Summer Adventures

December: Summer kicked off with school finishing up and mom arriving a week later. We spent the first few days around Auckland and enjoyed Christmas with the Jones' and a few more NZ friends. We then took off for the Bay of Islands about 4 hours north of Auckland. We went to Paihia, a popular holiday destination up in the Bay of Islands and enjoyed hanging out at the beach and relaxing by the pool at our hotel. Pretty much soaking in the sun and relaxation.

Before heading back down to Auckland we went on a bus tour up to Cape Reinga, the northern most tip of New Zealand, where the Pacific Ocean and the Tasman Sea meet.

On the way back to Paihia, the bus drove down 90 Mile Beach for about an hour. It was crazy driving down open beach on a coach bus! Way too fun!

Yay for Christmas adventures with Mom!

January: I had just over a week after mom left to finish getting ready for Ignite Camp, our youth camp for the Wesleyan Church. This year the Nazarene Church joined in as well and we had a great camp for the youth. Frank Richie was our speaker and Willet came from the States to be our worship band for the long weekend(they also came for Parachute) This year at camp, I was a cabin leader and my friend Kris and I organzed the rest of the cabin leaders throughout the year. I'm very thankful the church here supports the youth camp and understands how important it is to reach youth with the Gospel.

After camp...January was also a month of visitors. Some friends from Aussie came for a while and I really enjoyed spending some time with them. Sarah Smith (one of the girls) and I were able to go off to muriwai beach and camp/surf/chill for two days. This was a much needed time of refreshment and God really used this time to prepare me for Him to speak to my heart in the week following. Which leads into...

Parachute music festival is much like any major Christian music festival in the States with bands from all over the world that come to perform/worship through music. This year the organization ran a conference called "Noise" at the same time an offered many different seminars for musicians. I really enjoyed these seminars and was able to soak in a bit of encouragement and tips from great song-writers. During the festival there were also various speakers who preached at the morning services/seminars. There were two seminars inparticular that God really used in my life, one on leadership and one on disciplship.  

Finially February...well school started Feb. 3 and I am now back into the swing of things teaching. This week is actually my first full week back. I'm feeling optimistic about the year but really feeling that God might make some changes in direction for me this year as well.

I'll add more pictures to this post as well as up-coming adventures later this week.