Ready, steady, pack!

This morning the boys were up before six again, although thinking that they had done us a favour and slept really late, which of course they hadn’t. They went downstairs quietly and played anyway. After Good News Club we watched “The Nativity Story” on DVD together. It was truly wonderful and very close to the biblical account. It really was quite an eye opener as to the life and times into which Jesus was born. Highly recommended! When that was over, it was time to start on the big plan of the day, which was the packing. The boys have been looking forward to this day for ages, although I’m entirely unsure why – perhaps the holiday is more real with the suitcases standing open! I had to clean the cases very well as they have accumulated two years’ worth of dust. Once they were clean, and we had decided which cases to bring, the boys pulled clothes out of their drawers which they thought they would need – their entire winter wardrobe. Hello, summery South Africa! Had to pack most of those away and advise what the correct attire would be. Shame, they were so keen to help.

In the late afternoon, Nick drove up to Gavin and Tammy’s house, as Gavin has bought Nick’s black electric guitar and an amp – the same amp which we had so much trouble with after cutting off the American plug and attempting to fit a UK one, thereby blowing a part of it, and waiting a long time to get it fixed. With the money made from the sale, Nick has bought himself some other musical synthesizer thingie, which plugs into the guitar and can generate almost any instrument – so you play your guitar but it actually sounds like a didgeridoo or violin or piano. I say he’s bought it, but the buying is more of a process which has been initiated – it will be ordered by some chap here who goes through Richard James International, and will come from the UK. Tonight Nick and Tammy and the band are at the radio station, using their soundproof studio to record vocals and keyboards for one of Tammy’s songs, to release a single.

Bookings, school fun and preparations

I was up at 4 am yesterday (that’s Wednesday), because before nearly making a flight booking for our return journey, we received an e-mail from Kulula advertising a special, whereby if we booked any flight between Joburg and Cape Town on 7 November, it would be R299. The booking had to be done yesterday, and the sale started at 6 am SAST. Not wanting to take any chances on the tickets being snapped up, I set the alarm, and by 4.05 or so had bought our tickets. Yippee!!! Our flight leaves Lanseria at 6 am on the 3rd January. I am thrilled at the timing, as I hadn’t been waiting for anything specific before making the booking, and could well have made it weeks or days ago, thereby missing the special – I see God’s hand at work here!

This morning, despite a mild sprinkling of precipitation, we went walking, but saw no whales. School was pretty good. We had some fun in maths – you really had to be there to appreciate the moment, because I tried to explain to Nick afterwards and he just didn’t get it. It had to do with the filling in of the worksheet, and Caleb writing an answer in the wrong place and then getting it confused again, and then still writing another wrong answer in the box – it was just so funny the way it happened though, where Aaron and I could see what Caleb was doing wrong, so we just looked at each other and started laughing, and then laughed and laughed. Aaron’s laugh was so funny – not a silly one, or even a giggle, just a pure laugh of absolute mirth. I laughed until my eyes were streaming. When we finally managed to explain to Caleb what on earth was going on, he thought it was funny too.

I had the craft class at 2 pm. It was a very simple craft, making finger puppets with felt, which just involved stitching the sides together and drawing faces on them. Boy, did they struggle! They couldn’t thread their needles, didn’t know how to make a double stitch to start and end, and some couldn’t even do the simple running stitch! A couple of kids got on just fine, and made three or four, but some struggled with just one. Often though it’s the attitude which is the problem, more than the actual ability. They were somewhat hyper today, so I had to keep quietening them, and even sent one boy out the class for a while. He was only a half a degree subdued when I allowed him back in. All in all it was a good hour. I made puppets for the boys when I got back, and Caleb tried to do one of his own later – he actually managed better than some of the boys in my class! He didn’t finish it though as he was battling to get the needle through the felt, but at least he got the hang of the in and out of the stitching.

There is much activity on the island in anticipation of the Governor Designate’s arrival on Sunday. He will be inaugurated on Sunday at 9 am, and immediately following will be the Remembrance Day service. A lot of the government buildings have been either washed or painted – I noticed scaffolding up at Plantation House the other day when I was there. A platform has been built on the courtroom stairs, and bunting has been strung up along the waterfront. It looks pretty good, really.

Yes, we really do have an IT department!

I was back at the dentist today for some more work on the same tooth, as last time was just the start of it. I thought that last time was the start and end, and that all he was going to do was a proper filling, but alas, out came the needle and the drill. Fortunately the anaesthetic wore off after only about two and a half hours, much quicker than last time. It wasn’t really too bad. At 3 pm Nick brought the boys back up to the dentist, for their little checkup. The dentist really just looked in their mouths, at all the teeth, and said their teeth are very good. Caleb will need to go back early next year for a fissure filling, which the British Dental Health Board recommends – something new that they do with the rear molars (Caleb’s adult molars are erupting at the back), to flatten out the surface to prevent cavities. Sounds like a good idea to me. Hey, it’s free – why not! At 4 pm I was at the IT department in town, where I had arranged to take the laptop to download the anti-virus program I have bought. Instead of simply renewing our subscription with Norton, I decided to actually purchase the upgrade, which you simply do on the internet and then download the software. Unfortunately though it was too big for me to download on a dial-up and would have taken hours, so I asked the IT department for help. They couldn’t do it as the laptop had already grabbed part of it, so I had to physically take the laptop there. It was really great being on the internet via a network – such a fast connection! The boys had been riding their bikes in the schoolroom for most of the day; I think they have forgotten that they have a back yard to play in as well.

Whale spotting

WE SAW WHALES!! Nick and I went on our walk this morning, and while sitting on our favourite step on Jacob’s Ladder, we saw them – a mother and her calf. They were as far out as where the RMS usually anchors, but although they were fairly far, we could see them well. They were at the surface for about five or ten minutes, then disappeared, and surfaced at a different spot. We could see the water spraying up as they exhaled through their blow-holes, or whatever it is that they do – so awesome!

School passed by in a blink this morning, and then we all went to town to sort out our travel and medical insurance. It was very easy, really, just to fill in a form, discuss what cover we wanted with the girl behind the counter, and then she calculated the amount which we paid at the bank straight away. After getting a receipt from the insurance office, we went next door to shipping, but they will only issue our ticket next Wednesday. While in town, we bought spray paint for the boys’ bikes – red for Caleb and blue for Aaron – their choice, with some guidance.

Boys and bikes

One of our church members passed away this morning, aged 87. The Lord took him peacefully from his home. Although we mourn with the family, we praise God to know that Joe is in glory!

During the morning, John and Cindy came to deliver the bicycles we have bought from them – kids’ bikes, for the boys. They are very pink, so we will be spray painting them soon. The boys are very pleased with them. Caleb’s is quite a big one, and he can just reach the ground, sitting on the saddle, on tip-toes. Aaron’s is quite a bit smaller, but well sized for him. Both bikes have training wheels, so while I was making lunch, Nick took the boys and bikes to the school room and they rode around, getting used to the pedals and brakes.

During the afternoon we went to the pool. Caleb is getting good at swimming underwater without his armbands – I think if he fell into a pool now with no armbands, he wouldn’t drown! Aaron apparently jumped in the other day with his armbands on his feet, which quickly came off, but managed to get himself to the side without any troubles, so he might be okay too. Probably next year when we start swimming here again, we’ll start teaching him to swim properly without armbands too.

Futile teaching?

Well, today was a beautiful day, with blue skies and just a few clouds. The boys were up before 6 am, so I got up around 6 as well, since I had such a lot of stuff needing doing, including my prep for the Good News Club. I asked Nick this morning if he thinks the kids are actually learning anything, and he said no – not from any of the four teachers. I think they sit and wait for the lesson to be finished so that they can play! I’m sure something goes in, but for most of them, it doesn’t even go in one ear. The boys attended a birthday party straight after the club, at the Mule Yard.

Wait a moment or 7,200

School passed by cheerfully this morning. I had to carry Aaron downstairs because his foot is still very swollen. He was up twice during the night, once for a wee and once for water, so both times I got up as well and carried him back to bed. Otherwise, he can get around by limping, which he does if I’m not available for transportation! It bothered him a bit from time to time, and he complained about it being itchy or sore, but he managed to get his shoe on before lunch time and said it helped him with walking. Nick was out the whole morning at the Knollcombes Chapel, working with Nick and Vincent to start getting the church cleaned up. They apparently got quite a bit done, with moving pews, carting out rubbish, and painting a few rafters. He only got home at 1.10, just as we were considering walking up to the hospital for our 1.30 appointment for Aaron to have his medical checkup for travel insurance. I was pleased that he arrived home so we could use the car! We arrived shortly before 1.30, and eventually at 3.20 we were seen. The boys were getting extremely bored and restless, despite playing I Spy, ching-chong-cha, memory games, and reading a book. It was an awfully long wait! All that for the doctor to examine him for five minutes to confirm that he is healthy.

Bees really sting

The news of the day is that both boys were stung by bees, one each, in their feet. Poor Aaron wept in absolute pain, while Caleb had a bit of a cry but then was fine. This was Caleb’s first sting, and we are relieved that he had absolutely no reaction. Aaron, who has been stung five or six times (lost count), has a very swollen foot. How did they get stung, you ask? Well, we had some left-over jam tarts from Bible Study on Tuesday, which no one was going to eat, so I threw them out on the lawn for the birds to eat. It was very funny, actually, because I didn’t throw them properly so they would have all landed at my feet except that I used the container as a bat to spread them a bit further as they were falling, and two fell into the bucket of water that catches the drips from the geyser overflow. The boys laughed at that. But, unbeknown to us, the jam had spread itself on the grass, so while the birds ate all the big pieces, the bees found the jam. Late in the afternoon both boys were playing outside, barefoot, and Caleb was stung as he tramped on one of about 20 bees in a confined area. Aaron came shouting that something had happened to Caleb, so I went dashing downstairs, and when I got there Aaron had gone back to check on him, and he also stood on one. Caleb was sitting on the ground examining his foot and wincing a bit, while Aaron started howling straight away. I eased the stings out and then got them inside for ministrations, which involved anti-histamine syrup, cortisone cream, chocolate, and a video!

Globally puzzled

The boys did the scheduled developmental activity of finger painting with a spatula after school. Nick came down and did a painting too, using some stamps, and Caleb ran out of inspiration after spreading some blobs about, but Aaron spread the paint all over his hands and the paper, not caring much for using a spatula! The clean-up took longer than the actual activity had. I started doing the new Global Puzzle we had ordered as part of our curriculum, and spent the rest of the afternoon engrossed in it. When Nick arrived home from his guitar lesson (to which none of the pupils had come), he put Africa together, and the boys managed to get a few pieces in too. It was a difficult puzzle, because the pieces didn’t really interlock for the most part, since the pieces are shaped like the countries, but it was very educational!

Happy birthday dear Nick

This morning, being Nick’s birthday, the boys came through bearing a yellow bag with a few presents. We had bought him a long-sleeved t-shirt and aftershave, a mini alarm clock with time projection, so you can shine it on your ceiling at night, a pen and pencil in one, and a plastic cockroach to scare him with. I used the cockroach last night on the boys – Caleb was busy making another birthday card at my desk, because he had misplaced the original one which he hid too well, and Aaron was watching over his shoulder, so I threw the giant toy on the desk and gave a shriek. The boys jumped back and stared in horror at it for some time before realizing that it was fake! Hee hee… After that, the day was pretty normal, except that we went out for lunch – takeaways from Sally’s which we ate at Castle Gardens, enjoying the rare sunshine. Before going home we went by the docks, just to see if any containers had been opened, or to enquire when they would be if they hadn’t – wanting to get the other box of our curriculum stuff. It was therefore exciting to see many of the containers standing open, with a lot of contents unpacked! We hunted around a bit and found it. Unpacked it all at home, and everything that we ordered has arrived.

Nick has borrowed a sound desk from a chap on the island who has just recently acquired this piece of equipment but doesn’t know how to use it. He came around last night and Nick gave him a basic run-through, as Nick has learned from watching the manual on DVD. The desk is the exact one that Tammy ordered and which didn’t arrive, so in the meantime, they have arranged to use this one. So Nick actually had a very enjoyable birthday, with his office now being transformed into a studio. He lay guitar, bass and drums tracks this afternoon for one of Tammy’s songs. This is a really big thing for him, as music is one of his strong passions.

The Pastor is appreciated!

We had a combined service with fellowship tea this afternoon, and there were a number of guests, encouragingly. Nick and I had an unexpected surprise – October is apparently Pastor’s Appreciation Month, of which we’ve never heard, so Anthony, who was leading the service, read a poem for Nick and thanked him, and then Iva read a poem for me, about being a pastor’s wife, and then presented me with a bouquet of roses – I got a bit emotional! It was a really lovely gesture on their part. We had 12 kids in Sunday School, the biggest crowd we’ve had.

Curriculum and Carnival

Today was a really big day on our calendar, with two momentous events happening: the first one was the arrival of our 2008 Sonlight homeschool curriculum, and the second was the carnival, which the boys have been anticipating for weeks.

We couldn’t find our box at the docks on the first go, so had coffee with Elza and Sarel who were headed down that way. While there, the new surgeon joined us, who is completely German, and knows the town of Salzwedel. We had a brief exchange in German. He has only just arrived on the island, and will be here until May. He tried to escape from East Berlin, but was imprisoned for 1½ years before being released as a political prisoner – very interesting background! Also at the Coffee Shop, the ship’s doctor and her husband joined us for a while – they are South African and Afrikaans, and live in Cape Town. Very nice people. It was a great time of chatting! Our second try for the box was still unsuccessful, so we had lunch at the Mule Yard, and on our third visit to the customs hall, we found the expected box! Went straight home, to unpack the box…well, what an impressive collection of books! We are all very excited about next year’s school journey. We could only collect one of our boxes which came with the ship, because the other one is in a container, which were all still closed today, so we will likely get it on Monday or Tuesday. But the box we got today was the bulk of the books, so we could get a good feel for what we will be doing next year. We were so thoroughly engrossed, all four of us, with the new library, that I got a shock when I looked at my watch and it was 1.40. We had to be up at the hospital at 2 pm, and there was still a lot of organizing to be done with getting the car to the docks, us dressed, and to the hospital! Mad rush, got the necklaces and things into the car, which fortunately were all ready and waiting to go, got the boys into their costumes, meanwhile Nick drove the car to the docks and walked back up again, while I quickly got dressed and made up, and then the boys and I started up the road to the hospital, Nick catching us up on the way. We got there shortly after 2, and there were quite a number already assembled for the parade. The fire engine came shortly after, all dressed up with a live band. The parade eventually started at about 2.45, and it was certainly a crowd. It was no easy task trying to keep the boys with us, although they really would have been alright on their own. They had a lot of fun in their ghost costumes, and thoroughly loved the parade, although it was perhaps a bit overwhelming for Aaron and shame, he looked so small. We stayed with the parade until shortly before our house, and then broke away to go ahead and take some more pictures and video footage, and then we made our way quickly down town to the carnival area, to quickly get the stall ready. No sooner were we all ready and set when the first paraders came through! My stock sold fairly well – just over half the things were sold, earning a total of ₤92. I manned the stall from about 3.30 until nearly 5.30 – at that time we felt that the market was worn out and it was time to pack up. The intention was to have supper there as well, but after waiting in a non-moving queue for quite some time, we thought it best rather to go home! I made snackwiches for the boys after they’d had a bath, and we were all still looking at books by the time it was their bed-time. Caleb, entirely of his own accord, picked up one of the reader books, a Dr Suess one about a fly going by, and read the entire thing, out loud, just to himself. I was sooooo pleased that he did it! He is reading more and more without it actually being work, a chore, school, punishment, or forced. Yippee!! A love of reading is one of the most important things we want to foster in them, obviously aside from a close walk with God! Well, that ended the carnival day. We’ll have to wait to hear the news next week to find out how many people were actually in town, and how much money was raised towards cancer support and awareness.

Need a holiday

Lately our days have been so busy, and today was no exception. The first thing to happen was that the washing machine flooded again. I had manually switched on the water, and then should have been listening for the machine to start the actual wash cycle once it had filled so that I could switch off the water, but I was so engrossed in school that I forgot. Called Nick down, and together we mopped up all the water with towels and the floor mop. I switched on the water again for the rinse cycle, but noticed that it stopped running in briefly before it started up again, and wondered if it had righted itself. I listened carefully to the next cycle, and it did in fact stop filling at the right time. Strange – the programming had obviously gone amiss, and seems to be fixed now. We don’t trust it though – if it happened once, it can happen again! I’m going to have to just switch off the water in between washes, to be on the safe side, and especially when we go away on holiday! Imagine it decides to simply start filling up by itself, and there is nothing and no one to stop it!! We had a fine time in school, and not very much work scheduled for yesterday, so even with the washing machine episode, we were finished well before 12.

At 1.30 we were ready to go to town. Nick had prison ministry, but I had a long list of things to do. We all went to the museum together first, where Nick wanted to donate an ancient communion set which was found at Knollcombes (with the deacons’ approval, of course). Lucy was delighted to have the stuff, as well as a very old pulpit Bible, which she put straight into a cabinet. I showed Lucy the latest page, which she was delighted with. Cindy and the girls were there, doing a special activity which the museum offered during the school holidays, which was painting white mugs. I had heard about this activity, but thought it would only be during the mornings, when we have school, but as it worked out, the boys were able to do one each as well. While they were busy, I quickly popped across the road to the library to return books, and then to the police station to collect my vetting certificate. Dashed back to the museum, where the boys had finished their mugs and were waiting. We left there and went back across the road to collect the library pockets (I hadn’t wanted to wait around for them), then to the post office to send off a birthday card for a friend, and to Warren’s to buy a present for Nick from the boys, for Tuesday. Then across to the Emporium, for some birthday candles, and we were walking down the road back towards the prison to find Nick, when we saw him on the pavement, chatting to someone. The four of us walked all the way up to the Rose and Crown for the weekend’s DVDs, then to Tinkers for bacon, to Thorpes for some refreshments, to Brown’s to check on their DVDs, down to Sally’s, and then finally to the car.

On air again

Emma-Jane confirmed yesterday that I am not permitted to sell necklaces at the carnival, because of not having a work permit. I am not allowed to earn any money! I decided though to still sell necklaces, and just donate the proceeds to charity. Emma came up with the brilliant idea that the charity I make my donation to, could actually be our church if I so desired. Isn’t that great!! So any money I actually make on Saturday will be going straight into our church’s coffers.

For Caleb’s reading, he read a poem I read to them yesterday, which I read again this morning by popular demand. It’s a flowing poem which can be read quickly, about a meadow, and an old mother toad and her little toadie one, winking and blinking in the sun, and all that sort of thing. Caleb was thrilled to be able to just read the wonderful poem, and nothing else! We learned about Pablo Picasso today, and they found one of his paintings very amusing, wherein you can see a girl’s profile and both eyes, on the same face. His style of painting is called cubism, where all shapes in a form are reduced to basic geometric shapes and angles. We also learned about mountains, and the earth’s crust, and volcanoes. It’s always fun learning about volcanoes, and how mountains are formed, since we are on a volcanic island! After lunch I settled down to pick songs for the radio show, which took me up until the time I had to leave, to be on air at 2 pm. The show went very well. Tammy had a surprise guest, which was quite providential – this week is cancer awareness week (hence the carnival, which is a fundraiser), and the guest on the show is a tourist, who is a cancer survivor and recovering alcoholic. He shared a bit about his experiences, and could see straight away some of St Helena’s big problems – bad diet and drinking and smoking being some of them, which are a large cause of cancer on the island. It’s ironic – the government gets a lot of money from taxes and duties imposed on alcohol and tobacco, but most of that money goes into medical expenses, which are incurred from alcohol and tobacco abuse!! I didn’t really have much to say on the show, other than a bit here and there when I was introducing the songs. It was fun though, and not nearly as stressful as last time! Nick left at 5 for bible study, and then after washing the remainder of the dinner dishes which Caleb didn’t do, I baked a cake. I want to surprise Nick for his birthday on Tuesday at Bible Study, so had to make the cake tonight, which has gone into the freezer. It flopped somewhat though – it didn’t rise! So it is about 1.5cm high. I made it in a big rectangle, so have cut it in half and when I ice it, I will make it into a layer cake – but still, it’s very little and flat! I don’t know what went wrong, as I followed the recipe carefully (other than getting a bit of egg yolk into the white bit which has to be beaten, but it still went frothy). Oh well… Of course I had to wash and pack away all the baking goodies, otherwise Nick will know.

Coming in threes

We had a series of unfortunate events this morning…while I was busy with school, Emma-Jane phoned from the radio station – she is the main organiser of the carnival – to ask whether I had a work permit to sell jewellery. I confirmed that I did not, but since I had already confirmed this with her, and checked whether I would need one, I didn’t think there would be a problem, since the stall holders don’t need trade licences, being covered by the carnival’s general licence. Now there has been some query though, so Emma is going to investigate a little further – but I might not be permitted to sell them after all. Then, I had just got off the phone, when the boys started calling to say, ‘what’s going on here’ – the washing machine was flooding the passage. Nick and I went rushing downstairs, switched off the machine, mopped up a lot of water, and wondered what to do next. While we were busy wondering, the machine was continuing to fill up, so it seems that the programming which tells the machine to stop drawing in water, has gone awry. Managed to get it all out by running a spin cycle, and stopped the flow of water, but at the moment we will have to manually stop the inflow during the cycles – rather on the awkward side. Teddy has given us the name of someone to phone. While that was going on though, Tammy phoned to say that not all the long-awaited recording equipment arrived with this ship, as it was supposed to. There is one part, the major piece, the desk, which was missing from the order, despite being ticked off on the invoice. Poor Tammy said she felt sick with the disappointment. They were hoping to start the recording of her new album as early as this weekend, I think. We were wondering what terrible thing was going to befall us next, but thankfully, nothing did!

After lunch I went out to the museum to take a photo, for a layout, of a model carrack they have on display – a ship which Jaoa da Nova Castella would have used when he first discovered the island in 1502. Then I went to the seaside to collect some sand, which I will be incorporating into the page. At 2.45 we all went to visit Tammy, just to see what was there already, and had a cup of tea. She had cheered up considerably, and can see that God’s hand is in the timing. Fortunately she managed to sort out the whereabouts of the missing piece, which actually was never sent – the shop was out of stock at the time, so because they didn’t alert anyone to the fact that it wasn’t with the order, they will kindly post it all the way to St Helena at their expense. We are all just so relieved that the sound desk didn’t go missing or get pinched along the way – valued at nearly ₤700, you can’t easily replace it! We were there for about an hour – the boys played outside with a go-cart, and also watched the cat chase a mouse around the garden. The mouse wasn’t really intending to catch the mouse, or certainly not kill it – it just wanted to play. It was really funny and interesting to watch.

Morning ramble

This morning was a gloomy morning, but Nick and I went on our early morning walk anyway, despite the threat of a bit of rain. I took the camera, and we went around the side of the bayhead again, and this time I went with Nick to the battlement or whatever you call it – we were really hoping to get a good picture of a fairy tern, as there were so many about last time, and very close. But terns are notoriously camera shy and today was no exception! They didn’t really even come very close to us like they normally would. Found a cute little cave around that area too. Got home and just managed to fit in a bath etc before it was time for school! I felt tired, but we managed well nonetheless. It’s a bit difficult to stay motivated, as we only have four weeks of school left, and feels like we should be winding down for the end of year. I think we will have finished our maths syllabus by the end of the second last week, so our last week will be really slow.

Rugby...very patriotic...and tomatoes

Nick said he was tempted to invite ourselves to some friends to watch the big World Cup rugby game, but I wasn’t really keen – the fact that it was such a biggie doesn’t really change my dislike of watching sports! I encouraged him to phone someone to tape it. After trying three people, who all couldn’t tape the game due to some technical problems, we decided to invite ourselves to Sarel and Elza anyway to watch, with the promise of carrot cake as compensation! This arrangement was made at about 6.45, and we were there at 7. We put the boys down straight away, and then Elza and I chatted and made tea during the first half, and watched the second half, more or less. Well done South Africa! Not a very exciting game, but at least we can say that we watched it – who knows where we will be four years from now to watch the next one!

We harvested our first small crop of tomatoes during the week, which are unimpressive, but considering the fact that there is not a tomato to be bought in the shops, and likely won’t be until the ship returns from the Cape in a few weeks, this is better than nothing!

Crafty Thursday

After lunch I was wondering what I was going to do with my afternoon, as I had it all stretching before me. Then I remembered I had the craft class! I had prepared everything already, so just had to keep reminding myself not to forget to actually go to it. The class went well, making the Chinese dragons. Nick had left to go to Sandy Bay to visit a lady while I was out, and after that he had a guitar lesson scheduled in that area, and then bible study.

Tomorrow morning I can expect Aaron to be awake before 6 am, and then to come into our room to share some maths fact with me. This morning’s was, “do you know what 7 plus 3 equals?” I always let him give me the answer, and he correctly stated 10. I don’t know why he likes to do sums in his head at that time of the day, but he almost always does. He obviously lies in bed mulling over numbers, and gets so excited that he has to share it.

Dentist and big BIG sale

I made it to the dentist just on the dot of 8.30 this morning for an emergency appointment, but there was a waiting room full of patients with emergency issues, so I had to wait until 9 to see the dentist, and since he’s a locum, I had to explain what the problem was – emphasising that my pain was so severe that I nearly vomited this morning – and where I thought it was, which was difficult to do as the entire left side of my mouth was in pain. The anaesthetic was so effective that it reached all the way up to my eyelid, so that when I was blinking, my left eye was still dry. I had to manually blink that eye for a while! Very uncomfortable and unusual feeling. Fortunately it worked well in my mouth. After that ordeal was over, I had to go home to fetch money to pay the princely sum of ₤1.20 for a course of antibiotics that I have to take, to sort out an infection. I also went to the hospital, having bought my antibiotics, to make an appointment for Aaron’s medical examination, which he needs for travelling on the ship. Not very pleasant having to deal with strangers with only half a face in working order, but I smiled my best smile and explained that I had just been to the dentist. Getting home and looking in the mirror, I guess that fact would have been evident, unless people thought I’d had a stroke. I was finally home again at 10 am, having missed the entire first section of school, and just in time to give the boys their tenzees. Aaron asked if I would have to smile like that forever, sounding very concerned about it. We had just started with the reading part of school, when Tammy phoned to let me know about a big clearance sale happening at the Malabar. The Malabar doesn’t normally function as a shop, but Solomon’s was using the space to sell off a lot of old stock foodstuffs. We ditched school again, and the boys and I hurried along to shop. I was amazed at what I found – packets of biscuits for 20p each, tubes of Pringles for 40p, tinned foods for 15 or 20p a can…really very cheap. Quite out of date, mind you – some things expired in January, some as recently as August – but for that price, it’s not too bothersome. Things like biscuits still stay pretty good. Since we go through biscuits so quickly and spend so much money on them usually, I bought quite a lot. The boys each had a basket, until they got tired of holding them, and then just stood in one spot guarding them. It was really fun! After loading up three baskets, I went to pay, and it all came to only ₤11.20. Once that was all packed away we could carry on with school - all we actually did was the history reading, and the science reading. I couldn’t pronounce most of my words properly, so decided to leave Winnie the Pooh until tonight, where it could be a bed time story. That took us up to lunch time, which was 20p blackcurrant jam sandwiches.

Nick has been fixing the old pump organ he found at Knollcombes yesterday – he took the entire thing apart, cleaned it all thoroughly, and reassembled it. Some of the keys are still sticking though, so he will have a further look at it. When I got home from the dentist at 10 am, he was still in his pyjamas, as he was so involved in his job that he hadn’t taken time to bath yet! He seems to be having fun with it though. After his guitar lesson at Prince Andrew he took the boys swimming. The sun had only just started shining after a cloudy morning, so he deemed it suitable weather. They were home again about half an hour later, the boys almost blue, and went straight to the bath!

Supper tonight was our favourite grilled smoked chicken breasts, and I made a potato salad. We haven’t had potato salad for well over a year, I’m sure – either no potatoes, or no mayonnaise, or no opportunity! There is a big potato shortage here at the moment though, and apparently won’t be better when the ship gets back from the Cape, as the Cape has had a wet winter so potatoes are in short supply there too. Islanders are speculating that they will cost in the region of ₤10 for 10kg. Fortunately I bought a pocket of them some time ago, which I’m still using, and they have been very good. I only have about 12 left, so will need to go easy now.

Knollcombes 'treasures'

After lunch today Nick had a site visit at the Knollcombes chapel, where he and Teddy wanted to inspect the building and see what needed to be done as far as maintenance goes. The re-roofing project is finished there, but the inside is a complete mess. The pews are stacked one on top of the other, the pulpit has been dismantled, and there is dust everywhere. Nick and Teddy basically discussed what would be painted – which are the rafters, walls and floor (ie everything!). They are going to set about recruiting the prisoners to do the job. It’s free labour, and it gets the men out of the prison walls and doing something useful. Nick took the boys with him, and they amused themselves by playing with their trucks, going for little walks on their own, Aaron tells me, and even playing inside a little bit without bothering Dad. “Well, we bothered him a little bit, okay?” I was happy (very happy) to have the house to myself. I sorted out the craft for Thursday. It’s fun to make up a shopping list of the supplies I need, and then go across to the school to pick them out, and not have to pay for them! Hee hee! Once back from the school, I cut up bits of paper and got all the stuff ready, and then made the actual craft – the Chinese New Year dragons that I made with Caleb and Aaron. Nick and the boys came home just after 3, armed with a carful of old stuff they found at the chapel, needing fixing or cleaning. There are beautiful antique oil lamps which Nick washed, and I tried to brasso a bit, but they didn’t really buff up very well. They also found a “füssball” soccer game, which the boys cleaned themselves with pink superwipes, so they could play with it. It’s pretty cool having a game like that!