Our time with family….
was AWESOME!! My mom asked me (Tate) to do a blog post about having our family with us over Christmas this year. They were here a total of 17 days and it was PACKED full of FUN.
The blessing baskets started because we wanted to bless the people who work for J-life. My mom met with Esther in September and asked what would be the biggest blessing to the people here and the Blessing Baskets were created. My Aunt Cindy put a request on the city and also to the Sunday school classes at our church, or to anyone else who wanted to donate. Our goal was set for 50 but everyone blessed us with enough funds to assemble 80 blessing baskets!! Each basket was given away to people in need. About half of the baskets went to the J-life workers and the other half of them went to a group of elderly people located in a township near Johannesburg. These elderly people don’t have proper identification, so they are unable to apply for grants to help them. On top of that, they are taking care of children or grandchildren. We had many grateful hearts, and the elderly people in Johannesburg were so happy that they started singing songs of thankfulness to God.
We were also able to meet with Skip, a guy who works in the local community, and help him with a feeding program. It was considered a smaller program because everyone is South Africa takes holiday (aka vacation) for most of December. The majority of the people who showed up for food were elderly people as well. Aunt Cindy, Aunt Chris and Grandma were able to help set up tables, and we helped distribute the maize meal and veggies. It reminds me how blessed we are because we have so much food, and so many people have barely anything.
Our favorite part of having family here was playing games, games, and more game. We played soccer, RISK, MONOPOLY, video games, and cards. It was hot most of the time they were here, so we also got a lot of swimming in as well.
We spent the last week with the family in Kruger National Park. We were in the park for 2 full days looking for animals. It was very HOT, and we only explored about 1/10 of the park. Kruger National Park is the size of Israel. We saw the BIG 5 our first day at the park. We all wondered how the Big 5 got their name, and this is what we discovered.
How did these five animals – the lion, elephant, buffalo, rhinoceros and leopard – come to be called the Big Five?
It was originally a hunting term used by the so-called ‘great white hunters’ in the hunting heyday of the 19th and early 20th centuries, when professional hunters bagged as many trophies as possible in as short a time as possible.
Considered a rite of passage for seasoned travelers, everybody from American presidents to European royalty and heads of state came to Africa to shoot a large, dangerous animal. The Big Five quickly became known as the most dangerous animals to hunt on foot.
We also had the rare chance to see two wild dogs, two different times. There are only 120 wild dogs in the entire park, that sure was a TREAT!!
We love to take people to ACTS Family Church in Extension 23. This time they asked all the guys to come to the front of the church and dance with the Pastor, who was sharing the word of God with us. It was very embarrassing but fun at the same time. My mom took a video and it is below….you can see that white people can’t dance!!
At the very end of their trip we were also able to watch Megan get baptized. She has wanted to get baptized in Africa for a long time. It was a blessing to hear her testimony and be together again with our cousins.
For Austin, Tanner, Hudson and myself, the hardest part about being here is being away from our cousins. We miss them daily and had such a GREAT time with them while they were here.
-Tate
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