Canny Granny's Advice to the Young

I am very keen to get started with giving English lessons.  I have already been helping a young Russian with her university studies in English,on Skype, but I am also keen to help beginners.  My fees are very good. For more details email me on english.lessons1077@gmail.com. Then we can discuss why you want to learn English.  You may be in Britain already and want to improve your job prospects.  I'm sure I can help you with this too. I have been trained to make learning fun, but will also deal with grammar, but still in a fun way.  Most of all I will encourage you to speak as much as possible in lesson time, correcting you as necessary. So email me today and we can discuss what you need.

I have told you before to use your brain.  The most dangerous thing people can do is to accept what they are told by others, especially in authority, as this can lead to  being led blindly down a no through road.  Always question what you are told.  Make sure you get it right.  Of course that also applies to what I tell you.  Anyone who knows anything about Jesus knows that He would not be in favour of consumerism, gluttony and teaching our children to want more and more things. So why are we doing this and pretending it is to honour Him?  Let's look at the Bible record of His birth, which is of course very important.  The main feature is that He was born of a virgin ( who incidentally did not remain a virgin, but had at least seven more children, all documented in the Bible.) He was and is the Son of God, co-equal with the Father and the Spirit.  So when was He born?  No competent shepherd keeps his sheep out on the hills in Bethlehem a...

I recently qualified as a Teacher of English as a Foreign Language. I am keen to get started.  I live on the Devon/Somerset border so if you live near and would like some help to improve your English I would love to hear from you.  My dedicated email is english.lessons1077@gmail.com. No matter where you live I can offer you lessons on Skype.  In the past I have taught piano and violin so I have plenty of experience in teaching.  I am excited to be starting a new career. No doubt all the Christmas activities will be getting your attention at the moment so you can wait till the New Year to contact me, but I would be happy to hear from you sooner if you wish, when we can discuss your particular needs.  I trained with tefl.org.uk so I thought I should wave the flag for them. I am happy to teach any standard.

This weekend I spent some time with some dear friends who made me very welcome. The wife is almost exactly the same age as me.  Let me tell you how we spent the weekend.  We had dinner and a quiet evening in the first evening.  The next day we went around the town looking in the many charity shops. If you have read my blog recently you will not be surprised at that!! I found a warm moss green cardigan, a purple hand bag, a furry hat with ear pieces and ties under the chin, that was only 50p. Then I found a pale furry hat, one of those that is a band with no middle.  We did have fun.  My friend bought me a book of crochet shawls, in very good condition.  This kind of book is the sort of thing people buy because the pictures are all so gorgeous, but then realize they can't actually make them!  However I will make some of them, having had experience previously.  From another time I own two folders packed with exciting crochet patterns.  It was a...

People say to me, "Oh Russian's a difficult language." I'm not brilliant yet but I don't really find it particularly difficult, after all millions of Russians can speak it so why not me.  I know they have a head start on me but I'm game to give it a go.  People say,"But what about those funny letters?" Well the funny letters are really the easy one's because you don't already have a known sound for them.  The difficult ones are "o" which mostly sounds more like"aw" or even "a" to us. Also their G looks like an r to us and usually sounds like"g" but sometimes "v".  What looks like a B to us is a v.  As I said not really difficult!! No it's great fun and I love it.  The best bit is spending time with my teacher because she makes me speak the language as much as possible during the lesson.  sometimes we meet at a friend's house but when she is busy we meet in an old fashioned tea room. Th...

Because I am saving money to go to Russia again I decided that when appliances broke down I would not replace them.  So my hair drier stopped working. Now I dry my hair under the fan heater in the bathroom. My microwave went up in flames, so now I remember to get things out of the freezer in time for them to defrost naturally.  Microwaves can be very good and save you money, but I didn't want the expence of getting a new one. My home phone broke recently but I had a spare very basic version in a cupboard.  O.K. so I can't walk across the room with it and it doesn't have an answer machine or remember numbers, but for Russia putting up with that nuisance is worth it and I'm used to it already. I suppose I'm on the road to being a minimalist. My carpet was looking shabby, but instead of spending out hundreds of pounds on a new one I bought some cheap rugs and the room looks so much better. Be creative, save your money for what you really want.  Be disciplined about you...

Writing a blog isn't always about being inspired with a good idea.  Sometimes you just have to open a new post and start writing.  It's amazing what can result.  Today I am not feeling inspired but I am still writing. It's the same with a job you have to do and you don't know where to start, just start somewhere and the rest will follow and before you know it the job will be done. Oh look, I've just written a post.  Now go and apply these thoughts to something you need to do.

You know it's amazing how much better the brain works when it isn't being continually battered by sounds, movement and colours.  Try it sometime. Switch off the X Box, the loud music, anything designed to keep your brain in a continual spin. Listen to the silence and enjoy it.  When you get to my age, like me you might not have silence, but instead tinnitus, strange noises in your head, apparently the brain trying to make sense of the messages sent to it by broken hairs in the ear.  If you carry on listening to that music you will probably get tinnitus too. My problem was probably due to playing the violin right under my left ear! I am very fortunate with my tinnitus in comes in the guise of a Glen Miller band and I can go off to sleep, quite happily with it playing. But you have to be careful with giving the brain quietness, it's likely to make you think and this is possibly something you have not really done for a long time.  Denial is so much easier than thinking,...

I have been learning Russian for about eighteen months now. I started on the internet but once I had a teacher I discovered how important they are.  The internet can't stop you and say,"No that's not the way to say it." Not unless you are on Skype or something similar. My Russian teacher isn't Russian she is French but well able to take me through my paces.  This week I have a treat for her. I was a bit bored with it all and picked up my old German text book and looked at a song and a story, a well-known story.  I'm not going to tell you what they are, in case my teacher happens upon this.  I next decided to translate them into Russian! As you do! Of course I can't translate the song so that it rhymes or even fits the music. I abbreviated the story.  So that she does not think this is a ploy for me not to have a conversation with her in Russian I will see that we start the lesson with that and then see if she can work out what the song and story are.  Of c...

That's right, there is only one you.  Without you the world would be a poorer place.  At any time of life it is possible to feel down about yourself but I think this happens more when you are young.  It's hard to make sense of the world and see your place in it.  Let me tell you how unique you are.  You are not just one in a million.  You are one in five million. The sperm that fertilized the egg in your mother's womb had 4,999,999 (My math might be wrong but you know what I mean.) If another sperm had won the race you wouldn't be here, it would be someone else.  So don't give up on life now, you are a survivor.  How I see it God planned for you to be here. God likes variety so you are unique. Even identical twins are different, I know I have some in the family. Every child is unique so do all you can to protect them. Don't discard what God has made unique.

When you see a little old lady in the street, don't write her off.  Behind that wrinkled face is a wealth of wisdom on how to survive this life and possibly to know the way safely into the next.  In the past I have made the mistake of thinking all that you see now is the sum total of a person.  I remember being amazed when a little old lady told me she used to be an ice skater.  Wow, that was a surprise. You see, if like me you have reached nearly 71(Yes I've got to that stage where I'm beginning to boast about my age), well if you have got this far you must be a survivor and have some stories to tell to pass on the wisdom.  So if you have any sense you will befriend an old lady and get her to tell you her secrets and how to survive too. Why struggle on your own when a well of knowledge is living in your street.

Don't let other people form your opinions.  You have a brain, use it! There is great danger in following the crowd, the crowd might turn out to be following another Hitler. Be especially careful of scientists.  In my lifetime so many scientists have insisted they know the answer to something only to tell us five years down the line that they have discovered that they got it completely wrong and now they have a completely opposite opinion to inflict on us. Turn to your Bible if you want truth, but even there be careful because there are so many plausible leaders twisting even the word of God.  Ask God to help you and He will not let you down.

It's best to have a back-up plan rather than depend on the one course of action leading to what you think you want.  I studied for a degree in music for two years but then had to abandon it because of ill health,  I had intended teaching in a school.  Instead I taught violin and piano to individuals and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Let your disasters turn into triumphs.  Don't hang on to what is past and gone. Don't clutter today with yesterdays has beens, move into the future not hampered by the past. The best example of doing this is to commit your life to Jesus, then you won't need the old memories to cling on to, because today will be more exciting and fulfilling.

When I was about seven I was alarmed to find that my father's watch had broken and he would need to buy another one.  I think I had thought that life would go happily along with no changes.  This was a heavy blow, life was not safe and dependable after all.  As we go through life we have to meet greater challenges than that.  Life can be quite dependable for a while but then comes the latest big change that we have to face.  Maybe things have not gone as you planned.  Perhaps the exam results you had wished for have not materialized.  Do not despair you might be about to go on another track that will suit you far better.

If you make gaining money the priority of your life you will end up sacrificing some very precious things. If you train for a lucrative job, such as being a lawyer you might well spend more and more time on work and less and less on your family.  You will probably say that you are doing it for the sake of your family, but you will end up with children who hardly know you and having the latest toy in childhood and every gadget a teenager could wish for, is no substitute for having a loving, caring father spend lots of time with you.Also at work you will become ruthless and tread on colleagues in your mad drive to get the highest position.  As the Bible says,"You cannot serve God and mammon." That really is the worst thing you could do, to push God out of your thoughts.Mammon equals money.

Think before you act. Never say anything on social media that you would not be prepared to say to a live audience of fifty.  In fact what you say can potentially go to millions all over the world.  Do you really want to give a bad impression of yourself? Never post pictures of yourself in compromising positions, there are a lot of nasty people out there just waiting to trap you.  When in doubt don't! Also don't spend too much time on social media.  It can be a place to make friends, but it is no substitute for interacting with people in real life face to face. The tone of a person's voice and there body language mean you can understand what they are saying.  The written word does not have a tone of voice and it is easy to misunderstand someone on social media.  If you could hear their voice you might find they were not really being as unkind and abrupt as it sounded in your head. Making friends of the people who live near you or work with you can lead to li...

You could be forgiven for thinking that as I have not written here for some time.  I have been finishing my online course teaching English as a foreign language.  Canny Grannies don't sit back and let the world pass them by, they use their brains and keep them active. Now I have completed the course, I am putting more work into learning Russian, which I have been doing for eighteen months now.  Sometimes I get disheartened and feel  I will never get anywhere with it, but I just keep plodding away at it. You young people have to have this attitude with your studies, but just remember education is only for this life.  It won't do you any good for the next.  Only faith in Jesus will give you the happy ever after that you want and also abundant life in the here and now.