Cliff Notes

This is our new really cuty chocolate lab - we got her at 6 weeks, she's now 9 weeks. She chews everything but is really adorable! Her name is Bailey.

Because we have been so busy, I haven't had time to blog in a very long time so I will not attempt to give cliff notes of the past happenings so you don't have to read 10 pages of happenings.

Siguel: He has brought so much joy to our lives! He has a very sweet and sensitive spirit and somewhere along the line he learned how to be a gentleman - whenever I'm carrying anything he'll come and offer to carry it for me, if he's playing outside he comes inside to check on me and see if I'm ok. Tristan and Siguel fixed some bikes together and Siguel is a pro and fixing things. He's a very hard worker and so he loves helping Tristan. We introduced him to the play area at a fast food restaurant and he loved that - at first he didn't know what to think and then he figured it out and his smile was bigger than his face and he was dripping with sweat! :). We have started homeschooling him - two girls from our ministry come over every morning and are working with him on the basics - he has really enjoying school and learning English. He will say a sentence in spanish and then add in the one word he knows in English into the sentence - it's very cute! I think he's doing well with the adjustment, we have had some hard moments, he talks about his birth family a lot - which I think is a good thing - he talks about them but doesn't say he wants to go back with them. We have had Skype conversation's with his adoptive family which has been fun. The adoptive mom and brother are coming in two weeks for a visit which will be really great for Siguel. Today we have an appointment at immigration to start his passport process. Please continue to pray for his emotional healing, his English, and his overall transition.


Desiree & Koreen: We had a doctor and her sister come her through us to work for a few weeks. Since we don't have a medical clinic up and running yet, I found her a bunch of different things to do. Desiree and Koreen worked with a Brigade through World Gospel Outreach for a week and then stayed with us for the weekend. That Saturday we took them to a little town and Desiree saw patients at a missions project that is going on up there. She probably saw 50 patients in 2 1/2 hours which was great. Unfortunately it was storming all day which kept a lot of people away. But she was able to help a lot of people that day. We also got to spend the day with a great family - Ed & Val which was a lot of fun! Koreen then flew home and Desiree worked with a ministry that works with Aids families for the week. We then picked her up Friday and took her out with us to work with the brigade that we had at El Ayudante for the weekend. It was very fun being able to organize her trip and set her up to be able to help as many people as possible in only two weeks. It was a blessing to have her here!!!





CEAD Team: This last weekend we had a team of 32 people from CEAD (the church we worked with last year) come out and stay at El Ayudante and work to lay more blocks for the medical clinic. This was the first ever team to stay at the mission house!!!! Yippee! It was a lot of stress for us also because it was the first one - the drains didn't work, plumbing hadn't been tested, showers weren't hooked up yet, toilets were leaking, we didn't have mattresses (we were waiting for a check), some of the false ceiling had fallen in during a storm, the pump had been broken so we had to bring in a water truck, and we got a call from the guard the morning the team was coming to say the electricity had been turned off because the bill wasn't paid (not our department)! So there was a bit of stuff to do :). But God is great and Tristan is such a hard worker. We went out during the week and I cleaned while Tristan worked to finish the to-do list. We picked up mattresses on the way out Friday and we all worked Friday from 3pm when we got there until the team finally got there at 9! But we had 4 showers, two sinks, the kitchen sink, all toilets, mattresses on, dorms cleaned, and we were as ready as we were going to be! wow. Tristan preached about fellowship and working together that night to the group - in spanish - which was really cool. He did a great job with it all. Then after dinner and the service they wanted to play futball (it's not a good day without some soccer). So they moved the cars around the fields for lights and played soccer until 1am. (((Poor Siguel - he was so tired he was crying but he didn't want to be left out and it was too loud to sleep - so he played goalie with the big kids))). The next morning we had a typical breakfast, and they got to work. They worked hard all morning and laid about 300 block (a good amount), breaked for a huge lunch (it's all about food and futball) and then cleaned up their tools and headed home. During that time I was translating for Desiree as she was seeing patients - quite a stretch for my spanish but we survived (we told three ladies there was a DR there for the day and we had about 50 people show up to see her).




So, needless to say, the last 2 weeks were incredibly exhausting but also rewarding. This week we took Monday off to rest (which kinda worked - mostly turned into things around that we had to do). Tristan and his truck is assisting a team that has come in to build a church and community center up in the mountains. He picked them up from the airport, spent the afternoon with them yesterday, today he's taking them shopping for supplies and tomorrow he'll drive them up to Yoro and return on Saturday. Our truck has been such a blessing & used so much!

Sorry this was so long :). I'll try to stay up on this better so they can be shorter. :)