Wanganui Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Here's hoping you all have enjoyed a wonderful festive season - it was fantastic to be able to chat to some of our special folks on Christmas day - we do miss you, but hope that maybe by next Christmas we can welcome you to New Zealand and we can spend the day together!
Here's a taste of what we did on our first Christmas in New Zealand.

The day began with a lovely service at our new Church venue in the centre of town - we have managed to add to our little band in the form of Pierre on guitar (amazing what a few guitar lessons can do!) and Bonnita adding some beautiful dulcit tones on vocals. Plenty of old favourites in the way of 'O come all ye faithful'/'Kom alle getroues' and 'Silent Night/Stille Nag' with the stunning South African 'Somer Kersfees' to round everything off, made for a special Christmas day service.



There is nothing like a bit of fun in the sun for building up a good appetite for Christmas Lunch - this volleyball match was fiercely contested and was accompanied by much hilarity and leaping about -(especially Martie who stood on a bee) - her leaping about was definitely without any hilarity!



















Volleyball in the blazing heat was not everyone's cup of tea - some folks relaxed in the shade and caught up on some news from South Africa - the two ladies on the left of this picture are visiting here and spending Christmas with their families - hopefully, they felt as welcome as the flowers in Spring.





















If you really want to, you can make a festive and fabulous Christmas dinner anywhere! The garage at Marieta and Hennie's new abode was spacious enough to set up tables and chairs for all twenty something of us - the main reason being that the weather here in Wanganui is unpredictable and we were concerned about the possibility of rain on the day! We needn't have been so worried - the sun shone fiercely from 11am to 11pm!






Andre with lots to say about Pierre (our visiting 'preacher man' from SA) taking a ride on the swing!

The swing which is just a couple of kilometres out of town on the banks of the river was very popular on Christmas day - some of the braver (and younger) folks took the whole experience to another level by leaping off the swing when it was over the water and doing spectacular back-flip dives into the Whanganui river.

After checking the whole scene out from the sidelines for a while, Jo decided to risk it and take a ride on the wild side and swing out over the water.

As you can see, some folks just weren't too keen on swings 'n things - a little shut-eye after a great Christmas dinner was just what the doctor ordered. We don't think they planned to be caught napping! but they needed all their strength to muster up the energy to tackle the dishes!

Na al die dag se dinge, was dit heerlik om terug te kom van die swaai af en 'n ou koffietjie en

nagereggie te geniet - hierdie foto is vir al julle Bothatjies geneem om te bewys dat die ou blikbeker van Fairy Heights dit al die pad Nieu Zeeland toe gemaak het! Die 'kol' was spesiaal vorentoe gedraai vir die wat ons nie glo nie - ja nee wragtig, dis die eindste beker wat julle almal so goed onthou!! O, en die vla binne in was heerlik saam met die bruin poeding hoor!

Ons stuur ons liefde en beste wense vir die Kersgety aan al ons geliefdes - ons verlang baie, maar hoop julle se 'Krismis' ook heerlik was. Wie weet, dalk volgende jaar is daar van julle wat sommer hier saam met ons 'n wonderlike Kersfees sal kan saam geniet - julle moet nou begin spaar - ons wag vir julle!!

Dis al!