Enjoying Christmas Break

Last night we had a game night - from noon until 11pm, the McCann's (our team mates), Madison, Mike and I ate, played, and had a great time!

Today, Madison's friend, Rudy from school, came over. As La Ceiba is such a small town, there isn't much to do during vacation times if you aren't going anywhere. So, Madison and Rudy took this opportunity to hang out together. And, of course, they played games all day! Fun times indeed!

Update

Been relaxing, playing Wii, and I've been sick. In bed for 2 days, but much better now. Still have a cough that makes me feel like I'm hacking up a lung, but no fever or body aches any more. Love to all, pray your Christmas was blessed.

Christmas

Today was Christmas - our 4th country in 5 years. England, The States, Panama, Honduras. Quite an adventure, I must say - but such is the life of a missionary! For quite awhile Madison has been asking for a Wii. For various reasons including the cost, we have not gotten her one. Well, this year with the help of both sets of grandparents she got a Wii and lots of accessories! After Madison opened her first Wii accessory, we told her not to get overly excited because it was our team mates who were getting the Wii but we wanted her to have accessories to be able to play at their house (I know...I know...a little white lie - but she LOVED it in the end). Like the great trooper that she is, she said, "hey - that's great!". Her "final present" was a clue which ended up leading her on a treasure hunt to over 20 different locations around the house, which ended up leading her to her Wii! She couldn't have been more shocked and thrilled! So - for the remainder of the day we played :-) We look forward to some serious competitions in the future!

Madison opening her stocking - yes - it's what you see - A-1 sauce! A Madison favorite and a special treat indeed as it's EXTREMELY expensive here, so rarely purchased!


Our dear friend from church, Cherilyn, hand-crafted this AMAZING Raggedy Ann doll with three different sets of clothing! Madison was SO EXCITED to get this incredible gift! It didn't leave her side all day!


Dad enjoying his Crunch and Munch from his stocking.


The unwrapping of the Wii!!!

6th Annual Event

Okay - I know that every family has traditions during the holidays. Some fun, some serious, some just...I don't know...different... One tradition we have is to celebrate Advent. Another is that Madison gets to open a gift on Christmas Eve. We also have a huge dinner on Christmas Eve (think Thanksgiving feast, just slightly smaller scale). One of our traditions is the annual viewing of...no - not It's a Wonderful Life (although we do watch that), and not the Grinch (although we also watch both of those - the animated and the Jim Carrey version) - but...all three Extended Release versions of The Lord of the Rings - yes...that's what I said - all three...in one day...11.35 hours in all!!!! Glorious indeed! Even when we were in Panama for Christmas, the DVD's came along with us - and we sat on the bed of our hotel room, ordered KFC, and watched all three movies on our lap top. Although - Mike has put a ban on quoting the movie during the watching of it (of which Madison and I are RENOWN for doing - what a bah humbug move!). Crazy, you say?! Well - we just love them that much! So, even when Madison is grown up and out of the house - she WILL return each December to our house to watch all three of them! It's a day of no cooking (donuts for breakfast...pizza for lunch and dinner), enjoying awesome movies, and spending the whole day in each others presence. I think as a holiday tradition - it's a good one :-)

This isn't what we looked like after 12 hours of Lord of the Rings...just a great shot of Gollum


Enjoying the pizza, great movies, and the comfy couch :-)

Christmas Celebration 2009

On December 20, 2009 we took nine kids from Armenia Bonito out for a Christmas celebration. First we cooked them a Christmas dinner and provided them with a wrapped Christmas gift. Then we went to a Christmas presentation at a local church. There was music, a great play about the birth of Christ and a strong evangelism message. These kids had never experienced a Christmas celebration quite like this.

Take a look at this 2 minute and 35 second video to watch our celebration:

Kids Christmas Party 2009

On December 19, 2009 our mission team hosted our 2nd annual Kids Christmas Party in the poor community of Armenia Bonito. Over 200 kids received games, Christmas songs, a Gospel presentation, a Christmas gift and a plate of food. This event was a great blessing.

Watch this 2 minute and 40 second video to see this Christmas blessing:

Scholarships

Something that has been on our heart for a long time has been to scholarship some kids from from the village of Armenia Bonito. We have a contract the kids, parents, and one of us signs. This includes passing grades, tutors as needed, writing letters to their sponsors in The States, working for us one day a month, etc. This gives the kids buy-in, and a desire to do well. The scholarships are a year-by-year basis. So, we are starting with three kids, and are resting in God's provision for these kids. We have registered these kids before we have cash in hand. I took two of the kids to their school today for early registration, the other young girl we will register next month when the school is open.

Walter is one of the young boys who has worked with us for a long time - many of you who came down on short-term missions trip will recognize him. He was a favorite among many with his sweet personality, patience with everyone's Spanish, and a very hard worker! His desire is to be a computer technician. Walter finished school in 6th grade (3 years ago) and has not been to school since. His father died, and his mother works to put food on the table. Past 6th grade, kids have to pay for school, and for most all the kids in Armenia, this is totally beyond their means. For that reason, Walter has been trying to work odd-jobs here and there, but his on-going desire has been to attend school. His dream has now come true. Here he is:



George is a young boy of 12 who just graduated 6th grade. His mother died when he was young, and school past 6th grade was always something he knew was WAY out of his reach. However, he is now being given the opportunity to pull himself out of the poverty in which he lives. His desire is to graduate and then attend a Vocational school for car mechanics. This will allow him to get a good paying job and to be able to support himself, something he always thought was an impossibility.



So we stand by our desire to scholarship these boys and know that God will provide the funding from individuals in The States for them. The other young girl we will scholarship will be highlighted in a later blog entry.

Christmas Performance

Madison had another opportunity to sing with the choir from her school. This time it was at the local mall. They did 1 dance, and 3 songs. A lot of people were there and it was fun to see her! We are up on the second floor overlooking them. This is her last week in school until a much looked forward to 2 week vacation from school!

Clinic

Each clinic day certainly has a "theme". Last time was mostly children, today was mostly adults. Unfortunately, I had a lot of bad news for a lot of people. Blood pressures and blood sugars were very high, a few so high I recommended they seek in-town medical care immediately. Unfortunately, I know that most won't. This comes on the day after there were 3 deaths in the village. The first was from a car accident as they were coming into the village, the other was from an elderly woman who had a heart attack, and the third was a young girl (13 years old) who took her own life because of conflicts with her boyfriend and mother. So many people were taking my news seriously, but I don't know that many will make the serious change to their lives that they need to. I have created many easy reader/pictoral health education teaching sheets that I give out and have a lot of time with health education. These are definitely situations that without some basic information, their lives will not improve. I talked a lot about diet, and doing things that they CAN do. So although the news was serious for many, this gave me a GREAT opportunity to do some serious health education today. So my brain is tired from talking a LOT of Spanish today, and my body is tired because last night was a night of insomnia for me...ah well...I live each day as a joy as I'm working for the Lord :-)

Advent

For those of you who read my blog who live in countries around the world - here is a link for you. It is an on-line Advent calendar. I know December has already started, but it's not too late. It's been wonderful for us to follow along with this advent. We have our own at home, but this has been fun too!

Conference on Jesus In The Old Testament in La Ceiba, Honduras

December 3-5, 2009 our mission team hosted a conference for pastors and church leaders in La Ceiba, Honduras. Our visiting teacher, Joe Fitzpatrick, taught 29 students on the theme of Jesus In The Old Testament. Many church leaders in La Ceiba have only a 6th grade education. This type of inexpensive theological training is rare and highly coveted.

Watch this 2 minute 15 second video to see the conference:

Christmas Program

Tonight Madison and many of her school mates joined together for two purposes. The first was for a Christmas Program with the private schools in the area. Each school represented sang 2 songs. The second purpose was a competition between all the schools. Last year Santa Teresa Bilingual (where Madison goes to school) won first place. They did an awesome job with a full band support behind them! By far the best. However, they came in second place. A job well done. Madison was part of the choir and did a fantastic job!


One of these things is not like the other....

The whole group with their second place trophy.

Update

We are preparing for our conference that starts tomorrow. It is "Jesus in the Old Testament". We give a conference to local pastors and lay-leaders twice a year. Tomorrow is the first of 3 days for this conference, and we look forward to a successful event. Most of the pastors and lay-leaders out in small villages have little to no theological training, so this is a huge opportunity for them to come and learn.

Madison is in the second day of her quarterly exams, and is looking forward to the end of this week!

All in all a quiet week...

teaching and school

Just a quick update. Had our English class today in the village. Kids Club tomorrow, and this Thursday/Friday/Saturday we will be hosting our second Theological teaching to local pastors and lay-leaders. The theme is on Jesus in the Old Testament. We are looking forward to this with much anticipation, and are hoping for a good turn-out. As there is no postal system like we recognize in the States, Sean and Mike have had to hand-deliver flyers to the local churches in the city. This took 4 full days to get them all delivered. We are excited to see what will come of it.

I am also starting the preliminary research on local schools. Compulsory school only goes up to 6th grade. So, if you want to attend school past that, you have to pay for it. As the majority of the kids out in the Village are barely getting enough money to put food on their table, school is out of reach for these kids, and therefore, their hopes of getting any type of good job is way beyond their reach. It was put on our hearts to see if there was a way to get sponsors for these kids to attend school. So, the research is on to see what monthly tuition, uniforms, school supplies, etc. will cost so we can start getting some sponsors, and getting some of these kids in to school. School starts in February, so we need to get moving so we can register them in January. Please pray for this, for potential future sponsors, and for God to show us which kids to minister to this school year.

Christmas Preparation

Thanksgiving is done, the left-overs are almost picked clean, and now it's time for Christmas preparation. Our tradition since before Madison was born was to drive over to a local Christmas tree farm and carefully select our Christmas tree. Each year a different person selected the tree - Mike usually picked the most practical, Madison picked the "prettiest", and I picked the biggest darn tree I could get my hands on :-) Well - as Central America isn't really conducive to growing large amounts of evergreens such as Christmas trees - the ONLY option you have are fake trees. So, begrudgingly, last year, I purchased such a tree. Now, comes the preparation and building of the tree. Cool thing is - a cold front has arrived in Honduras, along with that comes rain. So, instead of putting my Christmas tree together and sweating in the process - we are actually in long sleeves and socks! Yes, it's only 72 degrees, but after living so long in 90+ degree weather (year round) it's a shock to the system for it to be "so cold". We also enjoy the practice of Advent. However, if you think you can find an advent wreath in Honduras, you would be wrong. So, like many other things I'm unable to find here...I make it. Purchased some wire, created the skeleton, bought some candles, some greenry - and wah lah! Advent wreath.

Tomorrow are elections for Honduras. After the increase in bombings and violence, we are opting to stay locked securely in our house for the weekend. Please pray for the people of Honduras - that they vote, they are safe, and that the elections will be recognized around the world. The U.S. has finally stated that they will recognize the elections. This is good news for Honduras indeed!

The "home made" Advent wreath...


Decorations around the house...



Building the tree

final product :-)

Thanksgiving

Today we hosted a small Thanksgiving dinner at our house. Our dear friend, Rhonda, came down from the capitol of Honduras - an 8 hour drive to join us. We also had another dear friend, Matt, came over and brought a young boy he works with who lives in the dump. Madison invited her dear friend from school, Rudy - this was her first Thanksgiving food. She found much of it good, much of it strange, and some she flat-out wouldn't eat. Our team mates the McCann's and their two girls were here - 11 of us in all. And BOY did we have quite a spread! Fun times indeed. We then finished out our evening by watching Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving! AWESOME day!

The Spread...


All enjoying the feast.

La Ceiba

La Ceiba is such a beautiful city! In the midst of all the poverty and suffering, the city has its own beauty.

Clinic

Saying a temporary goodbye to Eduardo


Yesterday we had our weekly health clinic. I love the opportunity it gives us to meet new people. We have also been so blessed to have some youth from the village help us out each week. They enjoy working with us, and it gives us a chance to spend one-on-one time with them. We are saying goodbye to Eduardo, a good friend who will be traveling to the island of Roatan to be with his mother for 2 1/2 months. In this time of economic struggles, especially when you live in a third world country - it splits families up. They have been without their mother in their home for almost 6 months. This is "normal" for the people in this community - people go where there is work, and the kids fend for themselves. We will miss Eduardo and his sister Johanna, but we are happy that they will get some quality time with their mother.

Some boys just "hanging out" with us :-)


Walter helping with intake

Mom and baby waiting to be seen

Genesis has come to see me about her cough...

Talking with one of my patients

Just another day

Today seems like just another day. Nothing exciting, nothing unusual - just the normal kind of day. But funny, when looking and reflecting back on your "normal" day - how not so normal, just 2 years ago it really would have been. Started the day with a splitting headache - I know - what's unusual about that? Nothing - but just feeling cruddy! Headache, achy bones, lethargic (NOT the flu), but I had to get up to take Madison to school. Mike is still gone until next week. On the way back I had to pause for 10 minutes while the herd of cows were paraded across the street in front of me on their way to new pastures. Then I went off to pick up a laundry line. But as you can't purchase laundry lines here (not the actual line, but the poles to hook your lines up to), I had to find a welder, and then pay him to have it constructed. My friend Sarah held on to the back of the truck with the pole while I drove back home. Then, as we don't have a shovel, we commenced to dig the hole with a machete. We then made our cement, poured it in said hole - and hopefully by tomorrow it will be good to go! In the meantime - washed clothes, and hung them around the house and over furniture hoping they will dry. Then I prepared all my dozens of boxes for med clinic tomorrow (this consists of re-stocking the medications, making sure I have all the supplies I need - purchase or replace as needed). Then, I input all the patient data from the previous week. I have a database on my computer, but as we have been so short staffed on med clinic days, just the extra time to find the patient and put the data in during clinic is too time consuming. So, I just write everything out and transfer it to my database at a later date. Now I'm off to go pick up Madison from school - as I avoid cows, horses, kids playing on the street, street cart vendors, go to the farmers market for things for dinner, sweat (yes, it's November, but it's still 90 degrees outside), and overall - finish out my day in what has become quite typical for me. Once the cement dries and I have laundry hanging, I'll be sure to post some pics of my new laundry line :-) Ah the little things in life that make me happy.

Monday

Today we had our weekly English Class. Learning more about verbs and how to use them in a sentence. I have some advanced students who have been attending - unfortunately, because of our "low staffing" (Mike is still in The States), and the McCann's have another ministry on Monday's, it's just me. So, my advanced students are a little neglected, but they are having fun, and learning none-the-less. Tomorrow is our weekly Kids Club, Wednesday I prep for clinic, Thursday is clinic all day, and Friday I recover :-) Been a little rough handling a lot of things here on my own, but God is good and gives me just what I need each day.

Girls Day

Madison, Oneida, Kaydi, Carolina, me, Kasandra and Nolvia


Today was our third group of girls we have taken out for a special day. Today we took them to a beach side restaurant where they enjoyed fish and chicken to eat. We then hung out - a great thing that girls love to do! We made necklaces, colored, did some origami. We were there for almost 2 1/2 hours! Then we took them out for ice cream, then back to Armenia Bonito. It's such a blessing to us to be able to have some special time with the girls! Lindsey and I are now in a place to start deciding which of all of these girls we are going to start a discipleship group with. We want to meet weekly with the girls and really get into heart matters. Please pray for Lindsey and I, that God would bring the right girls to us, and that we get something started. We are looking to start early after the holidays

Car ride back to Armenia - enjoying ice cream and cookies :-)


Madison and Oneida

1. 

Floods and Fungus

So, this morning while I was quietly sipping my hot coffee (gotta love the rain), doing my bible study, listening to Christmas music (shhhh...don't tell my husband) :-) I was startled out of study to the sound of water being dumped onto some hard surface. Now my first thought was - wow - the storm has come back full-force. However, when I glanced behind my back I noticed there was no rain pouring on our back porch. So off I went to investigate to find that the tank on the downstairs toilet was overflowing and had managed to flood the bathroom floor, the hallway, and started creeping into my kitchen! Are you kidding me?! Now, instead of yelling out any number of beautiful bad words in English OR in Spanish I managed to turn the water off at the tank and asses the situation. Now, my husband is gone, Madison is at school, I'm leaving to go to clinic in 1 hour, not having showered or gotten ready. Hmm...what to do? Leave it as is was my first inclination. However, being the independent, gun shooting, paratrooper, motorcycle riding, patriot missile launcher, mother, wife, nurse, missionary - I was NOT going to let this stupid toilet get the best of me! So, after throwing down 20 towels (okay - only 5), getting the wrench, spare parts, etc. I managed to repair the toilet so you wouldn't have even known there had been a problem (other than the tons of water still on the floor). Ah well - nothing the rest of the day couldn't solve. I was off to clinic afterall, and wouldn't be back until 5pm - plenty of time for nature to take care of itself :-)

Work in progress:

Clinic was a little crazy. LOTS of people - change of weather means lots of cold related issues. Along with that are the increasing amounts of foot fungus, nail fungus and skin fungus that I see on people. Ah the joys of nursing :-) Fortunately, with Mike being gone, we aren't short for helpers. We have had our "regulars" helping us every week - Eduardo on pharmacy, Alicia and Walter on intake. What a blessing indeed!

Deciding on treatment...

Walter and Alicia at intake:

Sean and Eduardo at pharmacy:

People waiting to be seen:

Bugs...

Kingdom Animalia (Animals)

Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)

Class Diplopoda (Millipedes)

Order Polydesmida

Family Xystodesmidae

Genus Sigmoria

Species trimaculata (Sigmoria trimaculata)

Bottom line? It's a millipede. You see, when someone decided to build our house, I think they left their level at home. Why? Well, we have about an inch gap at the bottom of our front door - but only on one side. So, we can't place a screen door to keep out critters. This allows plenty of room for things to find their way into our house. I often contemplate the reality of my world. I've never had a bug that's the size of my hand in my life, but somehow I live in that reality. I realize they belong somewhere in someones food chain - I just hope that I'm not included in that chain.

This guy has found his way a few times into our house. One time he made his way into my cupboards, and when my husband finally made his way into the kitchen to find out what the hysterical yelling, flinging of pots and pans across the room was all about. In the end - the bug won. He escaped:



And, if you remember the times I posted this guy who came into our house. After chasing him around our house - throwing sofas across the room (Hulk - eat your heart out), screaming like a wild woman, with my deadly broom raised above my head, convinced (or TRYING to convince myself) that he's more interested in eating bugs than taking a chomp out of my arm - and yet at the same time not wanting to squash him to clean up his shmoshed guts later, I finally swept him outside.




Course then there was the day that a full sized TOAD made it's way to sit harmlessly upon our shoes in the front room, croaking (or whatever they do) looking at us like this was his home and why in the world had WE invaded in HIS space. I'm still not quite sure how that guy made his way in:



And finally there are the tarantulas that come to visit. These guys have managed to come in 4 times...I'm done with them - I sweep them outside after the hair on my arms settles down - convinced that they do better catching bugs and swept outside, than squished underneath the shoe thrown across the room.



Why the bug post? Because with the increase in rains, the increase in the frequency of bugs finding their way into our house. This week alone - one tarantula and 2 millipedes. Let's pray the others don't come around.