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

Oh Happy Day!

Well, today has been a little better than yesterday. We are still down one TV and DVD player but things could be worse! The sun has shone all day and that always puts a smile on our faces! Greg has worked in the yard today and has almost got the yard level so the lake doesn't continue to grow in our backyard! ;o) We are planning on buying some sod next week so we can hopefully see some improvement in our backyard soon.  

We had a family over for lunch today and we are slowly making friends in this area.  We are going to their home tomorrow for lunch and we are hoping this is the beginning of a very good relationship between our families. They told us there would be 2 of them coming and then they called yesterday and warned us that there would be 2 more. So I had planned on having a meal for  9 people. Then they showed up and there were 7 of them.  Luckily I have learned to make a LOT of food and we had plenty for everyone!

Our neighbor, Elena came over this morning and wanted to know if we could come and look at the damage that had been done to her pottery. She said she didn't want to move it until we had a chance to look at it. It was really horrible,  at least half of her order that she had made for someone was destroyed. I told Greg I guess I could consider that my anniversary gift. ;o) We paid her for the damage that had been done and hopefully we can make amends soon. Please pray for her. 

The boys have started taking music classes at a church nearby. This is something that was never available to us before because of where we lived.  So now we are taking advantage of things like that and the boys are really thriving. Jerod is very serious about taking guitar and Alex is really liking the drums.  They are showing a lot of progress and we are very happy for them. God is really good to us! 

Sweet little girl at church on Sunday.

They are so beautiful!

Annie is trying to make friends. 

Typical street in our village.

I loved this cross they have at the end of this street, it looked like it had been there for many years. So much history here. 

Our new drummer in the house.

This is right up his alley!

Oh man, what have we started?

Here is our serious student. He is very motivated and very excited about learning.

Nothing like free lessons!!

These were AWESOME!!! We have been trying out new restaurants and this one will be one of our favorites,  I think. It was called Paparatzzi. We think that is a cute name because in Spanish a potato is a papa and the restaurant had baked potatoes with tons of different toppings and boy were they good!! This one came with broccoli, cheese, sour cream,  salsa, tomatoes and onions.

This one had cheese, sour cream, bits of steak, bacon, tomatoes, and onion and salsa. So.... goood!!

We saw this lady at Wal-mart and then as we all left in the rain we saw her on her moped with her kids.  

Her groceries are all in that box in front of her, and both kids had drum sticks in their hands just eating away as if they weren't bothered one bit by the cold rain.

Our neighbor's house. Oh how heartsick I am over this. 

All of the pottery that got wet on the bottom was ruined. It gets wet, then cracks. This is because she was waiting for it to be dry enough to cook in the oven. However, now she has a LOT less to cook. ;o(

I told her we were praying for her and she said, "Pray for my heart because it is very sad. All those hours of work gone." 

She wanted Greg to come over and look at each one to see which ones were destroyed b/c she didn't want us to think she was taking advantage of us.

Out of all the pottery she had made all of these were ruined. So, we bought $100 worth of unusable pottery today. They will all be thrown away b/c they just crumble when you pick them up. 

The peace offering. After we had smoothed everything over with our sweet neighbor, and tried to make peace between us, I was still a little worried she was mad at us. Then she asked if I liked this kind of pottery. So of course I told her I loved it and she quickly gave me one.  Then I felt like everything was going to be okay. I plan on making her a cake tonight and taking it to her tomorrow just to show her how much we want her friendship. Please pray she is blessed. 

Thanks for reading and keeping up with us! love to all! Missy

When it rains, it pours!

Okay, we are needing some prayer about now. Today was a tough day. My poor husband has just about had it with this house and I think it is definitely getting the best of him. Ever since rainy season has started we have had problems with rain entering the house through the roof.  We had some people come yesterday to fix it and it looks as if everything is going well that now.

Greg and his "fix it" man decided to re-route some of the water over the house so it would come out in the front of our house and help with "Lake Wood" as our backyard has become known. So that is what they did. However in the process of them doing this it rained and the  water poured into our neighbor's (pictured above) home and ruined a lot of her pottery that she hand makes. She wasn't a happy lady. We offered to pay her for everything that was ruined  however that may not be enough to make her happy b/c it was part of an order she was filling and now it has set her back quite a bit. I feel like poopie!

That was just the beginning.

Then as he was helping his "Fix it" guy do something else in back it was sprinkling a little but not really raining hard and all of a sudden a lightening bolt struck extremely close to our home and hit the television and DVD player. So that went over really well. Poor Greg just shakes his head and says, "We can't catch a break!"

Of course he has to hear me complain and I am sure that doesn't make his life any easier. The sink is leaking, our stairs aren't near complete, our backyard is a lake and there is mud everywhere. So you can imagine I am just a real joy to have around!

So if you could pray for us, we would sure appreciate it. I told Greg that all of this is happening b/c Satan is just pure mad at us b/c things are seemingly going well here as far as He is concerned! Love to you all!! Missy

Too busy to blog! ;o)

Hi friends!! I know it has been a few weeks since my last post. SO sorry. It just seems like life is flying by and I can hardly hold on. I will try and give you a quick update on the past few weeks. Our visits to our old village continue to go well and we are seeing them grow spiritually each week. We are like proud parents! They mentioned last week that they were thinking of changing the time so we wouldn't have to sleep on the floor at our old home  and we could just come to our study earlier and still have time to return home before it got dark. We are hoping this works out b/c it can be a little taxing on the family to pick up each week and go even if it is just for one night. Sometimes I forget what I have told you, I think I had shared we were doing that, if not, now you know we were staying there each week for one night after our study so that we wouldn't have to travel at night.

Things here are going well too! We had some American friends over here for the 4th and that was a lot of fun! It is always nice to visit with people in your own language and do things in English like play games, and of course eat all the foods that we love to eat. It was a super day and it was needed, for all of us! I am thankful that God has allowed us to meet people that have the same goal as we do and that we all get along so well. He is always so good to me!

We then had some special guests come and visit us at our new home, our boss and his wife. Now for many of you this would be a nightmare, but for us, it was awesome! We had a great time together and enjoyed more good food and fellowship! We have been blessed with a wonderful organization to work for and wonderful leadership.

We then had an absolutely wonderful time getting to know some new friends here in a neighboring village.  I will be honest and say sometimes these events we are invited to can drag on and be quite brutal, however; this was fun and we were the last to leave. Then last night we had our first storying session with a new family here. It went well and we now have plans to continue this every week with a new story. This family is very eager to learn and we are so happy to already have people interested in hearing our stories. God really is doing great things and we are just so happy to be able to be a small part of it! Thank you all for lifting us up, without you, this would be impossible! So, many, many, thanks! Love to you all!! Missy

Enjoy the pics!!



Our 4th of July meal!

                              

The other side of the room eating the great burgers our friend Charlie fixed.

                                    
This is Charlie, he was so good to the boys he actually made a special trip out to try and find some fireworks for our celebration. This that he was lighting sounded like a bomb going off, it was crazy! He told us they were loud, but we had NO idea how loud!!

                                    
                                                     This was his reaction to the bomb!



Sharon's famous homemade icecream. It was sooo yummy!

                                    

We also celebrated little Sammy's 3rd birthday and this was the cake Sharon made.

That is Batman's head you see.

                                       

Greg shooting off more fireworks.

This is a famous church we visited when our boss and his wife came to visit.

As you can see, not your "normal" boss! Love you Alan!!

This is in front of our home. I just thought it was a neat picture.

This is a pastor and his family who we have become close with here.

Okay, this is one of those things you see in another country and realize just how blessed we are. This little girl was on the counter in a public bathroom asleep. Those are all of she and her mother's belongings and they probably both sleep there at night too. I guess you could say that is home sweet home. Feeling blessed?

This is my sweet neighbor. We are getting to know eachother and she is helping me with the language.

This is our "hotel" accomodations when we stay overnight for church in our old village. Not bad after seeing the little girl above, huh?

Meeting new friends.

How precious is she?

and she?

Annie makes friends so easily, she just loves to play, with ANYBODY!!

These two girls were adorable! I think I will become quite close with them!

This is Jerod translating a praise and worship song into English. They had fun doing this. The pastor couldn't say light but he knew what Cocalight is, and couldn't say Power but knew what Poweraid was, couldn't say WE but knew what Wii was, so Jerod was trying change the song some at first to get him used to saying the words. It was funny! "To see you high and lifted up, shining in the Cocalight of his glory, pour out your Poweraid and love as we sing holy, holy, holy." Funny!!

Still raining a lot, as you can see all roads stay looking like this. Greg wanted me to get a picture of this guy but I couldn't. He was in a very nice IU jacket. Of course it is funny to think he was getting ready to sweep that road.