We've finally made our blog!

Hi all
We have had quite an eventful year so far, which has just flown by.
Leon was called as bishop in January which keeps him fairly busy, he also changed jobs at work moving from logistics to purchasing in the same company. Our garden, Leon's great passion, is starting to take shape and has been full of flowers after planting hundreds of different bulbs (an interest developed from our time in the UK) which have flowered for ages this spring. After spending most of last year with a house in various stages of renovation, all that remained was a lot of interior painting which was attempted by Leon, Lanelle & Matthew around easter and lasted for several weeks. So what remains now is some minor exterior work and painting which will hopefully be done before Christmas.
Lanelle's sister Tish and Sarah came to visit end of February to early June and great fun was had spending time getting to know Sarah well - we had a great time. We had a family half birthday for Sarah including a princess cake and all the cousins had great fun painting T-shirts. Tish helped out by babysitting during the holidays while Lanelle was still teaching for a few days. The children had some fun craft activities making Hama bead shapes, baking cookies, painting, playing outside, swimming and some fun treasure hunts with clues by Matthew and Tish. We all learn't what fun it can be to have a scripture treasure hunt for family home evening.
We took a weekend to Chelmsford dam along with our friends where the Matt & Leon got to ski and the children got to ride on a tube behind the boat. Lanelle, Tish, Christopher and Sarah just went for a ridein the boat. The children also enjoyed fishing, riding bikes and playing on the swings.
In June we all went to visit Granny Margaret and Grandpa Neil at the sea on the Eastern Cape coast of SA. We took our friends the Orchards with and all had a lovely time at the beach in winter and our swimming loving children even tried a swim in the ocean along with collecting many shells on the beach. We all got to catch baby fish in the river off the jetty.
Shortly after we got back home we went to collect our new pet, a german shephard puppy who was eventually named Jess. The children are enjoying having her and both Christopher and Rachel have overcome their fear of dogs. She is like any puppy and loves to chew, she has feasted on several of Leon's succulents and some other potplants and regularly chews one of the irrigation sprinkler heads. She has a lovely nature and loves to chase a ball.
On 20th August Rachel turned 8 and was baptised by Dad. This was a very special occasion in our family and Rachel was so excited that she couldn't sit still while Granny Carole and Grandpa Andy where talking. Granny Margaret and Grandpa Neil came all the way from Port Alfred to share her special day.
This last week the children got to spend with Granny Margaret and Grandpa Neil camping in the Kruger National park, while Mom and Dad stayed 50Km away on their own (weren't they lucky!). The children got to see Zebra, Giraffe, Hippos, various different buck, Leopards, Lion, Elephant, Rhino, Buffalo and even some bats. A babboon came and stole some bread off the table on Thursday morning right in front of Christopher and Rachel, it had to jump over Rachel's head to get it, when they were having breakfast. It was very hot, unusual for this time of year, and reached 45 Celsius so hot they didn't know what to do even though they went swimming. On 29th September Christopher turned 5, he was so excited and Mom and Dad joined everyone in the park for hotdogs, cake and icecream in the park at the pool.
In between these fun breaks lots of hard work and other events have been happening.
Lanelle is still at the university teaching financial accounting, to third years, in the mornings and has cut down from a 50% to a 35% post. Her afternoons are spent with running children to swimming and tennis lessons and Christopher to speech therapy, then it is homework and supper and everything else. She has left the scrapbooking to her Mom who produced a wonderful album for Rachel's 8th birthday. Any recreation time is spent doing a bit of light reading when she can. Not much sewing getting done besides some quilts for friends having babies however she plans to change that after a recent visit with her mom to a quilt festival. they are both going on a quilting retreat weekend next week where they will hopefully get a long way to finishing a quilt Mom started 5 years ago.

Matthew is almost as tall as Mom and can't wait to turn 12 and leave primary.He learn't all his articles of faith and has almost completed the assignments for the "Faith in God" progarmme. He is so grownup and enjoys as much as life will give him. He enjoys playing tennis, cricket and hockey and is working hard academically. He recently managed to obtain a 81% average over all three school terms and is very excited as he now qualifies for a gold merit certificate this year. He has had many projects or assignments for school and always tries to do something that no-one else might do as for his static electricity demonstration where he showed the class how to get a piece of cereal to swing.

Rachel is turning into a young lady who has reached the stage where she can brush and tie-up her own hair for school - something Mom and Dad are so glad they don't have to do anymore! She enjoys school and is reading really well after finding it so tricky when she first started in England. She loves to swim and would live in a pool if you gave her the opportunity. She plays mini-netball and mini-hockey at school and recently participated in the national eisteddford where she achieved a silver certificate for her poem on cats. Next year she intends to do it again and also do a prepared reading. Rachel decided to swop ballet lessons for tennis lessons this year. She loves to sing and draw pictures.

Christopher is growing up and doesn't seem like such a little boy anymore. He enjoys his Montessori preschool that he attends in the mornings with 5 other children where he has learn't to do so many practical things like cleaning dishes, cleaning windows, polishing, setting the table, folding clothes, sweeping, as well as the other skills for counting, letters and sounds etc. He suprised Mom and Dad the other day when he pointed out and named a Masked weaver to them. He has learnt all about fish and bird nomenclature (their different parts, e.g. gills, fin etc). Since going to speech therapy for several months has seems to have found his voice and now has so much to say we can hardly get him to stop. He has learn't to swim although is not that keen on swimming lessons. Christopher loves to watch Disney movies draw, cut and glue to make pictures, especially from flowers that he has picked from the garden. He enjoys cooking and baking and loves to pretend with his own play kitchen and food.
Well that is a brief update from all us. We are all happy to be home and around our family again. We have managed to adjust and settle back into a routine. We do miss all those friends and family far away and remember that we would welcome anyone who wants to visit South Africa.