Thursdays Thrills!

Thursday morning after first popping into the office we headed down south towards Rotorua. On our way we went into a café at Tirau and had a cuppa. We also had a quick look around the shops. Our next stop was Rotorua, we had decided to stay the night so booked into our motel first before exploring the shops. Well one shop actually but we had a smashing time in there, didn’t we Sue? Actually it’s not fair of me to post only half a story and as Sue will probably not read this post anyway I’ll spill the beans. We went into a shop called Spotlight. It’s a bit like Dunelm in England only they had lots of really nice fabric as well. On our way out they had a nice display of candles, had being the important word here. Malcolm and I were reading the signs, outloud, that were placed on each shelf stating not to pick the jars up by the neck of the jar. We watch as Sue very carefully picked the jar up just underneath the neck only that didn’t quite work out as planned. CRASH-SMASH Opps!

The two shop assistants were very kind and pleasant and cleared up all the smashed glass. I didn’t realise that glass could spread so far. We were very apologetic as we left the shop but when we were outside we saw the funny side and were in fits of laughter. Next stop a cuppa to calm the nerves. Sadly during all of this Elder Saunders was back at the motel resting/preparing for rnight out. Actually it was a very good night out. We went with Sue & Malcolm to a Maori cultural show which was very enjoyable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Maori Village On Stage

 

The Chief

 

Wednesdays Wanderings

I spent the whole day at the office on Wednesday because I had a lot to catch up on. Elder Saunders spent a lot of time driving around. He cleared out the lock-up of all the rubbish and took it to the tip. He also took the good used blankets to the laundrette to be properly cleaned before picking up the new bedding from Te Rapa Warehouse. During this time he dropped Sue and Malcolm off at Hamilton Garden and later collected them. They then came into the office for a while waiting for me to finished off my day’s work. On our way home we popped into Tuhikaramea Camp to drop something off to the Witts. Then we stopped by the Temple visitors centre to drop off the mail. For dinner we ate the left over curry from Monday which was still very nice. So a day filled with business.

Especially for Sue!

On Monday morning I got up is it raining, or sunny again?
I’m going to the airport to pick Sue up today, it play time, its playtime again.
Antonio, Antonia I’m singing, I’m singing again!

What a week we have ahead of us but first into the office to work for a few hours. There is no mail today as its Waitangi day and a public holiday. They are celebrating the signing of the treaty of Waitangi. Look it up if you are interested. Sue and Malcolm were due to arrive 1.45pm but their flight was delay an hour so that gave us more time to do deliveries on our route to the airport. First we delivered a washing machine to the Zone leaders in Papakura. They were ready and waiting for us with their old machine. So we were quickly on our way to deliver the microwave to the sisters. Another four satisfied customers (missionaries).

After we picked up Sue and Malcolm it was getting a bit later to do any sightseeing so we bought curry from our local Indian in Dinsdale. Very nice too and enough for two meals.

 

Surfing Saturday!

We had a bit of a sleep-in on Saturday. When we did eventually arise the Bellistons were waiting for us to go out for a drive. About 45 minutes away from their home is Rere. If you can remember last year we went to the Waterfall and the Rock slide promising to come back in the summer when the water was warmer. Well today is that day!
But will we go down the slide? To be honest I did not feel at all confident in having a go which was a shame because it looked like fun. We watched as many youngsters faced the slide and eventually Elder Saunders and Elder Belliston took their turn. It was amazing and in fact they went down twice.

I’ll try and load a video of it.

 

Yippee that worked I hope you can see it.

 

I came, I saw, I conquered. I have the scars to prove it!

 



Gisborne 2016

This is our first trip to Gisborne this year and possible our last. We arrived about 8pm and went straight to Elder and Sister Belliston’s home. We had a nice little chat but I enjoyed watching an Australian cooking show. This is a good way to de-stress after a stressful day. Not that I found this day stressful, I’m just saying.

Friday morning we were up nice and early and at the Elder flat by 9. The elders have now moved into a more suitable area. They were meant to be there at 9 with their key but they didn’t turn up until about 9.30 and they had forgotten the key! Never mind but I did make them work hard after that. I must admit that most of the contents of the house had been taken out and it was not too bad. Just a little bad, for missionaries that is. They did a very good job of following instructions and cleaning up. Just to clarify not all of these Elders lived in this flat they were just good enough to come along and help out.

We went to the Warehouse shop to buy a dustbin for the Elders and then dropped it off at their flat. They wanted to show us how smart the new duvet looked on their bed. We were also offered some of their delicious American biscuits, obviously I said yes otherwise how would I know that they were delicious. Because they worked so hard we treated them to lunch not that they were expecting it. In fact one of the missionaries wanted to treat us so he bought us a real ice cream milkshake from Carl’s Jr. Need I say more.

After this big meal we decided that we would fast until tomorrow lunch time. That was from Friday to Saturday instead of Saturday until Sunday. One of the reasons was that we would be travelling home on Sunday and you can get a little heady travelling such a long way with nothing to eat. Ours was another special fast. I will just to explain why we fast for some of you who do not know. The first Sunday in every month we call Fast Sunday. We either do not eat for 2 meals or fast for 24 hours. There may be reasons sometimes why you cannot fast, medical or something but generally the whole church fast on this day. The money that you save from not eating we put into a fast offering fund. This money is used to feed the poor and needy throughout the world as well as members in our church. We are encouraged to donate a generous fast offering. Meanwhile while we are fasting we can pray for a specific purpose. In fact it is said that “fasting without prayer is just going without food.”

Our special fast this month was for a little girl and her family, she is going for a serious operation tomorrow. Also a friend is battling cancer and we are joining our church members in England who fasted last week for him. We always hope for a miraculous result even if we don’t get the answers we are hoping for we are given the strength to cope with whatever.

 

Thirsty Thursday

First I should mention there is no reason why I put thirsty Thursday only that it rhymed!
We went into the office first thing to check out the mail, emails and sort any post for the missionaries on the final day of Conferences 

Today we wanted to listen to all of the 3 presentations but it didn’t quite work out like that. After listening to President Rudd’s opening remarks Elder and Sister McGregor introduced themselves before Elder McGregor talked about car safety. We then went outside and took all the old blankets out of the cars from Taranaki Zone and replaced them with the new ones. I had instructed Taranaki Zone leaders to ask all their missionaries to place a label inside their car stating their Zone and their names and I must admit they all were brilliant at doing this.

By the time we had finish loading all the cars the second presentation was almost over. So I offered my help to Sister Papple again. This time my role was to place cheese on top of all the Mexican mince. Another yummy meal from Sister P. After lunch we choose to go into Elder Tibbetts presentation which was excellent.

We all met back in the chapel for the conclusion which was after we did our Daft Duvet Demonstration. Again very funny! We didn’t stay for President Higgins final remarks, which would have been excellent I’m sure. We had a long trip down to Gisborne (6 hrs) ahead of us, ready for our flat clean-up the next day.  But that is a story for the next blog entry which I can’t write about now because it hasn’t happed yet. Just arriving into Gisborne now.

Weary Wednesday!

We woke up really early and had plenty of time to get ready and walk all the way to the airport from the hotel, about 3 minutes. The plane had arrived two minutes early at 5.48am and we were waiting from 6.20 until 7.30 for them to get through customs. We then drove back to our office in Hamilton where Elder Saunders talked to them about flats, fleas and finances. He then took them to the shops to sort out Phones, Falmers (for a hair dryer) and food.
He instructed the couple to read a Driving in New Zealand manual before he took the Elder out on the road. Then he let the Elder loose on the New Zealand roads! They first followed Elder Saunders to the garage then to the Church History Centre, only nobody was there, so he then took them to the motel they were staying at.
I stayed in the office the whole time catching up on loads of paper work. We left the office gone 6pm and headed for the lock-up where we first stuck sticky labels on all of the quilt cases. That was a bit of an improvement on using the tape and useless gun. Thanks Elder Saunders for this brilliant suggestion. We then loaded the trailer with the quilts, covers and blanket for tomorrows trip to Te Kuiti.