Well, I finally feel as though Christmas is here. It looks to be a wet Christmas this year with the heavy rains suddenly falling very late. With drought in much north and north-east Uganda, I am sure the rain is welcome to many and we pray they will now be able to grow a good crop.

It is strange how carrying out those familiar Christmas traditions is so important to us.

Last weekend Mark & I went to the Pantomime. Yes, there is even panto in Uganda! The Kampala Amateur Dramatics Society did an excellent performance of Dick Whittington.

As a family we have put up our tree and yesterday, I made mince pies with my two little helpers.

On Sunday 20^th like many of you, we shall be going to a Carol service at church. I know many of you are used to carols by candle light but the service at our church is advertised as ‘carols on candles’. I will let you figure out what that could mean…

It became clear to me this week that all of our children’s TV programmes depict Christmas in the snow because Amy suddenly said, “On Christmas, I will put on my coat and hat and go to church on the sled”. She does not even own any of those items!

One of the most special times each day for us has been our story time. We are working through a little bit of the Christmas story each day with the children and it is fun to see them take it all in, in a fresh new way. Yesterday, I commented that the Shepherds were the first ones to know the baby Jesus had been born. I was promptly corrected, “No mummy, Mary and Joseph were the first ones who knew”.

We pray that as you hear the familiar story again, you will be able to celebrate Gods special gift to us in a fresh way this Christmas.

Life here is never dull. For the past two days we have all been entertained by the presence of a lorry, which has been stuck on our road.  We live at the bottom of a steep hill. The road is a no through road, so the only way out is back up the hill.

On Tuesday morning the truck broke down at the top of the hill.

The driver then made the unwise decision, to try and jumps start the truck by rolling down the hill.  He was unsuccessful, and had to drive into the ditch to stop himself hitting our neighbours wall.

First the driver tried to repair the truck, then they tried to tow the truck up the hill but no luck with that either.  By evening it was clear that the truck was spending the night on the road.  Wednesday dawned. The truck was going nowhere and therefore neither was my car.  I abandoned the idea of shopping and went for a nice walk with Joshua instead.

When we returned a mechanic had been sent.  At midday the engine roared into life, but it took another two hours and lots of black smoke to finally get the truck back up our hill!!

It should have been five princesses but this is Uganda.  One princess did not make it to the party and another was three hours late!

Yes,  Amy just celebrated her 4th Birthday on December 4th.  She chose to invite a few friends to one of her favourite restaurants rather than have a big party.   So we headed to Spurs and enjoyed a wonderful time of trampolining, face painting, french fries, ice cream & cake.  Not forgetting that her brother had received a ‘Thomas the Tank’ cake earlier in the year she requested a Disney princess cake.  Mummy, got creative and managed to produce ‘Cinderella’.

Cinderella Cake

Amy was thrilled with her gifts (most of which we lovingly carried back from UK in the summer).  She loves her new shopping till and she wore her new cheer leader outfit to her party.  Of course, being a boy who likes transport, Joshua saw the shopping til and said

” ooh, lets buy train tickets”

Opening presents

Emma, Amy & Joyce

Well my two year old boy is growing up faster than his mum wants him too.

I guess all children do that, but he seems to being turning into a ‘big boy’ right before my eyes. Already 104cm, tall I have to wonder how many (or few) years I have before he is taller than me?

Recently, one of Marks projects has been to repair a bicycle that we found for Joshua at a roadside shop. After several weeks of Joshua saying “Daddy fix it?” we were able to give him his bike last week. He has graduated from a little tricycle straight to a big bike with 14’’ wheels and can be seen here pedalling away!