Winter Has Arrived!

Winter is well and truly here and the weather is awful. The Northwest wind is pumping heavily and has almost destroyed our TV aerial as well as taking branches off a few trees. The rain also arrived today which gets most locals quite excited but the English in us stops us from finding rain exciting!

Joel & Eli however couldn't wait to put their raincoats and welly boots on and go splashing in the rain. Thankfully they'd had enough after half an hour but Eli did manage to do some jumping on the trampoline in that time.

As you can see in the photo, the weather really isn't too good but it isn't deterring the boys!

Law In South Africa

A friend recently brought this to our attention..

Two recent court cases, have earned the attention of newspaper readers in South Africa

1. One person was fined R1 000 for not having a TV license.
2. Another was released on bail for R500 after being arrested for murder.

The moral of this South African story:

If you do not have a TV license and the inspector comes round, kill him.
You'll save R500.

Bible Study

We had an excellent bible study in Chris Nissen this morning. We were looking at the story of Samson as part of our series on Famous Bible Stories. The aim of the series is to equip the men with a good basic knowledge of where the famous stories are in the bible and what they're about.

Anyway, this morning we were looking at Samson asking the question; was his a wasted life or not? We came to the conclusion that his life was wasted but ultimately God triumphed and something good came out of it. We then sought to apply Samson's story to our own lives, what can we learn and how can we make sure we don't live empty wasted lives? Each of my men agreed that they want to live lives which reflect God's glory so that we can win the community for Christ. I was so proud of them for this!

Grieving And Rejoicing

Today has been a very sad day. We learnt this morning that our friend and patient in CNP who has recently got on to ARV treatment died. She had been very sick in the past week, but we never thought that this was it. Paula took her to the clinic on Tuesday and they immediately admitted her to the hospital where she stayed until her death. Thankfully, Paula, one of our carers and the family were all able to visit her in the final week and spent some quality time talking and praying with her.

Sing Along To Pink Floyd

As I was sat at the computer this evening Paula was feeding the boys and I could hear the David Gilmour CD I made from his recent Remember That Night DVD on the stereo. What really made me smile was the fact that Joel requested the CD, it's currently his favourite (having displaced Roger Waters to #2) and he loves singing along to classic Pink Floyd tracks from the 70's such as Breathe, Wish You Were Here & Comfortably Numb. He's word perfect and sings beautifully. In fact, he knows some of the Floyd stuff so well that he has his own names for them, for example Shine On You Crazy Diamond is known as the Aquarium Song. Joel's favourite at the moment is definitely Gilmour's performance of Echoes, he just can't get enough of it!

"Your Cape Town's Very Nice"

Today being the third public holiday in 1 week(!) we decided to go with our friend Jo into Cape Town, with a difference. This time we wanted to go to the Planetarium, which we knew would be a real treat for Joel. What a day we had! It turns out that the Planetarium is attached to the South African Museum a local version of the Natural History Museum, so we all had a ball gazing at dinosaur skeletons; stuffed animals of all shapes and sizes and getting truly knowledgeable about the great white sharks that we live alongside here in False Bay! Following a very memorable trip to the cafe where Jo had a 'small snack', and we all gazed on in admiration - we had an excellent presentation of stars, planets etc. etc. in the planetarium. Both boys were open-mouthed and loved the chairs that tip right back so that you can gaze at the presentation on the ceiling.

Bike Race Video

Here's a short video of the boys having a bike race. Joel is on Eli's bike and Eli very determinedly rides Joel's, watch his technique.

Breakfast

This was one breakfast that was thoroughly enjoyed, but probably for the wrong reasons.

This week is a bit of an odd week as Monday was a public holiday followed by Tuesday & Wednesday back at work with today and tomorrow also being public holidays. Great for family time but bad news for work and also quite disorienting as it's too easy to forget which day is which as it feels like the weekend all the time.

Guess we shouldn't grumble.

Pirates & Captains

We are learning that you really must never underestimate the power of a 5 year old to 'act out' what is going on around him! As anyone who knows him will vouch, Joel is absolutely potty about pirates - in fact, we're sure he believes he is one - and he is rarely to be found these days in 'civvies'. He must be dressed as a Captain and mum, dad and Eli are always being grabbed to look for Peter Pan, to fight Captain Hook or to debate with Captain Jack Aubrey (Master and Commander)/aka Captain Jack Strawberry after a little early days slip up by Cap'n Joel!! Today found Joel calling a doctor to his bedside to help him with his arm, which had been sawn off, and a bloody neck - all straight out of the film. When mum asked if he would like a book to read in bed (also straight out of the film - good one mum!), he said that that would be difficult with only one arm - good point!

Petzl Adventure Nights

I had a lot of fun on Saturday night riding in the Petzl Adventure Night bike ride in Jonkershoek. Visit my moutainbike blog Epic Adventures With A Mountain Bike for more..

HIV Training

Please pray for Paula and the HOPE home based care team who are attending a week's training course at Jubilee in Cape Town on HIV/AIDS. This is a great, practical course that will really help them in their day to day work in CNP. It has been sobering so far to learn the up to date stats relating to the pandemic, but so exciting to listen to a church leader preaching on the church's response to HIV/AIDS and to realise that we are at the cutting edge of this and are here to motivate the rest of the church now.