These are my first pigtails. Mommy likes them, but I don't!
Kaitlyn is 15 months old in these pictures. Steph wanted to take some pictures of Kaitlyn with her flowers. Of course Kaitlyn wanted to eat them.
Friday, February 23, 2007
Group Email and Lesotho Update
Dear Friends and Family,
This is Stephanie writing this time. It looks like it's been a while since you've heard from us.
We've had very hot, humid weather this week. Some wind and lots of dust and here and there some "fly spit" rain (literal translation from Sesotho). I am writing this in Ladybrand, and it is pouring rain right now with lots of thunder. I don't know how long it will last or if it will do anything for the Free State and Lesotho. We desperately need rain. It is very dry.
The elections last Saturday went very quietly. The LCD party, which has been in power for years, won again and by a large margin. The new party and its followers are not happy. They feel that the election results should have been much closer and they should have had more seats in Parliament than they had the last time. The losing candidate believes that since the winning party won with such a large margin that the election must have been "fixed" and he has taken it to court.
Glenn's keeping very busy with projects at the clinic. For those of you who were praying for the inspection there, the inspection has been canceled now that the elections have taken been place. Africa is always interesting! The counseling room is completely finished now. The next step is to receive testing kits and other materials to test for HIV/AIDs and do counseling. Glenn is currently working on a brick incinerator. It is somewhat complex, but he is overseeing it, and Ntate Mokoena is doing a good job. He has also had 3 meetings in the last 2 weeks and has another one tomorrow morning.
Kaitlyn had a cold/sore throat/ear infection the last 2 weeks, but she's feeling pretty well the last 2 or 3 days. She always keeps me busy. Books and the outdoors are some of her favorite things right now. She always wants us to read to her, and she talks all the time about the things in the books and everything else in her life.
Last Friday the Geise's came out to visit us for the first time. Philip came too. We had really a nice time together even though we had to find space for everyone, as all of you who have visited us would understand!
I don't think I've done that much that merits writing about. It seems like I'm at home most of the time lately. Do pray for me as I would like to do something with children's ministry again although I have not felt any clear leading yet.
This is a short email, I guess, but I think it covers most of the news. We are going to Uncle Piet's tonight for our first team meeting. I think one of the main things on the agenda is to tentatively set all of our furlough dates--to know when we can see you again!
I think Glenn was planning to post this and some more pictures on the blog, but it is still storming and pouring rain so I'm not sure he will want to be on line for a long time. We are still hoping for high speed internet sometime in the future! If you don't see this on the blog, then you'll know that's why there's nothing new there.
Thank you for all your prayers, emails, and love. We are so privileged to have such a wonderful support team behind us. May God bless you in a special way today!
Love,
Stephanie
Monday, February 12, 2007
Lesotho Update
Dear Praying Friends,
It's past time for another update and to share some more prayer requests with you. Thank you for your continued prayers!
Praise:
- The missionary team in South Africa and Lesotho had a profitable meetings with our Regional Director, Mr. Jim Howard.
- I (Glenn) visited the congregation at Ha Matala yesterday. Every chair in the church was full because of LOTS of children. There were also several adults, including some young men. It was a very encouraging service.
- Please continue to intercede for the pastors in Lesotho. Satan has not yet let up his attack. Particularly prayer for unity and spiritual depth. As you pray for them, also pray that we as missionaries will be excellent examples.
- The clinic will be evaluated on the 21st of February to see if we qualify for continued funding through the Government of Lesotho. Please pray for all the preparations that we are making, and also that the evaluation will be fair.
- Please continue to pray for our protection and health.
- From the 5th to the 10th of March I will be attending a pastors' conference with several of our pastors near Durban, South Africa. Pray that this conference will be a time of revival for all of us.
May God bless you richly for holding us up in prayer!
Glenn, Stephanie, & Kaitlyn Gault
Hope International Missions
Another Group E-mail
Dear Everyone,
Here's another short update on our lives. After weeks of weather in the 90's pretty much everyday, we had a break. Saturday all day it looked like it could rain, but never did. Then Saturday night a SW wind started blowing and brought us cool weather from Antarctica. I think it go down to 50F or a little lower than night. Sunday was clear and sunny, but the wind had just a little nip to it all day. It was cold again last night and today is pleasantly cool. I guess it's our first sign that fall is on the way, but I'm sure we'll have several more weeks of hot weather. Usually by the end of Feb. it starts to cool down a little, though.
Yesterday I went to Ha Matala. Steph and Kaitlyn were planning to go, but Kaitlyn doesn't do too well in a 3+ hour service. I also had to go to another church to present gifts to orphans in the afternoon, so we decided it would be best if they stayed at Matukeng. We had a good service with excellent attendance. I thought maybe it would be sparse since it was the last day of campaigning before elections next weekend. There were several political rallies in the area, but they didn't seem to steal to much of the congregation. God helped me to combine thoughts from the books of Exodus and Hebrews about the tabernacle, particularly the Holy of Holies. It seemed like people understood.
Kaitlyn is every changing. She LOVES to talk. It's really cute now, but I'm sure 
by the time she's two we'll be happy for a break. She's trying to make 3 word sentences now, but usually has to be prompted a little. A few days ago Steph had had to scold her for something. A little while later Kaitlyn was going around wagging her finger and saying "No, no! Naughty! No, no!" Unfortunately I forgot to download the most recent pix from the camera, but I'll put one on the blog that's about a month old.
A new political party was formed back in November which has led to these early elections in February. The new party's symbol is people making a flashing symbol with their fingers and hands. The taxi operators particularly support this party, so as they drive, the drivers and "cashier" make this symbol to passing cars. A few days ago an unlucky taxi driver made the symbol to the prime minister (who is of another party). He had his body guards stop the taxi, and he personally came and beat the driver. Politics in Africa are NEVER boring!
Love to all!
The Gaults.
Friday, February 2, 2007
The Week's News
Dear Everyone,
Hope this note finds you all well. We are doing well. Kaitlyn seems to be almost completely over her cough. We were worried about her for a while because it just seemed to be getting worse for about 2 weeks. The antibiotic seemed to clear it up, though and she's doing well. Thanks for your prayers!
I think the last we sent e-mail was Saturday. We were here in town for a school picnic. It went very well, and I think everyone had a good time. We played volley ball, then the
re was bag races, including one for the board and fathers. The students had a couple relay races carrying an egg on a spoon stuck in their mouths. Fortunately the egg shells were unusually tough, so there weren't too many casualties!
Sunday I preached at Matukeng, then we went to Uncle Piet and Aunt Hester's for a meal and meeting with the rest of the missionaries and Mr. Howard. The meeting was profitable, and we enjoyed being with everyone. We spent the night there and left at seven the next morning to take Mr. Howard to the airport in Bloemfontein. After he left Steph and I did several errands then went to a big building supply place to buy ready-made"devil's fork" fence for the school. (It's a steel fence made out of welded angle iron. It's low maintenance and fairly secure.) I had our double cab with Uncle Piet's big trailer. Unfortunately the fence panels were longer than the trailer, so the load was heavier at the back of the trailer which made it "wag it's tail." I only drove about 45-50 mph on the way home and we had to stop once to retie the load. It wasn't a relaxing experience, but by God's mercy we made it safely to Uncle Piet's about 7:00pm. We picked up Munchkin at Uncle Johan's then headed for home.
Tuesday I welded brackets to support a sink at the clinic and made a frame to support the new solar panels I bought several weeks ago. I got the solar panels installed on the roof before a late supper, then climbed up in the attic to do the wiring after supper. Wednesday I went to a TEE meeting in Maseru, worked some more on getting school uniforms made for orphans and preached at the Bible Study. The project for the orphans is kind of dragging on. Communication is slow to some of the pastors, and we've had a little trouble finding the cloth for some of the uniforms. I think it's because the schools just opened, so the cloth sold out when everyone was getting new uniforms.
Steph has been working on catching up our bookkeeping. We got behind on it when we were in America over Thanksgiving, so it has been a formidable task. The program we use for it on our computer isn't really adequate, so that adds to the problems.
Thursday we left Matukeng about 6:30 am to go to Bloemfontein for an appointment for Steph at the cardiologist. Michelle went with us to try to get her residence permit. Unfortunately she didn't have one letter worded right, another one wasn't on a letter head, etc. etc. so she has to try again next week. Very frustrating, but quite normal for Africa! For some reason the cardiologist was badly behind, so we kept rescheduling the appointment for later and later in the day. Finally about 3:30 we went in and still had to wait quite a while to see the doctor. We think maybe he had to attend to an emergency surgery in the morning or something like that.
The doctor did give Steph a good report on her heart. He is still convinced that her damaged valve was not the cause of the stroke. He says the damage is very minimal and that chamber of the heart is not enlarged much at all. He took her off warfrin and put her on a half aspirin a day. He is very confident that the valve will never give her any trouble the rest of her life. He did prescribe a battery of blood tests to try to find what caused the stroke, but they can't be done until a month after she stops taking the warfrin. I guess we'll see. It's always tough when specialists disagree.
Last night we spent the night at van der Merwe's. We had a relaxing evening and enjoyed being with them. This morning we had missionary prayer meeting at 6:00am then came to town.
Hope you all have a good weekend!
Glenn, Steph and Kaitlyn
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