October 11, 2010

Updates from our Facebook group

Because we have had such a trial getting emails to go out with our africanonline email account, I decided to start a Facebook group to keep folks more updated on what is happening with our family and ministry. It is a closed group but if you are interested in joining on Facebook, just let me know. We did not want it open to the general public so all sorts of folks could write on the wall and so forth that we did not know. However, we know that not everyone has Facebook so we are going to try and update our blog with the group updates until we can get the email stuff all sorted out. Thanks for all your prayers and support!

It is hard to believe that we are all packed up and will be flying back to Africa tomorrow. We have had an amazing six months of stateside time and thankful for all God allowed for our family during this time. We wish we could have seen each and every one of you but not possbile. We are glad our paths did cross with many of you. More importantly, we are blessed with everyone's prayers and support.We hope to send updates more often so we can keep folks more aware of what is going on with our family, ministry and the Swazi people. God is doing exciting things in Swaziland!

Our biggest prayer concern right now is for our flight back to Africa tomorrow for our family. Traveling with a 2 1/2 year old is going to be a bit of a challenge so pray Nathan does well with sitting still when needed and that we are all able to rest some on the flight. We will land in Johannesburg, South Africa, on the 27th, spend the night at our Baptist guest house and then head onto Swaziland on the 28th. We look forward to connecting with you once we arrive back home and sharing more stories of our African adventures. Thank you for joining us as we continue the journey God has called our family in serving HIM in Swaziland.

It is still hard to believe that this time last week, we were still in West Palm Beach, Florida finishing up packing and saying our final good-byes to family and friends. We wanted to say thank you for all your prayers for our family as we traveled back to Swaziland on Sunday/Monday on the plane and then driving in our mission truck on Tuesday to Swaziland. The kids did AMAZING on all the flights and Nathan even took two long sleeps on the international 15+ hour flight to South Africa. Praise the Lord! Lacie returned to school on Wednesday after our family arrived back in Swaziland on Tuesday. She was warmly greeted by her classmates and enjoyed being back into her routine. We have been slowly unpacking more and more each day and getting the house back in order. Nathan is just happy to be playing with his cars. Steve has jumped back into some of his Bible studies, mostly just re-connecting with the Swazis and hearing how God has worked in their lives. Our family plans to attend Hawane Baptist Church in the morning at their invitation and we are looking forward to being with them for worship. The youth leaders in our area were at the mission property this morning for a meeting in preparations for our annual youth retreat for our area in December.

As we get back into ministry, pray for
- our family as we adjust back to our lives here in Swaziland
- God's clear direction to know new work areas- upcoming National Women's Retreat on October 14-16 with Barbara Myers, our friend and co-worker on our Swazi mission family, leading the sessions on prayer.
- our Swazi mission family is getting new missionaries, Todd and Deborah Hoskins, arriving in Swaziland on October 14. Pray for their final days in the USA and special times with family and friends. We are excited to see our mission family growing once again.
- Lacie is taking her entrance exam to start grade 1 at Sifundzani Primary School in January. She will do great but she is a bit nervous.Lacie is finishing up her kindergarten (grade 0) school year right now. We are blessed and thankful for Al and Belinda Jordan that covered our ministry work and stayed in our house for the past six months. We were able to be with them briefly before they departed back to the USA. We cannot put into words how much we appreciated their willingness to serve our Lord in Swaziland the past several months.

Check out our family blog at: http://www.allensinafrica.blogspot.com/ for more stories and sign up to be a follower to keep us accountable in writing stories more often.

We have been so blessed to have Lacie in a small, preschool since she was three years old. It is literally five minutes away from our house with great teachers. They have Christian principles, even though it is not technically a Christian school. She has great friends there and we have loved the environment for her. Kindergarten or Grade 0 is the oldest class at the preschools here in Swaziland. Lacie is now preparing to start Grade 1 in late January, when our new school year opens. The school year for us is all-year round, January - December, with three term breaks. Right now, Lacie is on the list to get into Sifunduzani Primary School and we hear great reports from others that it is an excellent, private school. Primary schools are grade 1 - 7 so our little Lacie will be quite the little fish in a big pond next year. She will be taking her entrance exam on Thursday morning at 10:00am, our time. It is more of a time to see how Lacie does with listening skills, see where she is at with her basic learning skills, interacting with adults and so forth. We know she will do fine but she is a bit nervous. She is afraid she will be asked to repeat kindergarten, which is so not true. We should find out fairly soon if Lacie has been accepted into the school and finalize the plans for her to start in January. Pray that if this is where Lacie is to be in school that everything will work out. If it is not, God would close the doors tightly. If she is not to attend there, give us direction on other options. We have homeschooling as an option but not sure if that is the right one for us right now, either. Education is so important and we know we are at crossroads to an important decision concerning Lacie. We appreciate all your prayers and any advice of others as well.

Hope this catches everyone up on our latest updates....

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