Move to the seaside, take away the pressure!

Who would've thought that moving to a little seaside town would reap so many benefits in my life and my family. When I look at the busy life back in Brisbane, the driving back and forth to school, gymnastics, dancing, theatre and the violin lessons, auskick, not to forget the homework and the little time in which to do it... my daughters were under a whole lot of pressure to be there best all the time, all the time, all the time.  I look back and can see how exhausting it was for not only them but me too.   I had no energy left for myself or anyone else.  I thought it was normal to feel tired all the time, but it's not.  You take away all those pressures and you can breathe.  I walk with the girls to school everyday, its about 2kms down the hill and up the road.  We get to see the tides changing from day to day. We've had frost that made the grass feel like weetbix. We've watched the trees turn from orange and red leaves to no leaves at all. This is called the season changing and we are seeing it on our way to school everyday.  The girls are learning to cross the road carefully, listening and looking for cars coming, its developing their senses to be aware of their surroundings.  It won't be long and they can walk to school by themselves.  (Although I will always want to walk with them until they are to embarrassed to go to school with their mum, hopefully that never happens).  Last week it rained, we got soaked, and guess what.... it was fun.  Hot showers and hot chocolates when we got home and cuddles on the couch. Perfect.  The school principal doesn't believe in loads of homework, in fact the girls don't get any homework, just read a book, learn about life by playing with your friends after school.  Not having the pressure we were living under to perform, perform, perform, has had a huge impact on my girls.  Summer tells me about what she's learned at school, she's retaining that information and is excited to teach it to me.  And I have the energy to listen. I'm not driving, tired, taking on too much, no, I'm there, energised and alert.  I don't yell at my girls anymore, they're not naughty girls, they just needed me to enjoy them and I can do that now.  I just got told from Summers teacher that one of Summers friends was commenting on how much baking we do together.  I now have a daughter that does the dishes with me every night because we don't have a dishwasher. I hate doing dishes but I love doing them with my little buddy.  These two girls who use to fight over everything now share a room and hum to each other to go to sleep.  They are so buggered from real living that they are in bed by 7pm and sleep right through to 7am.  They eat better, they sleep better, they behave better.  Is it the sea air?  Maybe.  I say, take away the pressure of keeping up with everyone, and the pressure that some schools put on education and you get really cool kids that love life.  They have new girlfriends coming over to play most afternoons or my girls are out down the road at someone else's place.  They're home by 5pm, thats the rule and so far that's proved to work.  I didn't know this is what I'd be trading the big life in the city for but I like it.  I will admit, not having a shopping mall down the road was giving me withdrawals, and instant coffee is doing my head in a little but I'm learning to accept it, grow from it, my wallet always has cash in it because there's nothing to spend it on. I now love grocery shopping because I get to go on an adventure through the countyside to the big shops and actually open my purse once a week. There's value in the small things in life and I'm learning that.  This is a true testimony of Gods love in my life.  You know the song  "the best things in life are free" was playing in the car when my mum died, It's only taken almost 24 years to understand that. Thank you God for taking this approach to teach me that its ok to slow down, its ok to stop and smell the roses, and its beneficial to everyone not to put ourselves under so much pressure all the time.  In saying that, I need to get out the door and meet them after school, it's getting cold out so i'll have to walk fast to warm up!  I hope we can keep walking through winter, I mean, theres enjoying the cool air and then there's freezing your butt off...!!!!   Lets see how long it takes for me to need a second car.  Well, thats the 2nd instalment of life in NZ, so far so good.



On our way to school.... not a bad view from the stairs.

Building in New Zealand

Hi readers,

Well, we've been in New Zealand for a month now and I'd love to document our adventure as we go. I'm expecting some amazing 'God testimonies' because it really feels like we have a mountain to move to get to where we need to be, therefore I'm putting my faith in God to help us with positive progress.

I'll take you back to 2013 where it all started.  It was coming up to our 10 year wedding anniversary and after a rocky month of relationship troubles I had started looking at buying a house in NZ, to go back home and be closer to my extended family and old friends.  Turns out marriage grows from these tough times and what was meant to kill us only made us stronger.  Cliche, yes, but true.

My little mention of New Zealand brought us together and we started looking at possibly moving back there for a fresh start.  We both looked at each other and said "If we moved back to NZ it would have to be to the coromandel." We pretty much typed in coromandel to realestate.com and came up with Tairua.  Fell in love with a section of land, put an offer on it and flew over for a 10 year wedding anniversary celebration.  The grandparents had the girls and we had some much needed time together.
I basically stood on the top of the section of land and cried.  It was so beautiful!

If I can paint a picture for you with words... It is 72meters above sea level on the side of a cliff looking out to the beach down below, the mercury islands beyond and the sound of crashing waves and native birds.  Like standing on the edge of heaven, I was in love.  Didn't know how we could build a house on there but decided we needed to buy the land all the same.

Our intention was to fly back to Australia, sell our house and move over to start our dream build.

I asked the Lord, "give me a number, how long is this going to take"... I heard the number 3, I saw it everywhere I looked.  Great I thought, 3 days this is going to be fast.  But no, 3 days went by, 3 weeks, 3 months, then 3 years.  I was devastated.  I felt like a fool believing I had heard that number so strongly and I started doubting my faith.  But God had a better plan, he wanted to stretch me...
On the 18 december, 2016 we sold our house.  It was exactly 3 years, 3 months and 3 days!  Good one God, you got me! haha

We moved out, rented for 3 months, packed up our belongings to take to Nz and left some behind for when we come back.  Because at this stage we had decided to build a beach house in New Zealand and after two years return to Australia and live the summer months in NZ and the rest of the year in Australia.  But I have to say, since moving over I have found myself loving the peacefulness, the picturesque scenery everywhere I look, the people we've met, everything about this place feels like home.  So, lets wait and see how long we actually do stay....

So, as I really would like to do updates every week of how we're going I'll start back at the first week.
Our bags needed to be 23kgs and we had extra allowance for 8 bags. 4 of the bags were enormous and I was worried we would be over weight.  God quietened my anxiety and covered me in peace.  All bags were exactly 23kgs or slightly under/over.  We made it through the scary part! Everything went well for the rest of the flight except when we were getting a taxi to our friends house in Auckland and I hadn't written the address down.  It was in messenger on my phone and we hadn't bought data packs yet so I couldn't get messenger up. Noooooo!!! i hate technology!!  Thank you God somehow It came up on my screen and we now had a screenshot of the address... next time i will old school it and write it on paper!

During the 3 1/2 years of waiting we had visited Tairua a few times and were blessed to meet lovely neighbours to our block that have a car yard in Auckland.  Now my husband is very particular on his cars - he's a car man, so I was thinking this is going to take forever to find a car he will be happy with but God knows our hearts and we didn't need that stress so our lovely friends just happened to have an Audi S6 wagon at the right price for us and off we drove!

So, then we pull up at this delightful little 2 bedroom batch that had been offered us through a Tairua Facebook page with no references from us, we just looked like nice people.  Not only did it fit into our budget but it came fully furnished ready for us to move straight in. It may be a small, dinky house but it has amazing views of the mountains and other houses dotted around us.  The greenery and the wildlife is so welcoming.  Thank you God, again!

The girls started school, they love it.  Super cruisy, they can walk to school, no uniform, no homework. Let's say I have very happy girls, they are even sharing a bedroom and it's the best thing we could've done to bring them closer together.

We bought a chainsaw and the two of us, working together have cut and lifted out a ridiculous amount of scrub and trees.  My legs ache at the end of the day, and I find myself talking to the trees and apologising to the nice ones for cutting them down and trying to save the ferns and replant them.. I'm hoping for green fingers to kick in at some stage.

It's raining today so we're having a rest day. Actually I feel like, even though we're working together, every day is a date day.  Things will change when Brad starts working again but for now I have him all to myself and I'm loving it.  A few teething problems of being together 24/7 but we've worked through them and now i can say, we are team building! As cheesy as that sounds, after 15 years together we are more solid than ever.  God knows everything we need and putting the two of us together every moment of everyday with no one else but ourselves seems to be working really well.

Angels left handprints on my mirror!

I've been busting to post something about this for about 6 months now but was a little nervous so kept it to myself.  As soon as I heard my husband selling me to a new friend as 80%normal 20% weird I thought… 'yeah, that sounds about right, I'm happy with that' so I guess I'm allowing myself to share with you a little of my weirdness. lol.

So, as my relationship with Jesus started to grow deeper my need to see further into the realms of heaven became more intense.  I began by meditating on the word of God, filling myself with him.  Breathing in the name of God, Yod Hey Vav Hey and moving in the spirit upwards (ascending) into the heavens.  Filling my body, spirit and soul with the glory of God and resting in him in a balanced state.  A really healthy thing to do in your everyday walk with the Lord.

I had been doing this in my bed one night (husband was away working) and although I didn't see them with my natural eyes there were angels in my bedroom watching as my spirit engaged with Jesus.  In the morning I was standing in my ensuite when I noticed a very large set of handprints high up on my mirror.  Now I had only recently cleaned that mirror and my husband had been away and there was no possible way there could be extra large man's handprints on my mirror.  They were just there, so clear to see and up so high.  This must've been quite a large angel!  I took a photo and I'm sorry my photography isn't the best but take a close look and check out the size of those prints.  Amazing!

Later that week I found feathers under my office desk!  I haven't seen anything like it since, but just knowing that I have angels in my house watching me is pretty exciting.  I do think they get really bored with our lack of intervening in the spiritual.  I'm guessing it was my worshiping and meditating on God that got them interested in me.  I'm going to keep pressing in and walking in the glory, I love the thought of legions of angels being attracted to me because when they look at me they see Jesus!!  So, my friends…. get talking to God!  Tell him about your day and move into his arms of life.  Get the angels excited to know you!!!

What was happening when I was praying? Amazing!!

Here's a testimony of Gods love that will hopefully amaze you…. it certainly amazed me!
It happened late last year, I was in my kitchen and I had a strong urge to cry out to God.  I, by faith, stepped in through the veil and ascended up into the heavens.  My spirit was standing before Papa God and I was pleading him to help me with my book.  I said "GOD…. I want to thank you for these amazing people I've been meeting from around the world and I know that they come up here too, and I was wondering if the next time my friend in England is talking to you, if you could please tell her to share my book with her church?" I continued to stay in his presence for a while and when I came back there was a message on my phone.  Someone had shared my book….. Oh yes, thats right!!!  the very lady I'd been praying about less than 5 minutes beforehand had just shared my book on her church webpage!  But… it gets better…. that night as I lay in bed thinking how amazing God is and how quickly he had answered me I thought it would be nice to thank this friend by message.  What I hadn't realised was there was more to the story.  She had been in bed (I'd completely forgotten that lunchtime in australia is midnight in England) and had been sleeping on and off. The holy spirit had put me on her mind and she got up, went to her computer and shared my book on her church webpage.  Can you believe it???  I was praying on one side of the world and God was answering my need on the other side of the world!!!  I want to encourage you today, God hears all your prayers!

Heavenly Treasure - The Introduction

Hey there readers,

This is the introduction for my book, "Heavenly Treasure"

I hope you are enticed to read more!!  You can find the book on my webpage storiesaboutheaven.com

 Something I have always believed in is the silver lining theory.  When I lost my best friend at the age of 31 I was so grieved, that to me, there was no sign of anything good belonging to it.  Melissa was 8 months pregnant when it happened, a baby no one was blessed to hold.  Her two daughters, Keira and Ellah, also lost their short lives that day.  Melissa left behind two older sons, a devastated family and many friends.  

How could there possibly be an upside to this tragedy?  And there, lies the reason for the girls story to be told.  If I can reach into the minds and hearts of the younger generation and plant in them a picture of what heaven is really like then this tragedy has a light of day.    If I can recall pictures painted in my imagination from books read in my childhood then I have a responsibility to the younger generation to do the same for them.  

I have two young girls of my own that are encouraged to believe in the deeper mysteries of God.  God is not boring!  Heaven does not consist of sitting around playing harps all day.  When I started writing this book I asked God, how on earth was I going to write a book on heaven when I had never been there?  He kindly opened it up for me every time I sat down at my computer.  There would be times when I would be in my bedroom and he would prompt me in my spirit to go and write.  I would say ‘but I don’t know what to write‘ and as I obediently sat down at my desk I would start to type and he would show me exactly what to write.  Heaven opened up in the screen of my mind and I could get lost there for hours.  There was an occasion where I tried to write without him and the pages disappeared from my screen.  So, even though this book is classed as fiction I believe what I have written to be true.  I have watched those two beautiful girls grow and I hold them so close in my heart.  I believe as you read this book it will come alive for you, bring healing where needed and paint an awesome picture of the marvels and mysteries of God and the heavens.    

http://storiesaboutheaven.com

Hold on tight to your dreams - God knows when you're ready

I'm excited to say I'm back to writing my blog!  It has been a few years now that I have stopped blogging to pursue completing my first book 'Heavenly treasure'.  So blessed to be sitting here with my book on a stand looking at me.  Apparently that's the easy part… getting people to buy it and read it… well, that's a whole other level of expertise that I need help with.  You see I'm a big believer in shooting for the stars and keeping my dreams as  unrealistic as possible.  My whole life I've been told that with God all things are possible so I need to dream big.  The hard part is holding on to those dreams and holding on…and holding on…. until when you're ready (and usually we're not straight away, even though we think we are) boom! fire works across the sky!
So, what I'm trying to say is, I really want my book to be a best seller over night with people lining up to interview me and I'm thinking "I'm totally ready for that".  But it hasn't happened and some days I feel like maybe it's not as good as I thought it was.  Or maybe it was only meant for a few people to read and it's had its day.  It's really easy to give up and lose hope that God has his hand on everything we hand to him, and in the right time when I'm mature enough to roll with it.. he will roll with it.  Have you ever felt like that? Tell me I'm not the only one!!  Faith in God becomes faith when we have to believe in him and wait on him, his timing is perfect.  I wonder how many people and angels he has working for me right now without me even knowing?  And I wonder how many demons are fighting against me getting the vision of heaven out to our children?  The words in my head telling me its all over before it even begins?  hmm…. I wonder where they came from?  Certainly not from my God who loves me and has big plans for my life.  So, if you're having an argument with someone in your head about not fulfilling your dreams because of this and that.. tell it where to go and 'seek first the kingdom of God', he knows where you're heading.  I'm hoping my destiny says 'reaches the nations teaching children about heaven'.  Time and faith will tell.
So, welcome back my blog readers.  I hope I've inspired you to hold on to your dreams and keep trying!  We all need encouragement, give yourself a pat on the back, you've got this far!
If you need extra support and prayer with following your dreams please feel free to email me.
shona@storiesaboutheaven.com

Webpage - http://storiesaboutheaven.com

Angels amongst us

It was the school holidays and a big camping adventure was about to take place.  The Jeep was packed to the roof, as was the trailer.  Everything but the kitchen sink! Australia is a big place and we don't mind the distance covered when we're ensured with a good camping spot.  So 7hrs plus driving up the coast and then inland to a beautiful spot called Cania Gorge isn't considered all that far.  Especially when the crazy husband driver keeps it exciting by passing every car in sight.  We had stopped at the last little town before our destination to load up on refrigerated items to find that the supermarket was locking its doors as we pulled up.  We circled around a little and pulled up in the main street to find a 2nd mini supermarket with everything we needed with 15mins to spare.  Now this is where the story gets a little supernatural.  My husband had only just climbed out of the car when a kind gentleman came up to him and pointed out that we were missing two bolts that had snapped off the wheel on the trailer.  I'm not too sure of the mechanics of how the wheel and axle and bolts etc all work but what I do understand is that if this man hadn't shown us what had happened to the trailer…at the speed we had been going… that wheel would have fallen off.  We would have lost the trailer, possibly flipped the jeep and who knows what else.
Now, I believe in angels.  I believe in men in white linen.  The great crowd of witnesses.  There is another world around us that goes on and we are completely unaware until we stop and look.  That man that warned us? I believe he'd been here before, walking amongst us keeping us safe.  There is a lot of darkness in our world but God keeps it balanced by sending his light and glory to walk amongst us.  Think I'm going nuts?  Check out the bible, Genesis 19, lot had two of these men visit him and save him from the evil in Sodom.  If they were around back them what's not to say they aren't now?  So next time you have someone help you out, take a closer look.. Do they look old in wisdom but yet young in skin?
Hebrews 13 v 2  Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by doing so some have unwittingly entertained angels.