Images from our Christmas week

Christmas Greetings

We wish you all a great time over this special Christmas season. We are looking forward to spending some time off this coming week to enjoy the celebrations and to have some family time. We hope in the new year to be in better communication due to the arrival of a new computer. Blessings to you all.

Orphanage school

Joshua's school class support a school for orphans. A few weeks back they went on a school trip to take some toys etc to the children. They were able to interact with some of the children at the school.

A whirlwind

This week has been extremely busy for us due to the outbreak of the deadly virus Ebola. Thankfully, if the newspapers are telling us the truth, there has been a drop in the number of cases which is a huge answer to prayer. Simon and some of the other pilots have been doing numerous trips into Bundibugyo, the epicentre of the disease, to take Dr's as well as food for the missionaries that remain there. On their return flight they have been bringing back blood samples to be tested. World Harvest Mission who work in Bundibugyo had several missionaries come out with their children whilst they still could. They are now being housed in MAF's main guesthouse. It was a bit of a mad dash to get things ready and organised but we made it. Although then I had the challenge of taking care of future bookings that had been made. One family were due to stay in the Guesthouse two days after we let WHM use our main guesthouse. Where was I going to put them??? We eventually opened up the old guesthouse and scrambled around for furniture to make it livable. Thankfully, with a team of willing helpers, we made it just in time for the guests arriving. Just pray that we are able to successfully borrow things for future guests as Jacqueline (partner in crime for the guesthouse) and I are trying to make a 3 bedroomed guesthouse fit bookings taken for a 6 bedroomed guesthouse. Its a challenge but we hope to make it work.
Please continue to pray for those in Bundi and for the families who are split up at this time. These days are not easy for them. Pray that Scott and Jennifer will be able to get out for Christmas to be with their children.

Communication challenges again and a quick update

Sorry for not writing for a while. We are, again, having problems with our internet/email connection. We are able to get on for a few seconds then we lose the connection again. As you can imagine it is quite frustrating as our inbox is growing at a fairly fast rate. Apologies to all of you who have written to us recently and not had replies. I promise we will get to it eventually.
As I write I have just lost connection again. Hopefully it comes back so I can upload this post. :) I am also writing in the dark as the power is off. I guess thing are back to normal now that the Queen is gone :)
This week I have been attending a MAF training forum. It has been a hectic week but we are coming to the end. Hopefully I will have time to process all that I have learned over the next weeks.
Simon and the rest of the pilots have been busy this week with flying. Just last week there was a confirmed outbreak of the deadly ebola virus in Western Uganda. It has claimed a number of lives and many are infected. Simon flew a team of Doctors in yesterday and will fly in more people tomorrow. Please pray that this outbreak can be contained and pray for wisdom for the medical staff as they treat infected people. Pray for the missionaries in Bundibugyo where the epicentre of the disease outbreak is. One family in particular has had to fly their children to Kampala for safety while the parents wait out the quarantine time so that they can be reunited. It is a difficult time for many.

Well it is very late so I am going to finish here. Will hopefully have better internet connection soon so I can do regular updates again.