Letter to Richard - 23 June 2014

Dear Richard

I have had quite a productive week at work this past week J A big part of that was that I made a plan for myself over the next few weeks of what I want to accomplish, and so far I’m on track :D Having a plan definitely helps to stay focussed! I peer-reviewed two papers for journals and I started working on course material for the second semester. And today I spent most of the day at a session on government structures to help with our preparation of the material for the Public Sector Accounting modules.

Last Wednesday afternoon Andrew and I took off work and went for an anniversary lunch celebration at Schoongezicht, which is an all-you-can-eat buffet restaurant. Delicious! We’ll take you there some time ;) My car also had the bumper fixed, and it’s looking great! But I still have to have a service and the tyres looked at before we go to Joburg next month. Lots to get done…

On Friday we went and visited an aftercare, the lady across from the Banfields’ that they’ve been friends with forever. We’re pretty happy with what we saw and so Josh is probably going to go to her next year. I feel like this is another example of how things have just worked out for me when it comes to me and my kids. Because of the relationship she has with Aunty Corbie, and because she was one of Mom’s patients she is taking Josh, even though she had planned on not taking any more kids. But things are falling into place. But more so that with some other choices I’ve had to make with the kids we’ve had to step forward with faith into the unknown, trusting that Heavenly Father will make things right for us. There’s a lot of trusting and faith going on right now!

Josh has been quite emotional lately, and one of the things we try and do when he’s like this is doing play dates for him. So last Friday we had a friend over for Josh and Hannah, and this coming Friday I’m having 3 kids over, and Josh and Hannah got invited to one tomorrow. 3 play dates in 8 days! Hopefully that will go a long way to helping Josh! But there are things about having more kids in the house that is easier than just having my own 3, because they play with each other nicely, and I don’t have to do that much… But we’ll see how this mammoth one goes on Friday… If I’m still standing at the end… :P

On Saturday we had a Relief Society activity where we did sewing classes. So I made a skirt and 2 shoulder bags to fit my tablet, and one for Sis Pam as well. So that if we’re in the garden or something you can listen to something on your tablet to pass the time. I gave Heleen, Andrew’s cousin Bernard’s wife, a lift, and it was one of her first times with really spending good time with the sisters in the ward since they moved into Panorama in April,  and that went well J

On Sunday afternoon Andrew went to a meeting about the FSY – For Strength of Youth – conference that is going to be happening in December for the first time in  Cape Town. Well, more specifically for all the southern stakes, and it will be in PE or East London. It sounds like it’s going to be quite something!

During my lesson we had an interesting discussion… The lesson was on David and Jonathan, and contrasting their relationship with Saul and everything that happened with him. One of the things that made Saul hate David was the public acclaim that David got for his military success, and he got jealous. We read a great quote by President Benson, from the April 1989 conference. This is just part of it: “When pride has a hold on our hearts, we lose our independence of the world and deliver our freedoms to the bondage of men’s judgment. The world shouts louder than the whisperings of the Holy Ghost. The reasoning of men overrides the revelations of God, and the proud let go of the iron rod” The discussion actually led us to be realising that we can become dependent on other people’s good opinion of us, to the extent that we actually do lose our agency, in that our choices become based on what will make us look good to other people and not what is the right thing to be doing. It can actually be almost an addiction/dependence in the same way that an addiction to drugs or pornography can  stop us being able to exercise our agency correctly. And of course that then opens all sorts of other things that could limit our agency in similar ways. Quite something to think about! I am just loving my class still, although quite a few of my class members are being called as ward missionaries so that they aren’t coming to my class anymore L Leon, Danielle and Chante have all been called as ward missionaries now, which is great! And we’re working out how they can still be involved with the YSA as well…

So that’s it! Life is busy as always, but things are looking pretty good in general J

Keep well!

Shelly

Letter to Richard - 8 June 2014

Dear Elder Powrie

So I made it through one hectic week, and I’ve got about half a hectic week left for now J Then I don’t have any major deadlines looming for a while!

One hectic thing we had last week was that Andrew’s dad was admitted to hospital because he had black vomit, which turned out to eventually be an inflamed stomach, probably because of anti-inflammatories. It was quite a stressful couple of days while we were waiting for him to be tested and not knowing if this was the end or not… But not this time. The family has dodged another bullet…

We had quite a hectic week with Josh as well. He’s having a very emotional time at the moment, worrying about all sorts of stuff, and missing me when he’s at school. On Friday the school even phoned me at about 9:00 asking if I could come and spend a bit of time with Josh. So I went and we spent half an hour together and talked about lots of stuff. His day did go better after that, but then this evening he started saying he doesn’t want to go to school tomorrow again. It’s a continuous challenge! But hopefully with helping him to deal with all of these emotions now he’ll be better able to deal with them when he’s an adult. Great news is that he’s been accepted at Edgemead Primary for next year J That’s a very big relief! At least we can now know that he’s going to a good school, so we don’t have that to worry about on top of all sorts of other things.

I’ve worked at home most of this week, which has been great in terms of a very wet wintry week. I’ve done a lot of marking for the second assignment for the board course, as well as quite a lot of work on the new groups textbook. I just have one more of the 6 chapters assigned to me to rework. So I’m nearly there! Of course then it goes to the editor and we have to go through her changes, and then it will get set, and we have to check that everything was done correctly… Still lots of work to do! I don’t know if it will be ready for publication in August, but we’ll see.

This afternoon we went to Milnerton to see Joshua B getting baptised. There was a really good turnout, because now that they’re in Milnerton ward they’ve got friends there, plus a really good contingent from Panorama (and the entire program was Panorama members…) plus there was family and some people who went on the temple trip recently with them when the family got sealed. A really special event! But then they’re special people J It was quite nice to be there and think that that is where I got baptised. It was the first time that Caleb has really seen a baptism, so after Joshua and his dad went to get changed Caleb stayed with his nose against the glass barrier for a bit and I got to speak to him about what had happened. He’s a very special little boy, that one!

And in my YSA class today we had Tamzyn joining us for the first time, with her just having moved up from Young Women. She’s not overly excited about the gospel, but it was great to be able to bear testimony of how great my life is, and really it’s because both Andrew and I try to live the gospel. I don’t know if she’s ready to be hearing and listening, and I’ve got to be careful not to alienate her. But it’s great just to know what a blessing the gospel is to me!

Well that’s it. The rain is pouring down outside right now, and it’s definitely time to snuggle under our quilt and get warm! Hope that your house isn’t too cold!

Love you lots

Shelly

Letter to Richard - 1 June 2014

Dear Richard

Hopefully next week I’ll be looking forward to a slightly easier week ahead… This week is certainly still going to be hectic! I’ve got tons of marking to do, both for the board course and for my course (my students wrote their test on Friday), plus I have to finish off the chapters we’ve been reworking for the new groups textbook. I made good progress on the textbook this past week, getting to the end of 4 chapters, but I’ve still got 2 to go. But I think that they’ll go a bit faster than the last 2 that I did, so I’m hopeful J

On Tuesday morning Hannah woke up and immediately wrenched her neck L She couldn’t actually move for a while! She looked so pitiful and sad lying on the couch, all miserable… But once we got her medicated and mobile she got back some of her usual spark, and by the time we were leaving for school she was bossing everyone around! So it still took a couple of days to come completely right, but she made quick progress on some things!

We’ve been having a tough time with Josh this past week though, with him feeling all sensitive and his self-esteem seems to be quite low… And it’s one of those things that was just taking us ages to realise what was actually wrong! But thankfully now that we’ve isolated what the problem is we’ve been able to help him a bit, and he’s doing better, although he’s not quite our normal child again. And part of the problem was that he was being very disobedient, and then when he was reprimanded he felt like everyone was hating him… So it’s been a bit of a challenge to also be showing him how his own behaviour is influencing everything and try to help him be more obedient. We’ve had limited success on that front, but there have been a few glimmers of hope, like the fact that he was a huge part of us tidying the entire house while Andrew was at a High Priest Quorum meeting this evening J

Then on Thursday morning one of the other parents reversed into my car while I was inside the school dropping off the kids L It’s just my back bumper, in almost the exact same place as last year when I reversed into someone on campus! But what was great was how I managed to stay completely calm throughout! I think that my accident last year was still very fresh, and I know just how easily it can happen! And such a relief that I had no blame this time!!! So it was going to the police station immediately, and then on Friday I went to the panel beaters to get a quote to repair it. The other parent is accepting full responsibility, so except for the schlep we won’t have any cost at least J

I also had my meeting with Head of Department last week to talk about my performance over the last 4 years. He’s very happy with my “conscientious way” that I do all my work, and he said he’s very glad that I don’t cause any trouble ;) Like I responded – I try not to! Really the big thing is that I need to just get my Masters done. That’s the only big thing that’s holding me back at this point. But I should be able to go on sabbatical next year and then I can really get into it!

Yesterday we were invited, together with another family, to go and visit one of my colleagues at home for afternoon tea/snacks. Our kids don’t get a lot of chances to visit other people because we’re not that big into socialising… But we had a good time, and we took their two little dachshunds for a short walk. The kids have been talking about it ever since! That certainly made a big impression on them!

Today was fairly normal, including lots of craziness… Which is part of normal… We’re so enjoying having our family home evening on a Sunday afternoon J Andrew was in charge of the HP meeting this evening, and he says it went really well, and that Pres Kruger was happy and complimentary about it J Andrew’s still struggling to figure out his exact role in the presidency, so it’s so great that he’s having these successes J

And that’s about it… I’m writing today (being Sunday instead of Monday) because I’m expecting to have work to do tomorrow evening, like I have had the last few nights. But the nice thing about this time of the year is that I’m planning on working from home most of the week at least J

Have a good week!

Shelly

Letter to Richard - 26 May 2014 (end of first semester)

Dear Richard

Wow, but last week was a hectic teaching week! To get through our budgeted teaching during the year we should have 8 contact hours a week, and last week I had 15½… So a very busy week! And during that time I also managed to get through a number of things on my to do list, so it was a successful week, even if it was exhausting! I also managed to start getting back to gym more consistently, after April and early May which was a complete write off J And now that the semester is over I can have a bit more time to arrange my life :D One of the to do items was that I had to fill in a form that we have to do every 4 years as part of our performance evaluation, which will be followed up with an interview with our Head of Department this week, and then his comments get added and it gets sent off to the Dean. I must say it’s quite a challenge to put together a record of what I’ve done over the last 4 years. Thankfully I have kept my CV up to date with most of the details, so that did make things easier… But I think overall I’m happy with what I’ve accomplished, and I feel like I’ve grown A LOT as I’ve settled into my job. Compared to what I knew 4 or 5 years ago about how to do my job, I’ve come a long way!

This Sunday Andrew actually travelled to and from church with us! Except for conferences that hasn’t happened for most of our nearly 10 years of marriage! He went to Bellville, but at least we got to drive with him ;) We had our stake temple recommend interviews after church, with Pres Matzaluka, the 1^st counsellor in the stake presidency. He seems like a really nice man, and Andrew really likes him, from their time they’ve spent together.

In the afternoon the kids decided to create their own cake for the activity for family home evening. It was Joshua’s idea, and they mixed Marie biscuits and milk together (we added sugar and some cinnamon) and then it got baked… It wasn’t anything amazing, but Josh and Hannah were so proud of it! We took it over to Granny and Grandpa to show them, and they were just bursting with excitement to explain what they had done and to share it!

All of the kids are absolutely in love with the music from The Sound of Music. We had Joshua copying the dance routine from the song “So long, Farewell”, and we have Hannah and Caleb who sing along. And they all just sit enthralled most of the time. So cool to watch them appreciating something like that!

My quote for the week actually comes from my lesson last week, but I finally got to post it on the YSA facebook group yesterday, and I know that it’s actually very relevant to a number of them right now… And I know that you’re applying this principle often J

Elder Boyd K. Packer said:

“Shortly after I was called as a General Authority, I went to Elder Harold B. Lee for counsel. He listened very carefully to my problem and suggested that I see President David O. McKay. President McKay counselled me as to the direction I should go. I was very willing to be obedient but saw no way possible for me to do as he counselled me to do.

“I returned to Elder Lee and told him that I saw no way to move in the direction I was counselled to go. He said, ‘The trouble with you is you want to see the end from the beginning.’ I replied that I would like to see at least a step or two ahead. Then came the lesson of a lifetime: ‘You must learn to walk to the edge of the light, and then a few steps into the darkness; then the light will appear and show the way before you’”

Good words to live by!

Have a good week J

Shelly

Letter to Richard - 19 May 2014 (Hannah's 4th birthday)

Dear Richard

Well Hannah is now 4 years old J And she had a really great birthday, by all accounts J The whole week was about getting ready for the birthday. There were party packs to make, cupcakes to bake and decorate for school, the birthday cake to bake and decorate, presents to wrap… Thankfully it was the last hectic week like that until February next year J Hannah wanted a Barbie ballet party, and we decorated the cake with some ballerina figurines and there was lots of pink icing all over the things for the party! One big highlight for Hannah was that we gave her a bicycle, with training wheels. We kept it over at Mom and Dad’s house, and then we only gave it to her in the afternoon after the party in the morning. She wanted to get right outside and be riding and she’s got the hang of the pedalling. Josh also wanted his training wheels off again (we put them back on when his friends were here and he wasn’t confident yet) and he was doing so well with riding independently! On Sunday afternoon they also both wanted to go out and ride bikes again. And this morning they were asking if they can ride bikes when they get home from school! Exciting times J

I spent 2 days last week at a seminar about public sector accounting, to help us develop the material for the new Post Graduate Diploma in Public Sector Accounting that we’re busy developing. It was held at PwC, and it was the first time that I was there since I left 5 years ago. It was strange to be there, and I can honestly say I don’t miss it! It was very interesting to learn about government accounting though. So where as the normal accounting we do is focused on making a profit, and reporting to the shareholders mainly. But with the government accounting something can be an asset even if it isn’t going to bring in future economic benefits, but if it has the potential to provide a service to the people. And there are just such different issues!

I was lecturing again for the rest of the week, and this week is now the last week of the semester. I was also spending some time getting my test ready, which I’m getting done slightly earlier than I’ve managed before. I’m just about done now J Today I gave my last first year tut. It’s been a great experience tutoring them this semester, but it will be nice to have that bit of time back…

And that’s really about it. The week was really dominated by Hannah’s birthday, so it’s great to have that over. The final stretch at work for this semester too.

Keep well, love you lots J

Shelly 

Letter to Richard - 12 May 2014 (Mother's Day)

Dear Richard

So awesome to speak to you last night J And it was great to see how much the kids enjoyed hearing your voice J Caleb doesn’t remember you, of course, but it’s good for him to hear you periodically, and so when we’re talking about you he can kind of put you into context. But I know that he’ll have to get to know you again from scratch really, so that’s okay. And he’ll warm up to you quickly, because he’s that kind of child.

I wasn’t teaching last week, but I spent the time working on the new groups textbook, and also the old textbook. With the old textbook we’re at the final editing stages of the new edition, checking the edits that the editor has done. With the groups textbook we’re doing some pretty major edits based on the reviews that we’ve got so far.

Wednesday was the national general elections. On Tuesday I was telling the kids that we’d be going the next day to vote, which meant we’d be saying who we thought should be in charge of South Africa. Joshua responded, “I know who should be in charge – Jesus!” Out of the mouths of babes… But of course that’s not how it’s going to work for now… So it worked out that the ANC dropped their majority slightly, with the DA and Julius Malema’s party, the Economic Freedom Fighters, getting a higher proportion than before. I must say that seeing that the ANC did actually have such a biggish decrease gives me a bit more confidence that that voting process is reasonably sound. It will be a test at the next election though to see if they would allow their majority to drop below 60% if that’s how it looks like it will go. In the Western Cape the DA has been voted back with a bigger majority, which is great for our day to day living J

On Friday afternoon I went to the kid’s school for a Mother’s Day afternoon tea. It was pretty chaotic, because it was raining, so we were all inside the classrooms, and then also because I have 3 kids at the school I was going between the 3 different classes with all 3 kids in tow… But it was still a special time J

Saturday we went to Fish Hoek to see Andrew’s mom, and then Sunday we spent most of the afternoon at home, and then went over to Mom and Dad a bit. Andrew helped to make my Mother’s Day special, but I must be honest, the kids didn’t make it the best one ever… They gave me nice cards and they sang in sacrament meeting (but I couldn’t see them singing because I had to play, so I was behind them L), but they were pretty badly behaved during the afternoon, so it did put a bit of a dampener on the day. But I know they do love and appreciate me, they’re just too young to appreciate the significance of the day. I wouldn’t change them for anything though!

Yesterday in my Sunday School class we were talking about Moses’ last messages to the Israelites, in the book of Deuteronomy. One of the things he reminded them of was how important it was to not forget the Lord in times of plenty, and the lesson had the quote by Brigham Young “The worst fear that I have about [members of this Church] is that they will get rich in this country, forget God and his people, wax fat, and kick themselves out of the Church and go to hell. This people will stand mobbing, robbing, poverty, and all manner of persecution, and be true. But my greater fear for them is that they cannot stand wealth; and yet they have to be tried with riches, for they will become the richest people on this earth” One of the YSA commented that sometimes our  spiritual wealth can also be a problem for us. We can think that we’ve got a stronger testimony, or more gospel knowledge, and we can let pride creep in. Either thinking we’re better than other people, or just thinking that we’re fine and we don’t have to worry about ourselves. Very interesting take on wealth. And again, a case where wealth is a good thing, as long as you don’t let pride get in the way, and the Lord wants to bless us with both spiritual and temporal wealth, but then it will be a test to see how we respond.

So anyway, that’s me for the week. This week is going to be all about preparing for Hannah’s birthday and party on Saturday. But then we’ll be done with parties for a while at least!

Have a good week!

Shelly

Letter to Richard - 5 May 2014

Dear Richard

I have finally had some days free of marking, for what feels like the first time in ages! I finished the board course marking on Monday last week, and that then started a week where I did very little work because the schools were all closed because Monday and Thursday were public holidays, and I was home with the kids on Tuesday and Wednesday on my own, and then Andrew stayed at home on Friday while I went to work. What’s nice is that the kids are getting that little bit older and being at home alone with them is getting easier. Mainly because Caleb is now old enough to play with the other kids instead of wanting to be on his own mission the whole time, and demanding that I do things with him. So I actually got some time to myself, even though all 3 kids were at home J 

We also did some nice family things like going to the beach a couple of times and braai-ing. The weather was really beautiful most of the week, which really helped J When we went to the beach it was one of the first times that Josh and Hannah went into the water and played around. I thought the water was too cold, but then enjoyed it… Probably the first of many times! But it probably helped that Cindy and Dom were there as well, and being Vaalies they’ll go in the water any time :P

We also had Amy with us the one afternoon, and then two of Joshua’s friends for most of the other day. It was very sweet to see how nice and attentive Josh was to Amy when she was here! And Hannah and Caleb are always playing together. In fact, Hannah is getting Caleb to play all of her girl games, and it’s interesting to see how long that will last before Caleb realises that he probably doesn’t want to play her games ;) But she can enjoy it while it lasts!

And because the marking is all done I got to do some family and home things in the evenings again, like I made a big bag for the soft toys to go into in the play room, and I sorted the freezers. I always feel better when my life is more on the organised side J

There really wasn’t much else to talk about that happened last week… Life is busy as always… Last night I listened to Elder Perry’s talk from the April conference while I was doing the dishes, and I was very impressed with his analogy of us as horses. Very thought provoking.

But I guess that’s it. I’m so glad to hear you’re having such a great time J

Love you lots!

Shelly