A day of celebrating!

Yay! I am 10 today!


Can you tell which ones are mine? Not hard, huh?










Greg is a true geek, but his kids LOVE him! He told them he was a championship pool player, sports, he is good at, however pool, is not his thing!








Annie was really into this!






Jerod playing pool.

Alex playing pool too.

Thie was a rustic, but really nice hotel! We loved it!

Notice I am not wearing a colored tee-shirt!

He was very excited about his cheesecake!

He really only turned one! ;o)

We had a great time! I love family days like this. God is so good to us! Thanks for praying for us and thank you all for your kind messages! He loved them!

Look who turned 10 today!

Hello everyone! 10 years ago today I gave birth to one sweet boy, that we named Alexander Charles Wood. We decided to call him Alex. Here are some pictures I took this weekend. I will post more soon. His brother gave him his first pet, a bunny named Rosa. Don't they look happy? We are leaving today to stay in a hotel for one fun night to celebrate the big day! So, I will post more pictures tomorrow! Please pray for our safety! We love you all!

He Has Risen!!

He Has Risen! That is what I wanted to scream today at the top of my lungs! I went to see what all the fuss was about. The told me they were having a "race" today. I had no idea what they were talking about. So, I went to see for myself, what kind of a "race" was going on today of all days. It was a race alright. They take these statues of Mary and Jesus and they race from one end of the street to another. They say they are racing to tell the disciples that Jesus has risen. Now of course I have no idea why Jesus is involved in this race, but, same as in everything else, I just shake my head and say, OK. So, these women and men run down the street as fast as they can trying to beat the others who are carrying the other idol. So strange.

Anyway, behind this "race" comes the procession of yet another statue of Jesus. Bless His heart, he didn't look so hot. They carry little jars filled with Holy water around their neck and they walk with this statue. They pray to it and bow to it. They put their faith in so many things. As usual you will see many venders taking advantage of the situation. I am always amazed at the shoes these women wear as they walk in the dirt streets or on the broken concrete streets. They walk miles in really high healed shoes. It has to be so painful. I tried to capture some of their faces. Do they look like their Savior has just risen from the dead? I just want to go and hug them all and tell them that He loves them! I want to tell them that they don't have to pray to a statue, they can pray to Him any day of the week at any given moment anywhere they want to. I want to tell them that drinking that Holy water won't help heal them but that trusting in Him, giving their heart to Him, that is what will help them. I want them to know that He loves them! Instead, I pray for them. I pray that they will see that He is the way, the ONLY way. John 14:6 I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

More back handed compliments!

Hello everyone! Hope you had a nice Friday! I just couldn't wait to share this with you! I just knew you would find humor in it. I need a makeover! I need a new hair do, and all new clothes! Today my maid who is a different person than the one who said I never combed my hair told me some really great news. Here goes, can you guess by the photos? White, blue, teal, yellow, black, lavender,pink,brown and navy. I have other colors too, but I would bore you if I showed you every color of the rainbow! She said, "You know Melissa, even though all of your clothes are ugly, you are still pretty in them. She went on to say,"My husband said that all you ever wear is those ugly shirts in different colors and jeans, but for some reason, you are still really pretty. You are really lucky." Okay, I just am really tired of these kind of compliments! So, I am running away from home! ;o) What do you think?

Good Friday

Here are a few more photos. This one man was bowing to Mary, not Jesus. That is Mary who was following Jesus. In one photo it looks like she is falling. I mentioned that to my friend. I said,"It looks like Mary is falling." I was just making an innocent statement. She said, "They say if she falls it will rain a lot this year." I thought to myself, who comes up with this stuff? If you click on the picture you SHOULD be able to see a larger version of that picture.

These are some pictures I took today during the procession that they do in honor of "Holy Friday." This day is a supposed to be a very sad day where no one smiles or laughs or has any fun. In the past they had a law that you couldn't ride your horse,donkey,car, or anything that made it easy on you or you would be put in jail. One of our believer's relatives was put in jail for 2 days for riding his donkey on this day many years ago.

The picture of Greg was taken during the procession, one of our newest believers, Moises, was explaining everything they were doing to Greg as it was happening.They burn incense which they say is the perfume of God to bring his spirit into their presence. This is what this one woman in burning in front of her home. They take turns carrying the cross as penance for their sins. They wear these crowns as a symbol of the crown of thorns that Jesus wore. Some actually had thorns on them and they say they need to suffer like he did. They carried this statue of Jesus through the entire village and there was preaching along the way. They took off his crown and replaced it with this white blindfold which no one could explain. Many people would run up to the statue bow down to it and pray. They said most of the men who were walking in the precession today would be drinking tomorrow. It was so sad to me to see all of them doing all of this. They think it will somehow help them enter into heaven someday. Carrying a cross all over town, that is what they think it takes to help to get them into heaven. Some of our believers were walking in the procession as well and they know that they don't have to do that. Sometimes I think it makes them feel like they belong. They are scared not to do it for fear of what their family will say. They do it just to keep from being persecuted by their family members. So sad. They are not allowed to play music today or to take baths or to eat meat. They are generally supposed to suffer all day they say. We are showing the "Passion of Christ" tonight to our group. We are hoping we can keep the focus on the resurrection of Christ and not just his death. (which is what they focus on) Please pray for our friends here. It is hard to be a Christian here! It really is!