GETTING READY FOR CHRISTMAS!

HERE ARE SOME PHOTOS WE TOOK TODAY!

PS - ONLY 4 DAYS UNTIL WE ARE ON AN AIRPLANE HEADING FOR HOME, SWEET, HOME! AND THEN 24 HOURS LATER - HUGS FOR EVERYONE!! WE CAN NOT WAIT!!

THE RIGHT THING

THE STORY:

I walked into a nice bra store with the full understanding that I was going to pay some good money for 2 new bras. I know ladies you are like me - we all want to buy cheap bras - but is it really worth it?! Cheap does not always mean better in some cases. In the store the floor ladies were talking about the commission they receive on each bra purchase - 8%. It was a huge deal to them!

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So anyway, I carefully picked out two new bras and brought them to the counter. With a little patience, the cashier and I were finally talking the same language. The total-R290.oo (about $45.00 US). I can deal with that. I payed with a credit card (So add another 3% money exchange fee) and off I went.

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Scott (now that he is "monitoring" our finances) - always wants the receipt. As I was looking at the credit card slip, I noticed I was only charge R29.00 (about $4.50 US). Doing the math I was thinking WOW I saved R261.00!!! The HAPPY face I made was soon followed by great guilt. I knew what I had to do - Yes I went all the way back to the store and told the lady that she charged me the wrong amount. Her reaction (and that of the customer paying for her stuff) was speechless. They could not believe that I would be so honest (It is not common here in Africa - people are always finding a way to steal something). Thank you, Thank you, Thank you is all she could say - and she couldn't seem to say it enough. Then I remembered them talking about their commission. If I wasn't honest the poor girl would have had to pay the difference of the charges and she would of also lost her 8% commission.

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SO - I feel good - the sales girl is happy - Everyone wins - or did I?!

RANDOM

KINDERGARTEN GRADUATION AGAIN

School is done for the year and Maddie graduated Kindergarten again. After a lot of prayer, we have decided to home school Maddie for the rest of the time we are in South Africa. It has been a tough decision. I am not sure if I am able to do a teachers job, but I will do my best. If Maddie stayed in the school she is in now she would be a full year behind when we go back home for good. The environment at the school is not a good place for Maddie. She cries a lot and is very angry. Pray that this decision to home school Maddie is a good one and that we have the right amount of patience to do it.

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SANTA COMES TO TOWN

Wow it really does not feel like Christmas yet, especially with it being summer here. I am missing the cold weather and lights outside. I think I have only seen one house with lights on the outside. Another thing that is so different is Scott and I have only seen 1 Christmas commercial (and we have DSTV). Strange!

Here is Santa coming on the train to visit with the kids of the neighborhood. Maddie and Alex are running after it. I am not sure why they are not in the picture - I thought I captured the moment - oops. At least you will get the idea!

PAPER CHAIN

The kids are so excited to come home for Christmas (ME TOO)! They started a "Going to see Grandma and Grandpa" Paper Chain. It is always a race in the morning to count how many days are left! Our flight comes in at 8:00pm on December 14!!

FREAKY PICTURE

I was taking pictures of the full moon one night and I was messing with the settings on my camera. Well, I went inside after failing to capture the moment, and went to take a picture of Scott playing with our cat. Here is how it turned out! Freaky!!

SCOTT'S WORK

Here is an updated photo of Scott and Nkhensani. They needed to send one in for Innotec's Christmas photos.

It has been sad for me to see how slow and frustrating Scott's work is going. There have been a lot of roller coasters! God is good though and he definitely has a hand in all this (we can see it even though it is slow moving). I will let him update you on all that is going on.

Here is Scott's latest update:

We have had a ton of frustrations over that past couple of months with trying to set up our block yard. We have investigated a number of spots to put the block yard and each one has been a frustrating venture. The biggest problem has been getting commitments from the people we are trying to work with to rent property from. Since the set back at the sand quarry a couple weeks ago, we have been trying to work with another person where we can set up our machine. It has been two weeks of phone calls and responses like "I will call you in a couple of days when I get a chance to talk with so and so".

The latest big news has been that we may have an opportunity to purchase Hydraforms current block yard from them. It looks like a great opportunity and would get us a start with a number of customers, a completely set up block yard, and be able to accommodate almost any size order. We probably won't know for sure if this deal will go thru until after Christmas, but we are pretty excited about it.

I will be taking a trip to Mexico while we are back in the State over Christmas. Innotec has started a block business in Saltillo, Mexico and I am going there to see if I can help them out a bit and also learn from them as well. It should be interesting.

Kruger

KRUGER NATIONAL PARK

Last weekend we were invited to go with our neighbors to Kruger National Park. What an experience!

What amazing sites and picture perfect moments. I felt as if we were part of a National Geographic Safari! We saw plenty of elephants, baboons, impala, kudu, buffalo, giraffes, and little animals like lizards and monkeys. It was just weird to be driving and there in front or behind you were these wild animals living in thier own habitat and at any moment can charge the vehicle or can be attacked by a lion or cheetah. We drove for about 7 hours total through the park and we only saw only 1/16th of the park or less. We did not see any rinos, lions, cheetahs, hyena etc, but the rush of the possibility kept you looking for more. Scott even purchased some binoculars at one of the camps in the park. It is a big game park - so beautiful and so exciting! We will definitely be back to safari some more. It is amazing to see God's creatures in the wild and not at the zoo!! AMAZING!!! Here are some of our pictures of our exciting weekend:

Kudu

A Kudu deciding to stop traffic. In the car next to the Kudu is another couple we went with.

Impala fighting

Baboon and her young.

Chillin' out in a tree

Giraffe

Herd of elephants - Look at all the little ones!

Alex, Maddie and Elzette in front of an elephant skull

Buffalo

Here is a video I found while researching Kruger Park. I guess you never know what you might see there. (You may want to watch it first before you let your kids watch)

When I was taking a picture of the buffalo, little to my knowledge this lizard was nestled in a broken tree branch about eye level to me. I turned my head and boom there he was!

At one of the camps in Kruger - notice all the bats hanging over Alex's head!

Maddie and Elzette. They have become very close friends.

Eating Breakfast in the morning

At dinner with the group! What great company!

Gotta love this picture! Scott ordered a rump steak that you cook yourself!

Alex had enough and slept the night away on the bench behind us!

I know I always put pictures of the scenery of our trips - but it is simply breathtaking (these pictures do not do it justice). Kruger is 3 hours from our house and the drive is spectacular!! On the way there it was dark so we did not see any of this - then on the way home we were just taken back by the sights.

BEAUTIFUL! Here is an amateur video of our drive.

http://s221.photobucket.com/albums/dd12/lialeenstra/?action=view&current=krueger032.flv

Ending our weekend with the sunset. Do not let the sunset on your day without giving thanks to God for all the wonderful blessings he has given you!! What a wonderful Creator we serve!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Thanksgiving is a time

of gratitude to God, our Creator and Provider,

whose guidance and care go before us...

and whose love is with us forever.

Thanksgiving is a time

to reflect on the changes, to remember that we, too, grow and change

from one season of life to another.

Let us remember the true meaning of Thanksgiving.

Let us acknowledge the many blessings which are ours...

let us think of our families and friends..

and let us give thanks in our hearts.

~~Author Unknown~~

We are thinking of all of you on this Thanksgiving Day, wishing we could be there!

We have so much to be thankful for and God has blessed us so much!

We are especially thankful for all of you!

For all your prayers, support and

encouragement over the last few months.

You truly are blessings from God!

GOD IS GOOD!

WE LOVE YOU!

Update from Scott

Everyone wants to know how the business is going. So, here it is.

Setting the business up has been a major struggle. Since the day that I have arrived, we have been trying to get the business registered with SARS (South African Revenue Service). It has been a long process that is still a struggle. The accounting firm that we are working with has stuggled with getting documents to them and SARS has managed to lose documents as well. We hope that by the end of this week SARS will have all the documents they need as long as they don’t get lost again.

For the past 2 months we have been working on getting a location to set up our block yard at. Our first location was a good spot but the owners could not agree with each other where we should be. After 3 weeks of trying to meet with them and get a contract set up we decided to look elsewere. As we were looking for a good supplier of sand, we decided to ask if they had a spot for us to set up. They felt confident that they could accommodate us but wanted to discuss it with all the parties involved. The next week they gave us the go ahead. This was a great opportunity because it meant that we didn’t have to spend money to ship the sand to our block yard (25% material cost saving), they had power and water available so we didn’t have to pay for the cost of installing a power drop and drilling a well, there is 24 hour security on the site, and we didn’t have to purchase a fork truck because they have one that we could use. This sounded great so we had our equipement sent to the site, bought all the necessary stuff to power up the machine and hook into their water system. Today we received a call from the sand quarry that we can no longer put our block yard there. Apparently they had a verbal agreement with their biggest customer that no one could set up a block yard on their sand quarry site or the customer would buy sand from someone else.

We have other options for a block yard, but this means we have to start over again with getting things set up. We will more than likely need to pay a bunch of money to get power to the site, get water, buy a forktruck, and also build a building with bathrooms and showers. We have been to 12 meetings in the past 3 weeks at possible block yard sites where the people don’t show up because “something else” came up. Which we would understand if they would at least call and cancel, but we have driven out to the site (20-30 minutes) and arrive to meet with no one. So 1 hour round trip x 12 meetings is a bunch of wasted time.

Sales have been slow. We are quoting a large church and are excited about getting that business. We are also still planning on doing a bunch of security walling for a large development. Both of these projects will probably start February of next year. This is probably good seeing as we don’t have a place to manufacture our blocks yet.

Our truck has been in for repairs twice in the past month, so we are doing a good job at spending money that we are not yet making. J The good thing is that Khensani hasn’t quit yet and we are still positive (most of the time) that we will get this thing going. We are learning patience and how to deal with set backs. Pray that things turn around and we can get things moving forward soon.

Check out our flyer!! (just click the picture to make it larger)

Library Days!!

The Library!! What a great place!! Because we were limited in how many books and toys we brought from home to South Africa, we have been utilizing the library and the toy library! You might be asking A TOY LIBRARY? Yes, and it is great!! The kids are able to check out 3 toys and use them for 2 weeks. You then have to make sure you have all the pieces and then you return it in clean condition. HOW GREAT IS THAT!! Some may say GROSS, but think about all the toys you have a home that after two weeks never get played with again. This way the kids have "new" toys - they have a blast playing with them and then they go back and pick new ones.

Some examples of toys would be - Any type of Baby toy you can imagine, games, computer games, videos, educational toys (we have been getting a lot of these), whole kitchen sets, trampolines, barbies and tons of accessories, spiderman, cars with floor mats, puzzles, swings, outdoor games, legos/blocks, dress up, and the list goes on and on. The only draw back is spending an hour before you have to return them to make sure you have all 100 flash cards, or all the silverware in the kitchen set, oh and this one was fun looking for all the little, micro barbie accessories. I have learned that the smaller pieces I keep in a discreet location so the kids do not play with it. Anyway, the kids love it and are excited to play with new stuff every other week.

The pick of the week!

Checking out a handful of books - THEY LOVE IT




Next Post to Come:

Update on Scott's Work

Going Green

Plastic Grocery Bags - We all have a stash somewhere right? Well what if you had to pay for them at the stores you shop at? Would you purchase them? Here we pay about 5 - 7 cents a bag anywhere you go (grocery store, pharmacy, department stores). I know it is not much, but it is the issue of having to purchase them that bugs me. You see in 2003 the plastic bag was joked as being the "national flower" here in South Africa. You see them everywhere!! I understand the concept and the issue of a better environment and since plastic bags are breeding grounds for cockroaches - I went Green and bought the reusable grocery bags! It is incredible how much fits inside these bags.

Here are some other uses for plastic grocery bags for all of you who have a huge stash in your pantry!!

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A great mitt for things you don't want to touch, like picking up after your dog, yucky cat litter and yes even to fish out the toy or money that the kids dropped into the toilet (you know you have to get it out or the tears will keep coming!)

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Shoe Covers, you know when you come in from the mud and you don't want to track it all over your house.

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Poop bags/Dirty Diaper Disposal - especially when your kid had a "BIG" one.

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Travel - wet bathing suits, dirty shoes, dirty laundry bag

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An Everything Stuffer Bag - take home projects from school in, return items that were left behind at your house (my mom does this and writes our name on the bag).

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Re-use in the wastebasket in the bathroom.

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Lunch bags.

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A Pick It up Bag - tie one to the handle of your vacuum and all the items that you find while you are vacuuming (paperclips, legos, my little pony hairbrush, Polly pocket) can be saved!

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Leak prevention in your frig - wrap up meat so there is no spills

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Sink liner - egg peeling, husks from the corn, etc.

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And last you can always reuse them as a grocery bag!!

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Some of these I am still thinking yes you are reusing the bags, but aren't they still going to end up in the trash?

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WHAT DO YOU DO WITH YOUR PLASTIC BAGS?!?

Irene Dairy Farm

We took trip to the Irene Dairy Farm today. I would have never imagined the kids being so excited to see cows!! We have seen many wild animals here and all it takes for a smile on their face is to see a cow! It was a nice afternoon. The farm is a full running dairy farm with a nice restaurant to have lunch and a farm store. (I have to say it was the cleanest and most beautiful farm I have seen). The kids were very interested in the tractor and seeing the cows being milked. Enjoy the photos!!

Oh the famous tractor at the farm picture!!


The kids had to have a picture next to the cows with the numbers on their butt (they thought that was funny).

Look at the love between them! I have to say these two have created a special bond (not saying they don't fight), but they really watch out for each other, they hold hands in the parking lots, and they can play for hours together (yes even without fighting!). I have loved seeing them have this special love for each other.

All in a row waiting to be hooked up to a jug


A look at the milk collecting jugs



Seems like they have grown a lot since we have been here!

Follow the stone path to see more cows!

Alex learning to fly!


Maddie was tired of me taking photos - so I told her to smile for Grandpa - Look at the smile she produced!!! I think she misses all her grandparents!



Alex was a little more serious