Sunday, 10 January, 2016

The weather has been amazing this week - we are loving summer here. :-)

This has been another week of appointments: chiropractor, doctor, physiotherapy, another facial and haircuts (I got foils this time).  We always seem to be so busy when we return from being away - it's supposed to be a relaxing time, but it seems like it's been full-on this week.

We got our kitty cat back on Monday - Peaches - and it's been wonderful having her back in our home.  It's so nice being able to have a cat here when we are here, but good that we can take her back when we leave.  We will only have her for ten days this time, but ten days is better than not having a cat around. :-)  Peaches seems a lot calmer this time around and less skittish when we come near her.  She has even taken to sleeping on our bed at night and loves to be petted.  She does, however, also like to go into our closet or under our bed during the day.

our beautiful Peaches

On Monday, we were invited to dinner at the Cooper's (members of the ward) and the Kingsleys were there, too.  (I can't believe that I forgot to take our camera with us - sheesh)  We had a nice time chatting while we ate and then, afterwards, we had Family Home Evening with them.  We watched a video about some people from the Book of Mormon (Moroni and Zarahemnah and their armies) who were fighting each other, although Moroni didn't want to - he wanted peace - and only fought to help protect his people.  Afterwards, we had a good discussion about it and then spent some more time chatting before coming home.

On Tuesday, I went to our Bishop's home to help him and his wife, Diana, pack up their stuff (our friend, Jan, also joined us).  I was so glad to have Jan helping out as she is very visual/spatial and was fabulous at packing the boxes.  I ended up wrapping up the fragile pieces in paper and then handing the items to Jan to pack.  Diana and Bishop sold their house in record time and so are going to rent until they move further south in Queensland to be nearer to their daughter and grandchildren who live in Brisbane.  We were able to get all of the packing done except for their clothes and the things they are going to need to use until they move next week.

On Wednesday and Friday, I went over to Robyn's house to work on Relief Society Activity stuff for the upcoming activities for this year.  I am so pleased that we have been able to organize so much during the time Dad and I have been home.

I had another facial on Thursday and it was fabulous!  Helen is really skilled and she even told me that day that two of her teachers from TAFE (college) are now her clients!  After that, it was 'Dad to the rescue' with his technology skills.  We spent two hours with one couple in the ward getting their tablet set up and downloading church stuff onto it.  Dad then spent some time teaching them how to use the tablet, especially so that they could use it on Sunday at church.  Then, it was off to Robyn's to help her with a printer problem and then to our friend, Denise's, to help her with a printer issue.  Our friends sure were grateful to Dad that day for all of his help.

On Friday, Dad received his schedule from work for the first six months of this year.  So far, he has February off and then we are coming to Canada for the month of March for him to teach in Toronto.  A week after we get back from Canada, we head off to Perth for the month of April and then we are home for the month of May.  We then are scheduled to head back to Perth in June for seven weeks.  Dad might get more work than this as things often come up at QAC, but for now, Dad's happy with the amount of courses he has been asked to teach.

On Saturday, Robyn and I went for a swim near her place since it was such a lovely, warm day.  The water was a bit chilly to get into at first, but we were soon wet all over and spent about an hour just bobbing in the water and chatting.  It is so nice to live so close to a beach.  After our swim, we went back to Robyn's to work on some quilting samples which is our February R.S. activity.  The sisters are going to be learning how to do 'sashiko' which is a form of decorative reinforcement stitching (or functional embroidery) from Japan.  We are using this stitch to make a square each of a quilt which will be sewn together and then donated.

my attempt at sashiko - some of the designs which people do are amazing (you can google it if you want to see some of them) - but, I think mine is pretty good for a first timer :-)

Sunday, 3 January, 2016

This week was full of appointments for us.  When we are home, we have to try and fit in all of our doctor's, etc. appointments since we never know when we will be back home again.  This week, I had my yearly breast ultrasound (all clear), a massage (so relaxing!), a chiropractor's visit (much needed) and a facial (mmmm, I love being pampered!).  Dad also had a massage and a chiro visit.

I also got together with my friends, Bronwyn and Chantelle.  Since Chantelle works as a teacher in a city nine hours away, we only get to get together with her when she is home during school holidays.  We met at the Coffee Club for our usual iced chocolate and had a good long yak.  I met with Chantelle on Tuesday and we talked for three hours!  Then, the two of us met again with Bronwyn the next day for about an hour.  I love catching up with my friends and having an iced chocolate is a bonus! :-)

As you know, Dad and I are not New Year's Eve people.  We did manage to see midnight, said 'Happy New Year' and turned over and went to sleep. :-)

On Saturday, we went to a geocaching event held about two hours from HB.  It was organized by a long-time geocacher (Keith) specifically for newbies (people who had found less than 100 caches) to come and learn more about geocaching from more experienced geocachers.  Keith had placed a number of brand new caches in the area so that the newbies could be the first-to-find the geocaches.  Many of the newbies went out with the oldies to find these caches.  Dad and I felt that we had enough experience to go out on our own.  We were able to find out first cache quite easily.  After we found the first one, we went back to where Keith was to get a list of the rest of the caches.  We found 7 out of 8 of the caches - we couldn't find one as we couldn't find a place to park to get to it - we did see one couple find it, but they had parked their car on the side of the highway and we didn't think you were allowed to do that unless it was an emergency.

There was one cache which we had a real difficult time finding.  We actually came up to find it and found two other couples searching for the cache and we joined in the search.  None of us could find it and so we went back to Keith to let him know.  He then told us exactly where he put it and we all went back to find it.  While we were talking with one of the couples, we told them we were from HB and they told us they were from Maryborough which is half an hour from HB.  Liz and Bruce were there with another couple and asked us to come over and visit them some time.  It was really nice to meet another couple who enjoys geocaching and live so close.  We are looking forward to meeting up with them when we get back from our cruise.  We have no pics to share, though - we had our camera with us, but we were so caught up in everything there, that we completely forgot to take any photos.  Dad and I really enjoyed our day and look forward to doing more geocaching.  Some of the people there had thousands of found geocaches - Dad and I have about 95 now, so we have a long way to go to catch up to some of the others.

Dad and I worked a lot today on Relief Society Activity things - I love Pinterest!  There are so many amazing ideas on that site.  I am good at finding what I need and Dad is good at working on the computer to get things just the way I want them.  We have made up invitations for the year, plus invites for people to lead the activities, plus a yearly calendar of the activities, plus recipes for the luncheons / refreshments.  Dad has worked just as hard on things for R.S. that I told him that he should consider this his calling, too. :-)  I am really pleased at how much we have been able to get done and I think that the activities are going to be fun and a learning experience and most of all, an opportunity for the sisters to get together and socialize and get to know each other better.