Trek for treatment

One of the things that our church is heavily involved in is raising money for and participating in mission work overseas. On Saturday Eric, Aussie and I did the 'Trek for Treatment' which was a 13 km hike through the Brookfield Hills to raise money for the Leprosy Foundation of Australia to buy X-Ray equipment for a hospital in Nepal.










It was a beautiful day, a little chilly at first, but nice once we warmed up from the walk. It was quite a difficult hike, up and down hills the whole way, and I'm pretty sore and sorry now, but it was definitely worth it. Aussie was in his element of course, and didn't even get worn out by the end of the hike, even though he probaby goes about 10 times further than we do, as he runs back and forward the and side to side the entire way on his 20 foot leash. He did some great work pulling me up a couple of hills!







We loved being outside, and wished that we could have been camping. It's been a while since we have been camping - the last time was in Italy. Our weekends have been so busy that we haven't had an opportunity, but we're hoping to go in Spring after our trip to India.

















We're very excited at the moment, and little anxious because we settle on our block of land in Kenmore this week. Here is a photo of the land:


It's a small block, but we're actually glad of that because it will mean less yard work, and with the terrible drought that Queensland has been going through for the past 7+ years there isn't any spare water to keep a large garden going, so it's better to have a small yard. Also, it's directly across the road from a cute park, so we'll use that as our backyard without having to maintain it!



The block is in a fantastic location. It is literally within eyesight of the church, so Eric will be able to walk to work. This will be so great for him, because he often has late night meetings - and once we move to our new home he will be able to pop home for dinner. Also we won't have to buy a second car which will save us a lot of money. Here is a view of the street that it's on - Palm St.

Kenmore is such a nice, leafy suburb. It's really well established, with shops, cafes, restaurants, and several schools. Everything we could want within reasonable walking distance. We're very blessed to have found a block of land there within our price range (well sort of!) - there isn't much land available in Kenmore these days, we may have snagged the last block! The only thing is that it will be quite a long process to get it built as there is a real estate boom on in Australia and all of the builders and tradespeople are extremely busy and very difficult to book. We're hoping to get it done within 8-9 months... and in the mean time we have to pay rent and a mortgage!

I won't tell you how much the land is costing us, because you'd probably have a coronary, let's just say that the land is costing us quite a bit more than a very nice house in Atlanta would have cost. Then we have to build on it.... Oh well, we're trusting God through the whole process, 'cause He's looked after us so far. Here is a view of the cute park across the road from our block, and up the hill towards the church.









Here are some pictures of other houses on the street. It's a very modern, funky look - Dad is designing our house, and I think it will be great. Two stories, with 5 bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms. We can't wait until it's built and we can move in - then we won't be moving again for a very long time, and you will all have to visit us!











Au revoir!