Storying!

Tonight we had our first storying group in our home village here. It was awesome! They were so interested and had many questions. There were 13 there for our first time which we thought was awesome! We have plans to continue this every Tuesday night. We are excited. We now have one storying group in one village on Tuesday night and one in another village on Thursday night. 

After the story our new friend, Carolina served us Tamales and lots of other goodies. 

This was one thing she offered that we had never tried. It is a type of fruit that grows on the trees here. They were okay but didn't have much flavor. 

These are Carolina's parents who also came to hear the story! It was a great night. God is moving! Yippee!

Things are going well for us and we are so appreciative of all of your prayers! Thanks so much! Blessings! Missy

Blessings!

Hi everyone!

Okay so you know that our yard has been an issue for some time now. It has been like a lake for about a month. I hated it. Our dog hated it. Everytime he came inside I would have to clean off his paws b/c there would be mud all over them. It was NOT fun. Well.... after our wonderful 3 day marathon of VBS in the village ( which was a blessing in every way!) we arrived home at about 5:00 pm on Saturday and so did this.

Now any other day I would have been overjoyed to see this heap of grass arrive. However after running myself ragged for 3 days straight all I saw was work. So it was another Amazing Race challenge! We worked together as a family and by around 8:30 we had a new lawn. And.... we were smack tired! Jerod isn't in these pictures b/c he was inside the house mopping up all of the mud that was brought into the house with the wheel barrow. So he did his part too!

This is what our yard looked like last week.

 This was me and Greg after we moved dirt all over the backyard  to try and make it level. Above is the picture after we got it level. Of course we did that in the rain.  We made lots of memories!

This is Annie and Alex after we laid down the sod.

These are their muddy feet!

Those are Greg's shoes.

These are mine. All of that is stuck to my shoes.

This was our yard after we got it all down.

Here our Annie and my feet afterwards.

That is one happy dog! His first home with grass!

So happy, so blessed!

VBS village style

Hi friends! I really don't have much time but I really needed to get these photos on here so you could see just what a day we had! We have really found that where we live now the people are so open to try and learn more about Jesus and just be more like Christ in general. It has been wonderful! We are meeting with a family again tonight as we continue to listen to stories from His word.

Anyway, there is a church of about  I would say 25 people that we are trying to help strengthen. The people in this church are just as sweet as can be. They asked us if we would help them help another church an hour and a half away do a VBS for the first time. We said we would love to help and that is how this VBS started. Now we were told this church would be in charge of everything if we could just come and maybe tell a story or two and guide them a little. I have been here long enough to know that just isn't how it goes down. So thankfully we arrived fully prepared to do the entire VBS for three hours.

We were so impressed with this small church near us because they had five adults volunteer their time (which means they didn't work) to go and help this church an hour and a half away. How many of us can say we would go without pay for 3 days in a row and drive 3 hours round trip to help a church do VBS? Well, I am one that would jump up and down and stomp my feet and say you are crazy.... usually.  However... after going today, wild horses couldn't keep me away. It was just wonderful. We had more than a 100 children come today to hear about Jesus. They colored pictures on their knees because there was no table, they played games they had never played, they all sat squished together on benches and many of them were as happy as if it were Christmas. The smallest ones played with play-doh that they had never seen before, colored in coloring books which they never get to do with more than a few pages left in them, and they had snack. Not to mention singing songs, making crafts and laughing at us! It was so fun and we are all looking forward to going back tomorrow.

These are our marathon days as we are off to story tonight and then back to VBS tomorrow and then off to our old village to sleep in our old house and attend church there tomorrow night. Then it is back to VBS again on Saturday.  Please pray for our travels and for all of the kids who are coming. Some of these kids look like they never smile. I am not putting captions on these pictures b/c I need to pack for tomorrow and plan our lessons too! Love to you all! Missy

Enjoy the pics, Greg was with the older kids so he isn't in many of them, but he was there!!

On the way there, feeling blessed?

Jerod told the story and the man beside him translated into their indigenous language.

Alex showed pictures that went with the story.

This little boy to the right here is the last known Hornets fan! ;o)

Okay, I have to make a comment here. See these seats? Someone in the states gave this church an old church van. Which was a nice gesture however they can't keep the van up. It has flat tires and no gas, etc... so... what do you do with the van? Use it for storage and the seats for the church. ;o)

Making them laugh! 

Friends

This was Annie playing with her "friends" last week. She was making the best of her day as she was bored and had no friends to play with. It reminded me of me when I was little. 

This was the next day. We found a friend named, Katrina and she came over to play for a while. I had forgotten that every time Annie has had new friends over in the past they want to try our food. They always ask for cereal. So soon after she arrived she asked for two big bowls of different kinds of cereal. It was funny. 

That same day we went to a new friend's home for lunch and this little fella didn't know what to think of this talking doll. 

He just kept staring at her. 

Then last night we showed the Jesus film to a group of 40 people. It went well and everyone was enjoying hearing the movie in their language. However, some of the kids got antsy and wanted to play. So Annie played in the dirt with some of them. One of which was this precious girl, Haley. I asked her dad afterwards if she and her sister could come play today and he said, "Sure!" So at 9:30 am they arrived and they left at 6 pm. Annie said it was a GREAT play date!! It really was great!

Here is Annie with Haley's sister Karla. 

Here they are playing house in Annie's room. God has definitely answered our prayers for Annie! He is sooo good to us!

Remember that lunch I said we went to? Here it is. Yummy! One thing about coming to a new village is you have to get used to all of their favorite foods. In our old village everyone knew what we liked and did not like and we were pretty spoiled. We never really had to eat anything we didn't like anymore. That was just for the first year of living there. Well... I guess my year has started all over. ;o) 

Here were the fish being put in the soup.

Here is the fish on my plate. I ate it too. Did I sign up for this? ;o)

This is one of my new friends, Nancy. After lunch she gave me this tortilla holder and cross-stitched napkin as a gift for coming. I was so excited, I had admired that napkin all through my fish eating! ;o)

 This is Miguel and Alicia. We have started a Bible storying group with them and are excited to see what God is going to do in their lives. Please pray for them.

Okay, I realize you will have to click on this picture to make it bigger to actually see how funny it is. This is one of those pictures I had to take b/c to us, it is just too funny. This person obviously thinks it is really important for everyone to know that this old beat up truck is a Toyota. It would be an excellent commercial for Toyota. I mean, this guy is a die hard Toyota lover! You gotta stop and laugh sometimes, here is your opportunity! Love to all! Missy