TOFW Sheri Dew

is inspiringly and unfailingly honest.

How do you measure the influence of a woman?

Sister Dew is one influential woman.

As Dae said

Sister Dew's calling to the General Relief Society Presidency

in 1997 made a huge difference to how single women were seen

and how they were invited to serve in the Church.

I know that her calling influenced my own callings to

Ward Relief Society Presidencies.

Sister Dew talked about so many things

but the question that resounded with me was

 how do you measure the influence of a woman?

How often do we measure the negative effect rather

than the positives which are often so small and hardly noticed

until they culminate into the sum of years of small actions and examples.

How often can we see the influence of the wonderful women around us?

and don't say anything to them so they can appreciate what they have done too?

Why is it that we think of the saying

little pitchers have big ears when we are gossiping or sharing a woe

but we under value the saying when we are doing good.

A woman's influence is far and wide

when we DO and BE what is good.

An example of this is

Lucky at my work has never heard me swear

and believe me I swear at work,

not often.

It works well as a barometer of how stressed I am.

The reason Lucky has never heard me swear

even though I will have done it in her presence

is simply because she has an idea of who I am.

Religious people don't swear,

kind,caring people don't swear

OK I have no idea if she thinks I'm kind and caring

but I know she thinks I'm religious

and I know she knows she is free to behave as she chooses

without my judgement

because I know she is good person and believe in her goodness.

I just received my order of books and CDs from Deseret Book

of which Sheri Dew is President and CEO.

One of the books I chose was

The Ten Virgins

by Emily Freeman

well and God

but Emily has added to the story.

The parable of the Ten Virgins is so much more

than a bunch of women who were the example of the lottery of being saved.

Aside from the fact being saved is an ongoing experience

not a singular experience.

Fundamentally five virgins have used their oil (talents) wisely and well,

maintained their lamps and their reserves of oil

and nurturing their talents and sharing them

like the bottomless well they are.

The other five were to busy, too proud, too preoccupied, too whatever

that when the Bridegroom came they had used their small supply of oil early on

and had failed to renew it and

missed out on the wedding feast.

The five wise virgins didn't do what they did thinking

this is what I do to ensure I get to partake of the wedding feast.

They lived their lives openly, expressing their thanks for their gifts and talents

by using them for good as God intended them to do so.

They are women of influence because of their actions and deeds

some seen, some unseen

all suited to them and who they are.

God doesn't ask us to be someone we are not. 

We are all people of influence.

Worth repeating from Sister Hinckley

"Be kind. Everyone you meet is facing some difficult."

Women of influence who followed their hearts

Mary Johnson Parson

Anne Perry (or here) 

Martha Hughes Cannon

Stephanie Nielson

Emmeline B Wells

Little Old Woman

or go to Mormon Women Project

Time out for women

I finally got my time out

at

Time out for women

hence forth known as TOFW.

And it was in Auckland, not Ashburton!

Major bonus.

TOFW was a full day of wonderful speakers

talking about subjects that were relevant and important to women,

all women, not just Mormon women.

Although that helps for all the cultural references

that can't help but pop up.

Cool things about the day...

First of all TOFW was very pink.

Second of all were the speakers,

left to tiny right they were

Laurel Christensen

Hilary Weeks

Virginia Pearce

Brad Wilcox

Sheri Dew

It took me about an hour to get used the big screen and the tiny people.

My eyes struggled to adjust

but then like magic they worked just fine.

I couldn't decide which was the better way to watch the speakers.

I went with Dae* and 1500 other LDS women*

and a few men.

You know how awesome women are en masse*.

You do know right?

Women en masse are a powerful thing*.

Just their united presence is huge*.

It's like a breathing energy that hums*.

I love it.

The theme of the day was

Becoming*

Becoming the best you,

Becoming the you know you are inside.

Becoming free from all that you put in your way.

Becoming.... it's up to you.

click here to go have some time out yourself

* Another cool thing about the day.

yeah/no

what is that about? Yeah No - arch typical kiwi speak. The crazy thing? We all understand what that means???

I'm back from tropical Hamilton, back to the hail laden skies of Canterbury.

The lambies ignored me, which made it very hard to take a peak at the underside of Clary to check if his balls had finally fallen off.

They have!

They are on the front deck in the hail, where they are going to stay until the world dries out.

So while ordinary things were happening in Leeston, strange things where happening in the 'tron.

I jumped in the shower this morning and there was this on my ankle..

I have no idea where this inky blue splurge could have come from. I wore orange socks to bed with white and light blue jama pants and I'd been sleeping the same sheets for three days without this mark appearing....so where the heck did this inky blot come from?

Two highlights from my weekend were...

spending a whole day with Dae and writing a 'business' plan with her and

surprise meeting Saturday night supermarket* meeting with KayeK.

Every time I go to Hamilton I promise myself I will catch up with KayeK and I never quite get there, the universe conspires against me!

I never think of KayeK as shorter than me.

Her personality is so generous and embracing that she seems bigger, maybe it's her heart I see.

Meeting KayeK at the supermarket in the hair dye** aisle was serendipity.

My original over arching plans for the weekend were canned. I was quite hurt and confused about this but if the original plans had remained (which would have been great) I wouldn't have bumped into KayeK at the supermarket.

And that's a good thing.

I got to know KayeK about 13 years ago when I was the Deanwell Ward Young Single Adult Rep***. Her and her awesome husband lil'Lloyd - a man I will one day name a lamb after - and their kids - Jordan, Audrey, Jesse, Deej, Houston and JohnBoi - were welcoming and wonderful - they still are, only lil'Lloyd died (had to stop typing there cause my heart breaks every time I think about him) but the beauty of the family and Lloyd's legacy are their open hearts.

But back to KayeK. She is a whirlwind of caring. She helps and helps others, she invites us home, she attends our parties, she keeps us going, she cooks for us, she does all of this with grace and a happy heart.

I know she has had her moments of despair and her moments immense joy.

Through out it all she has remained faithful and strong. I have had some of my best times in her company and her fry bread is awesome

As an example of a good women, you can't go past KayeK

====

*a common accidental meeting place for Mormons. Comes from not going to the pub. That evening Dae finally met her ex-brother-in-law's mother for the first time and I also bumped in to the Pearses, as I usually do. Always seems to see them in a supermarket but always a different one - hmmmmm.

**neither of us use hair dye you understand, all Maori go blond when they reach certain milestone ages.

*** yet another purgatory type calling/job in the Church where you organise activities for ungrateful, half-hearted 18 to 30 year olds. Young Farmers is a similar demographic but way cooler and motivated. My life repeats itself, and I marvel at a mysterious blue dot?!?

nicknames

in Young Farmers it seems like everyone has a nickname except me. Aww poor me.

See in my family nicknames are signs of affection. From Pippapotamous to Mags/Margaline and friends called Goose and Dae, there are nicknames all around me.

The other day I nicknamed a new friend. Panda got his name because he is elusive which reminded me of a book title - "Eats shoots and leaves" a play on grammar. It can be a panda that"eats shoots and leaves." or a panda can "eats, shoots and leaves". My new Panda, he is of the second kind because he is so elusive. I don't think he knows how elusive he is. He seems to be places and then isn't. The perfect nickname for someone who lives in the back blocks of nowhere Otago.

Then there is Lucky. I work with Lucky and her nickname evolved from her name Lucy being shortened to Luc as in Luke which became Lukey and then Lucky. Now we don't even notice we introduce her as Lucky. Actually I'm not sure I even remember her real name most of the time.

Then we have Mr Legs. Guess why he is called Mr Legs??? go on, just try. Yup he has quite nice legs, that he does. Not like that tragic bogus sheep farmer on the Silver Fern Farms ads. Now his skinny legs are a shameful indictment on townies. Mr Legs doesn't know he is called Mr Legs but I'm sure he won't mind.

Pippapotamus is a play on Pippa. Margeline, is one of Emz's names. My dad, I call by his real name so that's like a nickname when you've called him dad all your life.

But me, no nickname.

two hours

it took me to get home tonight...

These are the beautiful Southern Alps with fresh snow.

They looked like that last week and this morning (except with some low cloud).

At Methven it was clear and bright, not exactly sunny, with little flurries of snow that melted before it hit the ground so there was no sludge to walk through.

A beautiful, cool, fresh day.

Raikaia is 20 minutes from Methven. It's where I turn in from State Hwy 1 towards the Alps.

This evening I left work at 6pm, it was already very dark, so dark that when I walked to the car I could hardly see in the 3 degree temperature. I couldn't even see my breath frosting in the cold air.

If it were light the sky would have looked like this (that's yesterday's sky by the way). It wasn't exactly raining as I neared Rakaia but I should have known from the steady, stream of traffic coming towards me and Methven, yes the bleeding Rakaia Bridge on SH1 was closed.

Very closed, not even some cars across in an orderly spaced, safe manner crossing but closed, closed.

And so after driving for 2o minutes to Rakaia, I was turned around by a sick sounding volunteer fireman who agreed with me that getting home was going to be a bit of a hassle.. about 2 hours of hassle as it turns out.

I just tried to find a map that would show you what a 2 hour detour entails but I slipped down some back roads and there is no map that shows those roads.

I have always driven a lot for my jobs and my be safe in uncertain terrain and detours plan is to follow the trucks.

This worked to a point then I remembered that the trucks would take the back road past Christchurch and I needed to turn back onto SH1 much earlier than that!

I remembered Hororata had a direct road to Dunsandel which is on SH1 and meets up with a back road to Leeston. Good thing Cantanbrian road mapper and namers are predictable and named the roads in the most obvious manner, like where they go to and from.

Pippapotamus, Oti and Dae you will remember the scenic Rakaia Gorge drive we took (not together and at different times), you know that drive into the mountains, along the Rakaia River, on the plains - well imagine that in reverse and in pitch blackness.

Epic is the term I think but I made it home to the fire and a hot bath and to bed in a minute.

Tomorrow it will be like this again and I'll wonder what the big deal was.

Then I will have a grumble about how much better the North Island roads are than ours.

and then it rained

When in Hamilton my home away from home is the Paea house. Aside from Rachael being a besty, I adore her children and love her husband like brother. Nepia is a wonderful man and an excellent person who fulfills many roles with grace and only a small amount of flaking out on the couch.

However, this past weekend the Paeas in all their generosity hosted the Deanwell Ward's youth garage sale at 7.30 in the morning. This was a delightful surprise.

There is a silver lining though... I got to catch up with people from my old Ward without having to leave the property plus there was a sausage sizzle so bread, mato sauce, onions and a sausage for breakfast - the breakfast of champions I'm sure.Some of my favourite people were there.....Kade and Mem

And Hanny, who was witness to the ever decreasing wares for sale.

By the end of the of three hours the Youth had made more than $600 towards EFY camp next January.

It only looks like I stood in the same place all morning. In reality I had Kade with me, who at 18 months old quite likes running onto the road at regular intervals - a fun, fun game at 7.30 in the morning.

Then it was time to make Hanny's day by going to watch her play netball for her school.

Hanny is a super prepared girl and played Wing Defense for the first half and was subbed off for the second half.

As I watched her it all came back.

Saturday mornings in the freezing rain in short skirts, running around having no idea what I was doing...

Luckily there were refs like Rachael there to keep an eye on things.

The best thing about that morning at netball - aside from watching Hanny's team win and Hanny get into the game - was that as the game started the rain pretty much stopped and didn't start again until the final whistle. Very nice timing.

Then Hanny and I went shopping for a birthday present for Princess Meg's birthday party that afternoon.


Ngaire, another besty and Princess Meg's mum does the best kids birthday parties.
Meggy turned six and you can imagine how perfect a princess party would be.
There were a few princes too.

Ngaire put together a great party - there was pass the parcel and statues and princess says and decorate your own cupcake and then eat it. And then run around until the sugar was flushed out of small systems. Simple works best I think. A perfect princess party with gorgeous dresses.

There was also basketball practice, soccer games, lunch, then a bit of in depth girlfriend catching up and talking late into the night.

A massive day was had by many.

A good weekend thanks to the Paeas (enjoyed meeting the Painters again) and the Reedys and most of all to Dae who drove me around to all my meetings, helped me with my goal to see more movies ("The Losers" - a nice bit of goofy violence and "Boy" - funny sad) and talk and talk.

no-sun-day

I've just returned from the tropical North. Waking this morning to sunny, sunny Hamilton but feeling terrible.

Was infinitely cheered up by Memmy hopping into bed with me to discuss slavery in America. Which, of course is a perfectly normal Sunday morning.

Had a great four days - achieving my work desired outcomes (actually, fingers crossed I may have exceeded one) plus had a great time with Dae, Ngaire and the Paeas et al.

The Southern Alps looked amazing covered in a massive amount of fresh snow. Finally winter is here and I suspect I will be complaining about it shortly.

Will report with photos tomorrow.

Joy - my favourite word

There's a visit I make every time I'm in Hamilton

I do it with a song in my heart and with a snack of some kind.

It used to be that Ngaire and I would make midnight pilgrimages to the Temple with mellowpuffs to have long conversations about everything you talk about in your 20s.

Now I find time to soak in everything I can as I have gone from the luxury of being so close to the Temple to being almost at the end of the earth from God's house.

This visit I met Sister Gee.

She and her husband Brother Gee (oddly enough) are on a Senior Mission - see it's not just our young people who choose to go on Missions, we send our least experienced and our most wise to spread the Gospel.

Sister Gee is based at the Temple Visitors' Centre where she greets and speaks with people who are interested in viewing the art displays, movies and all the cool interactive presentations.

The big attraction is the Christus statue or in my case His massive hand. I've always loved Jesuses hands, Him being a carpenter and all.

Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1768-1844) sculpted the original massive marble statue and it has been replicated around the world.

Dae and I visited after dinner at Lone Star, I have no idea why I keep going there. It always seems like a good idea and the meals are nice enough but I always leave with this feeling on not having been satisfied. I think it's their staff, although we did have a particularly funny wee waiter that night. Anyway accidentally we, meaning I, did not pay for desert. This was because we got it to go and I assumed that from the time we received and walked to the counter to pay that it would have been processed but it wasn't. Which I discovered after we had left and were sitting at the Temple dining on our stolen deserts.

So to redeem ourselves I made Dae join me on a walk up Temple hill and into the Visitors' Centre to look at the Christus. That was to redeem our thieving souls and our expanding waists.

Here's Dae having the time of her life.

This visit the exhibit was by photographer Mark Mabry, who should be commended for just having a cool name. Not quite as cool as Sam Land though, that's the ultimate in cool names of late.

Mabry has taken a series of the most amazing photos called Reflections of Christ, which you can see here.

My favourite photo is this one called Joy, 'taken' just after John the Baptist baptised Jesus - I think it's my favourite because I know how they must have felt and John the Baptist is one of my favourites. Anyone who loses their head for their beliefs must be worthwhile.

please take a look at the website and if you can visit the Temple Visitors' Centre and enjoy the inspirational photos.