School

Natalie's first day of school for the year went really well today. Apparently she especially liked the painting, and she made a new friend called Grace as well as seeing her friends from last year. So that was good. (I also wanted to remind people to check the AllSaints Beirut Blog in the links - there are quite a few pictures of the kids there.)

More flood photos

This afternoon we took Jeannie for a drive up to carrieton to look at some of the damage to the hawker road at the Januarrie Creek The photos don't fully show the power of the water and the massive pieces of concrete and build up of gravel on the road. There is also dozens of huge tree trunks that had been ripped out of the ground. They say it will cost over 2 million to repair. We also went down to have a look at the lagoon at Black rock and were pleased to see two black swans swimming on the water. trust you all have a good week. Very nice to see the country side greening up, all we need now is for the rains to keep coming.

At last

This has been the holidays with lots of beach and pools at friends houses. It will definately be remembered as the swimming holiday, as I write Annie is packing swimming gear to go on church youth camp at Victor wich includes surfing lessons at Middleton. Mike is working elsewhere so Zac and I will have some nice times together
starting tonight with the Charlots web movie that I promised to take the younger s,school kids to. We are also picking up Mike & mine new bike tomorrow(our christmas pressie & Mikes bday pressie ) and some time Isaac will take me out for coffee with the $ he got for his holiday job of watering pots for two weeks so there you have some of our news. Hope you are all well (Debbie!)
and safe. Lots of love ,Hoggies. xxxxxxxxx

THE DROUGHT HAS BEEN BROKEN

At 10,00 am this morning we topped 100mls of rain (4 ins in old scale) Another night of steady rain 51 mls mainly in the last 6 hours. I think our puddles are a bit bigger than yours in Whyalla. We took these photos this morning. the top one is at the driveway at Black Rock even washed down the neighbours kids. the gate into brooks across the plain which had a good covering of water over most of it. The other photo is at the turnoff at the main road. The road to hawker is closed and the pekina creek is running and the reservoir is filling. B O M are saying there is still more rain to come.

RAIN, RAIN, GLORIOUS RAIN

We have had one of the best soaking rains in years. Started raining at 4 am on Thurs. and fairly consistant for the next 27 hours. 49 mls here in Orroroo down at the farm 44 at the shearing shed, 48 at brookes, 50 at haynes and 55 at Acklands. It has started raining again with another 5 mls so far with more heavy rain predicted for tonight. This is what the roadway into the shearing shed looks like.
Hopefully the start of a good year. Will start a lot of feed out in the back paddocks. Will post an update on rainfall tommorrow

Calvins Card

Hey Calvin, hope you like all the smiley faces, just like yours!! Glad that you had such a lovely busy birthday! It all looks like lots of fun. Lots of love from all the Masris. (Well done Mummy! and Daddy too :) )

Happy Birthday Calvin!!!XXXXXXXXXXXX

Happy Birthday to Calvin, Happy Birthday to Calvin, Happy Birthday to Calviiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin! Happy Birthday to Calvin xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Just wanted to say ...........Happy Birthday Calvin.

Jessie is making a birthday card for you Calvin but it is not quite done yet and we need to go out for a while. So you will see your card later. Hope you have a lovely day and lots of fun with Mummy, Daddy, Natalie and I guess maybe some friends too! We love you very, very much. Aunty Lindy, Uncle Wadih, John and Jessie. xo xo xo xo

What we've been doing while Mummy is away

Natalie: Hayden came over to visit me. We played princesses and doctors and kings. We had fun with the doctors toys. Then we did Mr Potato Head. That's all there is. Bye.
Stuart: Debbie left just after 7am this morning to go down to Adelaide to stay with a friend. (The friend moved down just before Christmas, and her husband has just gone on a mission trip to the Philippines, and after being broken into on the weekend, she isn't coping too well.) Debbie took Calvin, to help celebrate Bradley's birthday. The plan is that she will stay overnight and return by lunchtime tomorrow.

Preaching day in Peterborough

Hopoefully we have the new blogger set up so we can go straight in. We took the service in the UCA at Peterboroughthis morning, good service and had time with some of the ex baptist folk over a cuppa tea. We were still able to get back and spend time with the Orroroo people. Rang Lindy last time all is going well the winter is starting to set in with snow on the higher ground Light snow where they live last week but melted in the rain. Have a trip to Adelaide on Tues, driving Cynthia Ploenges and Les Cottrell down to Enfield so they can attend a funeral then off to Laura to have the car serviced on Wed. will go to Pirie for the day in a borrowed car while they do the service. Photo of the Bundaleer Reserviour between Jamestown and Spalding They have just cut down all the Pine trees around so first time in years that you have been able to see the reserviour from the road. Have a good week.

At last

So I finaly sorted out the pasword bisso and signed up to the new blogg too. The sunset photo we took on our way home from Orroroo and the creamfight photo and others are self explanitary.We've had lovely holiday times with Mike around but he is back to work next week :(. Having breakfast at the market was one of the nice things, fireworks and swimming on New years eve was good too! I think new photos are still on the camera so more to come.
Glad you has a good b,day Dad and hope all others are keeping well. John and Jessie hope going back to school is good! :) Take care all. Love Kezza xx

Its been a good day

Thanks for all the blog cards and best wishes. IT has been a hot but good day. We upgraded to a new Next G mobile phone that will enable us to make calls while we are overseas and I guess overseas from here if we have too. The orange bean is a little massage machine. The Chiropractor said my neck muscles were very tight and some massages should help. time will tell how good it is. First go is very promising.
Mainly for Lindy's benefit we went to Clare for some shopping and lunch at the pub and called in at Jamestown on the way home to put in your cheque for #300.00 from the Lighthouse church and to give them your Tax File number. We then picked up Grandma Jeanie and went to Maggie's for a Coffee. The big question is "WILL YOU STILL LOVE ME WHEN I'AM 64"
I think we can say we have upgraded to the new blog.

Happy Birthday Grandpa!!!

Happy Birthday Grandpa/Dad/John!!!

We Love You Very Much

Jessie had great fun creating this card for you Grandpa. It is all her own creation, a graphic artist in the making if you ask me. We are hoping you have a lovely day with some special treats along the way. ANNNND, Happy New Year to you all as well. I have had no internet connection for the past 6 days so it is a bit late. We have had a manically busy holiday but it has been lovely! Lots of friends and fun (and food, but we are getting over that!) and now it is back to school tomorrow for the kids and I am down in Tyre for the day. Lots of love to all!!!!!!!!!

(By the way, Stu, I have already changed over Blogger!)

Migrating to New Blogger

You will have noticed (when you log in) that you sometimes have the option of upgrading to New Blogger. (It doesn't appear everytime, because Blogger is staggering the migration.) It would be good if everyone can do this when they get a chance, because if I move the Blog over before people upgrade, then they won't be able to access the blog. I'd like to make this upgrade later in the week, so if you see the option to Switch - please take it up. Happy New Year, btw. (That answer your question Kerryn? If you look in Blogger Help, there is a section on "My password wasn't sent to me when I forgot my password.")

Our Christmas So Far

Happy Christmas everyone!!!!!
Well, it has been a busy weekend but a good one. The concert went really well Sunday night and apparently we are famous now!! : ) We had a nice evening with Wadih's family at Graces house and then I went to our Midnight Mass service for the first time. It was really lovely, communion by candlelight. Unfortunately, Wadih's van wouldn't start so I had to leave a bit early to go rescue him and the kids and it was about 1:45am before we all got home. Christmas morning was a very family friendly church service, with stories and pass the parcel!! (See the church blog allsaintsbeirut.blogspot.com) Then we went to Nigel and Annettes for Christmas lunch with 22 of us. That was lovely fun and the kids slept over. So now Wadih has gone off to some work!!!!! Yay! and I need to go get the kids. We have a party at 4pm and another one at 7:30pm, but that one is minus the kids so they will sleep over at Tata and Jido's. (That's Adel and Doha) Looking forward to talking to you all tonight. Lots of love.

MERRY CHRISTAMS

Merry Christmas my lovelys!
i have nothing else to do so i thought i would share my thoughts with you lovely people who i know!hmmm hmmm hmmh mmmmh mmm hmmm mmhmm well write now im humming along to a song called be my escape hmm hmmmmh hmhm hmmm hhmmmm(thanks to Debbie Stuart Natalie and Calvin!!!!♥)(i hadnt heard of relient k b4:S) hmm hmmh mhhmmmh mmh hmmmh mmm<"and ive been locked inside that house while you hold the key">hmm hmmh mhmmh mhmmhmhm <"i......... got to get out of here... and i'm beging you im beging you to be my escape">hmmmh mhmmh mmhmm oh well enough of that ummm there isnt much to say hmmm.......... i love listening to music hmm hmmh mmhmm ok thank you if you have kept on reading because i dont mind if you stop now because i'm just writing everything that gose though my head laal lla la llalalalalal alal lala now im listening to running by evermore <"running...... running....... running... runnning......................"> <"you dont need a broken heart to know know a heart can be broken..... you just need to open your eyes...."> woaahhh woaaah woooah woaah woooooooooaaaaaaaah( arent i just a great singer!!!!!lol) RAchel slept over last night after she had been to the basketball and the 36ers lost so i think there out forever im not sure :S!!!!! hmhmhmhmhmhmhmhmhmhmhmhm <"cry to my daddy on the telephone hoe long now">hmhmmhmhm<"THE SAINT ARE COMMIN THE SAINTS ARE COMMING">(((new song by the way you can probably guess))) <"and the magnolia trees... child on a roof top mother on her knees please.....please..."> hmmh mhmhm mhmmmhm mmhmm mhmhm hmmm hmm ohhhhh the playlists over oh well thats probabaly best because i could be going on forever!!!!!ooo dads cleaning the windows....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
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hmmmm im going to eat an apple <><><><><><><><><><><><>>>><><><>its a big red apple oh and dont expect me to be writing for awhile because this is mabye 3 or 4 days worth of blog writing! ok ok now i'm completly blank theres nothing else in my mind just the cruning sound of me eat an apple and i dont think you need to hear about that because it would just take up another 2 pages!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

so im leaving now
GOOD BYE
♥ annie

Our Christingle Makers!!

Okay here is a Christingle. If you are wondering about the story behind the Christingle, it originates in 18th century Europe. Four poor children wanted to bring a gift to go under the church Christmas tree. All they had between them was an orange, a red ribbon, four smooth sticks and 8 sweets. They combined them to make a Christingle and took it along to church. When the local children saw it they laughed at the poor gift, but the vicar took the Christingle and told a story. "The orange is round like the world God created, the red ribbon reminds us of Jesus and the blood that He shed for our sins, the four sticks represent the four seasons and the fruits that we get are shown by the sweets. There is just one thing missing." He took a candle and added it to the top of the orange. "The candle represents Jesus, the light of the world." That, is a Christingle.

Mary comes to town.

Last night was the annual pageant night up the street and Natalie got to be Mary in the float that Lynne Gibb arranged on behalf of our church. As you can see it came together very well. They used props that Di Scott had used as part of her lights display a few years ago. The Ambulance crew thought it would be a good idea to display the changes in uniform over the years hence the line up of different coloured uniforms. It was a good night although the numbers were down a bit on some years.

Shopkeeper for a Day

Yesterday we had a small truck and a 4 wheel drive with trailer arrive with about a tonne of goods from City Baptist churches for us to distribute to people in our community.
This afternoon we set up in the town hall and by 4.30 we had handed out 21 food packs that we had put together. reckon we have about 50 to go. hope to hand them out before Christmas eve.
The packs in the back of the Ute had been put together by people in Adelaide and contained mainly over the counter pharmacy goods plus a few others things like Tee shirts hats and film. We received 50 of them. As well as leaving stuff with us they dropped off goods at Clare, Laura and the bulk of it is going to Hawker and beyond. They are predicting heavy rains tomorrow so the team could have a few exciting stories to tell when they get back.

HeY AgAIn!!!

Hello again
Sorry but im not very good at writing on the blog everyday but i will try and keep you up to date with my holidays. I went to my friends party on saturday and that was great fun because and made friends with her neighbours who are very nice. I slept over her house but we didnt do much after that. Today i went to marion with my friends and we were going to see a movie but there was nothing on so we went bowling and tried on lots of clothes. Ummm i cant htink of anything else to say so merry christmas and i might write soon!
♥mwah♥

Crazy Hair Day

No this is not John's usual style for going to school but today they have Crazy Hair Day as the beginning of a week of silliness before the Christmas Holidays. Tomorrow is Pajama Day, then a bake sale Wed, Red Day on Thursday and then Friday, Christmas Party last lesson.


We had a great Carol Service last night and were able to meet in the church building. First time for a few weeks so that was pleasant. Not quite the usual numbers of 250 but still well over 150 I would guess. And for once, everything worked, the power point was fine, the playback worked, the readers did well (John was one!!), the singers sounded wonderful (I was one!!, but everyone else said we sounded wonderful so it's okay!), the food was enough and quite tasty, nobody had too much of the mulled wine! ; ) All in all it was a roaring success.

Just two more things to get through and then we can enjoy Christmas! We have a Crib and Christingle service Saturday and then Sunday evening our choir is having our concert which will be televised live for Christmas Eve. What fun!! There is nothing worse that cameramen all over the place when you are trying to do your thing!

Okay, Cheery bye for now.