Russell and Precious marvelling at their new laptop!
The kids with Santa before they opened their gifts.
Fun in the pool! Apologies for the delay, but at least I'm getting this in before New Year tomorrow!!
We've had a busy week with some friends from the UK who are out here with Lionsraw. The Flint family have been raising money and awareness all year for the work out here and especially for Sithembakuye Orphanage. They arrived on Christmas Eve and we brought all the kids, Russell and Precious (who run the place), and a couple of Gogos up to our house for Christmas Day for a party they'll not forget in a hurry.
The children had never been to our house and they were over the moon to see a swimming pool, and even more excited to be given swimming costumes and allowed in to play. Hardly any of them can swim but they enjoyed being in there. One of the boys got into difficulties in the deep end almost immediately causing Steve to dive in and rescue him, but that didn't keep him out of the pool and he was soon back in having fun.
The mist was moving in though and after a while we had to get the kids out of the pool and stick them in front of 'Santa Claus - the Movie' whilst the braai was cooking. Lunch was borewors, steak, burgers, baked beans and mayo mix (cold, but actually quite nice), salad and bread. It went down very well, as did the cake, ice cream and fruit for dessert. Every child finished what was on their plate and came back for seconds. Not a bit was wasted. No fussy children here!
Even small touches like letting off party poppers and pulling crackers were greatly enjoyed by the kids and they were very excited when Santa came in to give them all their presents. The whole group of children, with ages ranging from 2 to 17, got excited for each child as he or she went up for their presents. The joy in the room was almost tangible. However, nothing could beat the amazed reaction from Russell when he was presented with the one thing he'd been praying for - a new laptop. His old one had been stolen at knifepoint a short time ago and he'd been struggling to work without one. There was certainly a lot of celebration when he opened that present!
We'd taken Russell and Precious to ToysRUs a few days before to get a big present for each child (which was an adventure in itself!) and they also got lots of little presents from the UK. The brilliant thing to see was that each child shared their toys with others and also respected their own stuff. Even a few days after when we've been down to the Valley to see them, they are still excited at what Santa brought them!
To see the joy and happiness that this day brought to these children was quite overwhelming and the sense of euphoria and Christmas joy was everywhere in our house. It truly was an excellent day!
