Nothing too special, just more building. I took Ben and Esther out to see the building progress, planning to stay for like half an hour or so, we ended up being there almost the whole afternoon. We continued with the foundation works on the second duplex, though we had lots of stoppages due to rain:

Last night we went out for dinner to celebrate Ben Ward’s birthday and then went back to the Ward household for cake(thanks again to Kathryn) to celebrate his & Esther Lawson’s engagement:

And instead of photos of children, I thought I’d put up some of the mothers and one extra:

As promised here are some progress photos from October, up to Wednesday 21st, when we cast the concrete on the bottom of the foundation of Duplex 2.

Duplex No. 1 being roofed:

The site above Duplex No. 1 where we will put Duplexes 2 & 3:

Foundation works for Duplex No.2 (notice on the right, Pastor Johnson Agaba, our volunteer storeman!!):

Birthday time again, today was Brian Bob’s turn - no more until next month now (Kathryn is pleased about the little break from cake baking).

Some more children photos, sometimes happy. . .

Sometimes not . . .

Where are we and what have we been doing?  Yes we are still here, but we have been busy with a few different things.  Unfortunately there were a couple of children who got sick and were in hospital, but all things are fine now.  Just another one of the things to get you frustrated here.  One girl, Dorcus was a little sick so we took her to a private, but small hospital for a check up to see what was wrong.  They could not find out what was wrong, but said we should take her for a C4 test at the HIV clinic at the main Kabale hospital.  The problem was that it was late Friday afternoon which meant that we had to wait until Monday morning to take her becasue it’s closed on weekends.  By Monday she had deteriorated a lot and when she was finally admitted, the doctors were thinking she would not survive, but with many people praying for her and a drip to get some nutrients and other things into her she soon recovered and was discharged on the Friday morning.  By the following Monday she was back at school and as cheeky as ever. 

The building at the land has been going full steam ahead, we started the second house while work on the first is still going.  For the next two months rain is due to fall a lot so we are going ahead with the second house so that we can work when it is dry enough, but when it rains we will come back to the first because things we can do are inside and the first house is now roofed.  I will post some progress photos soon, but I think some photos of the children are long overdue.   The beginning of October saw two birthdays, Christine:

And Ronus:

Then here are some random photos I took on the day of celebrations:

Sorry again for the lack of posts.  October 3rd saw Ruth, Kathryn’s sister fly out.  Ruth came to visit for two weeks and even though we were still busy with other things it was like a holiday having her here.  Just to have someone close visit was great – it’s a pity she could only be with us for two weeks.  Thanks so much for the visit Ruth – we owe you a visit in Brisbane now – maybe next year hey!!! It was fantastic having you here.

Needless to say I am finally trying to catch up with many things that are well overdue, financial records etc – and of course posts on this blog.

Busyness, tiredness and laziness have caused us to be unable to post for way too long, sorry. But let me try to catch up on what has happened. A few birthdays:

Joyce:

Dorothy:

Janette:

Blessed:

At the beginning of the month Kathryn and I went away for a night at the lake for our anniversary, it was great to get away and relax, even if it was only for a day and a half:

Ronnie, a lady from Australia spent some time here and really was touched by the drop-in centre and the boys that are there.  Here she is with some of them – taking them out for lunch after church on Sunday:

Here is what I’ve been busy doing, a few more progress photos of the building project:

We also have had Kathryn’s sister, Ruth, visiting.  It has been great to have her here.  I will post some photos of her next post.  We are heading off to go to the National Park and then to drop her at the airport for her to head home after two weeks in Uganda.

Today we started building again, the next plot of land where we will build is still being cleared but we started again on the first house, starting to raise the walls:

It was a bit of a run around day again, building site visits, selling feathered chickens, getting the car looked at for bad noises that have developed, meeting the school inspector, trying to organise the school since one teacher did not come back after the holidays, and then Kathryn had another training session with the board of VCCS – which is when I took myself out for dinner and then spent some time with the children at Akanyijuka.

The weekend also saw the launch of a revamped website for missions at our supporting church.  They have information and regular posts from us as well as from other childrens’ work and missionaries from around the world that our church supports.  Check it out at www.destinations.org.au

These three days we just tried spending as much time with Jan as we could, whilst still trying to get our normal jobs done.  Saturday I took Jan shopping with the Matrons to buy bulk food for the month.  Sunday we went to church, had lunch and took Jan to the border where we left her to her own devices to get to Kigali to catch a plane on Monday.  Thanks so much for coming Jan. We love you!

Here are a few extra photos of Jan’s time here:

A rare photo of our house that Jan took: