MAF Nathan and Sarah Montgomery Newsletter

It is hard to believe that Christmas is fast approaching.   It is rainy season here and the weather is a little cooler but it still doesn't feel like Christmas is a month away.  We have been creative and made a number of snow crafts with the girls so at least it looks wintery in the house.   We are excited to be able to celebrate with some new traditions this year and will be enjoying Christmas dinner with some of the other families here and spending the day together.
The girls continue to enjoy school and the extra things that go along with that.  Hannah has just finished her season of soccer and enjoyed the good competition and learning new skills, as well as making new friends.   She enjoys having friends over for sleepovers and going to their houses for movie nights.   Jasmine has had a great first term and continues to take her school work very seriously.  This coming week both Hannah and Jasmine will begin end of term exams and although they are not looking forward to, they are learning good study skills and will be well prepared.   Aliyah loves all things about school and especially enjoys the swimming lessons that are a part of Phys Ed, each week.  The school recently held Rain Festival and each class was given a theme to decorate their room and the kids dressed up as well.  Aliyah wrote her own story and invented her own costume as a Marshmallow man from her story. She then won best costume for the girls in her class.   Lauren is steadily learning more in sounding out words and has taken the task of learning to read with full enthusiasm.  It is fun to see her writing notes to everyone and being interested in sounding out how to spell things.  Lauren also went on her first field trip with her class, and was so excited to ride the bus to her teachers house where they looked at structure and building materials to go along with their study unit of buildings and materials.   This coming week we are looking forward to the school Christmas concert with each of the girl's classes presenting, as well as the choir for the three older ones and Hannah will be part of the Middle School band. Christmas break begins on Dec 18 for them and they are looking forward to the time off from school and doing extra things with their friends.

We are continuing to find our way around Kampala and even made it out to Entebbe to the Botanical Gardens with some friends.  You can check out some of the pictures from that day, on our blog www.mafmontgomerys.blogspot.ca   Since we live in the city, it was great to be able to get out and enjoy a quiet green space that was only about an hour from our place.   We are slowly getting used to the traffic here but sometime it can be crazy and take twice as long to get to where you want to be.  This weekend, the Pope was visiting and there were a number of road closures planned, so the kids were off of school on Friday and we have stayed close to home, spending our weekend visiting friends close by and doing a bunch of baking. The tricky part is that when a road is closed, there isn't a nice way around, so it gets complicated.  The good thing about the Pope coming though, is that some roads were improved and the general cleanliness of the roads were stepped up as well.  They have people that work daily and sweep the streets, but we noticed a higher number of them in the last few days.
We have just about decided on a home church after visiting a number of different congregations as we mentioned in our last update.  The church is a newer one here and we enjoy the fact that it is a mix of Ugandans and internationals as well as good teaching and an active children's church.   The girls also enjoy going there too which is an answer to prayer.

Nathan has been busy with inspections on the DRC planes and also helps the Uganda team when needed.   Last month we were able to attend a family conference with all the other families in the East DRC program.  It was great to meet them and hear of the work that is happening right in the Congo.  They live in such different circumstances than we do here, so it was good to learn about life and how to better pray for them there.  We are hoping to visit them soon and see first hand the ministry in Nyankunde, DRC that we are a part of.

Thank you for your continued prayers and encouragement.  We praise God for His faithfulness and grace as we have learned many new things and have settled into life here in Kampala.  Pray with us for deepening relationships with the Ugandan people and for opportunities to share the love of Christ in our daily routines.

In His Care,

Sarah and Nathan,  Hannah, Jasmine, Aliyah, Lauren