Snow Day

Rachel and Megan have never been to the snow before, so as a special family treat while we were up near the mountains, we decided to take them up to Falls Creek. The day was spectacular, clear blue skies and no wind. We hired toboggans and had a fantastic couple of hours zooming down the slopes. We took a chair lift up to the plateau, until it became too cold to enjoy. Great fun day.

Life on the Farm

We are just back from a quick trip to North Eastern Victoria to catch up with some family and friends. Kelly (Narelles cousin) and Dave put us up for a night, and we had a great time catching up and enjoyed the country air. The girls had a ball riding and grooming 'Rose' the Shetland pony, who is due to have a foal in October - how cute! We got to meet Jack and Chase - 6 month old sons of Narelles cousin Shari and Robbie, and Rose, Rex, Beth and Josh joined us for dinner. Narelle also caught up with her high school best friend Megan, and her beautiful little boy. There never seems to be enough time to see these precious people, but we are so grateful for the moments we had with all.

Footy Fun

Sandy took Rachel and Grandma Kath (Narelles mum) to the football last weekend. They had a grand old time together with some family friends. Geelong won, so they were all VERY happy. Bill Bryson in his book Down Under referes to Australian Rules Football as "a very popular form of loosely contained mayhem". I whole-heartily agree.

Megan and I gave the game a miss, so we went off and did some Christmas shopping together in town. This is a necessity, as there are not many shops in Mt Hagen and we have Christmas and birthdays for the next 12 months to think about.

Visa Update...

Great News! As of last Wednesday our work permits for P.N.G have come through, HOORAY! Thanks to those who prayed!

A bit of background on this particular drama. The PNG government issues work permits for mission groups for a three year period and then renews all of them at the same time (even if you just entered the country a few months previously). It just so happens that M.A.F.s renewal coincided with the election period so the process took a bit longer than normal. Most of the work permits have been renewed for MAF, but there are a few outstanding , ours included.

We have expressed our passport to the P.N.G officials in Brisbane, and hopefully they can process our visas and get our passports back to us by next Thursday, as we fly out the next day - Friday the 31st.

Visa woes, a prayer request

We are looking forward to returning to our home in Mt Hagen in Papua New Guinea, our flight home has been booked for the 31st of August.

We would appreciate your prayer though, as it seems that there have been delays in getting our work permits and visas. Please pray that our work permits would be issued this week, so that we can get out passports up to Brisbane where our visas for P.N.G are processed.

This usually takes about 4 or 5 days, so if we haven't got our work permits by the end of this week, it looks like we will have to extend our time in Australia. This in itself is not a terrible thing (some might even say, 'whooo! More shopping and holidays!'), however we are needing to get back home and back to work.

Please pray that we get some results this week. Thanks!

And now, for some more Melbourne family shots. This was last Friday, we took the train into the city for an afternoon at the Melbourne Museum. A great day out.

The people beside us.

I stole this quote off my brother and sister-in-laws community blog theashram.blogspot.com .

"We shouldn't seek the ideal community. It is a question of loving those whom God has set beside us today. They are signs of God. We might have chosen different people, perhaps people who were more caring , cheerful, intelligent and like-minded. But these are the ones God has given us, the ones he has chosen for us. It is with them that we are called to create unity and live in covenant."

(from 'community and growth' by jean vanier)

Beautiful Melbourne

After a week of bad jet lag we have settled back into off-field life and soaking up the the joys of being back in Australia.

Each morning we continue to work away with the girls with school, but our afternoons have been full of shopping and catching up with family. Its been so great to be with Narelles Mum and Dad, and also Geoff (Narelles brother), his wife Sherry and their boy Isaac. Here are some pictures of our time so far.

Down at Willamstown, one of our favorite places in Melbourne.

Grandma Kath (Narelles mum) with her Grand babies. (Dad/ Poppa had to work this day).

Geoff , Sherry and Isaac.

Meggy having fruity fun at Science Works.

Megs on the giant couch at Science Works

Fun on the Puffing Billy train with Grandma and Poppa.

Jet Lag and Road Trips

Our girls have got to be very good flyers.

Jet lagged parents, in transit.

Hello Friends.
Last night we arrived back in Melbourne, Australia after busy month traveling over South Africa. We caught up with a number of our supporting churches and loads of wonderful friends and of course, our family. On our way to Cape Town we stopped in Maseru, Lesotho for two nights to visit with some good friends there. It was a treat to catch up with people we used to work with down there.

Views on the road to Maseru, and in Maseru. View from our friends house.

Undoubtedly, the highlight of our trip was a relaxing week by the seaside down near Cape Town, where we stayed in a friends holiday house. Narelle was still busy with school with the girls each day, but our afternoons were spent by the sea. The kids spent hours chasing the waves and collecting seashells. Our house overlooked a bay where the whales come to stay for the winter, it was awesome to see these beautiful creatures playing and breaching in the surf. It was truly amazing. We came away feeling refreshed and rested.

Sandy's Mum Joyce, with our girls in Johannesburg