I talked with Yvonne, the teacher I am taking over for, at the end of the day, just to get a few more pointers for Tuesday. I had some thoughts going through my mind all throughout the day - z, q, and l are our letters for next week and I picked out zebra and quilt for the crafts for the coming week and decided that the lion that Chantelle's teacher's aide had chosen, was a great idea. There I was - feeling great about being in charge of a classroom again. I know it will be busy and I will likely be stressed for a bit, but I am really looking forward to it. Sam, my teacher's aide, is great and she even helps do some of the teaching (as opposed to some TAs who just do all the prepping) and I know it will be easier for the students to make the transition from Yvonne to me with Sam in the room.
That evening, we were invited to Robyn and Geoff's for dinner - originally it was going to be us and Rob and Rosalea, but Rob and Rosalea went to the Temple this weekend. Robyn and Geoff then invited Neville Pearce to join us as well - Neville is in his 80s and just lost his wife, who was the love of his life, and so he is now on his own. We had a lovely roast chicken dinner which was delicious and the conversation was really nice, as well. I asked Brother Pearce how he and his wife met and that led to him telling us quite a lot of his life history. It was really nice to get to know him a little and of course, it is always nice to hang out with Robyn and Geoff.
We got to sleep in on Saturday morning and I made it to a respectable almost 9am - I was very pleased! :-) Dad slept until about a half hour before I woke up which was pretty good as well. We lazed around for a while which was really nice as it's been full-on for the past three weeks and it will be full-on for the next two weeks until school holidays. We had a few errands to run before we went to our friend (and my Primary secretary) Denise's to pick her up. It was her birthday and I had told her that I wanted to take her out for lunch to celebrate. When I had told her that, she was overcome a little bit - she told me that no-one had ever done that for her before. I was surprised to learn that and happy to be the one to do this for her as she is such a nice person, a great secretary and a lovely friend.
We dropped Dad off at home and then I drove us to the restaurant. The one we wanted to go to was closed for lunch as it turned out, so we went to a cafe next door. After looking over the menu, we both chose the same thing: chicken with mango in a filo pastry rolled in macademias with fries and a salad. It was $15. which in Australia isn't a bad price. We thoroughly enjoyed the meal and took our time eating it. I told Denise that we HAD to have dessert and we both chose a raspberry cheesecake. It was wonderfully yummy and I ate it very slowly. :-) The slice was VERY small - the smallest that I have ever seen. I thought that maybe it would mean that the cost of them was cheaper (the prices for the desserts were not on the menu and as it was Denise's birthday, I didn't want to ask what they cost). WELL, I was shocked when I got the bill - the cheesecake slices were $9. EACH!!! Wow, I thought, that was over the top pricing for what we got! But, what can you do - at least there was no tax and tip on top of the final bill as taxes are included in everything you buy in Australia, and you don't tip in Australia (the wages are very good here in Australia, so I guess that's why they don't tip). Even though it ended up being an expensive bill, Denise loved the meal and the company and came away with a smile on her face, so that pleased me.
That evening (yesterday), we had guests for dinner - the missionaries and our Bishop and his wife, Diana. Elder Richardson has become close to both us and them and, as he is likely being transferred next week and the Bishop and Diana are leaving for a month, it was the last time we could all get together, so he asked me if we could do that at our house and I said 'yes'. We knew that I was going to be taking Denise to lunch and wouldn't have a lot of time to make the dinner before 5pm when our guests would be arriving, so we 'cheated' and bought roast chickens, gravy in a packet, buns and a mud cake from the grocery store and added mashed potatoes and microwaved carrots. The Bishop and Diana brought a salad to round out our dinner. The food was great and we had such a good time talking with everyone. Both the Bishop and Diana are really funny and we laughed tons over the night - we had such a fun time with them and will definitely be having them back for dinner when they come back from overseas (they are going to Utah to see their daughter and her family).
Bishop Brown, Diana, Elder Richardson, me, Dad, Elder Paki (pronounced Pah - key)
Today was another busy day at church. We started our day with a ward missionary meeting, then I got things ready for Primary, then Sacrament meeting (which was about keeping your testimony strong - Fiona, Audrey and Rob, the second counsellor in the Bishopric, all spoke. The most important point I got from the meeting was that it was so important to be doing things which will continually strenthen my testimony: saying my prayers, reading my scriptures, attending my meetings, etc. - someone even mentioned that you are never too old to stop building up your testimony). Primary went very smoothly - we were down two teachers, but Maureen, my first counsellor, taught the Valiants (8 - 11 year olds) and the missionaries taught the Sunbeams (3 year olds). Debbie, my second counsellor was away, so Denise and I met during the class time to get caught up on some Primary business. I was in charge of 'Sharing Time' - we were talking about how important it was to keep the covenants you made with Heavenly Father - the children were doing some 'fill-in-the-blanks' which they seemed to enjoy - we didn't have enough time to finish the task, though - I am hoping that their parents will work with them at home to complete it. After church was finished, I had a Primary Presidency meeting - our first since Maureen returned after being away for six weeks and, even though Debbie was away, I wanted to start our twice monthly meetings and hold this one when it was supposed to be held. Our first meeting took over an hour, but we covered a lot in that time, and hopefully our future meetings will be shorter. We received a very nice compliment today - one set of parents, who came into our meeting to listen to their son give a talk, told me afterwards that they were so impressed at how organized our Primary was and how much their children enjoyed coming to Primary. We were all so pleased about that because we have been working hard to make that happen. :-)
Dad went to choir after our meetings today - it's High Council Sunday next week and so we will be having a special guest speaker and the choir will be performing then. They are going to be singing a hymn called 'Jesus Saviour, Pilot Me'. The choir is made up of about 15 members and I am looking forward to hearing them sing next Sunday. Leanne, who leads our music in Primary, is the choir director and she is really really good at what she does. Dad finds it a bit challenging the way she teaches, though - he needs to be able to look at the words and the music and the choir director all at the same time, but Leanne wants the choir members to only watch her.
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