Team fun.

Busy, busy week.

We're enjoying Kris' folks and friends of ours visiting. Monday we picked them up after some shopping in Port.

We spent the night at the Ortlip Center and then headed up the mountain on Tuesday morning.

With the vehicle fully packed, we left two suitcases at Ortlip to be picked up later. The picture was taken before 6 or so more bags were added.

They are brightening up our world both literally and figuratively.

One of yesterday's projects included putting up lighting in two locations in the kitchen.

The lights on the wooden wall at one point were on my folk's garage in Allegan and the hanging globes were from my childhood.

They once hung on a pole in Allegan but were shipped to Haiti when her folks moved to Haiti in the mid-70's.

 When we lived on LaGonave, I recognized the lights and claimed them back from the storage shed where they had been placed.

School under the old/new lights. 

 We brought them to north Haiti and now up the mountain.

They look nice! Hard to believe that they have not cracked over all the years and miles of travel.

The guys helped Cory with his hoop nursery while the women cooked and helped Fritzlin with his schoolwork.

Today they are working on mahogany shelves, painting ship-lap for the last wall of the storeroom wall, and thinking about where the outside clothesline can be put up.

 Praying for Port-au-Prince as large protests are set for today.

Continue to pray for Eli and Anna as well during their busy college days.

We continue to be thankful for the internet at the neighbors, especially as we try to set up visits and plans for our partnership development time this spring and summer.

Ortlip Center and home again..

So Monday we packed up and cleaned up a bit while Cory and Stephen talked to the crew about working on the access road and starting to dig sand to use to make the water cistern.

Start of the new road near the coffee plantation ruins

Then we headed down the mountain, reaching the Ortlip Center in the early afternoon.

We stayed at the Ortlip Center for Tuesday and Wednesday to help the staff host a large team working in a nearby town. We enjoyed some swiming and faster internet as well as interacting with the team.

On Thursday morning Larry and Marti Grimes crossed over on the boat from LaGonave to join us on our trip up to Fauche. We stopped for a bit of shopping in St. Marc, then for mangos and a bit of lunch along the way.

Friday: school work, unpacking, laundry, moving mahogany boards, catching up on emails and updates.

Thankful for Stephen who took pictures of the road work and sent them to us.

The access road to the house should be done by late July when we plan to head back up to Délice.

The district men's conference starts on July 5th.

Please continue to pray for the transition to Délice.

Pray for our adoption paperwork to move forward.

Feb. 1st Team report

Today was a good day. Yesterday the church was packed out-Cory had to walk back up to the house to bring down our plastic chairs. The sermon was about how we are all human and have red blood. As Christians we need to suffer with the suffering therefore lightening their load. And we shouldn't just be telling people that we're praying for them but we also need to be donating money, food, and supplies to our brothers and sisters in need.

Today the kids and I did the first day of our new school year. They had most of last week off having completed the last school year on Monday-right before the grandparents came on Tuesday. So after a few days of computer games it was time to start up again.

Gerda is keeping us full of yummy food. Mom painted. The guys did carpentry. I also tried to thin out my In-box. Still with close to 500 to go so if you haven't heard from me. Sorry.

Chris and Kathleen are learning the ropes of running a guest house in Port-au-Prince, post-earthquake style. Sleeping under nets under the stars. Please pray that this will be a growing experience for them. We know that they will be a blessing to those they come in contact with. And we're glad that they were able to connect with Chris's dad at the airport even for a few minutes.

Please pray as well as we start to look at how to get our Northern team to TiGoave around the 20th of Feb. as well as 4 guys coming from Michigan. Travel plans are always challenging in Haiti, even under normal conditions.

18th Dec.

Friday!!!!

Yesterday Cory and Chris went to Cap. They went to the bank, did some shopping, went to pick-up lots of cargo, had to wait a couple extra hours as BOTH customs guys took the MFI flight to Pignon to do their cargo making the Cap folks wait, then more shopping and back about 6:30.

While most of the cargo was furniture for missionaries in Port-au-Prince Cory was happy that he had 10 different types of rare seeds come in, mostly from Asia. I too was surprised! Here is what I posted on the Sonlight Forums-last night.

Surprise BOX Day!!!!

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YEAH!!! I have been tracking our boxes for fun knowing that it would likely be a week or so before they arrived in Haiti.

Our mail and cargo goes to Ft. Pierce and then once a week is flown into Haiti. DH went today to pick up cargo because some friends of ours had hundreds of pounds of furniture being shipped in that he had to pick up for them.

I saw that the boxes were still traveling yesterday so knew that maybe next week. With lots of Christmas boxes and cargo MFI decided to fly two planes today!!

Of course I knew in ordering the science that it would be looked at as last time they thought that the dirt for science was agricultural. The big frog caused a bit of a stir. [Frogs and reptiles are feared by the people here] I guess that after asking if it was food-the customs officer held it to her nose and decided it wasn't food.

Guess I'll have to get my work done tomorrow in a timely fashion so I can look though the boxes and NEW books!!!! Merry Christmas to ME.

23 Feb. Good byes are Hard.

Well we are back down to a household of just four. Cory and Anna took the folks to the airport this morning. They should be back in Florida with in an hour. They were dropped off at the airport and Cory made sure they were all checked in before turning back to home. He and Anna returned in time for lunch-we didn't want them on the road this afternoon because of the Carnival street parties.

Eli and I stayed behind. We did three loads of laundry, dishes, burned trash, straightened up the House of Hope a bit and did some school. The big project was a scratch post for Rose. We think it turned out nice.

No more visitors are currently on the schedule. We have 70 days before we return to the states. Need to work on the plumbing in the Dearest house and finish up the painting there. Cory is working on ordering additional banana trees and some other trees. Eli plans to continue with the Moringa Mountain Project-we have a few hundred cups waiting to be replanted.

Will now be going back to less frequent blogs-

Feb. 22

Had fun celebrating Anna's birthday yesterday.

Sunny day [81 degrees] with nice breezes this afternoon. We enjoyed church at Fauche this morning. Pastor Jonus preached on Not being embarrassed of the Lord.

Ready for church.

Tomorrow Cory and the folks will head out for the airport about 8 am. Cory will drop them off and make sure their set before heading back home.

Because of Carnival he would like to be home early before the parties in the streets. The team is scheduled to leave Haiti at noon-heading to Fort Lauderdale.

Feb. 21. Happy Birthday Anna. Prayer request.

Popcorn for about 100 people was bagged up before we ran out of popcorn.

This picture is early on as people continuted to come as the video was shown.

Down where church is currently being held the team showed a Planet Earth film. The kids liked seeing the elephants, and the wild dog chase.

Clean up, cake decoration, paper work, putting things in the new shed, setting up of a solar panel, and other small tasks were the order of the day.

Cooks with their new fancy scarves-a gift from Gerda.

We are thankful for our eight years with Anna. She brings much laughter, energy and singing into our home.

We are praying for a family we know on LaGonave going through a very difficult situation. Please join us in prayer for wisdom and that the situation will ultimately bring people and glory to the Lord.

Feb. 20th

Clean up continues. All the Moringa trees have been given out-now will need to replant the cups whose seeds didn't grow. Off to give out trees.

Last poster hung in the House of Hope and the hat rack is up.

Haiti Missionary Wall started-still waiting for a couple of prayer cards.

New screens in all the windows of the Dearest House.

School done for the week, new school book order started for our next school year, birthday cake cooling for Anna's birthday party tomorrow.

Popcorn to be made for movie night on the compound tonight. One of the Planet Earth movies will be shown. Gennier is going to use a blow horn up and down the street to let people know-should be interesting to see how many come.

19th Feb.

The team is starting to wind down their jobs. Cupboards moved into the kitchen of the Dearest House. The table was varnished again. Bath room screen is in place.

Dad, Gene and Gerda went on a garden tour. Here Cory shows them a chocolate pod in the back yard.

Bunk beds were painted for the second time. Shelving for the tool shed put in.

Paint on an old X-ray trunk that will likely end up in Eli's room.

New hooks for the Thedes with the old hat rack moving down to the House of Hope.

Cory and I participated by phone in a mock emergency drill with our crisis team back at Global Partners. Many phone calls first with me then Cory-taking to each of three teams. All three teams were able to locate Cory who was missing.

Demolition started on the Fauche Wesleyan church. The roof is now off. We are told that the walls will also be taken down. A new church is planned.

Feb. 18th

Busy day here-many projects that need to be finished. Clouds now and then but no rain so far.

Table for the Dearest House kitchen, which will also serve as counter space as there isn't any.

Notice the nice white walls. And Gerda is working on curtains.

Second coat of paint on the tool shed door frames and doors. First coat on the bottom of the bunk beds. First and final coat on two sides of the water tank [hopefully to increase the warmth of the water by harnessing the sun's energy.]

Shelving for the tool shed, second coat of paint on the kitchen, first varnish coat on the table, and working on plumbing are afternoon projects underway.

School, cooking, laundry, E-mails, blogging, letters.......

Monday 16th

Nice weather continues.

Dad and Gene working on doors for the tool shed. School work. Computer work. Laundry. Cooking. Painting. Varnishing. Writing thank you notes. Cutting Moringa handouts into half sheets for handing out.

Mom painted 'House of Hope' in French above the door and 'Welcome' in French on another. "Dearest House' also has been named -in Creole. Our door that you may of seen her painting above a while ago "Lakay Elim" means house of trees and is named after an oasis that Moses stopped at with the children of Israel.

This clinic sign mom painted back during the visit in November but this is the first time we saw it as it took a while to get permission from the city rulers to put it up. It is just down from the Wesleyan church.

The men and the kids went down to the Port Margot school and gave away trees from the Moringa Mountain Project-were about 400 short so will return tomorrow. Some of the children hid their first tree and got a second one. Glad they want the trees but wish they'd of let every one get a tree first.