Björn's enterprises

It seems that I have been posting a lot about Torvy lately - these things seem to go in cycles. So I thought I'd let you know how things are going with Björn. He is working part time at a greengrocer's. Being underage, he earns less than minimum wage, but it's more than doing nothing, and working an average of 8 hours a week, he is building up quite a little haul.

The work is quite physical, so he gets a good workout at the same time, which he enjoys.

He has taken to buying a few sweets from the store and selling them for a profit at school. He has a huge potential market, since there are no longer any sweets, fizzy drinks, crisps or any other junk foods on sale on any school campus in the UK. All part of the healthy schools initiative. School meals all have to be healthy as do all foods and drinks available to the kids. Of course, that doesn't stop parents sending the most abominable packed lunches, so I don't know how successful it will be.

The thing is, there is an independent store on campus which sells exactly what it pleases. Y7s and 8s are not permitted to go to that shop, but anyone from Y9 and up has simply transferred their junk fix purchases there.

I admire his ever-enterprising spirit, but I am concerned about the morality of his actions. His argument is that the kids can go up to the store, so he is not doing anything questionable. I maintain that Y7s and 8s will be able to buy from him and he has no way of knowing what ages his customers are. While the cut-off line may be arbitrary, some parents of younger ones may be resting assured that their kids are maintaining a healthy diet while on campus, only to be scuppered by my son!

Hmm. Is a puzzlement.

No doubt I will be doing a sitrep about Björn again very soon, when he turns 15. Fifteen. FIFTEEN!!! Good grief. How did that happen?

Torvy's party

Last night, we had a party for Torvy's 13th birthday. We were expecting 28 kids, but only 14 turned up. This is a tendency we have noticed - whether this is an English thing or a teenage thing, I haven't fathomed, but many kids will say they're coming and then not pitch, among them often some of the party kid's closest mates. Weird.

Fortunately, those who did attend had a whale of a time, the birthday boy included. We split them up into teams and kept them on the run all night, playing balloon volleyball, table tennis, pool and chüngel (which is always a hit).

Torvy scored a lot of money, which he is going to put towards a bass guitar. We went looking at basses today and he seems to have enough. As he test drove a few of them today, it was the first time John had seen/heard him play the bass and he was quite impressed. There's no denying it: the kid is talented!

The guy who plays bass in my worship band has offered to help him choose a bass and to mentor him. Next week, we hope that he will be able to come with us to actually buy the guitar, after which Torvy is hoping to join the youth band. He also belongs to a boy band of sorts with two of his friends, one of whom is unbelievably talented on the lead guitar and quite the little songwriter - they're just short a drummer at the moment. Any offers...?

So now he's 13

There seems to be a lot of news about Torvy at the moment, and this post is yet another of those. For those who don't know - he became a teenager this Saturday past (16 September). So here's a quick catch-up about our newest teenager. Here you see him on the phone to one of his well-wishers. He has a habit of pacing when he is on the phone and covers fair distances during longer calls!

He is 157cm tall and weighs 47kgs. He has masses of slightly curly or very wavy golden brown hair that hangs down to his shoulders. He still has a very elfin face, but we're expecting that to change over the next year as testosterone has its wicked way with his features. We will all be sorry to see the that nose go, including Torvy himself - he has always had the neatest, most beautiful little nose in the family. Genes have not been kind to the rest of us in the olfactory area - it remains to be seen if Torvy will escape unscathed in that department!

He plays the guitar, and is quite a talented musician, having a good ear. He is planning to buy a bass guitar with his birthday money and start improving on that instrument, too.

He is not very sporty, but would like to join a gym. There is a kid's gym at school, but it's private and costs a fair amount to join. We shall have to see whether we can make the numbers work.

He is a responsible little boy, who steps up to the oche and takes ownership of whatever he is given to do (although not always cheerfully). He tends to pessimism and is a real worry-wart. He has the wackiest sense of humour and has been known to reduce the family to helpless heaps of hilarity.

Karyn's Master's degree

I start my course on Tuesday next week. I tell you what, though: for a world-renowned university, they are seriously disorganised and totally out of touch with the real world. I spoke to my head of department on Tuesday and learned for the first time that there are all sorts of induction activities scheduled for Tues and Wed next week. Since I didn't know about them, I haven't arranged to have any time off, and it's a bit late, now! She (the HoD) was puzzled that I couldn't drop everything and attend anyway. She was sighing over my lack of commitment to the programme because I can only attend one evening of lectures a week. I've told her that I work full time, but perhaps it hasn't sunk in that, not being a teacher (unlike most of the others), my working day is longer and I don't get the school holidays. Perhaps she doesn't have kids of her own, either, since she doesn't seem to appreciate the additional demands of a family. And as for my commitments at church... why don't I just move my cell meetings to another night, and do I have to attend them (well, yes, since we lead the group)? I don't know.

So as I said, I start my course next week, but I have yet to have a meeting with a tutor to plan which modules I'm going to do when...

If I actually come out of this with a Master's degree in Educational Studies and not a BSc in plate spinning, it will be a bit of a miracle, I think!

Well THAT didn't last very long!

Torvy and Lauren's romance lasted about 24 hours. It seems to be the destiny of my sons to have their hearts broken by Rawlins girls!

More Torvy news

Well, it's finally happened. Starting high school seems to be the time for getting paired off, and Torvy has proved no exception. He has got himself a girlfriend. Oddly, not someone from school, but a girl from church that he has known for years. Even more oddly, this girl is the younger sister Chrissie! Her name is Lauren, and they have been sort of circling around each other for ages, so I guess it was bound to happen.

Torvy's update

Today Torvy set off to high school for the very first time. He had to go on his own, since Björn only starts tomorrow (Friday - isn't that weird?). I'm sure he'll be fine - he's very sensible.

He had a rather mixed day yesterday, very good feedback from his guitar teacher who is highly impressed with him, his talent and his progress. I heard the tail end of his lesson and I was pretty impressed myself! He is playing Hey Jude, with some rather complicated fingerwork. When I arrived, he was playing it as a duet with his teacher, and it sounded great.

But the poor lad had a rather unpleasant experience on his way to the lesson. He was walking along minding his own business, with his guitar strapped across his back, when some complete stranger cycled by and punched him in the face in passing, yelling "Ha, ha!". It's not the first time I've heard of this sort of thing happening and I have even witnessed it once, but when he told me about it on the way home, I was incensed. His face was a little swollen and bruised when I collected him from his guitar lesson. We reported the matter to the police, but of course, there is little chance that he will be apprehended - the police have bigger fish to fry. We were very impressed by the way Torvy handled answering the police questions - totally calm and sensible about the whole matter.

One niggling worry is that the kid who punched him is very likely to be a pupil at the same school. The hope is that he will be in a different hall, though - with 2500 kids in the school, there is little chance of their paths crossing. Fortunately the swelling has gone and the bruising is very faint, so it shouldn't attract any unwanted attention at school. If, however, he turns out to be in the same hall as Torvy, it might be quite unnerving for the little chap, because he is fairly sure they would recognise each other - they got a good long look when the kid stared back at Torvy defiantly while cycling away, and Torvy is somewhat distinctive with all that hair!

Speaking of little - we shall have to see if he has overtaken his Granny Carol in the growth stakes when she arrives later today. Not a very tall order (haha), so quite possible.

Last days of summer

Today was surprisingly sunny, after a few days of rain, although it was blowing fit to bust. And we discovered an unexpected characteristic of our little garden: it is very sheltered. After church, we barbecued some boerewors and sosaties, courtesy of the local South Africa shop (actually a biltong factory that has diversified over the years).

You see us here, sitting at our new outdoor table, totally sheltered, while the upper branches of the trees around the outside of our property showed how hard the wind was still blowing. Of course, the days are already getting shorter and the evenings are cooler, so we know that autumn is not far off, but the summer is not completely over.

Newday

Well, it seems I will be unable to get the kids to blog about their experience at Newday, so I will do my best. The photo shows Torvy in one of the tents - Björn avoided having his picture taken and only appears in group shots. I'll spare you those!

There were about 5500 young people there. They spent the week enjoying teaching and worship, and doing some outreach work in the city centre. More than 280 kids made new professions of faith, while there were over 240 re-commitments to Christ. 174 people were miraculously healed. 200 people from the city signed up to attend Alpha.

Apparently there was a South African band playing for one of the worship sessions and they taught the kids a Zulu song. Then they called all kids who had lived in Africa onto the stage to teach them a dance. Surprisingly, I learned that our boys went up. The ex-pats were spread across the stage and Torvy was positioned right behind the lead singer, so whenever they zoomed in on the lead singer, there was Torvy's face on the large screens. The leader who told me about this said he looked absolutely gorgeous up there. But of course he did - he's an absolutely gorgeous boy!