Busted Tooth

The night before last Kaleb fell and busted one of his front teeth. It was the strangest thing because for once he wasn't doing anything extremely dangerous and was just playing on top of some refrigerator magnets in the kitchen. He was holding onto a towel over his head, with both hands, playing superman and fell. Rather than catching his fall by letting go of the towel he caught himself with his face and his tooth reeped the consequences. So, yesterday we spent all day at the dentist. They put him under and extracted what was left of his tooth. Poor boy, now he really looks like Dennis the Menace. We were blessed to have a very nice Dr., he worked very well with Kaleb. Thank you all who were praying for us yesterday. Kaleb seems to be doing great this morning and has had very little side affects from the anestesia.

School Shoes

Thanks to the Adult 2 class at Broadway Church of Christ. We were able to hand out 18 pair of school shoes and socks. The kids were so excited to try on their new shoes. What a Blessing! Thank You for your sacrifice and love.
(I posted this again because the pics didn't show on the last one....sorry!)

Just a little update view of our family!:) Kaidan and her friends were playing dress-up and Kaleb insisted on joining in!:) Justin is going to be so happy I posted the pics of his son. The picture of Kaidan is after we took ALL of her braids out.....she looked awesome. And then the last is just of us two.

Clothes Closet

We want to thank all the groups, South Lake Blvd Church, Twickenham COC, Fort Walton Beach COC and Niceville COC, who came this summer and left behind clothes for the community. We also want to thank Julie and Alicia for helping us organize and get the clothes and shoes ready to give. This last Sunday we opened the rooms and the members from Church were able to pick out items they needed. There were many happy faces. Many will be blessed through your donations. Thank you!

Summer Fun

We just back from our family summer trip to the beach. It was wonderful to just be with family and watch the kids play. Now, we must begin real life again. The kids program will begin in two weeks so we have to begin planning and looking for material ect. We hope all is well with each of you. Thank you for your prayers and love.

Summer Coaster

I know I have once again let down on my blogging job. I apologize. It has been another roller coaster summer and we are finally getting off to take a breather. We were blessed with the opportunity of hosting four work groups and two large youth camps this Summer. The camp session we direct each year went really well. Our hopes were to have 70-80 youth and we ended up having 110, so a total of 130 people attended. It was a great time and we pray God was blessed!
Justin's brother and sister came down to visit for several weeks in July, and my best friend Alicia also came to see us. It is hard to put into words how wonderful it is to have family and friends come and share in the work here. We enjoyed the moments we had with them. They deserve a medal for surviving the chaotic times with groups.
It is now time to start gearing up for another school year. Our goal is to begin teaching English and some other skills in addition to helping with homework this year. This is a little intimidating for me because my degree is not in education. However, we see the need and are going to do our best to teach what we can. If any of you have beginning English material or know of cool Bible curriculum in Spanish please let us know. I have been looking on the internet for a while and it's not the same as walking in a book store and finding material. Any advice is welcome or if you just feel God is wanting you to come down and help we would love that also!:)
Kaidan and Kaleb are doing wonderful. Kaidan was able to spend a month with Keith and Dana, Justin's parents, in the States and she loved it. I have to say she came back a little spoiled, but nothing out of control. Even though we missed her like crazy it was good for her to have that time with her grandparents. Kaleb is definitely showing a little personality. When he wants something he has no issues with letting you know. He and Kaidan are finally at the age where they can play together and that has been wonderful for us. It is so fun watching them!
Thank you all for your continued prayers and love. I will be writing at least every two weeks to give you little updates on the work here and our family. We pray each of you have had a wonderful summer. God Bless.

Up at Night

Once again, I am up at 2:30 in the morning not able to sleep. My family has been gone four days now and I feel a big chunk of my heart is absent. The last few days have been a wonderful yet hard learning experience. God is showing me how blessed I am. He has blessed me with an incredible partner in this life that loves Him more than anything and two wonderful children who are so fun to be with and so easy to love. I am a truly blessed woman.

The work here continues to grow and flourish. God seems to be blessing it despite our weaknesses and inadequacies. This month has been a wonderful month full of events and people. We hosted a medical group who offered services to the Tabacundo and surrounding communities. This group from Arkansas helped and encouraged many through their sacrifice and love. During this same weekend, a wedding also took place here. A young lady who I have had the pleasure of knowing since she was three years old joined her life with an Argentine who recently graduated from the Bible School in Quito. It was exciting to watch them dedicate their lives to each other. This was the first wedding to take place here at the camp, but after seeing how beautiful a wedding can be in the midst of God’s beauty I think we’ll be seeing many more lives joined here.
We have entered our last month of the children’s program before we take the summer break. Recently we have been busy celebrating Mother’s Day and Children’s Day. For Mother’s Day the children made cards for their mothers, and they also helped cut out and decorated cookies for their mothers. Now I have to say, that was a full day. Organizing cooking and decorating for 100 children is a much bigger task than I thought. We had very limited supplies, so we all used the same cookie cutter and we could not make a whole lot of icing so we had four colors and one by one, they chose what color they wanted and then decorated their cookie. At the end, it was totally worth it. They were all so excited to take their finished cookie to their mother. God continues to grow the program and send us children who are in need. Please continue to pray we have the wisdom to work with each child and provide them with their needs. I want to thank all of you who have been praying for the man who is raising his four children on his own. His youngest baby seems to be growing and doing much better health wise. He is still very behind in motor skills, but is gradually making progress.
God keeps showing us He is in control of the church here. Our new brothers and sisters continue to show us how blessed we are. Their love for God and desire to follow Him is so encouraging and often humbling. They remind us how blessed we are to be sons and daughters of the King. Again, we thank you for your prayers for the people here. God is at work and we are thankful we have so many partners in this work who love Him.
Before I close, I would like to share a special prayer request. We are facing more and more teen mothers in our area. Often, they drop out of school and begin living with the father of their baby and his family, not out of love or a commitment, but necessity. It is a sad but very common situation here. The local children and family protection service has repeatedly contacted us asking us to give temporary housing to children living in abusive and neglectful situations. Currently, we do not have the facilities or the personnel to help the way we feel God wants us to. As we look for what He desires for us to do in this situation, we know we cannot shut the door. We have begun thinking about possible housing opportunities that we could offer as a temporary living assistance for those in desperate need get their feet back under them. Please pray for God to guide us to His will and share with us your thoughts. God is good and I believe He will supply us with what we need to follow His will.
We pray God is blessing each of you.