Juarez for Thanksgiving

As many of you know we are going on a mission trip the week of Thankgiving. We went two years ago and it was a life-changing and life-shaping event. Following is a schedule of our days. We would covet your prayers as we venture forth. Please also pray for good health for all of us during the week.

Sunday - Travel day. Please pray for our time together, the blending of our team, the safety of our bus, and calm hearts for us as we go into a place very different than Boulder County.

Monday - Bethel Orphanage and Agua Viva Senior Men's Home. We will be spending the day loving the kids and these "grown up" orphans. We will share a meal together, share the Gospel, and mostly provide a visit in Jesus' name. Please pray that we would be bold and not timid and make the most of sharing with these sweet new friends quickly.

Tuesday - Bethel Orphanage. There is something wonderful about spending two days in an orphanage. To be able to say to the kids on Monday, "Hasta mañana" is simply the best! We will play soccer, basketball, football and other games with the kids this day. Pray for us as we leave part of our hearts behind as we say, "Adios" to our new friends on Tuesday afternoon and believe that God is with them always.

Wednesday - Brother Ray's Feeding Center/Church. Today we will worship with Mexican brothers and sisters, we will help feed 200 people and minister to Jenny Tapia and her small band of servants who work faithfully in this place each week.

Thursday - Loma Blanca Colonia ("White Hill"). Today we will serve a big Mexican feast to the colonia. We may have 400 people. Please pray that we have enough food, that there be a real sense of peace and calm on this place, that we will not be stopped by the poverty that we see and instead see this neighborhood with the eyes of Jesus. We will also share a puppet show with a theme of "Do Not Be Afraid, God is Always with Us!" Pray for strength and good relationships on the team because today we will begin to be very tired.

Friday - Loma Blanca Colonia. Today we will have a health fair for adults and kids. We will share the importance of good spiritual, nutritional, emotional, community health. We will also be doing a mini "Operation: Christmas Child" and deliver shoebox presents to the kids.

Saturday - Travel Day. Again pray for safety and for sweet reflection on all that we've seen this week.

I would encourage you to make a difference this Thanksgiving. Help out in a food kitchen or invite those without family over for Thanksgiving dinner. We have so much to be thankful for, even in these tough economic times. Again, thanks to all of those who helped us get here. You are a blessing to us.

Vaya con Dios!

Categories: parenting

My Hero

I think my husband is terrific. The past three months Scott has taken it upon himself to lead and coach a First Lego League Team (it's a robotics/design/science and research competition) so that Connor could be involved in it, which is right up Connor's alley. We tried to find a team that was accepting members but to no avail so Scott decided to lead one. Three other boys signed up for the team from our church and off they went. Now you need to know that Scott has never taught or led anything remotely child oriented. No, I take that back, he has done puppets but only behind the scenes. Anyway, this was a huge stretch for him and none of us had ever seen how this thing worked. They met every week for a couple of hours and worked on team building, researching climate problems and making a presentation and designing, building and programming a Lego NXT to perform certain tasks. 10 year old boys are not the easiest to keep on task let alone 4 of them but with the help of 3 of the parents, they went to their first competition this weekend.

It was AMAZING! There were 24 teams, most of whom who were much larger teams all competing to move on to State . The boys handled the stress well, (when the robots breaks down in the middle of a 2 1/2 min round it's stressful) they met with judges, presented their research and won 5th place. They were presented with a huge trophy as the 2008 "Rising Stars". We were all shocked, Scott, parents, the boys, utterly shocked at how well our little church team did.

My whole point of this blog was to say how proud of my husband I am. He has been willing to be drug to every home school convention, every parenting class, parenting retreat, and reads the books that I put in front of him. I am so grateful that he is in this parenting adventure with me, he is my hero.

Oh, the team didn't quite qualify to go to state but that's okay because half the team is going to Mexico with us and State was on the Dress Rehearsal for the Christmas play and the mean director (me) said "No, they can't skip". There's always next year.

Categories: parenting

So Proud!

I just needed to share some proud Mom moments:

All three kids memorized the entire first chapter of James and are currently working on the 2nd chapter. They are better at it than I am.

They wrote a letter to send to friends and family about supporting them to go on our family missions trip to Mexico and raised enough money to pay all their own fees. Thanks to God and all of you who selflessly donated! You should have seen their faces when we added up the donations.

They canvassed the street for shoebox gifts (see Operation Christmas Child for more info) to give to poor children in Mexico, knocking on doors and explaining what they were doing and received 11 shoeboxes to take with us. Most of these donations came from non-Christians and adults but the kids are favorites with the neighbors who were unwilling to let the kids down.

What I love most is their utter confidence that God will provide and that no matter how uncomfortable the task is, they are fully willing to sacrifice to do the right thing. (If you know Collin, knocking on doors and talking to strangers, is a sacrifice - even if Mommy was right on the sidewalk. Caileigh thought it was great fun!)

I am so grateful that I get to be their Mom. They are precious beyond measure and I know that God has a great plan for their lives.

Oh and the picture at the top is the kids riding an elephant. Yes, a real elephant. It was big and Caileigh was little unsure of the whole idea - who knew that Caileigh was scared of anything .

Categories: parenting