U.S.A. Here we come (Dec 2010)

Things continue to progress here with rain coming almost perfect to this point.  Just the right amount at just the right time.  The roofs have all be leak proofed again and apart from a minor collapse of the chicken coup roof and a larger one of the car port roof, all have held up well under the rainy conditions.  And the few roofs which showed weakness we were able to strengthen before our departure.

The chicken mansion is now complete and the kids, Charles, and all had a fun time trying to catch and round up all 200+ chicks to relocate them in their new home.  This new place is much larger and has compartments for the different sizes of chicks to keep all of them safe and meet their different nutritional and vaccination needs.  It also allows space for them to run outside and eventually be split between egg layers, and those that we will use for meet so we are all quite excited about this.  Please pray that the chickens continue to stay disease free during this time where lots of illness’ seem to be going around.

God knew that we needed extra help during this home stretch and so we were so thankful for the extra help that God sent our way.  First, a team from South Africa came to lend their hand with some projects around the orphanage for a couple of days.  They laid electric cable from the generator to the orphanage house (so that there will be electricity there when the generator is running), helped clean up and rearrange thing around the house, and helped me build gates for my new workshop. Thank you guys and girls.

  Our friend Gretchen also graciously gave of her time and talents for a few weeks.  She helped Amber immensely with getting supplies for the orphanage organized, trying to find out how many of each item they will need while gone, inventorying what we have, getting baby clothes and needs sorted and ready for when we are gone (they all needed clothing for the next size/sizes up) and trying to get paperwork in order for the time when we were gone.

We were also blessed with a visit from my mother (Jako’s) and she made it her full time job to love and dote on Jakob as much as she could.  He kept her busy but she was intent on making up for lost time since her last visit.  He took her all over the show and invited her to play in the dirt with him.  All her attention blessed not only Jakob but us as well to get the rest of the tasks done that we needed to give attention to.  All of these people were instrumental in helping and were God’s special gift to us during this busy time.

Orphanage Christmas

Before we left, the children were blessed with Christmas gifts from the Dutch Reform Church in Livingstone.  The church body put together some some gifts to each child and wanting to take pictures of it we surprised them gave it to them just a few days early. They were so happy and thankful for it!  Each present was tailored for each kid, with the boys getting real tools and toy trucks, the girls getting umbrellas, a purse and knitting yarn, and the babies blankets and clothing.  It was so much fun to see them open these gifts because I think that for all of them this was the first time that they received a gift for Christmas.  Thank you Dutch Reform Church Livingstone for blessing these kids and in turn for blessing us. 

 Where things stand now

Currently all of the orphanage supplies have been bought, individual roles and responsibilities defined and clarified and everybody is “pumped” for the transition to manage the place on their own.  It’s a bit bittersweet for us saying goodbye to everyone here, knowing how big the babies are going to be when we get back, knowing that Jakob is going to miss his friends and just leaving things in their hands, but at the same time we are excited about getting to spend time with Amber’s mom that side as her condition continues to decline.  I know that Amber’s heart has been there for a while and will not be at true “peace” until she is able to love on her mom in person once again.  Even so there were a few tears at the goodbye knowing all that we were leaving behind, even if just for a few months.