Day off for me

This morning I woke up with a severely croaky voice – possibly using it too much after having been sick. While I was having my quiet time, Aaron woke up and came through, also coughing and sounding very miserable. Having just stepped on a toy ship and cut his foot didn’t help to cheer him up any, so I lovingly suggested that we bunk school for the day and the boys could watch Wall-E instead. This, and a bowl of orange-flavoured muesli, soon got him up and bouncing. I was actually feeling quite well but really did as little talking as possible during the day. Thus it was that we skipped our first day of school this year due to illness.

Not Ruperts again?!

Nick has had the day off today – it’s a Lay Preachers’ Sunday, and he was able to completely bypass the morning services. Usually even when he’s not preaching he needs to go and do the music, but today his services were not required. We spent the morning at home, other than a quick walk to the shops for supplies for our BBQ, then headed off to Ruperts for the afternoon. First though, he had to stop at the church in town to show the parliamentary people around the damaged buildings – this has to do with the rock stabilisation project. While he was busy I drove around the island running errands – dropping off and collecting things. Eventually we were all ready to go – we had picked Scilla up as well, so she spent the afternoon with us which was great. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to our outing though – the location is my least favourite spot on the island, being rocky, unshady and ugly. Nick is very keen on ocean swimming at the moment though, so our plans had to include the sea. But when we arrived I nearly squealed with delight at the empty beach – there was one other car there and all the shade coverings / BBQ areas were available for us to choose from. This was a big factor in my equation and made the day for me. We set up camp under cover; Pam, Geoff and Maddy had followed us from town, and Rob, Claire and family and Sappho arrived shortly after we had the fire going. Phil and DT also popped on during the afternoon, so we were quite a good group.

The kids all had a great time playing on the rocks, exploring, and just being together – they are a good combination and all enjoy one another’s company.

Nick’s guitar pupil, Gareth, also came for a visit and he and Nick played guitar for a while. At about 3.30 I took Scilla home, and when I returned Nick was in the sea with Geoff and Maddy – always the die-hards. Since it had been drizzling off and on, and the skies were grey, I didn’t feel at all inclined to swim despite having actually worn swimming gear all day and feeling like I might brave the Atlantic Ocean. Maybe next time.

Run Around Nick

This morning we were in town quite early again as I wanted to be set up by 9 am. Poor Nick and the boys just have to tow the line sometimes. We offloaded the boys at the manse, from whence they ran down to Pam’s house; we packed up the car with my stuff, Nick dropped me off, and then he went back up to Pam, thereafter coming back to town to collect Caleb’s birthday present from the docks – a keyboard, ordered from the UK. We are pleased that it has arrived safely, but Nick took it straight back to the manse so that Caleb won’t see it, so we haven’t opened it at all. Then Nick and the boys went to Good News Club (I had special permission from the pastor to be absent), and after the club Nick was back at the docks, this time with Geoff to collect an electric piano for the League of Friends or Ladies’ Group or something. That had to be delivered to the Community Care Complex in Half Tree Hollow. Pam got lumped with the boys but I don’t think she minded. Meanwhile I had been having a great morning – I enjoy selling my wares because it means I get to chat with a lot of people – some that I know, others who are tourists off the RMS or yachts. I chatted with a couple who had approached the tourist office and were disappointed to find it closed…I asked if I could offer any assistance or info, and they said they were inquiring about the Baptist Church and looking for more info! They had seen our pamphlet on the RMS (we have a charity box with some info nicely laminated and put up on the ship), and wanted to get hold of a copy, being Baptists themselves and therefore more interested. I was pleased to be able to point her to the church’s blog, and also mentioned that Nick would be showing some of the Lords and MPs ‘and things’ from London who arrived yesterday, around the church tomorrow – and apparently this couple are of that party (turns out I was actually speaking to Lord Shutt’s wife). I guess I should have been more respectful of the dignitaries. Nick was ready to collect me at 12, so we packed up, dropped the stuff at the manse again, picked up the boys and came home for lunch.

Oh, my PotD project is going well – I have put together January. I think the whole thing is going to look great when done – I suggested to Nick that it would be an interesting coffee table book for us. He shot back that he would remember never to buy me a coffee table :-)

Old friends

This morning we were at the docks early to say hello to Cindy and the girls. It was great to see them again, and of course we were happy for all their sakes that the family is reunited.

We didn’t hang around too long after greeting them, instead coming back home to get on with school. Again, it was a light day so I coped fine, even though I was feeling worse than I had been yesterday with a runnier nose than before and watery eyes. I spent a lot of time in bed, in between other things. After lunch we headed back to town, as Nick and I both needed to renew our drivers’ licences; I had a bit of shopping to do and Nick had a prison service. He has started these up again on a Friday as he has someone who is interested, although yesterday he was pleased that two prisoners had attended. After doing my shopping, the boys and I meandered down to the prison where the car was parked, and Nick came out half a minute later – great timing. I spotted two fairy terns on a ledge outside the prison…it was until after they flew away that I saw their baby! Shame, quite an ugly little chap – a juvenile, caught between cute babyness and elegant adulthood, rather like a gangly teenager with spotty skin.

Snotty noses and potatoes

I’ve been wrapped up in a cold today…it started last night with a sore throat and strangely, dizzy spells. This morning I was so sick I didn’t think I’d be able to do school, but I know that whatever we miss I’ll have to catch up another time…so I pulled myself together, despite the principal kindly giving me the day off, and we tackled the work. Fortunately it was a mercifully light day, after several days of lots of heavy workloads. We had finished by about 11. Nick, meanwhile, had gone visiting – he’s not preaching this Sunday because it’s a Lay Preachers’ day, so he had free time. He did three Sandy Bay visits, and came home with about 5kg of freshly picked potatoes from Mervyn and Daphne.

Teutonic Hall

When our somewhat painful day of school was over, Nick asked if I’d like to do anything, as again he had a free afternoon, his guitar pupil being sick. We discussed a few options and finally settled on visiting Teutonic Hall. This old house has a sad history – if Nick got it right, it was a hotel of sorts in the 1960s, but white ant moved in and ate the house apart. It is now an overgrown ruin filled with rubbish and broken parts of itself – it was weird going into a ruin where the paint still looked relatively fresh on the walls. A tree is growing out of an upstairs window; its roots are in the mud holding the stone walls together. The sad part is that it was left to go to ruin – I guess that by the time the owners realized what was happening they felt it was already too late. It is completely beyond hope now. Some poking around outside revealed a rusted motorbike covered over with creepers, and even a garage with a car under a tarpaulin. How very strange.

Pressing on

It’s a sad but true reflection on my day when the PotD is one of a pile of ironing! I have been neglecting the ironing and so now it has become a monster. I haven’t yet finished it – but am happy to report that a large chunk of the wrinkled clothes are now flattened and hanging neatly in cupboards. My plan is to finish the rest this evening some time.

School was fine – much like yesterday, we jumped around between written work and reading. The boys say they like it like this. During the afternoon, apart from ironing, I did some more beading (and phoned to arrange a spot in front of the Cannister for Saturday), popped out to the Longwood store, and made a macaroni. When I put it that way, it really doesn’t sound like I’ve done much at all today. I guess I haven’t!

Another day threaded onto the string of life

Well, it’s really just been another one of those days where nothing particular happens. School was a bit of a jumble, but a nice one. Since Caleb is poorly, I decided to start with the nice stuff, so we did Ginger Pye first which they are enjoying. It’s a bit of a mystery novel again. Then we alternated with written work and read-alouds – history, writing, science, maths, and so it went on. In the end we got everything done although I let Caleb skip a few bits and pieces. There are certain parts that must get done every day though, like maths and spelling, as those seem to want to fill up 180 days which is our whole school year – any days skipped will mean catching up some other time. During the afternoon I settled into beading, producing 7 necklaces and 22 pairs of earrings, in reds, whites, silvers and blacks – all in preparation for a stall on Saturday, with a Valentine’s special - a “₤1 off the marked price” on necklaces and bracelets, which I hope will bring in a lot of sales.

It was a fabulous evening here in Longwood…almost clear skies, and beautiful outside at 6.45, when I was out taking photos at Nick’s urging. This is my photo of the day for today…it’s me on the golf-course!

PS

I forgot to mention about the rain…it was unnerving driving to town in the morning after heavy country-wide rains, to see so many rocks lying on the roads. Good rockfall conditions are heavy rains shortly followed by clear skies and hot sun, which is what happened today. But, no incidences.

On the other hand, Heart-Shaped Waterfall was spectacular – the water, usually trickling with the pressure of a hosepipe, was spewing out water by the hundreds of gallons.

Head o'Wain service

So, here’s how the day unfolded. We had a late start to the morning, having slept in until at least 7.30…it was raining and dull so no-one felt inclined to get up. Also, we didn’t get a good night’s sleep on our mattress – it always takes a night or two to get used to a new bed. Added to which that Caleb is teetering on the edge of laryngitis, and was coughing and squealing during the night. Anyway, back to the morning…we had only just got ourselves ready and sorted, and I had done the bulletins, when we left to go visit Pam and Geoff. We particularly wanted to see how Geoff and Maddy were doing, and are happy to report that they are much better. Their welts are still bandaged, but they are not in pain. We stayed for a cup of coffee, then came home in time to make our dazzling lunch of pork and apple burgers (the pork and apple patties are a new speciality made by the Star’s local butcher). Then Nick went over his prep, I folded bulletins, and we got ready for church. We left quite early as we needed to get a bit of petrol on the way. The service was good – Nick is still in his Acts series, and preached about why some believe and some don’t, without really getting into election. His emphasis on unbelief was pride and touchiness on the part of the Jews. After the service we had a fellowship time – we had invited people to bring a plate of eats and their own beverages, which worked out pretty well although we still took cups, saucers, tea, coffee, sugar, milk and two kettles just in case. Teddy came across some old photos at the police station of Jamestown about 100 years ago, which were interesting to look at – there was one showing our present schoolroom with five skylights! Before the rockfall it had two skylights…after repairs, it will only have one.

Watch out for the jellyfish

Our Saturdays are usually fairly predictable, so when unscheduled things pop up, it’s quite exciting! The first thing to happen was Nick’s and my prayer walk, and then Good News Club. Pictured below is our youngest member who is brought by one of the girls who regularly babysits…then all the girls have a turn with her, playing mommy.

After GNC we did something we should have done months ago – brought our double mattress over from the manse. We’ve been making do with the lumpy, sagging mattress here, but have finally had enough of waking up with aching backs and shoulders. ₤10 later, we have luxury and comfort again. In the afternoon, Pam and Maddy came over, but Tammy had to cancel her band practice with Nick, leaving him with time for a swim in the ocean again. He took Maddy and the boys, collected Geoff in town, and they all went to Ruperts. Pam and I happily scrapped in peace – and we got to eat all the chocolate-topped mint digestive slices ourselves.

At 5 pm Nick phoned from the hospital, and Pam very calmly took in the news that Geoff and Maddy had been stung by jellyfish. Poor guys – it was pretty painful at the time, apparently! Nick had a few small welts as well, and Caleb and Aaron were fine. John T came around for supper – we thought he should be eating more than snickers bars and crisps while he waits to be reunited with Cindy and the girls, who will arrive on Friday. We had a great evening together. Okay, the photo...ja, not the most flattering, but they were laughing at me making them sit so close together, so who can blame them for the result?

Elle Cee strikes again

Nick woke up at 5.30 this morning, wide awake (most unlike him), so decided to get out of bed and watch the sun rise, which he did from Millennium Forest. His photos were pretty spectacular, but this was our favourite.

The boys and I started school at 8, and worked only for an hour which was enough time to finish off the last of the week’s work – really, just the spelling, writing and maths. Nick and I had double-booked the car, but a little negotiation offered the solution of Nick dropping me off in town, then taking the boys with him to the radio station where he had some prologues to record. I spent the next few hours peddling my wares, and it was a fairly profitable stint.

Nick and the boys came back to town at lunch time, and we had take-aways for lunch – although not in our usual Castle Garden spot. In the late afternoon there was a sociable atmosphere around here...Nick chatted with Richard while the Piccolo kids busied themselves in a big pile of dirt and stones, left there by the government for their ongoing pipe works. That would have kept them busy for ages had pizza not lured them home…

The pumpkin seedlings which sprouted after Nick’s genius idea of burying the pulp in the garden have taken over…they have almost covered the entire patch of dirt out front. I’m wondering where the runners are going to go next – they will still get heaps bigger.

Friendly faces

Very, very quiet day…school in the morning, then just normal at home stuff in the afternoon. Since there were no events happening during the day which called for a photo, I went wandering around Piccolo looking for something to shoot. I came across DT and Claire who had just returned from shopping, so here they are!

Friends find fresh fruit for foreigner (that's me)

School was good…I’ve been doing extra work throughout the week to prepare for Friday’s short school day (I’ll be selling beads), so the workload has been a little heavier. We’ve started studying birds again, in more detail this time. Yesterday we did ostriches, and today was penguins. The Emperor Penguin can reach a height of 120cm as an adult – nearly as tall as Caleb. We measured.

The boys were invited to Katie’s birthday party at 4.30 this afternoon. I dropped them off, pottered about at home, and then Nick and I both fetched them at 6.30. We stayed for a cup of coffee and cake (me, drinking coffee at 6.30 – I wonder if I’ll sleep tonight?), then got home just in time for Nick to leave again for Bible study.

Yesterday Claire came by with a bag of tomatoes – she found them in Thorpes, and knowing how much I love them, bought some for me. This afternoon DT came by with a handful of them too – I must surely obsess over the lack of tomatoes more than anything else!! Mental note to self…stop discussing tomatoes with people you’ve only just met. Anyway, so now I have a beautiful array of them on top of the fridge in degrees of ripeness. I am blessed! Today’s lunch was a tomato and mayonnaise sandwich, on brown bread nogal.

Hmm, finished this page today…not entirely happy with it, but hey, I was whale-like after all.

The dragon flies (not dragonflies)

It rained in the morning but cleared in the afternoon - I got a load of washing dry. Amazingly, doing the washing seems to be a big part of my life, which I hadn’t noticed in Jamestown when things were automatically dry by the end of the day regardless of whether it had been raining or not. Partly due to the drier weather, but I suppose having my washline strung under cover helped somewhat… Nick and the boys flew the kite in the afternoon. I had a 2-minute window of opportunity to catch the kite in the sun against the grey sky.

The beginning of the beginning

It rained a lot today. We had several hard showers during the day which started quite suddenly and ended as quickly.

Some excitement regarding building…Nick arranged with PW&SD to remove most of the rocks which had been stored in the schoolyard. They removed the gate from the yard, then cleared away rubble with a bulldozer. This is in preparation for the forthcoming repairs. I’m not sure what we’re waiting for now.

Them muddy boots

We thought we might do Flagstaff with Claire and Rob today, but it rained so much that we decided against it, choosing rather to mooch about at home. There has been a lot of work going on at Piccolo to do with digging trenches for the re-laying of pipes – PW&SD has been here for a week or more with big earth moving equipment and dump trucks, all very interesting for boys. There are now huge piles of fresh earth lying about and long trenches, perfect for getting dirty in. The boys’ shoes weighed twice as much at the end of the afternoon – there followed a lot of bashing of shoes on tree stumps to loosen the cakes of mud.

While they were occupied outside, I was inside…scrapping, of course…Jess came to watch while I scrapped. Fortunately the page fell together in very little time, otherwise Jess would have been bored watching me stare at the photo, wondering what to do with it!

Nitakaposema, ‘Go,’…

We've just come home from a morning in town. First, I took Caleb to see Scilla, and she's ordering new specs for him as his prescription has changed – he’s had his current pair for two years, so that’s not bad. Caleb chose his frames – a dark copper pair which look super. Then on to Good News Club just in time to start. I did the teaching today using a fairly amusing object lesson regarding missions and bible translation – I gave instructions to one team in Swahili and one team in English. Unfair disadvantage? So have the people who don’t have the bible in their language! After GNC, Nick needed to see someone about the building, so the boys and I went to the manse where I sorted a bit more of the remaining household contents. Since I don't think we'll be living in the manse again, I may as well pack it up slowly - better now than later! We were there for about an hour, then did a bit of shopping in town, buying up some more reduced, out of date goodies. The Star was having a promotion on some of their meat products - they have a new butcher who makes a lot of lovely things. They were barbequing burgers and kebabs as testers, so we all had a little sample. Yummy! Then finally, home.

Pam and Maddy came here in the afternoon – Pam can’t make a Thursday night anymore so we’re trying a Saturday. Pam digi-scrapped and I paper scrapped. Maddy and the boys found Tom and Sappho, and the five of them ran around outside playing some sort of prisoner game with sticks. Pam supplied ice-cream, fudge sauce and sprinkles…double yum!

Sappho's ice-cream...she asked me why I take photos of weird things.

Deep thoughts, grotto, building and party

I’ve been thinking about a few things (I have deep thoughts while I’m washing dishes). Presently I have two thoughts of substance in my head. The first is that I enjoy hanging around with people (specifically, female people, since I tend not to hang around with males other than my husband) with whom I can absolutely be myself. I suppose this is a normal thing – really, who wants to spend loads of time with people who put you on your guard – but I like to be with people who will laugh if I use the wrong word and not think I’m an idiot, or with whom I can swap cooking disasters. I have a couple of those very wonderful ladies right here on the island, a few more in South Africa, one tucked away in Pennsylvania, and a few more dotted about the globe. I’m enormously thankful that God has put these ladies in my life. Friendship is a mysterious and valuable thing. The second deep thought is something I’ve always known, but lately it’s becoming more of a forefront matter. It is that God’s grace is sufficient for me (2 Cor 12:9). It is more than a sentiment which applied to Paul; it is a solid truth upon which I can base my convictions that whatever happens, God will sustain me. Linked in with this truth is the doctrine of God’s sovereignty, a favourite of mine – in all things, God is at work.

Well, today has been a quiet day – I like to have quiet days, so long as there aren’t too many of them all strung together. The weather was great early morning so Nick and I walked around Longwood - there are a few little roads to explore, and we can usually get into the expansive fields from any of the roads and thereby back to Piccolo, making a pleasant round-trip.



School went well and the boys have done fabulously with their spelling and writing this week. We finished the book “Red Sails to Capri”…it was a bit of a mystery novel which we all thoroughly enjoyed. Set in Capri, Italy, it was about a mysterious cove housing a cave which the people of Capri had been afraid of for many years. Along came three foreigners who caught wind of the mystery and were determined to find out its secret…the last chapter revealed the surprise, and it turned out to be a true phenomenon! We googled it afterwards and saw pictures of the famous Blue Grotto of Capri. We were all super-excited that the book, which I had assumed to be purely fictional, had basis in fact, and we even watched a short video clip of what our dear characters in the book experienced.

Nick had another building meeting in town with the builder, planner and some other important meeting to discuss the way forward with the repairs. It seems that work can actually begin next week! The first phase will be to repair the archway between the church and schoolroom which needs to support wooden beams running across the schoolroom, before that roof can go on. The poor schoolroom has been standing open these last five months. It was also been suggested that instead of tearing down walls in the church and manse, the loose stones can simply be hammered back into position, wedged in place with smaller stones, and then lime-mortared. This will save unimaginable resources of time and money! We are very excited about this development, which originally came from some experienced Saints, but then was confirmed by the aforesaid Important People who have the last word.

We had a Piccolo Party in the evening. It’s amazing how many words there are beginning with P that go with Piccolo…people, picnic – one can really have fun coming up with silly titles. It was Louise’s 19th birthday on Tuesday, so we were all invited for a bring-and-share style party. It was good! The kids had a ball playing outside at night – not usually a privilege afforded them.