Adventures in Hervey Bay

October 31, 2010

Happy Hallowe'en! We actually had kids come to our house tonight - we were really surprised. Only one student at school mentioned he was going out for Hallowe'en and none of the teachers mentioned it at all. We were under the impression that it wasn't really done here. There were costumes for sale in the stores and some candy for sale, too, but it wasn't really talked about and no ads on tv, either. It turned out that only six kids came to our house. We don't know if that has to do more with the fact that we live out of town or that it really isn't done much period. I will ask the teachers at school tomorrow how much it is done here.

Yesterday we had a really lovely relaxing day here in Hervey Bay. We started out by sleeping in 'til 9:16am - what a great way to start the day since we are usually up by 6am when I am teaching. We Skyped with Terri-Ann for about 90 minutes (the boys were already in bed) which was really nice (the talking bit, not the boys in bed bit ). We love Skype and look forward to doing it with the rest of you at some point, too! After lunch, we went down to the beach and spent the afternoon there. We set up our chairs under a tree - some backpackers had the NERVE to sit under OUR tree, so we had to make do with another one. :-) As soon as we had set up, we went into the water and boy, was it refreshing - actually, it was COLD! :-) We stayed in for about five minutes and then decided we would rather be sitting in the warm air. Dad bought some camp stools for us to use at the beach so we were very comfortable with our feet up on them as we enjoyed the sun and the books we were reading. We did take another short dip in the water part way through our time at the beach - very refreshing! :-) Dad and I both agreed that we have to stop taking the beach for granted and get down there more often.

Today at church, I had a meeting with our Branch President and he has called me to be the Primary President. I thought it might be coming since our current Primary President is burned out (she's been in the calling for six years), but I thought that since we travelled so much, they might call someone else as President and leave me as the first counsellor. So, I will be sustained next week and then have just one more week after that before we head back to Canada for two months. Also, today, we found out that our branch is going to become a ward which is very exciting to everyone here. We will also, along with Bundaberg, become part of a stake. The stake centre is in a city called Nambour which is about 2 1/2 hours away and stake conference will be transmitted via satellite into our chapel. The first one will be on the third Sunday of November so we won't be here for that, but when they have the next one which I'm guessing will be in six months, Dad and I would like to travel to Nambour to see what a stake conference is like here in Australia.

Just a note about our 'getting healthy' plan - it's going really well to date. I have lost 21 pounds so far and Dad has lost the same. We are finding that exercising is really making the difference and we are making sure that we get out and get some every day (well, not on our 'day of rest' - Sunday :-) We either go for a walk or a bike ride. This week, we are also going to start doing some strength training exercises. We hope that we will be able to continue on this plan while we are in Canada, so please don't offer us any fatty foods or desserts when we are there. :-) Actually, we don't eat any fast foods anymore because our tummies just can't handle it. We rarely have any desserts, but if we do, we try to make it low fat and try to fit it into our eating plan. We are looking better and more importantly, we are feeling better. :-)

October 29, 2010

We're going swimming tomorrow! :-) Just thought I would put that in since I got an email from Uncle Kenny telling me that it had snowed in Barrie last week. :-)

Nana will be pleased to hear that we have FINALLY had our wills written up - well, they are in the process of being done. We went to the lawyer's yesterday and spoke with the girl there. We had a lot of questions for her especially since we are in Australia and you girls are in Canada, but we were assured that with the way technology is today, there were no issues at all.

We went to see a woman at H & R Block today to find out how to do our taxes since Dad is earning money in Canada and I am earning money here in Australia. We were with her for almost two hours talking about how to file our taxes here. It turns out that it's a lot easier than we thought it would be. The cost of her services was covered by the money we are receiving back from the government here, so that was good, too. We will likely use her services next year as well, just to make sure that we have understood all the ins and outs of the income tax system here. Hopefully, after that, we will be able to do the returns on our own.

We didn't get our exercise in last night because we still had three movies to watch (they had to be back today) - Dad and I watched one and I watched one while Dad was out at his weekly SES meeting. We watched 'The Kite Runner' together - it's about a young boy growing up in Afghanistan who then moves to the U.S. when war breaks out in Afghanistan - he then returns to Afghanistan as an adult when a close friend dies. It is a very good movie, but it is very emotional - it was hard to watch some of it as I have a hard time watching movies which show how badly some people treat others - I won't be reading the book as I think it would take too much out of me. I really prefer to watch movies which entertain me rather than ones like 'The Kite Runner'. While Dad was at SES, I watched 'My Sister's Keeper' - another really good movie, but also very emotionally draining. So, I was wiped out by the time I went to bed last night (emotionally speaking).

I was called this morning by TRACER, the company which calls supply teachers to fill in for absent teachers. Unfortunately, I couldn't take the job since we had the appointment with the woman at the tax office (and that HAD to be done today), but at least I now know that Tracer has my phone number. Since I hadn't received any calls up to that point, I wasn't even sure if I was in their system to be called. Hopefully, I will receive a call or two next week. I was asked today (at Kawungan) if I would take over Jane's class (another grade two class) on Monday, so that's great as the kids in that class know me a little bit. I also have Terry's class on Friday, so one more day of supply teaching this coming week would be good. I would like to aim for two to three days of supplying each week when we come back from Canada (and the new school year starts).

October 27, 2010

It's been a busy week even though I am done with my teaching contract. I have been going into school each day for a few hours just to get the kids caught up on one assignment I was having them complete. Sixteen out of twenty of the kids have completed the assignment other than the editing - I will go into the school for some time during the next two days to give the students time to finish it so that it's ready for marking.

Yesterday afternoon (noon - 3pm), I supply taught in one of the other grade two classes. What a difference between that class and Bronwyn's class - I would take Bronwyn's class any day of the week. This class couldn't stop talking - at one point, I said to a group of girls that maybe I should change their seats around - she said that the teacher had let them choose their seats - I couldn't understand why - they weren't getting any work done sitting in their chosen groups. Tracey, the teacher, had told me that if this one boy, Tyler, did nothing, that was okay. Unfortunately, he also chose to do somersaults in the classroom, shout out, mimic me, and even hit me once in the knee. I told him, in no uncertain terms, that if he did that again he would be gone. When I talked with Tracey today, she told me that she thought that if she was going to be away again, she would ask his mother to keep him at home. He did at one point tell me he was on medication, but it obviously wasn't working - or maybe it was and he is just worse if he is not on it. Anyway, I was glad to be out of there - I certainly earned my money yesterday. I have another supply day on November 5th lined up in another grade two class and I hope that experience will be much better than this one was.

Dad spent the day at the Family History Centre on Monday - they had quite a few people come to do their genealogy on that day, so that kept him somewhat busy. He also received an email from a friend in Canada who is in the airline business. In the email, the fellow told Dad that he was now working for a different company and that this company was looking for airplane inspectors on planes which this company leases to airline companies. Dad sent this company an email today along with his resume to see if they could use him here in Australia. We'll keep you posted if Dad hears back from this company.

We had the missionaries over for dinner last night - Elder Wong and I beat Dad and Elder Lock in a game of cribbage - we told them last week that we were done with being nice and letting them win and we were going to win this week - so we did! :-)

Dad just sprayed another spider - they are the creepiest things here - they are called huntsmen spiders - they are brown and they run across the floor. Dad bought this machine that sends out soundwaves which are supposed to annoy spiders so that they won't come in the house, but obviously it's not working perfectly. :-) We have rarely seen them up 'til now so I don't know if it's because of the warm weather or what. Dad is going to spray the outside of the house and on the floor between the house and the garage again.

We have been watching movies again - we rented seven this past Friday and so far we have watched four of them. "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me" (6.0), "16 Blocks" (7.0), "Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls" (6.0) and "The Manchurian Candidate" (8.0). We have three left to watch tomorrow: "My Sister's Keeper", "As Good As It Gets", and "Kite Runner". I haven't read "The Kite Runner" yet and it is on my list, so I hope watching the movie won't ruin the experience of reading the book.

We were both able to do 'Meals on Wheels' again today - I haven't been able to do it while I was doing my contract teaching, so it was good to be back again. I was welcomed back by some of the people there - it's so nice to be appreciated. I enjoyed chatting with our 'regulars' - they are such nice people and are really grateful for what we do - and we are very happy to be doing it for them. :-)

October 24, 2010

It's been a very relaxing weekend - mostly. Yesterday (Saturday), we got up early and were ready to head out at 7:15am. Our branch was doing tree planting for the local council. Fifteen people showed up to do the planting and it only took us about 1 1/2 hours to complete the task. The fellow in charge showed us what to do (dig a hole, put the plant in, put the dirt back around the plant, leave the pot upside down by the plant) and then we went to it. Dad and I worked together - he dug and I planted. Once we were all finished the planting, we had to water the plants and pick up all the pots. I was wondering why we had to meet up so early to do the planting, but I figured it out by the time we were done with the planting. By 9am, it was quite warm out and since we were expending energy doing the planting, we were sweatiing quite well. Dad and I really felt good doing the service project - the fellow in charge said we were the only church who had volunteered to do the tree planting and said that we could come back and do some more in a couple of months so that we could finish up planting in the area we did yesterday.

After the tree planting, we went grocery shopping and then spent the rest of the day/afternoon relaxing at home. We took our computers and magazines outside and sat on the patio chairs and then out in the sun - another lovely day and it was fabulous being outside and enjoying the sun and the fresh air. Around 5pm, Dad and I went for our daily exercise which was a walk today. Dad has mapped out a route for us to try and finish within 30 minutes. It's a 3.5km route and right now we are doing it in 35 minutes. We are going to continue to walk the route and try to speed things up a bit each day until we reach our goal.

We spent the evening doing some more relaxing - life is so hard here in Hervey Bay. :-) We rented 7 movies on Friday night and decided to start watching one last night. We chose to watch 'Austin Powers' and, although we stopped watching the movie because I was too tired to finish it, I can't see yet why it has received such good reviews. I haven't found the first half hour that funny - hopefully, it will pick up when we start watching it again.

Today was our Primary Sacrament presentation and it went fairly well, over all. Three of the kids wouldn't do their parts, so the leaders had to sub for them. The young women also joined us in the singing - we really needed them as the kids don't know the songs as well as they should have. We had about a dozen kids there today which is probably the most we have ever had at one time. The presentation itself ran fairly smoothly and we heard positive reviews about it afterwards, so that was good to hear.

At 4:30pm, we were back at the chapel for the missionary fireside. When we got there, Dad was asked by Elder Lock who was leading the fireside and Dad told him that Chris Vakas was supposed to be doing that, he thought. Chris wasn't there, so Elder Lock asked Dad if he would conduct the meeting. Dad also had to speak during the fireside. The first speaker was Ashley and he spoke about Joseph Smith's first vision - he spoke for about ten minutes and he did a great job. Ashley is an 18 year old boy in our branch who is quite shy, so I am sure that it was difficult for him to give the talk, but he just got up and did it, which was great! Dad spoke about the authority and organization of the church and did a really good job, too.

We spent quite a bit of time cooking/baking this weekend. We made pea and ham soup, Italian vegetable soup, brownies/cupcakes (for the primary children after the presentation), and two chicken dishes. I just love doing the cooking (I'm not really into baking) and everything we cooked this weekend tasted really delicious! We have been inputting the information about the food we have been eating into an internet site and I am still eating a little more than I should (calorie-wise) and so I am still tweaking my eating plan. I want to make sure that I eat two fruit and vegetables each day. I know that I should be eating more vegetables daily, but since I am not a vegetable person, I figure if I eat at least two servings per day, that's not too bad.

October 21, 2010

Last night, we went to Santini's for our anniversary. We were the first people for dinner - they don't open until 5:30pm - but, by the time we were done, the place was one third full. We started off with a delicious garden salad with a light oil/balsamic dressing. The waitress then brought us our main meals: Dad had beef tortellini with a bolognese sauce and I had curly green fettucine with chicken pesto sauce and we shared an order of garlic bread. They had two sizes of the main meal: entree (smaller) and main (regular size) - Dad and I decided to go with the entree size and it was quite enough. Both Dad's and my meal were totally delicious! We enjoyed all parts of our meal and ate slowly so we really relished the food. :-)

When we were done, we went to see if The Cheesecake Shop was still open (it was) and we bought a small pavlova for dessert. I couldn't wait for us to get home so I could eat a slice. It was soooooooooooo yummy - with strawberries, peaches, pears and kiwis on top - and the cream.......mmmmmmmmmmmmm. Dad and I only ate one third of it last night, so we can enjoy another slice tonight and one tomorrow night. What a lovely treat! :-)

The past two days have been quite good, both at school for me and for Dad. I have been mostly working with the 'low' children at school - Chantelle has a handle on the class and hasn't needed me to handle either Ryley or Travis (although I have spoken with both of them a few times over the past two days, but mostly in passing and it seemed to be enough to settle them down). It's been nice to be able to work with the children who need me the most, although both Taleighya and Hayley have needed speaking to - Taleighya about doing her best work and Hayley about acting her age. I made the mistake of telling Taleighya yesterday that she would stay in for recess if she didn't get her work done - she didn't care as she doesn't particularly like going out for recess since she doesn't have any friends. I told her today to go back to the classroom since she wasn't working and sent her work with her. After a while, I guess she figured that she wasn't going to get my help and so she got to work and completed the task I had given her. When she came out to show me, I praised her for getting the work done and talked with her about the importance of always doing her best. The next task assigned to her, she got right down to work.

I stopped by Bronwyn's house yesterday after school to set up a time to meet with her and tell her what's been going on at school. While I was there, she gave me a beautiful glass necklace she bought in Venice. It's very colourful and it will go with many of my tops. I thought that was very thoughtful of her. She also told me that Leanne, our VP, told her that she was very pleased with the way I have taken over the teacher role in the classroom - she told Bronwyn that everything had been very seamless going from Bronwyn to me. Bronwyn also told me how pleased she had been that I had been able to take over the class - it was so stress-free for her knowing that I knew the kids and that I knew what was going on in the classroom. I was really happy to hear that Leanne was pleased with my teaching - hopefully, that will lead to more jobs in the future. I am going in to speak with her tomorrow about how the hiring process works in Hervey Bay.

Bronwyn came into the school today to see how things were going and to get a report of where we were up to in our teaching. We sat with her for about two hours and caught her up on what's been happening in the classroom while she has been gallivanting around Europe. She seemed pleased with what she saw happening in the classroom and with what we told her. I told her that Chantelle has been doing the majority of the teaching and so she, Bronwyn, could do some one-on-one assessment when she came back - she seemed really pleased about that.

I feel a little sad that it's all coming to an end - although it's been challenging at times, I really do love being a teacher and helping children learn. I love watching them take in what I am teaching them and then them showing me what they have learned in different ways. I love integrating my lessons over various subject areas - I haven't done as much as I would have done in my own class, but it's still been a really good experience for me. Bronwyn told me that there is a grade one teacher who is planning on taking long service leave next year and that I should go and talk with her and let her know that I would be available to cover her if she would like. She might have someone in mind already, but I figure it won't hurt to go and speak with her, so I will do that tomorrow. I will be spending some time next week going into Bronwyn's class to finish up some work with some of the students so that Bronwyn doesn't have to worry about it. And Tracey, another grade two teacher, has asked me to come in and cover for her for the afternoon on Tuesday. But, sometime this week, I plan on having one completely lazy day including a really good sleep-in. :-)

October 19, 2010

Happy Anniversary to us! :-) We both had a really good day today - me at school and Dad running around like a little chicken with his head cut off. :-)

All of our students were here at school today, but maybe the extra day off made a difference because all of the 'challenge' children were manageable today. Ryley even earned three stamps today (one for each session) which really pleased all of us. I worked a little with Travis today and he seemed pleased with the little bit of time I could give him. I spent most of the day working with small groups or one on one with students. It is so nice having two teachers to twenty students - too bad we couldn't have it like this all the time.

I went into talk with Leanne, the VP, today to see if there were any other contract positions coming up beginning next week and she said that she didn't know of any. She told me that they were very pleased that I could work for them for the past five weeks and asked me if I had enjoyed myself. I told her that 'most' of it had been enjoyable. :-) For the next three weeks, I will just see if I get any supply teaching jobs - if not, that's fine, too - I won't mind having some downtime. :-)

During the day, Dad cleaned the house, did a little grocery shopping, did a couple of errands, mowed and trimmed the lawn and got dinner/dessert ready early. Phew!

After school, Dad and I took a 6km bike ride around the area we live in. We even rode into the Anglican College to see if the kangaroos feeding on the grass there would hop away if we came near them. There were about ten of them on the grassy area of the school when we started riding up towards them - as we got closer, half a dozen of them hopped away, but four of them just stood there and stared at us as we stood there. It was so cool to be so close to them - next time we go for a ride, we are going to take our camera with us to get some photos of them - we will post some on here when we do that.

We had the missionaries over for dinner tonight - it seems that Tuesday nights have become our 'usual' night to have them over. We made tacos for them (well, Dad made them) and they really like them, as did we. We made them a white cake with chocolate icing for dessert (well, Dad made it) which they also liked (and took the rest home - Elder Lock said he was going to eat it for breakfast :-)

We will celebrate our anniversary tomorrow by going out to dinner to an Italian restaurant here in town - we are really looking forward to it! AND, we are NOT going to count the calories from the virgin pina coladas or the pavlova which we eat tomorrow.

October 18, 2010

Wow, it's been a few days, eh? Not much has been happening, but I will fill you in on what's been going on here in beautiful Hervey Bay (and I promise to write more often from now on). :-) Friday was a really good day at school - would you believe it, five students were absent and four of them are my challenge children - Ryley, Travis, Sean and Kurtis were all away. Sean and Kurtis just whine a lot and won't 'give it a go' (an Aussie saying meaning 'give it a try') and that's annoying, but they aren't behaviour problems like Ryley and Travis. But, having those four away made our classroom so much nicer to be in. When I saw them away, I actually wanted to do some teaching, rather than letting Chantelle do it all.

Our weekend was full of relaxing - well, my weekend was. :-) Dad spent Saturday with his SES friends. They were doing parking control in a small town about half an hour from Hervey Bay. It was a day of activities to raise money for the local athletic programs (eg: recreation centre) - there were markets, food tents/stalls, horse races, games, kids' play areas, auctions, etc. Dad spent about 7 hours there and only came back at 3pm because the local SES leader called them back because there were callouts going on here in Hervey Bay (big storm from the previous night so there were fallen trees all over the place) and she wanted a back-up team in case they were needed (fortunately, they weren't needed).

I was going to spend part of the day cleaning, but when I looked outside and saw a blue sky and the sun shining, I had to make a choice. Let's see: inside and cleaning or outside reading - it was a hard choice (yeah, right! :-) NO, I DID NOT CHOOSE TO CLEAN. :-) It was a glorious day and I enjoyed being out there in the sun and fresh air - it really is a beautiful place to live here.

Saturday night was spent relaxing in front of the tv. We have found a show over here called 'Air Crash Investigations' which we enjoy watching (Dad especially) and I love watching a show called 'The Bill' (a British show) and so that took up our evening. Dad also found time to work on his talk for next week's missionary fireside - he is doing it on the authority and organization of the church.

Sunday - another relaxing day - was spent at church (we had a practice for the Primary presentation which is next week). When we got home, we had lunch outside and we spent the rest of the day outside relaxing. Dad worked on his talk for a while and I read some magazines. I have attached some photos of the beautiful day that it was.

Today, Dad spent the day at the Family History Centre - pretty routine, he says. For me, it was a Pupil Free Day (which means no kids - yay :-) We spent most of the day doing team planning - not that interesting for me since I am not part of the team on a full-time basis, but very good for the team as a number of questions were answered and some assessment tests created. There are a lot of expectations of the teachers here and more seems to be being heaped upon them. I know that I don't want to teach full-time here. I am going to go into the Anglican College next week to see if they need any supply teachers. I am also going to talk with the VP at Kawungan to see if there are any other contract positions coming up in the next three weeks and/or at the beginning of the new school year at the end of January 2011.

Dad and I have decided to plan ahead of time what exercise we will do each night and so we went for a good brisk walk today. Tomorrow, we will do our strength exercises and also hopefully go for a bike ride. We have both hit plateaus in our weight loss and I think that it has to do with not being consistent with our exercising. I thought that since writing down our menus works for our eating plan, that if we wrote down our exercise plan, we might be more likely to do it. Wish us luck! :-)