1st Day of School!

Please pray, first day of school today with all 3 of my munchkins! I think it could be a very long and frazzled day. I will write more later today. Love to all! Missy

1st Day of School!

Please pray, first day of school today with all 3 of my munchkins! I think it could be a very long and frazzled day. I will write more later today. Love to all! Missy

Missing you all!

Hi friends! I say every day that I have to update the blog and every day passes without an update. I miss writing on here because it is like I am talking with my friends. I miss talking to friends. I have so much to tell you and never have time to tell you. So, even though we just got home from church about an hour ago and it it is 11:15 at night  I  still wanted to talk to you all.

This past week has been good. I hear things that make me laugh from my kids and that is always a good thing. Greg hadn't shaved for a few days and he kissed Annie and she said, " Daddy your spikes are hurting me." I love that! Then she said tonight that she made some kids laugh through their lungs.  Where does she come up with that? Alex said something the other day and now I can't remember for the life of me what it was. They are all very Mexican again. Annie has really started to come out of her shell and is speaking Spanish again quite well. She forgets how to say some things and asks us, but all in all we couldn't be happier with how she is starting to remember. The boys play so well with the kids here. They have been enjoying Hotwheel races. Greg moves the truck out of our carport and they race cars for hours. It is fun to see.

Jerod turns 14 on Monday and it was neat to see how he wanted to spend his birthday. On Monday we have church so we wouldn't be able to do anything to celebrate so he chose to celebrate it last night. He wanted to rent a movie, which was Tooth Fairy, and watch it with our projector, then he wanted me to make homemade pizza, which was quite tasty if I do say so myself! :o) Then he received the gift that he wanted, a few Hotwheels and an ax. I would never have dreamed that at 14 those would be his wishes, but they were. So we watched our movie together as a family after he chopped some wood with his ax. :o) It was a great night!

We have been teaching a few words in English to a bunch of kids on the street and playing games with them for about an hour each week. These kids are precious and range from age 5 to 14. They all love to come and we all have a blast. Today after playing, Jerod invited them all to come to our church meeting. We were pleased to see that about 5 of them came. They sang songs with us, prayed with us and then heard how to have a relationship with Jesus. We were happy to see that their parents allowed them to come! We are hoping that some of them will come soon! Please pray!

At church tonight I was thinking of you all and wishing you could have seen the sight I saw. It was really quite funny. We all gathered in our friends home to worship and about the time Greg wanted to talk, the rain started. We are in the middle of our rainy season and it is going good. It poured! Now why is this funny? Well because we were beneath a tin roof. The noise was so loud that you couldn't hear anything. Finally Greg said, " Thank God for rain." and he sat down and we waited for about 15 minutes for it to calm down, then we prayed and the kids left to do their study and Greg was able to talk again.

After church I took some of our friends home because it was still raining. On the way we passed this little old woman, I would say in her 80's and all she had over her was a piece of plastic. It broke my heart. So, we invited her to get in the truck. She couldn't even hear, I think she was half deaf. She just smiled and did her best to climb in the truck.  So I asked where she was going and found out she was on her way to buy a candle. Her children have moved away, my friends told me that they don't care for her at all and she has no power. She just wanted to see. So after buying her 2 long wax candles like you would see on Little House on the Prairie, we drove her home. That is when I felt so ashamed. She had to first walk through a huge puddle to get to her gate, stand in the water to open it, then walk through what to me looked like a river to get to her home. Of course she did this in the dark b/c there were no lights. My friends said she lives very humbly. Now these friends are friends who have NOTHING so for them to say she lives humbly means she has NOTHING, literally. Our plan is to visit her soon and find out how we can help. Please pray for her. Her name was Eloise. Okay, I know that I have been long winded, my heart is heavy.

Ya know so many people ask about how things are here in Mexico. My answer is always the same, "It looks the same as it always has." Now that doesn't mean there aren't bad things happening. I am sure there are. There are bad things happening everywhere. But... I have been to a lot of places lately and everywhere I go, the people are precious and kind and loving and want to do their best to make a living so they can have water and food and a bed and their kids can have school supplies. I have found that in my opinion the majority of the people here are just wonderful! My heart breaks for them! Times are tough for them but just like that sweet little Eloise, walking through 6 inches of water on a cold dark night, she had the biggest smile. She was used to that life and was just thankful for a shorter walk. Please pray for Mexico. I love it here! Love to you all! I really will try to get some photos uploaded soon! Until then!

Problems downloading!

Sorry, I am having problems downloading my pictures. So... I promise you will see pictures tomorrow! Love to all! Missy

What's Happening?

I have so much to tell you all and I know you don't want to read a lot. Sorry.  I always have these great goals of writing on here a little at a time but then I don't have the time. I really don't have the time now because it is late and I am exhausted. But.... you need to hear what has been happening. I will write like the ADD person that I am so if this goes from one place to another very quickly, you will know why. :o) So, buckle up, here I go.

Our prayer retreat with our company was so wonderful. We got to see many friends that we hadn't seen in a long time and it was great getting reaquainted. Annie loved seeing all of her old friends and had a great time being with some of the older kids for VBS. The team that came was great and all of our kids enjoyed their week. The boys and I stayed up playing cards most nights and Greg enjoyed going to bed early with Annie each night. :o) That is how it usually is in our home. We left the retreat refreshed and educated.

We then headed to one of our favorite cities for a little extra time with the family. We had fun eating pizza and watching movies. We shopped at a pet store and we think we know what kind of dog we want to purchase. Greg has promised us all that we could purchase a dog in October. We shall see.

We then headed back here to our home and have enjoyed hearing the rain outside ever since we arrived. The temperatures have been around the upper 50's and lower 60's. We have loved it! It really hasn't stopped raining since we got home. That would be 4 straight days. Of course our friends have said that it was raining for about 3 days before we arrived. It is funny because if you had told me 5 years ago that I would live in a place where it rains almost every day for about 3-4 months, I would have said, "You are crazy, I will go nuts!" However, I love it! I love hearing it and I love that I get a break from lots of visitors. One thing that changed when we left the US was that Greg became the extravert and I became the intravert. Okay, well maybe not the intravert, but I don't mind staying home! :o)

We have been enjoying our friends. Today I spent the day in town buying school supplies with one of my good friends. We laughed most of the day and I can't wait to put some of the pictures on here from these past few days. We were leaving a store and I was driving, my friend's daughter was in the passenger's seat and she was in the back seat. My friend's daughter had told her that she needed to use her seat belt because it was safer. So, being the obedient mother that she is she used her seatbelt. Okay, I have to go downstairs, get my camera and download this picture, because without that you won't fully appreciate this story. It was TOO funny. She had the strap around her whole body but it wasn't buckled. It was like a harness ready to hang her! I about wet my pants. We showed her how it was supposed to go and she said, "I think I will risk it, this is way to tight." :o)

Then tonight we spent the night with some friends of ours that are extremely quiet people. Can you imagine ME with quiet people? Well, they think we are ridiculously funny. We were playing Jinga and had a blast! Our friend, Alicia who is about to have her baby, laughed so hard I thought she would go into labor for sure! They laughed at the game but they laughed more at Greg. We heard some water dripping from their fridge and Greg, otherwise known as " Mr. Fixit" said, " Hmm... let me see..." and put his whole head in the freezer, stayed there for a few minutes and with all seriousness shuts the door, and says, " No, everything is fine." I bust out laughing because somehow he thought he knew that there was nothing wrong with their fridge. I told them there would be a flood tonight. So that became our joke, Greg says everything is fine. Anyway, this may not be funny to all of you, but we got a lot of laughs out of it!

Now it is time for me to go to bed. I will upload the photos and you can see some of what we have been doing!  Please keep praying for us. Love you all! Missy

Out of town.

No pictures yet. I am sorry I have not been on here for a few weeks. I have been out of town and we have not had much internet service. We are back and I can't wait to share all we did. It was sooo much fun! I will update you all tomorrow but for now, I am smack tired! Love to you all! Missy

Last day with the team.

This was our team's last day and we took them to a fun tourist spot. This is called, Janitzio and it is a Purepecha island. They live off of tourism and we helped their economy! This is the team in front of a very famous statue. It is at the top of the island and when you get to the top you can climb up inside of the statue and peek out of his hand. They all enjoyed doing that!

This was at the restaurant where we ate. The three of the boys in the front were dancers that do a typical Purepecha dance. They were the owner's grandsons and they did a dance just for us.

This is the statue of a man named Morelos. I took this when they were in the hand. I will have to post another one where you can actually see Rachael in the hand.

This island is called, Janitzio and it is a Purepecha island. They live off of tourism and we helped their economy!

Do you appreciate your water? Imagine having to carry your bottles of water up to your home. There are a ton of stairs here because the island spirals up to the top and their are no cars, horses, donkeys or anything to help them with this job they rely on good old fashion shoulders!

This little girl was too precious! I took more of her but only had time to download one. She was just standing there by herself and wanted to see her photo after it was taken.

One thing that they sell a lot of is fish. These little fish are just simple minnows. Now for some people eating fried minnows with eyes and a tail is no big deal. For others....like Racheal and I it is tough. However, she arose to the occasion and took the plunge.

"I can't believe I am doing this!"

"Oh it's grose! I mean really grose!" As you can see, Alex was enjoying this!

This was the little guy after Racheal got ahold of him!

"Okay, I am doing it, see!"

"I did it!" I am with Racheal, not exactly something I will willingly do again!

This is how they are sold. Some actually have their mouth open. Yuck! Greg loves them. He is weird!

Please pray for us this week as we will be traveling. Pray all goes well with travels and we have no delays of any kind! Pray also for my sweet friend Fair. I talked to her last night and she is doing well but does need prayer for quick healing. Pray also for a friend of mine named Krista. She lost her father yesterday and I know she and her family are suffering. She is my age and her father was a very well known person among our company. Thanks for praying for us. We always need it. So if you are thinking about us for any reason, pray! Love you! Missy

Okay, so this is out of order. This was of Jim, Annie and me on the boat that takes you to the island.