Week of fun and evangelizing!

Hi! I wanted to give you a quick idea of what our week looked like. We have been working pretty hard and decided to take 2 days off and visit the city. We went swimming, bowling, shopping at a mall, and ate at Chilis! For some of you that may sound like just another weekend, but for us this only happens about 2 times a year. So, we were excited! 

Then we returned home for our month of evangelization and went to a village we have a study in each week. We tried to make friends with some of the family members of our group there. It went well and we saw a lot of openness. We also saw a lot of persecution. 

Our shoe ministry has continued to be a key tool to reaching people with the love of God. Many who don't have any desire to listen to us, sometimes are much more open when you have a pair of shoes to give them. Thank you all for blessing us with your used shoes! 

Annie and Daddy swimming.

Alex the model.

My sweet family.

Our oldest son, we are so proud! ;o) 

Sometimes even Annie gets new shoes! 

The view on the way to one of our studies each week.

I love to squeeze me some children! This little girl has been scared of me for about the past 6 months, she is just now warming up. I am happy!

Please pray for Juana. She is the mama to all 3 of these sweet children. They don't have a father in the picture. She struggles just to feed them. 

This is Greg storying through the Bible, as Jerod draws quick pictures to help them remember which story he is talking about. It was a review of the past 8 months. 

This little one got herself some new shoes! All the girls ever have are jelly shoes b/c they are so cheap here. This village is very cold, so jelly shoes are not practical or comfortable. She was happy, even if you can't tell.

This was our evangelism day.

We found these women in the street who were more than happy to listen to us and wanted to come to our study.

Happy with his new crocs.

Annie playing in the woods with her friends. She is such a great MK!

This little one also got her first pair of tennis shoes. She didn't even know who Dora was, but she loved her shoes!

New crocs. We are out of boys shoes, these were our last pair, but we were happy they fit him!

Traffic can sometimes be bad when we are on our way to share the Gospel! 

We got ready to leave the village and found the road completely blocked. So we had to find another way out. Our friend helped us navigate our way through back roads. We had to dig up rocks and fill in holes to make it, but we did!

You can't tell, but it was raining too! SO fun! 

Our cars waiting to find their way home. 

Change Is In the Air!

Hi friends! I know I haven't updated this in a few weeks, so sorry. We are doing well, aside from battling with your normal allergy and stomach virus stuff!

Fall is my very favorite time of year and it is probably the hardest part of being out of the US. I love seeing the leaves change, wearing sweatshirts, going to football games, and I LOVE fall festivals! Not to mention my love of garage sales. So, not being there now is very hard for me! I do hope all of you will enjoy every single day on my behalf! Although there isn't any change of leaves here or the other changes that fall brings, there have been many changes for our people here this past month.

We have been so blessed and have been able to help so many people here b/c of the love and support that many of you have given to us. Through our shoe ministry,(Which I want to emphasize is NOT an organization, it is just us accepting shoes from friends, churches, and schools who want to participate.)and other gifts we have been able to help many! Hope you like the pictures and see the change that has occurred in many lives here.

Lots of new and used shoes to bless lots of feet!

Lots of shoes with holes, replaced by....

Lots of new pretty shoes!

Cherished!

These little ones were so confused about why they needed their picture taken with their new shoes!

He was wearing girl's shoes and she was wearing boy's shoes.

SO Happy!!

Out with the old in with the new.

Ever kissed your shoes?

Another change... This was our friend, Estella's home. Holes in the roof, only one complete wall and a tarp for one wall. 

This is the wall with the tarp.

Change has come to her and she now has complete walls, a pretty new roof, and the rain can no longer come into the walls.

I will post a picture of the complete project very soon! So... no pretty leaves, but the changes we have seen are just about as pretty! Love you all! Missy

Here's an update about our ministry.

Soles 4 Needy Souls

Here is a video we made to raise awareness of our shoe ministry.

Homeschool, Shoes and Estella

Hi friends! Time is getting away from me and I am not updating as much as I had hoped. School started and it is going well. I used to say that the three things I never wanted to do were homeschool, leave the country or be a B. God in His awesome sense of humor combined all of them and I love all 3! We have decided to do video updates as often as possible to try and bring hisvillage to you! Hope you like our 1 minute video posted in the post before this one.  Love to you all! Missy

We found out Annie loves uniforms and so this year she is wearing one to school! ;o)

Day 2 uniform!

I am so glad I get to teach the best daughter in the world! 

One thing we love about homeschool is our PE days. This day we went to a park and Greg worked on football skills with the boys and I went discovering with Annie. Not the best hair day for me, but... my husband didn't seem to care! 

Annie and I discovering Science by the river. This is what we found...

We think ants are WAY cool. They work together better than any humans ever could. They walked for miles in ant terms to get these little orange and yellow leaves. Then they carried them all the way to the top of this tree. It was fun to follow their trail with my camera lens.

Can you see the trail of orange going up the tree?

We followed them to the very top left corner of the tree. Really amazing!

Football... boring! Ants are way more fun! 

We are always amazed at how much they look alike! They were deep in some discussion. He loves his boys!! And his GIRL!!

Annie and I helping Alex out with his photography class! 

Annie made these cakes. They were super yummy!

The world looks so peaceful in her hands!

SHOES!!! This ministry has taken off like wildfire. After our last team brought a box of used shoes to us many others got on board and have sent us shoes too! We now have 5 boxes in the mail to us and we plan on using these to open many doors. 

This is what it looks like when a little one receives used shoes! 

We gave her 2 pairs b/c she needed them pretty badly. As you can see, her happiness was beyond words! This family had never let us in to visit with them until we had shoes. 

"Gracias!!"

This is how kids in the village play. It had rained hard and they just played in the puddles/street.

I have mentioned Estella many times before. This is Estella and Jacob. She is our house helper and our poorest friend. I love her with every fiber of my being. I am praying for a way to fix her house. 

There are more pictures below, but this is one side of her home. Just a tarp for a wall. They sleep on the floor, have one outlet for a light that they borrow from their neighbor, they have no bathroom or any water. Please, if you pray, pray for her. 

This is the front of her house. They have put plastic over the roof to help keep the rain out.

Wood's Video Update #1

Here is our first Wood's video update! Hope you like it.