)

Anyway, being the kind of Grandma that I am,

what better present for a sweet little girl, 

than her very own pink recliner!! 

Yes, you read that right. A pink recliner

chair with a cup holder (and it actually reclines too. And 

no, she doesn't have a TV remote and yes, she puts whatever

she wants in the cup holder.

Soggy dried bananas or whatever fits!)

Miriam is now walking and jabbering and is the most 

adorable, sweetest little baby ever! 

And when she looks at you with those amazing big,

blue eyes of hers, your heart just melts. 

She even manages to melt old Grandpa's heart too! 

Happy Birthday beautiful baby!