It has been a while since my last blog posting. We have been trying to get the house in order, spend time with the kids, and Scott has been having work meetings. As I am typing this Scott and the kids are playing games in the backyard.



I think the kids are adjusting ok. Yesterday when we were driving, Alex asked “When are we going back to our other house. I like that one. My friends little Nick (Stroobosscher) and Andrew (Dieleman) are there. I have two friends. He also talks a lot about all his cousins and Riley.

Madison is ok – she has been helping me around the house and she is now on a mission to write every one of her friends from school, church, and family a letter. We had to go to the store to get some more paper and a scissors. In a few weeks check your mailboxes!!

Maddie and Alex also talk a lot about all their grandmas and grandpas. They can not wait (me either) for when we have internet at home and we can see eachother on the webcams.

We are slowly getting somewhere with the house organization. Here is our living room. It still needs the personal touches of pictures, rugs, and curtains, but it is nice to finally have a place to lay and read my books.



Here is our laundry room/room where I do the dishes. I am still working on Scott to get a dishwasher. He says we have one already – me. This is where they have the sinks to do dishes. The sink in the kitchen is a round sink used for washing food etc. It is quite awkward to wash dishes in it.



Here is our kitchen and dining room. We just purchased a dining room table (minus chairs) last night. YEAH!!

Here is the “kids room” a mess as usual – just like home.

The weather is kind of warming up a bit. It still gets pretty cold at night. Here are some pictures of the storm clouds last week coming in. VERY COLD when the sun doesn’t shine.

looking down the street from our driveway -----------accross the street

We have been able to go to the park with the kids (in our subdivision). There were a lot of kids and families there. The kids have fun at the park. They wake up in the morning wondering if we are going to go there that day.



Cooking – I have to say is very hard to do when you have limited ingredients. Just think of all the stuff we use – pizza sauce, snacks, cream of chicken soup, cresent rolls, hot dog buns, tortilla chips, Velveeta cheese, macaroni and cheese, lawrys, chocolate chips, Jiff peanut butter, ritz cracker, strawberry jam, bagels, sticks of butter - oh you name it – THEY DON’T HAVE IT. They do have, however, rows of flour, sugar, rusks (dried bread), any ingredient to make soup, eggs in packs of 5 dozen etc. I brought along my South Christian cook book very hard to use when you can not find or they do not have the ingredients. BUT GIRLS – I know you laughed at all my spices etc, I have started a very good collection so far J

We still have our favorite meals, which taste close to that of home cooked – Hamburger pie, and BLT’s, Chicken nuggets and American fries, spaghetti. We did buy some meat to cook on our braai outside when we finally get the rack to go in it.

I did find this at the store: Notice the "American Style"

We ate them in less than 1 day.

Scott – If anyone knows Scott he can not sit still. Well he has managed to find everything in the house that needs fixing. The best was the hot and cold was reversed on the upstairs faucets (minor problem). He thought a quick fix would work – well three trips to a home building store and no shower for me for a day (because he had to shut the water off), turned out to be a bigger problem. Also – I found Scott’s real passion in TV – The history channel and National Geographic. He now stays up later than me (not normal)!!

That is the latest – When we have internet at home – I promise my blog will become more exciting. We all are still recovering from our colds (not fun), and we have a trip planned to go to the Pretoria Zoo on my birthday. Not much else exciting here. I have been getting use to the fact that I have nothing to do – so I clean (oh yes mom – you would be impressed the laundry is always done and the house is always clean) and I read books – The latest books were Sophie’s Heart by Lori Wick and Too Small to Ignore by Dr. Wess Stafford (thank you Barb for the books). Scott and I also have been trying to learn Afrikaans. I also have been spending a lot of time keeping the kids busy – reading books, baking cookies, painting nails, playing spiderman, singing, going to the park, and rumbling.

I miss the interaction with family – friends – and church. Thinking of you all the time.