savannah

today skye took grannie and grandad to visit savannah, georgia

inlaws are cool

aren't they?

happy christmas

wishing you a very happy christmas

hello grannie and grandad

we're home

from hospital this afternoon. physically, mags is doing amazingly well
but obviously, emotionally, we're devastated

the doctors, nurses and hosptial staff have been amazing
we're so grateful for the prayers, love and support of our wonderful family, friends and church family
we know God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble (psalm 46)

thank you

elijah john

we lost our little baby son today

family

it's cool having some family time...

here's duncan, hannah, skye and aidan with auntie marianne

one today

happy birthday miriam!

(great work on the cake too, richard!)

the posse

and a big happy birthday to olivia!

phil mags skye brooke olivia and steve visiting from england
(and not forgetting jina, who's not in the piccie)

unbelieveable

down to five emails in the inbox!
I feel all clean

skye video

click here for a cool video of skye reading with jaedan

first fire

tonight we lit our first open fire of the fall (that's autumn for the brits!)
we laid back and thought of england, guy fawkes and the calladines
(love you guys and can't wait to see you!)

also a big shout to brooke who ran the new york marathon today in 4hours and 4 minutes! woohoo! go girl!

big shout

to jonesy and hillary!
heard you got engaged today!
loads of love and congrats to you both

baby bolster

congratulations kevin, lucy and amy bolster on the birth of ella clare yesterday!

loads and loads of love to you four and welcome to the world ella clare!

preggie

woohoo! it's official, we have a new wriggly baby!

toronto

just back from a great trip to the toronto airport church with the YT group from church
it was wacky and challenging but very exciting and inspiring too

mags has been before, but for skye and me it was our first time in canada
boo boo did great and it is nice to be back earlier in the day

amazing

you go all the way to toronto and who do you meet?
two boys from home who you haven't seen for about 7 or 8 years!

here's matt phil and james enjoying a sheffield reunion lunch

just a thought

watching poor old will p give away the clemson virginina tech game it occurred to me how discipline can be really necessary sometimes - if tommy b had benched him after the first quarter they may well have won the game

skye praising jesus

had a top time with friends brad and roeman last night

roeman took this awesome pic of skye praising jesus
(we know the real reason you log on here....)

life here

isn't all hardship

here we are going kayaking this morning
on the creek near our house

happy birthday to you

happy birthday to you
happy birthday dear mags
happy birthday to you!

new kelly

a huge hello to kerstin maria kelly!

woohoo! welcome to the world!
loads of love and well done susan and jonathan!

welcome joel matthew!

here's beautiful aimee holding her new brother

well done isabel and nev and aimee!
loads of love to you from the usa kellys

ten years

of marriage today!
God is good, mags is patient, phil is blessed

girlfriends

skye had a fun time this evening playing with annie grace

more congratulations!

to jean and francis on your wedding day! woohoo! how exciting! we know you are going to set india on fire! we wish we could be with you and are praying for you

congratulations!

to matt and jo parkins on the birth of scarlett cate! woohoo! welcome to the world miss scarlett! we love you guys and are praying for you!

wherever you may wander...

...there's no place like home!

it was great to see matt, michelle, mags, skye and ann waiting to greet us the airport - thank you

big sis

got to spend some really precious time with big sis marianne in brighton this weekend, here we are on the beach witht he pier in the background

dream come true

I've been looking forward to visiting the giants causeway for a long long time

big splash

mags and skye made a big splash at the party for our friends chris and cameron and harper

the westerns rock

big love to you andrea, tchad and isaac

what a treat

atle and anette came all the way from norway to play with me on the beach!

sorry

for not updating our blog for, like, ever
we're not dead as some suppose, just been to and fro roaming the earth
look back over the past few months to see what we've been up to

today is carolina day

when carolinians celebrate a notable defeat of the british on June 28th 1776 and fly the state flag of south carolina - a good day to keep a low profile as they (allegedly) marched the brits they captured through charleston with no trousers on!!

orphange

this is kelsey, who'll be the first little girl in the orphanage that we helped lay the foundations for

to the highest

mount whitney 14, 494 feet (4,417 metres) above sea level

from the lowest

badwater basin in death valley 282 feet (85.5 metres) below sea level

mad adventure

set off westward on a mad adventure in california today...

dangerous streets

saw this fella crossing the road this evening!

a big hole in the ground

here's phil with skye at the grand canyon

we're having a fantastic time in arizona, including one very long day today visiting the amazing and awe inspiring grand canyon
i've always wanted to see it so i am one very happy bunny!

skye dedicated

we had a dedication service for skye this evening at st andrew's
dedicating her to God and giving Him thanks for her life

well, the calladines will have their hands full - they agreed together to be skye's 'God-family' - just like kodjo had his hands full during the service!

state eight

welcome to the hotel california

go west

phil flew out to arizona (state seven) with mal today for meetings

i love bono

"There is a continent—Africa—being consumed by flames.
I truly believe that when the history books are written, our age will be remembered for three things: the war on terror, the digital revolution, and what we did—or did not do—to put the fire out in Africa.
History, like God, is watching what we do."
you can click here to read all of bono's remarks at the npb

simplicity

woohoo! it's the end of the journey for our things - we collected it all from the shipping agent's warehouse today, a month and a day after it left sheffield

it's funny and healthy and good - we've been here nearly two years now, the process has been one of simplification, our story is that our amazing God provides every thing we need!

steelers win

the pittsburgh steelers beat the seattle seahawks 21-10 to win the fortieth superbowl in a strange, somewhat less-than-convincing game

home again

phil arrived back safely this evening, having covered about 1600 miles in total and touched the ground in two new states, alabama and mississippi

congratulations to dave and janelle on the birth of benjamin owen!

home this week

is a school gym in long beach mississippi
after hurricane katrina it was converted into temporary accommodation for volunteers helping with the relief work creating 'camp coast care'
on one side is a dining and hanging out area and the other is camp beds

they regularly house around 150 volunteers at a time, but this week has been much quieter with 35 here
it's operated by a committed team of volunteers and church leaders in a neat partnership between two denominations

new porch

olivia and charles pose with miss hortence and her shiny new screen porch

look closely

you can see it's a beautiful area, but look closely and you can see almost every home has a white trailer (a caravan) in front of it, where people are living while their homes are rebuilt

devastation

until we got here and began looking around it was impossible to really take on board the devastation of event like hurricane katrina
this is a house we saw at the beachfront

quite literally everybody has lost something
around two-thirds of the population of long beach still have not returned - the storm hit five months ago

mississippi with a mission

phil set off today for a six day mission trip to the gulf coast of mississippi
a group of ten from the st andrew's year team will be helping with hurricane katrina relief
follow the team's adventures online at the year team blog


here's the team after lunch at charlie joseph's in la grainge, georgia

fdr

"let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance"
(from franklin d roosevelt's inaugural address, saturday march 4th 1933)

shipping news

the stuff we shipped from the UK has arrived in Charleston today! woohoo!

but perhaps you're more interested in skye who has teeth and can crawl now (it's official, mummy said so).....

what goes...

...wriggle, wriggle, lunge, face-plant-into-the-carpet, giggle?

(answers on a comment below)

pirate baby

panthers lose

the carolina panthers lost 14-34 to the impressive seattle seahawks, who win the nfc championship and now progress to the super bowl
they'll play the pittsburgh steelers in detriot on sunday february 5th
(translation: some american sports result)

home help

spent the day doing errands, tidying up at home and getting ship-shape
later mags and skye helped the calladines and phil went with some of the year team crowd to hollywood (it wasn't glamourous - just helping at a nearby church)

late christmas pressie

this morning daddy put my last christmas pressie together....
....it really is a rocking pony!

as you can see, i'm getting pretty good at balancing now!

also wishing a huge happy birthday to amy!

tasty milk

responding to fresh encouragement over christmas from susan and miriam we've been thinking about buying more stuff that's either local, organic, animal-friendly or fairly-traded - hence 'loaf'
it seems the interest and market for this kind of goods is much less developed here than it is in britain and the cost is often twice that of the usual suspects
to spread the cost our resolution has been to switch one item a week to loaf-principled goods in our grocery shopping
harris teeter organic milk (like the salted pork) is particularly good, slurp!

woohoo!

congratulations to ansley and jim who got engaged on sunday evening!

today is martin luther king day

'most Christians are thermometers that record or register the temperature of majority opinion, not thermostats that transform and regulate the temperature of society'
challenging stuff

go panthers

our team take on the chicago bears in the nfl playoffs today
(translation: a quarter final cup game in american football!)

habitat for humanity

spent a happy morning digging holes and wrapping houses with the college crew at habitat for humanity

a long-expected party

well it's goodbye mulehouse
the sale of the house God gave us in Sheffield was completed today
it was a wonderful blessing to us and we thank God for special friends and times there
we pray it'll continue to be a great home for the new owners

friends

we had fun playing with friends who came over to visit today

here's elizabeth with annie grace, skye and cameron with harper

explorer

skye's now a nifty roller and loves to explore - especially under furniture if that's possible!

stories

the year team regathered today, we simply told stories of what God has been doing with each of us over the three weeks we've been apart and prayed
good times

jon senior is travelling back today too (with his mum, who's visiting for a while)

chilling

a quiet day at home

flying high

us airways were very good to us
skye got her own little first class bed both ways!

stuff

finally the shipping company came to free rich and mim from our stuff!
they collected 18 boxes to send to south carolina

cute piccie

here's the granddaughter (skye) with gran (helen) and granddad (john) at rich and mim's in sheffield

baby boom

there is a lot of babies blooming in sheffield, it's really lovely to see

here's mags with joy and skye, isaac, noah, jo with ben, jack
a special hello to isaac and jack, our gorgeous Godsons!

taylors in town

john, helen and auntie maggie came back to sheffield for the day
it was lovely to see them, they said they wanted to see us, but we know what the real attraction is....
....skye playing the spoons!
:)

happy new year

skye with her great aunt evelyn and grandma