This baby is now officially overdue - according to the English due-by date anyway - but we're keeping busy and enjoying ourselves. There would be no point just sitting around wondering when n°2 was going to turn up!
Today we went and explored the woods at Chicksands with Auntie Ali...
I thought I would follow up the last post, where I mentioned the notes I'm writing on support-raising for SIM France, with a quick post about our own support-raising.
I didn't realise how complicated it would be to calculate where we had got to in raising our monthly support. At the moment, we have about 60% promised by people who have given us a definite figure, and most of whom have already started to contribute each month. (The money we currently receive is held in our SIM account to be used for moving costs and necessary purchases on arrival in Benin.) But we also have a church and several individuals who have pledged to support us but not yet given a figure. If you are among them, expect to hear from us soon!
Another thing which makes it complex is that our support is calculated in Euros, but part of it is given in pounds by UK supporters. Apart from the fact that any fluctuation of the exchange rate will have an effect on how much we actually receive in Euros, the recent strength of the Pound means that if someone pledged to give £30 a month a year ago, at the time that gift would have been worth about 45€ ... but on today's exchange rate it would only leave us with 33€ - quite a difference!!
Of course, no one in the UK is earning more because of this, so our solution is not to ask our supporters to increase their giving, but to find more supporters, and this will be our task over the next few months.
Despite this sounding very technical and dry, support-raising has been an exciting time as we've seen so many people interested in becoming partners with us, not only in financial giving but by their prayers and practical help. It's been wonderful to see our team coming together, made up of friends, family and even people we didn't know before! On our side, we want to do our best to make sure that we communicate well with our partners, through our newsletters but also through personal contact. We would like to be able to support them in prayer as they also seek to serve God in their daily lives.
Although this baby isn't due until Thursday of next week, people are already starting to ask me if I've felt any twinges and saying they hope I won't have to wait too long. I am a bit impatient to see him or her after nearly nine months of pregnancy, and it is a bit weird to know that labour could kick off at any moment, but I'm not in any hurry.
For a start, I'm sleeping well at the moment, and very much enjoying it, knowing that soon sleep will be in short supply! And I'm enjoying time spent with Simon, playing with Duplo or looking at books.
Another consideration is that Simon's birthday is so close to Christmas. This year, with having his first party, I realised that it was a lot to think about birthday and Christmas at the same time. So the further this baby's birthday can be from Christmas, the better! We'll have time to get over Christmas before having to concentrate on organising another birthday party and so on.
I'm also fortunate enough not to have got very big, and not to have a lot of common late-pregnancy niggles. Apart from bad heartburn and feeling a bit heavier than usual, I am in very good health. Even my back is holding up well, praise God!
I'm also working on preparing some notes for SIM France. These will help French missionaries to raise their support. We had some excellent training last year at All Nations from Myles Wilson, whose book on support-raising, "Funding the Family Business" (see
website) is available here and we would recommend it to anyone raising their own support. However, it is only available in English, which is an obstacle for some French missionaries and explains why SIM France want to put together their own notes in French.... to complete my last post, I wanted to point out that although there were no photos of it, we very much enjoyed celebrating Jesus' birth on Christmas morning at Christ Church, Bedford.
Also, we had a beautiful - if chilly! - walk on Boxing Day near Sandy, at the RSPB National HQ.
Simon celebrated his second birthday on Friday. If he was older, he might have been slightly confused by going to a mums-and-toddlers Christmas celebration and being given a present by Father Christmas on his birthday, but at this age he takes it all in his stride! And just seemed slightly perplexed by having about 50 people sing "Happy Birthday" to him while onstage dressed as a shepherd!
He took a while to get warmed up to unwrapping presents in the morning. I was beginning to wonder whether they'd all end up waiting until Christmas (!) but with some help and encouragement he eventually got on with it and loved his new toys.
On Saturday we had a small party for him. Just two other children were able to come, but since Simon still doesn't like crowds of other kids it was probably just the right size for him. He got on very well with the little girl who came, who is a few days older than him. He led her by the hand into the room where we had lunch, and pushed her around on his pushalong Thomas afterwards. They also had lots of cuddles - very cute!
I made a Thomas the Tank Engine birthday cake, which I was very proud of!
