Failure to process (life grade unknown)

One week back in the U.S. This evening, from the backseat of our borrowed car, Jude overheard our hushed conversation of insecurity concerning our future. Helpful as always, he informed us that, "Papa could look for a job managing houses again, and if there aren't any he could take care of a hotel, or be a carpenter. The only job he can't do is sell electronics because he would want to keep them all. Mama could sell electronics because she would want to get rid of them - or she could weld."

So that's it folks. Maybe I'll be a welder. Sounds as likely as anything today. Our hearts are grieving while rejoicing. Lucy and Jarod are dealing with stomach issues, Jude and I have a cold - it is freezing here - and the warm welcome of our friends and family make it all ok. Well - maybe almost all ok. We heard today that David and Olga had their baby girl. And I cried. I scrolled over my blog - reminiscing in hopes of successful debriefing. And it failed.

I am at a profound loss of words. We are ok. We are grateful. We are living in a grace that we sense deeper each day.
This year was beautiful. Difficult, confusing, and beautiful. I thank the Lord it only happened one day at a time... and I have a feeling I should be grateful that next year is just as unknown as well. But don't be surprised if I take up welding.

Thank you for reading - thank you for caring -

But we do have fast internet... just uploaded these photos from our last week in Honduras.

We had a self appointed "adios" committee at 7 a.m. the morning we left.


Lucy's "adios" committee.



Cards, fried feasts, and swimming were nice diversions to break up the hours of packing and cleaning and saying goodbye.





60 people came out for our last library time together and to welcome Jason and Sarah back



Jason and Sarah were neighbors, friends, mentors, and more


An excellent group of Gringo friends... who we wouldn't have wanted live this year without.


Abner - "Our Native" who we COULDN'T have lived this year without :)

Back blog - 11/14

I never got a chance to post this... and now, it looks like Kendi's mother can't get the visa stuff worked out... I watch him become more sullen each day... and wonder at the way expectation and disapointments effect our lives... and the lives we never even have a chance to have. Oh... and Lucy is all better.




WHAT PHOTOS CAN NEVER CAPTURE

After a quick trip down to the clinic in Rio Veijo this morning, confirmed that our miserable little Lucy does indeed again have an ear infection and is headed for pneumonia, Jude and I left her in the care of her capable and far more patient father and headed off for an adventure. Usually, I would have put off any scheduled activity to hold and nebulize my ailing daughter, but alas – immigration waits for no one and lost memories can never be regained.

Shortly after arriving here, one of our dearest little friends tried his best - through language barrier upon language barrier - to explain that – he lives with his aunt – his mother lives in Spain – he hasn't seen her in 3 years – she is coming to get him sometime and take him to Barcelona. I have gotten more bits and pieces of the story from his two aunts who have become close friends, but no one seems to be quiet sure --- if it is going to happen, when, the legalities involved, how permanent it is, and what will happen to the rest of the 12 people who she supports here in Urraco, if and when her children move to Europe. Perhaps they will have to sell their land, perhaps move to SP and get a factory job, maybe wait for their ticket to Europe... maybe... “we'll see when Doris gets here... we'll see what she says... we'll see” – and that happens Tuesday.

But the one thing I know is that if our 12 year old little river swimming, soccer playing, tree climbing, squash planting, lying, laughing Kendi gets on a plane for another world. There is no return ticket. End of life one. Game over.
And until I came into the circle of this family and the tensions involving imminent “upward” immigration I had never given a second thought to the lost memories of the immigrants searching for a “better life.” They don't usually come with an iphoto cache. No way to explain the exotic fruits of which they are accustomed, or a tutorial from which to demonstrate how they spent vast amounts of time beating out their corn or carefully drying their beans. If they can even find someone who is willing to listen.
And so, to know that our vivacious unstoppable Kendi will be “surviving” in the jungles of Barcelona, saddens me in a way I never would have expected. Because he and his family do not survive here – they thrive. His aunt cooks delicious meals every day, having not gone to the grocery store in 3 years. He is as accustomed to catching fish by hand and walking jungle paths in the dark as an New Yorker is accustomed to hailing a cab. How long will he be stuck in survival mode? How much will it transform his character? Only God knows. I know I have been in survival mode for one year – and it has changed me – in ways I will never be able to explain.
But I know, that if I take a few photos, let him take a few photos, maybe in 10 years when he has been fully “in-technicated” - he'll be able to open his lap top and show his fiance, “My home – this is me where I thrived.”
At least he'll have soccer in Barcelona – and now he'll have a photo cache... even if it cannot capture 'home.'






I am particularly fond of this photo Kendi shot of me trying out Tita's new outhouse... They'll put up the walls just as soon as they get the money for wood.



Exodus 23:9
Do not oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt.

Ya me voy ahorita!

My passion for this phrase began after waiting 3 hours for a haircut that was then interrupted by a perm. I played it over and over in my head. How could I have so badly miss translated a phrase that I was sure meant “Yes, I am already coming to you right now, this minute!” ? Three hours and a perm – maybe that woman had said I need a perm “ahorita” with a different silence on the H or roll of her R! I must solve this mystery – but no.
Instead I wait until 10 for milk that was coming “ahorita” at 8. I wait for my friend to babysit so I can teach classes. She said she was coming “ahorita” - but that meant after she washed her laundry (and I think we have clarified that takes more than pushing a button). Kids say “ya, me voy” - “I am already on my way” - when they haven't bathed or eaten... in fact no one has hauled in the wood, to start the fire, to cook the meal. If they have to say, “I am coming right now” - it means they are not because they are in the middle of something.... and every something here takes awhile. It is like they don't understand that things take time. Actually it is like they don't understand that there is time. Like, “right now” - is different than “later.” I am the only type A person for 2 hours in any direction so I am the only one ever or frustrated it seems. Apparently, parties are starting “ahorita” when someone still has to drive a half an hour to get a speaker system and load it on your motorcycle, and parades start when you drive a half an hour in the other direction to get the marching band – that by the way - has to hitch a ride, and we only get about 12 cars a day up here. Church is always starting “ahorita” - much later. That is ok with everyone.
Today, when I went to buy eggs from my neighbor, she said she didn't have any right now, but they were coming “ahorita.” So we chatted for a bit and then things fell silent. I began to wonder if we were waiting for her husband to bring them from the chickens in the other field, or her daughter to gather them after breakfast, or maybe her mother was bringing them from her house, as I knew she sometimes does. I was wondering what his ahorita was going to look like. I was actually planning on doing something with those eggs today... for breakfast rather than dinner. So I finally broke down and ask. “When exactly will the eggs come?” “Ahorita” --- a few more minutes... and then I asked how they would get there. She looked at me like I was an idiot, and then explained that we were waiting for the chickens, there in her front yard to lay them – that is where eggs come from gringa. Of course, I was the idiot here – it wasn't like we had anything better to do then sit around and wait for the chickens to lay there eggs!
Time is not worth money here. There are no jobs, no other options, if you don't get done today what you were planning on doing – tomorrow's schedule looks exactly the same – and you cannot hurry the chickens.
So, I still don't understand what the phrase means, but I have decided I am going leave, “ya me voy ahorita.” It is two weeks away but I think it is appropriate. Normal time is over. The packing has begun, the forward thinking is in full swing, email and plans for the future and recap of the last year is taking more and more time each day.
So, to the people of Urraco - “ya me voy Ahorita.”
The rains have begun, making swimming dates and church schedules unreliable at best, and at worst, each time could very well be our last. “Ya me voy ahorita.”
I am cleaning out the fridge, and eating mountains of leftovers and pastelies. No more time for baking cookies for the kids and cooking classes with friends. “Ya me voy ahorita.”
No more time for watching movies and shelling cacoa with visitors. “Ya me voy ahorita.”
No more time to learn Spanish and devote every waking moment to the impossible task of understanding Honduras. “Ya me voy ahorita.”
It is apprapo... though I know not what it means. But I need to quit writing and make dinner “ahorita”.... because Jarod said he'd be home “ahorita”.... but just a forewarning to those to whom we come – “right now” means nothing to us anymore.


a group of the kids after a special music class in the library


a group of the kids durign a special photography class given by GUARUMA at the library


Jude "carrying" a sack of coffee

It's been a busy week :)


Oh yeah... and we aren't that organized anymore either. Therefore I cannot upload our Thanksgiving pictures which include everything from the butchering of the chicken, digging of the sweet potatoes, wheelchair races, and coconut chopping.

Final proof that I am my mother

It is the baggage limits - I tell you. We don't want to do it, but the airlines made us. How on earth are we to bring each of you a souvenir in bags that weigh under 75 lbs? Who gets bags of fresh roasted coffee? Who gets homemade chocolate? Who gets the dozen slingshots the boys are busy making? Who gets the bags my neighbor sewed when she was desperate for money? Those of you who have written us? Those who have prayed for us? Those who have donated to the village and library? I am telling you, there is no 75 lb solution – and no way to give you all that we want. SO.... we are going to have a party.

I know it is the most miserable time of year to do so, and I know those of you from a distance won't be able to come. I know that we won't have time to sit down and chat about your lives – about the details we really want to hear. But maybe if we do this one big thing, we can share just a little bit of the year we have had with you – and we can show you how much you have meant to us – and maybe you can go home with some REALLY cool stuff. So you are invited:

Monday, December 14th
High Plains Church Basement

7:00 p.m. Showing of our video presentation - Q&A
7:30 p.m. Giving of a massive amount of door prizes
7:45 p.m. Sampling of Honduran yummies and chatting

If you cannot come but would like to be included please email us your name and address (and at least a few sentences about your year... it's not too much to ask) – we'll include you in the door prizes and will mail you our year end DVD.

Children welcome and PLEASE invite whoever you think would be interested and RSVP to 785-625-6220 by Dec 11 if you know you'll be making it. And NO MOM we aren't sending out invitations, decorating, or taking out a newspaper add (but you can call your whole address book if you want).

Finally - Our life here is crazy beautiful as ever. I don't want to write about leaving in two weeks because I don't want to think about leaving in two weeks. But it is probably good thing we are, because a few months here and we would be fully Honduran. I am making my own tortillas and when Lucy was sick last week I resorted to the folk remedy of chicken fat mixed with menthal and kerosine. It worked she's all better - plus 5 new teeth - don't nock it til you try it... never mind that she was totally flamable for a few nights. So no good Honduran blog.... you'll get your fill of Honduran info hopeful the night of the 14th.

The seeds

I have had a crop of sweet corn produce ears no larger than my little finger. Sweet Potatoes no bigger than my thumb. I have watched packets of carrot seeds be carried away by ants and 8 successive plantings of tomatoes wilt before my eyes. 4 packs of peas have produced 8 pea pods and a dozen children have been disappointed by their first taste of a hard bitter radish that they planted.

Five months – no eggplants, no sizable onions, miniature squash, and rotten melons. Packs of seeds generously donated from foreign friends, and planted by me with the best of intentions. All the while I have watched wild yams grow the size of trees, oranges, avocados, and mangos fall off trees faster than we can give them away, pineapple tops sprout on kitchen counters, green beans grow taller then Lucy, cucumbers take over my refrigerator, and the dead sticks I place in my garden for space markers sprout to life in two days.

I have learned the word “carne de perro” - which means “meat of a dog” - or “you can't kill it.” “No serve” - it won't work - and “pega bien” - it will stick good – are some of the most common phrases in my vocabulary. I have received age old wisdom about planting according to the phase of the moon, intermixed with such boggas advice as, “That tomato died because too many women on their period walked by,” to the point that some days I can't tell the difference. The variables in rain, heat, quality of soil, age of seeds, pests, fungus, and pestering animals would take a lifetime to master. But my neighbors don't have a lifetime to experiment – if what they plant doesn't grow – they don't eat. So they plant corn, rice, and beans. And the soil depletes and they burn off some more forest, and their diet is unbalanced and they never know the difference. They don't own the land so they won't plant fruit trees to invest in their future. They have never eaten some foods like okra and New Zealand spinach that grow like gang busters so they by 1 limp bags of chips and frozen koolade.

Isaiah 17:10-11 Why? Because you have turned from the God who can save you.
You have forgotten the Rock who can hide you.
So you may plant the finest grapevines and import the most expensive seedlings.
They may sprout on the day you set them out; yes, they may blossom on the very morning you plant them, but you will never pick any grapes from them.
Your only harvest will be a load of grief and unrelieved pain.

And I ran across Isaiah. Verses filled with gardening imagery. Verses ringing true about plants and humans. Nothing can grow without His grace and wisdom. The best of all foreign seeds wilt without His blessing. All the work and labor to produce what we WANT is in vain in the face of his ordering the universe to the contrary. And so we plant in our lives what we think we want. What we see someone else has – that looks so good- that grows so well for them. And then we toil to see it produce nothing – to leave us empty and wanting. The foreign seed has failed us because we looked to it for provision instead of to the one who created the climate of our lives within which we sow. We never ask Him what he would have us plant in the garden of our lives.

Isaiah 28:24-29
When a farmer plows for planting, does he plow continually?
Does he keep on breaking up and harrowing the soil?
When he has leveled the surface,
does he not sow caraway and scatter cummin?
Does he not plant wheat in its place, [d]
barley in its plot, [e]
and spelt in its field?
His God instructs him
and teaches him the right way.
Caraway is not threshed with a sledge,
nor is a cartwheel rolled over cummin;
caraway is beaten out with a rod,
and cummin with a stick.
Grain must be ground to make bread;
so one does not go on threshing it forever.
Though he drives the wheels of his threshing cart over it,
his horses do not grind it.
All this also comes from the LORD Almighty,
wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom.

And Isaiah again speaks of our lives as seeds. That we may take comfort that the one who created us knows where we will grow and how we must be handled. How often I have thought my soil too dry or my threshing too hard – but He alone knew that I would rot with moisture and remain useless unless cleaned. He made us exactly the way we are, to inhabit a different climate than our neighbor... and we spend so much time as cucumbers wishing we were lettuce. Do I think that the soil that he plants me in next will be worse for me than the soils of Urraco? From the greenhouse to a garden I go.

But do I regret these plantings? These failures? Not one seed. I have gained more wisdom than food, and my little friends and I have learned more lessons in tenacity. I have shared the few things that have worked with neighbors, and they have shared with me. We have laughed at failures and eaten new and different meals together. And I have heard that there is a cherry tomato in the jungle that grows like a weed. I will find it, I will transplant it before I am transplanted in his perfect timing.


Walking through the gardens to our house:


PLaying in the sugar cane and yucca..... please note the little gun Jude has holstered in his pants. *sigh*



Speaking of seeds..... they don't fall far from the tree

Lucy

Jarod

my soundscape

Jason and Sarah have introduced us to many wonderful things, not the least of which are TED talks – (15 minute lectures over a myriad of topics that you can download in Ceiba and watch on your computer at your leisure.) They are entertaining enough for a Friday night of chocolate shelling and just thought provoking enough to keep our brains from rotting on half comprehended Spanish and village old wives tales.
One of last nights lectures was on “sound” and creating the perfect “soundscape” for your life. While Jarod was pleased to learn that a noisy environment is scientifically proven to decrease productivity by over 2/3 (thus giving him solid footing for demanding some peace and quite), I was amused by the extravagant idea of controlling 'your' life to such a minute detail. In stark contrast to the noisy week that Urraco has had, I have decided that only we isolationist individualist North American and Eurpeans would dream of such a “sound control” concept. The rest of the world just shakes their heads.
A Birthday party for a 3 year old and 1 year old started our week. Complete with an extravagant rainbow cake made in the complete dark due to a lightning storm and 6 adrenalin stoked kids it was completely noisy. You can't have quite with children.
A 2 hour drive home in the dark with sugar pumped children down a bumpy dirt road in a truck that could use better shocks. You can't control sound in transit.
48 hours of rain commenced the rainy season, with the metal roof continually pounding reassurance for 2 more months of mind numbing heavenly racket. There is no silence in tropical rain.
Monday night we had 8 kids over for pupusas and to celebrate the end of the school year with a little game of pictionary. The laughter of teenagers screaming in broken English is a sound like no other.


During the four hours of library time the children were remarkably respectful of the silence rule. But on Monday we introduced over 20 kids to puzzles and on Wednesday thy began with water colors. There were so many questions, so much excitement. Learning cannot be silent.
On Tuesday our neighbor Angela and her family needed help moving to Ceiba, then plans changed to Wednesday, and Margery had to take a test on Thursday so, “could she spend the night with us?” - and of course, “what time?” “ok, let's change plans again.” There is no peace when you really KNOW your neighbors.
On Wednesday, Pamela taught me how to make rice – even though she had broken an arm in a soccer game and her husband was laid up because of, well, a little too much to drink – as usual. And as we rinsed rice in her kitchen and the chickens cleaned up the fallen pieces I wondered at the thought of tomorrows soup, eating today's lunch. There is no silence in Honduran cooking – the chicken's talk to you and YES a whole ¼ Lb of butter sizzles in the skillet for every one pound of rice you cook.






On Thursday I went to help Tita put the finishing mud coat on her new house ( and see her new outhouse - dug for $10) but by the time I reached her house 3 people had informed me that Evangelista had died. The grandmother of Darwin, Allen, and Edwin who had been struggling with stomach cancer for some time, had finally, quietly, left our world. But even death is not silent in the aldea. More cars than usual came baring family from town and the cousins played up and down the streets. The room which held the coffin and body for 24 hours hummed through the night with prayers and condolences until 5 am when they drove to her resting place down in Toncontin.
Our house must be the quietest place around because Friday, weak with exhaustion from the vigil Allen slept on our couch. And we tried to be quite. But people are coming now to buy oranges and leches, to see if there are any shoes left, or work. And the men were on the hills chopping and singing, filling our open windows with the sounds of machete labor.
Yesterday, we walked through the town on our way to learn to roast coffee, picking up bits of news and watching friends noisily crack coconuts between rocks. Dona Wilma, chattered the whole 2 hours we roasted the coffee as her wooden rake brushed the beans over the hot metal. She told me about her 16 year old daughter who has down syndrome and her 33 year old son who is mentally ill. She told me about who her children are going to buy her a pila – but she really will miss washing clothes by the river. It is just so peaceful. Such a soundscape.
And as we walked home with the noisy children we picked up a long the way, the only thing that seemed out of place was a whir of Don Pedro's newly purchased weed whip.

Next week I'll take better pictures (A)

Today, 63 of my students completed their final exam, resulting in almost a perfect bell curve, and Jarod, after 4 months successfully roasted a delicious batch of coffee. Lucy learned to say her name as well as 4 more spanish phrases in the last week, and Jude reached a record of playing so hard that he needed 3 baths in one day – on that same day he also succeeded in instructing 6 different boys in picking a dozen cacao pods that weren't ready and getting himself a nice punishment for the generosity. We all ate fresh fried fish eggs, pounded coffee hulls off in an old tree stump. All of this excitement in spite of the fact that we have been told by the Doctor that our “lower GI tracks are surely riddled with worms that are sucking valuable nutrients, primarily those in the B12 family.”
It is really all very good news that we have these worms, because Jude was the only that actually had any GI symptoms – and they were only little red worms NOT the six foot blue worms we could have apparently been harboring. I had just been assuming I was exhausted for no good reason – which led to a lot of family tension. So now we know, we had parasites – we took a pill – and now they are gone – and our energy should be back to normal in a few days. I can hardly wait to see what kind of activity our family will be up to then.
We are in Ceiba this weekend for a birthday party for two of our favorite little missionary girls... and to use the internet to – sigh – by our plane tickets to the states. With Jason and Sarah gone and school out things should look a little different over the next few months. I hope to open the library a few more days a week – targeting specific age groups and interests. I should probably focus a bit of attention on my six dying gardens... but the depression is heavy and the hope one ripe tomato before we leave is dwindling – I am telling you The Garden of Eden was NOT a tropical jungle.
For next week I already have a date scheduled with one woman who is going to teach me how to make rice, because Jarod likes hers better than mine, and I didn't have the heart to tell him that I am sure it is because she uses an amount of animal fat that I could not, in good conscious, use in a month's worth of cooking. Wednesday, I am going to another woman's house to learn to roast coffee over an open fire (since the coffee roasting is woman's work here, I have to be Jarod's spy, I guess) and then my final exciting plan for next week is to assist a friend in finishing making her adobe house – which I think will amount to smearing mud on to dirt for hours on end. Skills, people – I am telling you I am going to have made skills. Mad rice, coffee and mud house making skills upon my return – how marketable is that?
But speaking of marketable – while I run around with a dozen dirty kids, a few women, doing nothing important but oh so exciting - Jarod keeps plugging away at the boring electronic end of things and tedious chocolate and coffee making. He completed a video for Give Hope 2 Kids that I think he is going to post on facebook (You should watch it), and that Jason and Sarah will be able to share with supporters in the States. He has the security system up and running – which should protect us from the hooligans I bring to hang around the house and library. And he may be headed in the right direction to help the cacao and coffee be marketable for more than 50 cents a pound. Last week Jude, 2 local boys and I drove around for five hours selling used shoes left by the summer groups out of the back of the truck. The highly profitable and slightly psychotic adventure resulted in $150 which I think we are going to put toward concrete, rock and labor to build more paths... because rainy season is coming. I am so glad I get to sell the shoes and my husband gets to build the paths.

Oh yeah, Jarod does get to do some fun stuff like go fishing by hand at night in class three rapids, and he has successfully converted his progeny into little cacao fiends.




THESE ARE OUR CHILDREN



And one final note. I haven't really mentioned the political situation on my blog because frankly it doesn't affect us at all, but then the other morning I woke up and thought, as usual, “I wonder how many presidents we have today, or where they are, or if anyone knows.” And then I thought later – “huh... I guess that is a strange thought I should have included on my blog.” Oh, and we did hear gun shots, screaming, and crazy driving the other night, and we had another day of canceled school last week – but that was only a result of the World Cup qualification.


Oh, and a more final note - we are thinking of entering a photo contest and need your input - please look at the photos Jarod put on facebook and Flickr. Here is one I took today and I am thinking of entering it as "Beauty and the Beast". What do you think?

Thoughts I never thought I'd think. But I REALLY DO.

Thoughts I never thought I'd think. But I REALLY DO.

Grocery shopping is so extravagant.

How can I get a 1,000 extra calories into our diet today? Maybe I should fry something in animal fat.

Should I kill that 4 inch spider by my bed or is it really worth the mess tonight?

Is it rude not to eat the endangered species they cooked for dinner?

I am freezing! It has got to be like 75.

I think I'll sell shoes out of the back of my truck today.

I can't grow any food – maybe I'll just grow flowers... or at least these flowery weeds.

Now, is this one of those plants that I can just cut off and stick in the ground and it will take root?

Where is my machete? “Jude, have you been using my machete?”

Did they just tell me that the are ending school a month early and no one knows or cares why?

Oh, good – another dead mouse by the fridge!

Has Lucy had more sugar today or vegetables. Wait. Have we had any vegetables today?

Is it a problem that my two dogs are doing the 'real hokey-pokey' in the middle of our 40 kid hokey-pokey circle, or should I just keep singing?

We've only had refried beans 4 times this week. That is really what we should have for dinner.

OH! (upon seeing a student do her chores at home) So that is why that 3rd grader is so strong!

Why did that squirrel just jump on Lucy's face?

Did I just tell my student that I am really hot and tired today or that I want to make love to him? I think I should just stop talking.

Is this kid just showing my this 2 inch fish or is he asking me to fry it up for dinner?

Middle of the night, “What's that sound? Is it someone outside my window or is that rat in the pantry? I hope it is someone with a gun outside my window.”

Oh look – I have a storage shed and 100 books – maybe I should start a library in a language I don't speak... when I am already struggling to survive!

Who fed the monkey today? Does he eat watermelon?

I'd really like some chocolate. If I start right now, I can have some next Saturday. Or how about frozen yogurt. We get milk on Tuesday – so I could have that made by Thursday.

Will it be more distracting to try to get that cow to leave the classroom or should I try to shew him out?

I am pretty sure this kid hasn't eaten today. Should I still make him work for the food or will he pass out?

This delicious orange julius only cost 4 cents and about 1 hours worth of labor. Good thing our time isn't worth anything.

Does this woman really want to be my friend or is she just walking 2 miles to try to sell me $1.00 worth of tortillas.

What family activity can we do while it rains and is too loud to talk or hear ANYTHING?

If I ever build a house I am going to build it with a sink to hand wash clothes... it is just so handy – and it can double for a place to clean animal carcasses. But my kids CANNOT brush their teeth there.

Do these pants make me look thin or do I have worms?













-- Post From My iPod

Blessings (A)

The last two weeks have been amazing. After spending a nice weekend down in La Ceiba indulging on the internet, we returned to begin preparing for our final short term group and cleaning out a storage unit to transform it into a community library.

The work was hard. The hours long, and the last 20 minute scramble before the doors opened felt like something straight out of HGTV. The two hour grand opening fiesta felt like a miracle. Over half the village came – adults as well as children – and although they enjoyed the crafts, games and piñatas, they POURED over the books and continually asked for more stories. Twenty minutes after the fiesta was supposed to have ended the children's corner was still full and you could hear the low hum of children sounding out words. This was their first experience in a library – for many, it was their first taste of recreational education. I can not thank you all enough for your prayers and support. For those of you who gave us money for ministry before we left – know that you bought those book shelves. We know that this is just the beginning as we hold twice weekly story times, craft times, train librarians and more . But the Lord has blessed so far, and we know that it is in his hands. Please keep your eyes out for Spanish books – as you can see – there is plenty more space to fill!



The space AFTER a week of cleaning and sorting and BEFORE a week of AMAZING team work that transformed it to:




A place of joyful learning.



The group who made this happen (Minus my amazing husband who was the everything handyman for this project and the driving 'can do' force behind it. ½ because he wanted the community to have a library – and ½ because he wanted to move the community center out of our house!)



2 ½ hours in...



Vicki, Jude, Delmis, and Seyli enjoying the reading nook Vicki created. Jude stayed there for over an hour!



Standing room only at story time!


Along with participating in the library miracle – his last group built us a walking path and STEPS!! In four months we have gone from a trench to castle like luxury at our back door.


Building the path between the houses



Blowing bubbles on the 'stoop'.... the luxury of a stoop – where once stood mud!

This group was amazing and encouraging. The Lord's work here in hearts and lives is apparent. Our life here is beautiful and fulfilling. But the count down to the unknown begins... 10 weeks to uprooting once again.



P.S. Lucy is up to about 5 signs and a dozen words these days – including 'chicken'. She spends most of her time walking instead of crawling. Her fascination with shoes continues... and last night she threw mine in the toilet twice (It makes you really wish you had doors to close). Thankfully she picked up that bad habit after the team left with all of their shoes! Here she is in Pastor Paul's shoes... although she seemed to favor Vicki's bright pink Crocs.

Some more pics and Videos

Here is the new puppy Rocky. Jude and Lucy love him. We will feel better about him when he quits barking at our door in the middle of the night.


Jude is learning to swim. Here is a video from today in the pool... without waterwings.


Lucy blowing kisses to you all.

State of the unit

So, we sit in a posh seaside villa soaking in the internet through three computers and an I-pod (obviously we needed a break from the vogue 'ideal' no?). It's been over a month since I have had access to a reliable internet connection for an reasonable amount of time and it seems that this trend may continue. I hope to be calling several of you this weekend, so to eliminate any small talk on my end and get to the important stuff (like me hearing about your family) I'll just say - “read the blog.”
The family unit is well. I'd say an A.

Jarod
His homemade chocolate is becoming a community favorite – and a continual point of discussion among us all. He will be starting in soon on coffee roasting ideas, which should also be highly entertaining. He has been building stuff, fixing stuff, hauling stuff, planting stuff, and reminding me it is a good idea to sit down every once and awhile and enjoy the quite of our home. Reminding me to go for walks and take pictures... just because it is enjoyable. Because where we live is amazing. Besides finding great joy in the natural world around him and the many things to learn on a daily basis, he is building a few friendships and enjoying his Bible Study with our friend David. He is dreaming about 'what to do next' and tonight we learned he needs to look for a job based on a (ROWE – you can look it up). Or I guess maybe he wants to move to Wisconsin to make cheese – or Canada to tap maple trees – to Oregon to audit classes – or Kansas to fix wind generators... but only if he can ride his motorcycle. So yeah – he's the same. And here is his favorite mushroom shot - these come up over night and vanish by mid day. We are pretty sure it is poisonous.




Jude
We all agree he is doing well. Weird but well. He is a strange little guy with questions about, “why are family is white,” and repeating words like 'horchata' again and again – just for the fun of it. He still asks almost daily about when we will go back to Kansas or when he will see grandpa or play at Izaac's house, but even more frequently he asks when his friends are coming over or when we are going to the river to swim. He is learning to read and loves working on school with me and going to school to teach English. He is joy and he is trial – he is the reason that I have been spending my few free seconds reading a parenting book.



Lucy
She is walking on her own now, a bit. Talking on her own now, a bit – in both languages. She is dirty. She loves shoes and food. She has weak lungs and a bad attitude – and she is the town of Urraco's mascot. The children love her – the moms love her. We love her... but this parenting book is coming in really handy... and I am telling you that whoever she becomes... she was born that way.




I am continually amused at my daily miscommunications – with my bumpy road as teacher, neighbor and friend. I am enjoying myself deeply... frustrated often, missing the comfort of easy old friendships and learning lessons by the second. I am super pumped that by the next blog I may have put books into the hands of every child in our village and set up library story hours to flood their little brains with my horrible Spanish and the wonder of a little library!