No water!

Purepecha traffic jam!




Waiting for water.






This is how they transport their water to and from their homes.







This is the line of women waiting to use the alotted few buckets of water to do their wash. Most of them had been waiting all day.






This is the amount of water that comes out of the spring that everyone in our village relies on. If you don't get water here, you must buy the water from a water truck. Lately there haven't been enough water trucks coming to town for everyone to buy water. So they must wait.




During rainy season, water isn't a problem, but it hasn't really rained since early November.

These women will wait patiently with their jugs until they get to fill them all up.

What a day! I thought I was going to post today and the title would be," The things that make you go Hmmmm......" but then I got home and found out we had a water shortage. So, that changed my title. What would you do without water? These women are trying to find enough water for their familes to take baths with, to wash clothes with, to wash dishes with, to cook with , to wash their hands with , to drink, to you name it... and all they have is a trickle. Pray for water!

I wanted so badly to capture all of these things that made me go, "Hmmm..." today on camera, but I wasn't able to, so I will just have to do my best at describing what I saw.

Here goes.... a little baby about 18 months old with a blue face mask on, sitting on his mama's lap in the front seat of a moving car, going about 45 miles an hour. Hmmm...... protect from Flu, but risk death in car accident? We are so confused by all of the people wearing these masks which are really uncomfortable, but no one around here uses their seatbelt because they say they are uncomfortable?!? I wonder if the seatbelts were painted blue and everyone wore them for a week if it would start a trend?

Two boys with blue masks covering their faces riding one horse together, in the middle of a deserted farm. Now correct me if I am wrong, but unless they are contagious, who are they protecting themselves from, the horse?

A horse in the street with a really expensive chainsaw strapped to the side of it. I don't know it just looked really funny to me!

Those were a few of the things I saw today while I was in town and thought I would share them.

Our village is struggling right now! The Flu is the least of their worries right now, without water, WE are going to have far greater problems! Right now our family has about a week and a halfs (half) ? worth of water. We are going to try and stay on top of our water situation, but please pray we don't get desperate! Thanks for praying! Love, Missy

Pray!

Hi All!

Many of you are concerned about us because of the Flu. No worries, we are all fine! There have been no cases reported in our state as of today. We are being cautious, but not really worried at all, so you shouldn't worry either!

One of my favorite verses is
Matthew 6:27 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

I actually wanted to ask you not only to pray for Mexico, but for our friend Clay, who was burnt in February. www.claydavidfite.blogspot.com He will be having surgery on his left hand tomorrow. (Wednesday) They have prepared the family that they may have to remove a good portion of each finger. Please pray that the Drs. will be AMAZED at what they find! Thanks! Missy

Day of fun with our church group!

If you look here, you don't see many bathing suits, I don't think I saw but a few the whole day, other than my family's.


Annie is always the center of attention!


Barbara and her son playing.

This it Moises, Francisca and Esmerelda.

This is me with my good friend, Barbara, we had a wonderful day today. We talked about some things that had been bothering both of us! Her son has been bullying Jerod and today we got that all out on the table. I felt 100% better after talking this over!

Jerod and Alex with 3 of our friends, they had a great day! It was just what we all needed!

I don't know who he is, but I had to take the picture because he was trying to kill the bees with a butcher knife. It was just too much.

This is Annie and Yesica, they had a blast!

Angelica, Lupita, and Salvador, the parents stayed dressed like this all day long! They had to be sooo hot! However, we were just glad they came!

Hi everyone! Today was a super duper day! We have been trying to plan a fun day for our church for some time now. Well today was the day! We got together our friends and headed to a water park that wasn't to far away and had a great day! Yes today is Sunday, but remember, we have church on Monday and Friday here and the only day they don't work is on Sunday. So, this was the only day to do it. Just in case you were thinking, "How dare you?" Not that any of YOU would think that, right? ;o) (Habib)

Anyway, it is so fun to go to a water park and when you get there 10 people come up to you and say, " Melissa, did you bring me something to wear?" You have got to be kidding me? I mean, I understand the women, because they don' t have clothes to wear in the pool. So, I generally come prepared for most of them. However, some of the men came up and asked if we brought them shorts. They all have shorts! So, Greg ended up giving them all of his spare clothing as well. It was interesting!

Then when it comes time to eat, "Melissa, do you have salt, do you have plates, do you have cups, do you have napkins?" Now, people in the states always wonder why I always pack everything in my house when I go somewhere, it's because everyone always expects me to have everything they forgot! The strange thing is, I always do. I think now it is more a challenge, what are they gonna ask me?

I wanted to get a picture of some of the people at other tables. The clothing people wear to these water parks is really priceless! I mean, if I could have taken a picture of the footwear they wore to the water park, I think you would have had a really good laugh!! There were cowboy boots, work boots, tennis shoes, wing tipped dress shoes, penny loafers, you name it, they were there! All except for probably flip flops. (well I had those on, but other than mine, there weren't many!) I am not saying this to make fun of these people just to show you the difference in the water park attire here and in the states! I mean, can you imagine a man walking into a water park in the states with his shorts, and shirt and cowboy boots and cowboy hat and he takes off the cowboy boots and hat and then gets in the pool? Well, that is about how it happens!

Thanks for your continued prayers for our safety! We felt them today as no one was hurt and we had 30 of our friends from church together on this trip. Please continue to pray for all of us. Love you all! Missy

Volcano Pictures

One of the 7 NATURAL Wonders of the World! The Volcano, not Christian!!
This is out of order, but this is taken from the top of the crater looking into it. Pretty cool! Our friend, Christian decided he would climb down into it. That is his head in the very center of it. The little dot.




This was a group of MK girls, with Annie in the middle, in front of the volcano at the start of the day.

This was before the climb, Jerod, Alex and an MK friend, Christian. This was taken a few miles in front of the volcano.

This was on the way up the climb. I kidded my friend, Anita and said we needed to stop every few minutes and take pictures, when what I really wanted to do was breathe! So, this was us stopping to take some pictures! ;o) Notice everyone else was in front of us.

This was taken 45 minutes later, when I made it to the top! At the top of this volcano in a village near ours in Mexico. It is about 9213 feet above sea level, guess that is why I needed oxygen! Although, we live about 20 minutes away so you would think I would be used to it, but a few thousand feet makes a difference!

I was just happy to be alive!

Greg and Annie at the top of the crater, the wind was whipping by and he had to hold on to her so she wouldn't blow off!

Our friends Andrea and Alicia

Me and Andrea, she helped me make it to the top! She was my moral support, and let me tell you, I needed moral support! ( or oxygen)

Alex, Jerod, and Annie at the top of the crater.

This was the trip down the volcano. It was 100 times more fun than going up! If I had known how fun going down was, I would have enjoyed going up a lot more!

I don't know if you can tell, but our teeth are covered in black ash from the volanic ash that got stuck all over them throughout the day. YUM!!

The sliding board from the top of the volcano, to the bottom.

Eating in the truck, they were HUNGRY!!

View from the bottom.

Yesterday I was reminded of many things! We joined our friends the Morris family and had a HUGE yard sale. It was a lot of fun! Not like when I left the States and was emotionally attached to everything, this was, "Get rid of anything that we don't want to see in a year!" (which was a lot) So, we sold a lot of things, of course everything was sold dirt cheap and the people left happy. I was reminded of our departure from the States and how nervous I was. Now I am once again we are departing a country and once again, WE are faced with many transitions, please pray! Especially for Annie, who really doesn't understand what we are doing.

Anyway, I was also reminded of our trip with the Morris family to the volcano. I never posted pictures of it because I left my camera in their car. So, now I have the pictures ( I have had them for quite some time) and wanted to share the experience with you. It was a funfilled day and a great experience! I hope to do it again next year! (only with less of me!!)

Please continue to pray for us as Mexico isn't exactly the safest place to be right now. HOWEVER, the will of God IS the BEST place to be, so I am not worried. I know He called us on the field at the time when He did and I really feel it is His timing that we are heading home soon. We do need your prayers!

Mama, and Honey, ( my parents) Don't freak out!! I am only telling people this so they will pray, not because I think I am in immediate danger! (I can hear my phone ringing!) So, you can add my parents to your prayers! :o) Love to all! Missy

Celebrating life!

Praying for the mama to be.


How sweet is this baby? She was begging to have her picture taken and I was loving taking it! Can you tell?



This is where culture is definitely present! Notice the back of the rented chairs advertize a Mexican beer, and look right in the center of the picture, that is a horse. Yep, a horse came! ;o)



I'm gonna be a big sis!!




This was the very fun toilet paper guessing game, how big is she really? I don't think she liked this game very much!


This was definitely where the culture came out! Who has the most children? She won, with.....you guessed it..11! Ha, you don't hear that much at baby showers in the U.S!


Today I spent the day with two other friends in a village not too far away, celebrating life. A friend of ours is expecting her 5th child in the next few weeks. We celebrated with a baby shower. (which they didn't really know what a baby shower was before today) It was a lot of fun and my friends, Jenell and Sharon did a great job hosting it! I pretty much just tagged along. You can see by the pictures that even though we tried to make it like an American baby shower, there was still a lot of Purepecha culture present! Please pray for Luisa over the next 2 weeks as she prepares for baby number 5!

Medical frustrations

Hi everyone! I am so frustrated with how our people are treated by the medical doctors here. Now not ALL of the doctors, but a lot of them treat our friends like they are NOTHING. It really urks me! The other day our friend pictured here, Concha, was having a lot of abdominal pain and back pain.

Now, I am not a Dr. but, I have been to enough to know what the first questions they ask are going to be. Are you pregnant? Do you hurt when you pee? Does it hurt when you poo? Do you have loose stools? You know all those normal ?s. So, anytime one of our friends is sick, they always call me and I always ask those questions. Well, if it is a man, I usually leave out the first one! ;o)

Hope I am not giving too much info, but if I am, SORRY! Greg is asleep and he usually is my proof reader if I think I could be crossing the line! So, just remember, who is writing this! :o) So, I went to see her and the first question I asked was are you pregnant? Which she said, I think, I am , I am 2 months late. So, I immediately think she is having a miscarriage. AGAIN, I am NO Dr. but come on, how smart do you have to be? So I ask a few more personal questions about what was happening and then I think okay, for sure, you are having a miscarriage. So, I ask, have you been to the Dr? Which she says, "Yes, 3 times." They told me it was indigestion, then they said it was gastritis, and then they said, oh maybe I should have an ultra sound." I asked if they did the ultra sound and she said, we didn't have the money then. We had spent it all on medicine for all of the other things. So, I say, "Did they give you a pregnancy test?" "No, they said, it wasn't necessary." ME: (red faced and mad) "THEY SAID WHAT?" Okay so I tell her that since it is Sunday ( I didn't say this, but I thought, and she had probably already lost the baby since this had been going on for about 2 weeks) she could probably wait until the morning and then I think she should go to a gynecologist and have them look at her and see what they think. So, she did go and the did find she was "aborting" her baby so they then did a DNC on her.

All of this to say, I am sick and tired of them treating MY people like they are stupid and worthless and good for nothing. Why would any Dr. not have the decency to treat her as if she were his own mother or daughter or wife? I don't understand. I am so sad. She really wanted another little baby. Please pray for her as she is really heart broken and discouraged.

Prayer time with our Sunday School Class In Asheville

Pray for Pedro, that he too will accept Jesus.


This is Mimicka, she has now found her Savior!



Isaiah 11:6 ...and a little child will lead them.
This is Migue and Pepe and I think this verse is perfect for them!



This is Mike when he was here with Petra and Prisiliano. They were at our house today when Mike's class did the video prayer time. Prisiliano was so touched to have Mike pray for him!

Greg praying.

Prayer time with the BBC class.

I love that God called us to be missionaries at a time when technology is so advanced! It makes communication so much easier than it was for those who were on the field years ago. Today we had a video prayer time using Skype, with our Sunday School class at Biltmore Baptist Church. It was awesome to be able to connect with them and help them understand a little bit more about our lives here in Mexico. We had some of our believers present and they were really surprised that you could actually communicate through the computer. Keep in mind they don't really understand email, so imagine them trying to understand how they could see people and talk to them through the computer. It was neat! I took a few pictures while they were praying, ( I was praying in spirit, but had to capture the moment for all of you to see!) It was so neat to hear their prayers in 3 different languages, Purepecha, Spanish and English. I know God had to be smiling! It meant a lot to us all that Mike took us back to our class and has made us come alive to them. I know our believers here were touched to see so many Americans praying for them. Especially since they are sometimes treated as if they aren't important.

Then tonight our friend Mimicka came over and shared with us that her children had come home after our Bible study on Monday and had explained to her that they had made decisions to follow Jesus. They told her that they understood that they were sinners and wanted to accept Jesus as their Savior. So they told her that during our study on Monday night that they had prayed to invite Jesus into their hearts. I taught the class on Monday night and so I knew that this could have happened and I was wondering what she was going to say next.

She then explained how her oldest (8) had told their dad he wanted him to stop drinking and that he himself was going to start obeying. She then told me she too wanted to invite Jesus into her heart. So after going through a short Bible study she too invited Jesus into her heart. She then asked Greg if he would come by their house this week and share this message with her husband Pedro. Please pray that Pedro would receive this message well too. We are PRAISING God tonight! It has truly been a great day! Thank you ALL for praying! Missy

Tiring, but Awesome Day!

This man started many Purepecha churches in the area and was persecuted years ago. He is now enjoying the fruit of his labor!


So sweet!






14 year old coloring, and loving it.






Notice how they have pierced her ears, they all do this, but they tied a string in hers because they were getting infected and they didn't want them to close up.




This is a very precious Purepecha woman, they don't all smile like this!




Happy, with her life in Jesus! Her husband was also persecuted for following Jesus many years ago. She is the mother to the pastor pictured above.



Little boy eating his tortilla.





Annie took this picture, this girl has a precious smile, but oh how I wish I could take her to the dentist!






I love my job!



Children eating their snack.

We had a good day. I always love being late in Mexico, it's never a big deal! We tried to have everything ready on time and wanted to leave our house at 10:00 am in order to arrive around 11:15 am. The service was supposed to start at 11:00 am. However, we always arrive first and end up waiting about 30 minutes for everyone else to arrive. Today however, we arrived at 11:45 am and were still the first to arrive! I was a little shocked. They finally started about 12:40 pm, you gotta love that. What is even funnier is that it doesn't bother anyone. I think Greg and I are going to have some serious adjusting to do when we get back to the land of the stressed! (yes, that would be many of you reading this!)

I took some pictures of the kids coloring, I thought it was so neat how they were so interested in coloring when some of them were close to 13 or 14 years old. I love that! We talked about being "Fishers of Men" and how we could do that. They told some of the stories they knew from the Bible and said they could start by telling the stories they knew and sharing those with their family and friends! It was awesome, it was Bible storying at it's best! I would say, "Who knows a Bible story?"and they would tell one they knew. Since we will be leaving in just a few months we are using all the food we have, which included the Goldfish we bought about 2 years ago. (they weren't exactly fresh) So, to go along with the "Fishers of Men" theme we ate Goldfish and played some games. Hope you like the pics. Love to all! Missy