105 & Dubai

I'm writing this from the TSCF office in Wellington at the start of TSCF annual staff training - and am greatly looking forward to the week.

A quick update on the house: Last week we sold 105 (for the 3rd time). Significantly, this time it's to a cash buyer who is an ex-pat Kiwi living in Dubai, and his mum from Tai Tapu has been round doing all the looking and advising him.
So, we're excited, but cautious too as it's just a paper contract at the moment, and won't go unconditional for the next couple of weeks. All being okay though, we hope to move in October.
It's nice that Lincoln is so small and friendly though - Liz has dealt with the mum through work, and it turns out we'll be at the same am-dram production together next week.

Thanks to those that have prayed and asked us and encouraged us as we've been stressing.

Moving house?

Back in April we blogged about wanting to move house We sold our house to a lovely couple wanting to downsize to be nearer grandchildren. They loved our house. All was good. But, over the last few months it transpires that they've not been able to sell their house in Hororata so have pulled out of the sale of our place. This is frustrating, to say the least.

We still want to move; Catalyst means lots of boxes of books, it'd be nice to have a dedicated study/office, space for more students rather than squashing into our small living room, and also Terry on the way. We're motivated to move. And owners of the place we hope to move to continue to be very gracious and have allowed us another few weeks to sell this house. But the question remains - will our house sell again? There's not much volume in the housing market at the moment so we may have to stay put, which wouldn't be ideal but not impossible. We've been reminding ourselves that so many cope with so much less. God is good, and God does care - it's our lack of trust that has been bubbling to the forefront.

If you know anyone who wants the country air of Hororata with lots of house for the money, have a look at Campbell's Cottage

It's the place our (previous) purchasers want to sell. They're still up for selling - I had Alison in tears on the phone at the thought of not moving to our place.
Alternatively, if you know anyone who'd like to live in sunny Lincoln (and yes, the sun is shining weakly at the moment!) then here's our new TradeMe ad.


We're trying to keep an eternal perspective on all this, and failing some of the time. Please would you pray for our stress in this situation?

Terry not Terri

Lizzy & I went to the hospital for a baby ultrasound scan yesterday. We thought we'd be in and out in a couple of minutes but apparently they take hundreds of photos and dozens of measurements for first the radiographer, then the midwife to check, and that takes an hour. It was a dimly lit and warm room, so on a cold winter's afternoon we both just wanted to fall asleep! We didn't really understand what was going on, apart from not just one, but two sonographers telling us the gender of the baby.
Yes, it's Terry not Terri. They seemed very sure about that.
Psalm 127:3 reads: Sons are a heritage from the LORD, children a reward from him. So that's cool.
Obviously, I'm already hoping Terry's a cricketer. Opening bat preferably, but any position is fine. And my mum has kindly said England or the Black Caps is fine! Good on ya mum!

Here's Terry with his head on the left, facing upwards, and belly on the right, spine at the bottom, and right arm over his mouth (apparently):


But I do need to clear up one matter which has become a confusion for some - 'Terry' is only a code-name. Seems a lot better than 'bump' (one of our friends has 'Percy the Parasite'!?!) We don't actually like the name Terry that much, (no offence to Terry readers) and he'll have a new name come the summer. Of course, we're open to sponsorship rights for the naming of our child......