Sunday, August 3, 2014

Letter to Richard - 3 August 2014

Dear Richard

Wow, it’s been a hectic week! And the week ahead promises to be even more crazy!

Work is getting busy. I was lecturing the whole week, and then I was also supposed to take 2 tuts, but ended up taking a third one because of a miscommunication. I’ve had some really nice feedback from some of the students though about my teaching J One of the students who has previously tried to do the CA third year accounting course asked me why I don’t teach the CA students because she thinks I explain really well J Really nice to hear! (And the answer is that I don’t like to teach there because it’s too technical. Teaching the non-CA course it’s more about the principles, which I much prefer…)

I also met with a guy from the EBE Faculty (Engineering and the Built Environment) about a CPD course they’re going to be running for property valuators. I’m going to help them with a day of lectures on what is in financial statements, which they will then go on to use to do a valuation. The course will be running in September, and this is going to be a nice experience for me! And if it works well they’re planning on repeating it probably twice a year, so a nice bit of extra income once I’ve done the initial preparation.

I don’t often wake up with a song in my head, but on Thursday this week I woke up with “I Stand All Amazed” in my head. Then on the way to work I happened to listen to Elder Bednar’s talk from this last conference “Bear Up Their Burdens with Ease” which is about how we all need burdens as part of the plan, but through the Atonement the Saviour can make them lighter for us to bear. Amazing how these two came together so beautifully for me! And I can truly say that I DO stand all amazed at the love that the Lord has for us. Wow! It was also special because that evening we went to the baptism of an 8 year old, the son of dad’s counsellor, Siya Sibotoboto. It’s great to see how our kids are also getting ready and excited to be baptised! Less than 2 years until Josh turns 8!

Yesterday we had our first and last Saturday at home for ages! And it was so amazing to be able to get things done here at home and not feel all rushed! Between Friday night and Saturday we sorted out all the kids clothes that have come second hand to us, and we also sorted out all of the toys, which needs to be done periodically. It feels great to have less clutter! I also asked Dad for a piece of wood that I can use on my music stand so that I can stand and work in my office now and again. But you know Dad ;) It turned out to be much bigger than just a piece of wood! It’s got a whole base, at various different angles to fit on the stand all beautifully J We’ve got a great dad! Josh and Hannah also helped us with it a bit, and they enjoyed seeing the wood being sawed and doing a bit of sanding. I’ll try it all out at work tomorrow J

We also had a talk to Joshua yesterday, telling him the story of the stripling warriors, and trying to impress on his mind the importance of being exactly obedient. As we explored it with him it made me also realise how important it is to learn to be exactly obedient in every aspect of our lives. At this stage Josh needs to be exactly obedient to us, his school teachers, his swimming and soccer coaches and his Primary teachers. And without that obedience he can’t learn and progress. We don’t ask this obedience out of a hunger for power, but because we know what he needs to do and learn so that he can progress to the next stage of life. And he won’t be able to succeed as an adult if he hasn’t learnt this! We’ve also been fasting this weekend for wisdom in our parenting, of all 3 kids, but especially Joshua right now, with all of the emotional difficulties he’s having, and the things we need to teach him. Being a parent is a challenge! But I think he has been quite good since we spoke to him. And for FHE this afternoon we spoke about how important it is to be kind and share, and we did some role playing. We were actually visiting Mom, and we decided “impromptu-ly” to have FHE there with her. We’ll still have to see how the kindness lesson plays out.

Today, for the first time since I started teaching the YSA in January we didn’t have a proper lesson. It’s strange that the class was completely not in the lesson today, and we ended up having about 10 minutes of lesson L But I’m not going to let that become a pattern… Part of it was a very slow arrival of class members. That will be one nice thing about switching next year is that everyone will be coming from sacrament meeting, so there won’t be the YM and YW leaders getting stuck with the youth, and the executive secretary running around quite so much (I hope!) And you’ll be there part way through the year, and you’ll bring some seriousness ;) But on the whole I’m still really enjoying my class J

This coming week I’m doing a huge load of teaching, so I don’t expect to be standing by the end of the week! But I do know at least that it will pass J

Hope you have a great week J

Shelly

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