As winter is finally melting into spring at home, here in Australia autumn is rolling in. Summer is over and it is time to break out my sweaters and scarves. Its cooling off at night and I keep forgetting to bring a jacket with me when I go out. Its my favourite kind of weather. I can wear jeans and a light jacket and be completely comfortable.

Shae, Steph and I are going for one more summer excursion though. We are heading up to Wollongong today to visit a friend for a week. It looks like we'll have perfect weather to do some walking and hopefully a day at the beach as well. Wollongong is said to be one of the most beautiful cities in Australia and I'm really excited to spend some time exploring another part of this amazing country.

Lisa, my host sister, and I got up at 5:40am to get ready and go see the hot air balloon festival down at the lake. My teammate Shae also came. Each year for two weeks in Canberra there is a festival which entails getting up early to go see hot air balloons take off. It all happens in a park next to the lake. There are stands open that sell breakfast so you can eat and watch as the balloon are inflated. Its a gorgeous sight as colorful balloons take off gliding high over the lake. Unfortunately that did not happen today. The weather was questionable and there was too much wind for the balloons to actually take off. Two balloons did inflate. One was a giant kookaburra. Even though the balloons didn't leave the ground it was still a beautiful morning. We went for a nice walk around the lake and then had breakfast together before heading off to start our day. It's these sort of days that I am very thankful to God for the unparallelled beauty of the world and my chance to be a part of it.

Ulladulla

Just got back from Church Family Camp. We spent the weekend hanging out down at the coast near Ulladulla. It was awesome. Swimming conditions were pretty good. I even managed to catch a wave on Sunday. We also saw a penguin casing a school of fish. It was pretty cool.

Before we went to camp my host family went for a little retreat in the hills near Bega. Bega is famous for cheese. So we went to the cheese factory. We spent two nights in an adorable cottage in the country. The area had recently had a lot of rain so everything was a beautiful vibrant green. It was really nice to spend some time away from everything and relax for a while. On Friday our coordinator from RJ, Kay, is coming to visit. Its shaping up to be an intensely busy visit but I'm excited to see someone from home anyway.