Happy 9th Birthday Beautiful Gate!!

This past Friday we celebrated the 9th anniversary of Beautiful Gate. When BG first opened their doors there were 7 children and today there are approximately 40, and have cared for 240 children over the past 9 years. God is good! Beautiful Gate has been such a blessing to so many children who were in need of a safe haven, and who just needed to be shown love, and we believe they receive that being here at BG. We are thankful for all the staff members who put all their time and energy into making BG what it is. Christ's love is put into action everyday and it is evident. Thank you BG for giving us the opportunity to serve with you for this short time, our lives will never be the same!

We had a small celebration which included dancing, singing, poems, prayer, and skits that were prepared by different staff members, all optional but all very good and entertaining.

Some of the men doing some sort of Besotho dance...... and yes we had to stare at the dessert on the table there until everyone was finished performing, talk about torture! :)

Lindsey's house mother (on the left) and some support staff singing and dancing a Besotho song.. hilarious! we tried to post a video but that will have to be shown later.

Lindsey and her support staff Me Lisebo dancing the traditional Besotho Dance. She was so good they forgot she was white! They say that she is a true Besotho and cannot go home anymore, but don't worry, she'll teach you if you want :) :)



After the celebration, we realized how difficult it will be when it is time to leave. We are not asked if we are coming back, but when, and that is what we want to hear because our desire to return is already in our hearts. We wish we could stay longer, Friday is coming too quick!!!

Visiting Edward's Village

Edward, one of the workers at Beautiful Gate, invited us to his village in the mountains where he lived until he was thirteen years old. After driving about 2 hours and hiking for 1 we finally made it! Here is a picture of some of his relatives. Thanks Edward for a great Saturday!

Hiking in the mountains.

A boy from one of the villages in the Lesotho mountains. One boy about 3 or 4 yrs old saw my roomates and I and ran away screaming and crying because it was the first time he had seen a white person. Seeing four at one time must have been quite overwhelming :)

More kids staring at the weird looking white people.

During this time of year it gets pretty cold in the mountains and many of the children don't have shoes. When I get home I am hoping to contact Tom's Shoes and encourage them to donate shoes to the children of the Lesotho Mountains...... If you haven't heard of Tom's Shoes visit their website at www.toms.com. For every pair of shoes you purchase a second pair is donated to a child in need :).

The houses

The pictures don't do the mountains justice. They are absolutely breathtaking.

Thanks for reading, we would love read your comments!

~Lindsay

an update and pics! :)

Yes we eat on the floor.... no table :)

Lindsay with two of the girls from here house. Yes, the one on the left is smiling

Lindsey and one of her boys.

More kids from Lindsey's house

Some of the neighbor boys posing for a pic!

From LindsAy:

Hello everyone! Sorry it has been over a week since the last blog update. Apparently we are not very good at this.

Another week went by very smoothly. On Monday, the social worker received a phone call from the Lesotho adoption representative stating that two families from the Netherlands are on their way to Beautiful Gate to pick up their children. whoa! The social worker was not too thrilled about this phone call. Usually the representative calls at least a day in advance. So around 10:00 both parents arrived to pick up their boys!!

I think the boys were around 4 years old. Lindsey and I did not know them very well because they were not in our house. One of the boys has been longing for a family; most of his friends have already been placed, and when he finally met his parents he looked so happy. It was beautiful. Both families returned on Friday for an adoption celebration which was fun to see. Both boys were very excited (as were their parents). A few of the Beautiful Gate workers spoke and presented the families with a quilt. The parents signed the adoption papers and everyone prayed over them. When the celebration was finished one of the boys ran up to Lindsey and I and gave us both a hug. We were obviously very touched since he didn't really know us :) He hugged a few more BG workers and walked around the BG property with his mother and father before they left.

There will be another adoption next week and he is from Lindsey's house. There are many other children in the process of adoption currently and we were told that more could be adopted soon with short notice (hopefully not a short as 2 hours like last time :)).

I have been fighting a bad cold for over a week now and it has been quite annoying. I sound like a dying cow, it's rather attractive ;). If you could all keep me in your thoughts/prayers it would be greatly appreciated. I would like to spend my last three weeks here healthy!

~Lindsay

From LindsEy

Okay so we are just horrible at updating our blog, our scatterbrained, usually unorganized personalities probably have nothing to do with it :) Anyways, we are over 2 weeks into our time here in Africa and we can't believe we are going home in less than 3 weeks! Sad day :( Thank you all for the prayers and thoughts and words of encouragement, we appreciate it and cannot not tell you enough how thankful we are to have such amazing people in our lives :)
well, these few pictures will give you a snap shot of what its like for us, but we can't upload more for the computer is slow, so we will have to show you all in person when we get home!
God is good and we are proven that everyday we have been here! in our new friendships built with roommates, in our daily en-devours and keeping us safe going into town and on little adventures, in the smiles of the kids we see, the hardworking house mothers and support staff, oh God is good! even in the rain He is good and his power is seen! And rain is a reminder, that after the rain, there is sunshine, and that is true in much of life. there is always a storm or a pouring rain, but afterwords there is sunshine. It has been storming for the last few days, like REALLY storming. raining and cloudy all day, thundering and lightning at night, and it was the first we have seen of anything but sunshine since we got here! But we woke up this morning, and it was like the rain never existed. Clear, bright blue skies with the sun shining down, oh how i love it!
I also see the sunshine goodness in the support staff ladies in my house and lindsay's house. our houses share a kitchen, and after breakfast is over and the kids are sent off to school/playgroup, we get to help them do whatever they need help with being feeding the little babies, cooking, cleaning, laundry out on the line, ect. Sweeping is a big one, i have swept everyday i have worked, and it felt all worth it on friday when my support staff lady says to me "you get a sweeping certificate for doing such good sweeping!" how she makes us laugh, everyday without fail. The world cup is big here, but for her every 10 minutes she will scream wherever she is "FEEL IT: IT IS HEREEEE!" They seem to like us okay too, at least we hope! My support staff lady and Lindsay's gave us our Sesotho names, and my lady named me Impo and says to me " It means gift from God. you are a gift to me, my sister from America. you are a gift from God to Khosto 2 (our house)" and then says a few days later "you must stay in Lesotho and at BG, i will e-mail your parents and tell them you are staying." They named Lindsay "Lineo" (pronounced Dineo) which also means "gift from God" (this is what they tell us and we believe them, if they mean something else we don't know haha), and she told her that "you must stay in Lesotho because I have brother that you should marry, i will email your parents and tell them"...:)

The world cup is here for sure!! we feel it!! :) :) and it has been so fun so far! we here the horns all over, and all the games are on TV and we have watched about 3-4 so far, and it is all anyone around here talks about! We rooted for South Africa on Friday... they tied, and we rooted for USA last night (even though our English roommate rooted for her country... grrr :) ) and they also tied.. what is the deal??? ohhh we shall see, but it's fun!

Last weekend we went to Malelala to go horseback riding in the mountains of Lesotho with our roommates. It was incredible, like nothing we have ever seen or done before. no words can describe! It was real horseback riding too, we were going up and down mountains on skinny little rocky paths, going through bushes down the sides of the mountains, through streams and valleys, it was so beautiful, pictures will never do justice!!!!! i have never seen any view like that before, and i don't know if i will ever have a view of that again!! I kept saying I felt like I was Dr. Quinn or at least in that show, and i will keep saying it because it was THAT fun and amazing, we had a great time, and God showed me again how amazing He is because of the beauty her created in His creation, it was great to just be among it and be in awe of it, truly amazing!!

okay well that is going to be all, a late dinner calls us! thank you again for all the prayers, keep them up! we will hopefully update you all again soon!

~LindsEy

By LindsAy:

It has been a week already and we can't believe it! Time is going quickly and we are loving it. We go to the houses at 7:00am and help the kids get ready in the morning.... yes if you us 7:00am is a bit early but we don't wake up until about 6:40 :). The kids are rather crazy in the morning and they know I can't speak Sesotho so they challenge my authority and laugh at me :) For example one boy thought it was be fun to jump on the couch and I yelled at him, instead of him getting off about 6 more children joined in and laughed. So I just laughed too and hoped my house mother was not annoyed with me. Other than some misbehavior the kids are great and I already know I will miss them.

I usually have about 2.5 hours off for lunch which is amazing I love the down time to sit outside in the sun and read a good book. The weather has been very nice thus far and I am not looking forward to cooler weather that I hear is coming. The mornings are rather chilly but the afternoons are very pleasant.

Today I was sick with a fever and sore throat so I did not work today, but fortunately I am starting to feel a little better. Tomorrow we will be pony trekking in the mountains which will be amazing (pictures to come soon)!


By LindsEy:

7 days we have been here and we can't believe how the time flies! and we have time to update our blog twice in one week wahooo! :) Well, our first week is complete, and we have had a full week of our 'jobs', and fully enjoying them!! However, like Linds said, we wake up early, and even with going to bed at 9:30 pm, morning is never a friend of ours no matter what time it ends up being :) BUT, right at 7 i walk over to my house and say hello to 11 hilarious, adorable, sometimes trouble making but always lovable kids. Even with waking up early, my mood is never down because i get to hear the older kids sing their prayer before breakfast every morning, and it is that simple joy that gives me a positive mood for the rest of the day. not only with them singing, but seeing the little ones of the house (5 ages 1 and under in my house) and feeding them and getting them to smile and even changing their napi's (diapers), i just sit and enjoy my time with all of these little ones the God created special, and after spending just 5 days with them i can see their individual personalities come out a bit more and i am loving it. Funny little things happen everyday and you just have to laugh, and there are so many moments that i wish i could capture on camera and take it home to show everyone, but it's a little hard to have a camera on you 24/7 when you are trying to take care of 11 kids ages 0-6 with only a handful of people...:) :)

Bohlokloa is a perfect example. he is a 2 1/2 year old little boy, adorable!!! yesterday and today, he walks around the house with his pants but no undies on, and his pants are always falling down so all you see is his little butt hanging out as he is running around and jumping all over me or whoever else. Me' Mametella (house mother) put some on him before he left for playgroup yesterday (actually when he was sent back because he didn't have enough clothes on), and he came back from playgroup for lunch, walks out to the back where we were eating, sits in he grass and i see his little butt just hanging out of his pants again!! and i pick him up, swing him around and hit his little butt and all he does is laugh hysterically because he knows that he should have his undies on. hilarious!! all i could do is laugh at him and tickle him, and then everyone else wanted to join in on the tickle party too!

Lindsay and I are loving being here, we know we are supposed to be here, God has given us an opportunity to serve and we have taken it. There is nothing to complain about (well, the very chilly mornings maybeeee :) ) because we know we have been called to serve, we are here to serve, and we are being blessed through this experience! Even though these kids have stories of pain and sadness, they are blessing us in so many ways, along with the people we are meeting (slowly, as there is alot of people around these parts we have realized!), we have no excuse but to be happy and thankful for this amazing experience and opportunities, even with the hard things or experiences we hear and see. this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and we are so grateful for it! And I may or may not already have a few children that i would like to come home with me :)

Overall, it has been an amazing first week here. from the children we have met and are interacting and building relationships with to the staff that takes care of them, to our roommates that we are getting to know, and the fun times we are about to have pony trekking tomorrow and sunday.... it has been great and we only pray for our weeks to come to be just as rewarding as we continue to serve here in Lesotho!!

thank you all again for all of your support and prayers, keep them coming we appreciate them very much!

Hello From Lesotho!

Well this has been a long time coming, we apologize for not updating sooner! but we are here!!!!!! wahoo!!!!

All of our flights went very well, we had no turbulence or any delays or anything, which was good for us because who knows where we would have ended up if something did happen. our luggage even made it to Lesotho the same time we did, which is something Lindsey Miles was worried about :) we even met some pretty cool people on our flights and at the airports during layovers that were also traveling around the world which was fun for us.

We arrived right on time on May 28, at 7:30 am after not sleeping one minute on ANY of our flights (well maybe 30, but that is really about it), and we were ready to see the country of Lesotho! we were picked up and brought to Beautiful Gate by a certain Ms. Christina and a few other Beautiful Gate staff, got a quick tour from Terp and then got a tour of the city of Maseru later in the day!

We are staying in a 'house' with Christina, two Americans and a girl from London, England. We feel like we are in college all over again, which we don't mind at all, it's fun to live with people and not have to do homework all of the time :)

It's incredible being here in Lesotho and at Beautiful Gate. we cannot believe that we are here after all of the dreams, thoughts, and prayers that have gone into this journey thus far! we are excited and looking forward to what God has in store for us these up coming weeks and have already seen things that we will always remember and cherish.

Monday we got our job assignments here at Beautiful Gate, and we are both excited because we are working in the houses where the children are, so we will be interacting with them everyday, and we are excited about it! there are 4 'houses' here, each house has about 10-12 children in them, with a house mother and staff. there are 2 separate buildings, each with 2 houses in them, sharing a kitchen that connects them. We are each on one side in one of these houses, so we each work with a separate house mother and children, but also work in the same kitchen with the whole staff. our house mothers are very nice and know English, but they also like to laugh at us a lot and talk about us in sesotho to each other. We are their entertainment for the day we think, but they did teach us how to dance today while we were making bread, so we will teach you all when we get home!! :)

it has been interesting trying to get a feel for what it is like here at beautiful gate. We have seen all the children come outside to play, and it was so incredible to see all these little people running around the yard. but as the days go on, we are being hit little by little at what we see and learn about these children. while feeding them or playing with them or holding them when they are crying, we have moments of sadness for each one because of the stories that they have and the terrible things that some of these children have gone through, and realizing that these children do not have families of their own. it breaks our hearts.

what really made it real was today, another little one was brought to Beautiful Gate, and it's incredible to see the things that Beautiful Gate does for the children in this community is amazing, and we are so thrilled and so blessed to be a part of it and see and experience it, even if it is for a short time.

Thank you so much for the prayers and support you have all given, it has been an incredible journey for us so far and we are looking forward to updating you again soon!!!!

One Week!

By LindsAy:

Well in 7 days we will be on our way to Lesotho! We have raised all of our funds which we are so thankful for, we couldn't have done it without you! At this point it still does not seem real to me and I don't think it will until I am on a plane. Believe it or not my packing as been minimal and my mom has been reminding me that I should probably do that soon. Being a pretty last minute person, I probably wont be 100% packed until 1:00pm on May 26 :)

Lindsey and I will be leaving Detroit at 5:40pm on May 26. From there we will fly to Amsterdam then to Johannesburg. Early the next morning we will have an hour flight to Lesotho. With all the time changes we will be arriving around 7:30am May 28. I think this is 1:30am MI time. If anyone has ideas to pass the time flying let us know! Since our Ipods will only last for about 7 hours (well for me my Ipod is 3 years old) we will need to find other ways of entertaining ourselves, this actually might not be too difficult considering its Lindsey and me we are talking about.

If you could keep us in your thoughts and prayers it would be greatly appreciated. Lindsey and I have never been on a plane for more than 3.5 hours and both of us have odd/unrealistic fears about flying. Also, the volcano in Iceland has been irrupting ash (maybe not irrupting) so some flights in Amsterdam have been delayed. Even though Lindsey and I would have very exciting adventures in the mother country if our flight happened to be delayed, we would like to stay on schedule :).

Thanks again for all of your support and prayer!

~Lindsay

Dream Big.

Our Dream.....
(By LindsEy)

Have you ever had a dream that became a reality? Have you ever planned out something in your life, only to not have it work out because it was what YOU wanted and not what GOD wanted for you at that time? God's timing is not our timing, and His timing is something that i have learned to wait for and embrace. there have been things i have wanted and not wanted, and they happened just the same, but in the end i realize how necessary they have been in my life to where i am today. A learning experience, or a moment of joy i will never forget, or my heart breaking and seeing the world in a different light for the rest of my life because of that. it's all God's timing. Well, God has called myself and Lindsay Ebels on a journey of HIS timing, and we are taking it and have realized why we are taking this opportunity now, and why our plans of going wouldn't have been as great because they were ours.

We have both been wanting to travel to Africa for as long as I can remember, and we both have similar hearts, we have a passion and emotion for people and helping people and building relationships with people. Africa has been on our hearts for a VERY long time. We have both individually attempted to go previous to this, but things never worked out for us, and we now realize why! We are supposed to go now, we are supposed to go together. And what is amazing to us is that we will be traveling to Beautiful Gate in Lesotho, Africa, which is a place that our home church, Haven CRC has been supporting for a few years, and we know a lot about them and their mission. Watching videos from families and people in church that volunteered at Beautiful Gate, i would get a tug in my heart and tears in my eyes EVERY time. I wanted to go! i wanted to go with one of the groups that went, but it was my timing and i was so frustrated when it didn't work out, but i have learned patience through this process, and now the timing is perfect. Just perfect! I am going with a good friend who shares a similar passion with me, and we are meeting our friend Christina Terpstra there because she will be serving for 6 months and we are going to be there for a part of it. It's perfect!

Please join us on this journey! Join us by reading this blog, praying for us and supporting us. Your prayers are coveted more than anything! Thank you for the support that has already been given to us, and that will be given. we are looking forward to seeing where God is going to take us Lindsaeys through this life's journey! We will be updating everyone through this blog, so "hello" and "welcome," and we Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

Lindsey Miles :)



How it all started.....
(By LindsAy)

I remember a couple years back when a family from my church had the opportunity to serve in Africa for six months. After watching their video in church I knew it was something I wanted to do as well, but I had to be patient and wait for the right time to go. Late one Thursday night in September, Lindsey and I Facebook chatted (no lie :)) about what we were going to do with our lives after college. This idea of serving in Africa together almost started out as a joke.…We both had the same “crazy” dream to serve in Africa and began to talk about how we should just turn this dream into reality, why not? So, after much needed prayer and communication with the Beautiful Gate staff, WE WILL BE GOING TO LESOTHO!!

Lesotho is a small country surrounded by South Africa. Lesotho, with a population of only 1.8 million people is very challenged as a nation. The impact of the high rate of HIV/AIDS, and a population of whom 56% live on under $2 a day is struggling. The Poverty and AIDS pandemic led to a new phenomenon of abandoned babies. Beautiful Gate Lesotho is an organization that has cared for over 170 babies since June, 2001. Currently, there are 35 children aged between 0 – 4 years in Beautiful Gate’s care.

The one necessity of our trip in order to move forward was our plane tickets and we have them! We were both nervous when we found out that the prices of tickets were significantly higher because of the World Cup in South Africa. Fortunately, we have an amazing travel agent who found tickets that were about $600 cheaper than we thought we would have to spend. God is good! We are still in the process of fund raising but have been extremely blessed with the financial support we have received thus far. We will be leaving on May 26 and returning July 3. Now that we have plane tickets reality is sinking in and I think I can speak for Lindsey when I say that we are both getting excited!

The tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn’t a calamity to die with dreams unfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream. It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim is a sin.
Marian Wright Edelman

More to come soon :)

~Lindsay Ebels