Septiembre 19 - 30, 2011

"The Lord opens the eyes of the blind;
the Lord raises those who are bowed
down;the Lord loves the righteous. The Lord watches over the strangers; He
relieves the fatherless and widow;
but the way of the wicked, He turns
upside down. The Lord shall reign
forever - your God, O Zion, to all
generations." Psalm 146:8-10


Hola! Gotta few more days in this report than usual, but this gives me an op to put the rest of September under September; I'ma glass is half full kinda person!

We continued to seek the "fix" needed for the cistern problem, and even after our new friend, Isidro the plumber, came to offer his expert help, the water situation needed attention. Seems the float he's adding in this foto has ("had" hopefully) a mind of it's a own and wasn't kicking in the filling system when it was supposed to. Then just yesterday, 3 weeks!! AFTER this problem began, the pump didn't turn off! Thankfully, I just happened to be in the area to see water pouring out of the top!
We've discovered that a big and TIME CONSUMING part of the challenge here in Guate is finding the right parts to fix things. So many items have been re-rigged in very creative yet non-long-term-ways that 1st one needs to figure out exactly what part is needed; then you need to find the tienda or store that has them, and this search is always complicated by varying lunchtime schedules, not to mention random days off for any reason whatsoever. So just buying the part you need can and often does take many days.


My planner says the 1st day of autumn was 23rd September, so here are some doctored-up fall fotos cuz we are the land of eternal spring, thus no genuine autumn leafs! Triste. Top foto we have,from left, Gilda, Ana Gabriela complete with Indian face paint, y Marta. Notice that both ana y Marta are STILL wearing their hairnets, a wondermus implementation of chef Angelica that's still holding! Yea! They were tortillando this day.


And even tho we don't have fall, per say, we did have a harvest of mandarin oranges FROM OUR YARD which the kids LOVE! Thank You, Jesus, for such simple pleasures!

SAY, DID YOU KNOW YOU CAN CLICK ON ANY FOTO AND IT'LL GET BIGGER? TRUE!



Carolina FINALLY got to celebrate her cumpleanos on Saturday, September 24th! This dear girl has been asking for months when it would be her turn to have her day. Her celebration was a wee bit short as Saturdays are school days for the older girls, so her cake and prayer ceremony was after dinner!

Sunday the 25th was supposed to be the day we could have our once-a-month visit with Tatiana at Casa Alleluia, but she had bad behaviour so we were cancelled. I've always wanted to see how visiting day goes for Rosa de Amor, but since it's on the same day as Tatiana's, we hadn't had a chance,until now. We think it was absolute providence that we were at Las Rosas. One of the newer girls got her first visitors, and I'm still not sure if it was her parents or foster-type adults. The rules state that you must stay in sight of Rosa and her staff at all times; no going to a room to visit or off to another part of the yard. This man and woman took the girl to the plastic playset, where the woman proceeded to take the braids out of her hair while the man walked all around the playset. He was carrying a large poncho, and after he went full circle and came near the girl, he opened the poncho and held it like a curtain...in between them and where everyone else was. Seeing no staff immediately,G began to call very loudly for Rosa while I ran thru the house to get her. G's call prompted these adults to stop and look at him, then Rosa came out very quickly, spoke to them, and drew them back to where they belonged. This precious girl has already had way too much abuse in her short life; my entire gut was yelling that she was in harm's way, so we were so grateful to have been there to not let that happen "on our watch".

Monday, the 26th...Floridelma goes to court and is removed from RDA. Please keep her in prayer.

Tuesday, the 27th...G digs too much with one side of his cuerpo and hurts his back. Having a lot of difficulty getting around the rest of the week.

Wednesday, 28th...dinner at Mark Richard's turns into a new "assignment" for G especially; he'll be going to Chuya, the Richard casa out in po-dunk Guate a few days each week while Mark is in the states.

Thursday, 29th...SAW A FIREFLY IN THE YARD!!! (a pretty good replacement for fall leafs!)

We round out September with Gilda's birthday! She and her sister, Sonia,with her in the middle foto, have only been with RDA for 3 weeks, so what an honour to get to celebrate her so soon!

All the kids had been at Iglesia Elim all day Friday celebrating the Day of the Child(10/1) and each girl came home with a crown; isn't that a delightful way to celebrate them??!!(They also all got official Elim sweats...tops and bottoms!!)Anyway, it was such a wondermus thing to see that for her special time, no other girl had her crown on, only Gilda! These kids are so fabu!

FYI, Gilda selected a vanilla cake with whip creme frosting, topped with strawberries and chocolate drizzle; sound good?

How Miguelito managed to get into every foto, I'll never know! I do know this however comma that he loves to pray for others, which is what Lidia is doing in the bottom foto, praying for the birthday girl!

DIOS LES BENDIGA!

Septiembre 12 - 18, 2011

"Oh Father, what path am I walking down with You? It does seem so narrow. Please give me grace to live for You and to die to my own selfish desires. Encourage Christian workers...today to live for You and to forget what is behind them. Amen."
9/17 prayer from "Voices of the Faithful"






Monday, September 12,
Lizzy turned 4! Yolanda
did the honours of bringing
in the pastel.

Monday we also learned that Oscar Molina Perez would be in a presidental run-off with Manuel Baldizon in November. Neither of these candidates seem to offer any hope for improved social welfare. Triste. My dentist said he doesn't want to vote for either one...sound familiar anyone??


Tuesday was departure day for Patsy, so we gave her a lift to the airport. And while we were in the City, we went ahead and made the shopping rounds plus took a cruise thru zones 1, 4, 5, 9, and 10, which is like playing sudoku with your car..and your life! In ink, no erasers, AND no answers in the back of the book! So when the directions actually flow correctly, it's like doing a 5-star puzzle on the first try!

On Wednesday, the 14th, RDA received a new girl
13-but-looks-like-she-might-be-9-or-10 yr old
Deborah. As always, she was so very scared
and bewildered. So I'm happy to report she was in a
much better place the very next day; here she is,
right, in her very 1st foto. Such an honour to
be able to take then give personal fotos to
these loved-by-God-kids.


The 14th was also the day before Independence Day here in Guatemala, and the kids who go to public school here in San Lucas had been looking forward to participating in the community festivities at the town square right next to their school. Alas, there was a fatal shooting in same location on Wednesday, so they cancelled all the activities. Here's Katherin, trying on one of the other girls' tipico clothing so she could wear it in the parade that didn't happen...bummer. Makes her look way too old anyway!

Thursday was a real quiet Dia de Independencia here at Las Rosas. The kids didn't seem to mind too much, and they didn't have to go to school OR do homework. I got a pleasant surprise on this Guatemalan holiday; when I would think of peeps in the states, I would wonder what they were doing for the holiday! So now I think I can safely say I'm at least part chapina, si??!!

Had another escape early Sunday morning; Floridelma, dressed, with a small bag packed only with the clothes she came in only a few months before(so thankfully at least she didn't steal anyone elses'stuff),left about 0200. She had taken the key to the small door in our gate off the staff keyring, unlocked the door and left it ajar. What she did with the key she will not tell, so now the door is once again padlocked. One of the teens discovered she was gone, so she rousted 2 other teens, and they took off...yes, at o' dark thirty, after her and found her just standing in front of a nearby gas station. Rosa was also in hot pursuit but didn't quite reach Flori at the same time as the teens. The police were also on the scene grilling Flori, but to no avail. So they all came back here, and since Flori was the same kid who stole my cel phone, and even though she denied it, it WAS found in her underwear....Rosa had her remove all her clothes in hopes of finding the key. But no key, and Flori either says she never had it, that the door was not only unlocked but standing open OR one of the other girls who didn't leave had the key.ggrrrrrr It's a very sad situation, especially since Rosa tried to take her back to the judge on Monday, but the court was so backed up, Flori came back here. Her regularly scheduled audience is the 26th, so she will leave then. She is one lost young lady, so please keep her in your prayers. Gracias! Pray for me an' G too as this sort of stuff drives us wacko. Muy dificil..adios

Septiembre 5 - 11, 2011

"Really! there's no such thing as self-rescue, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. The cost of rescue is beyond our means, and even then it doesn't guarantee life forever, or insurance against the Black hole.So don't be impressed with those who get rich and pile up fame and fortune. They can't take it with them; fame and fortune all get left behind. Just when they think they've arrived and folks praise them because they've made good, they enter the family burial plot where they'll never see the sunshine again." Psalm 49: 7-9, 16-19, The Message



For those of you who took the quiz on facebook AND guessed SOLAR SYSTEM, felicitaciones! Correcto! Katherin's very own interpretation of said heavenly system done totally without buying a thing! It bobbled too when you held the end; quite clever! Anyone got any other ideas as to what this is/was?




So this week has been one totally full of really busy yet fabu stuff! A week of layers many days, with multiple activities, some unexpected, needing attention simultaneously, it seemed. Our friends, John y Sharon Millane, were coming in for a muy rapido visita on Thursday, the 8th, so the early part of the week was spent prepping for this. We knew to prepare the guest room, and of course to have the Lily(name of this gorgeous place)looking as good as she could.We had help with this; here's Lesbia weeding the front planter under the careful supervision of Pink.
THEN we received an email from John on the 4th asking for a nice meal to be served AT the Lily for our very 1st board meeting of Asociacion Rosa de Saron, the new NGO ministry that now oversees La Lily. So in the next 3 days, we went to Guate once and to Antigua 2X to buy dishes, glasses, silverware, a tipico tablecloth, items we didn't have in our modest cocina. And thankfully Rosa helped by doing the grocery shopping and by hiring a chef. 4 of the teens got to assist the chef in making pepian, a popular yet quite involved tipico meal.

We were looking forward to showing the Millanes the cement work they funded. Here are some before and after views of the work: The first 2 columns on the left are the front driveway and part of the garage, while the last column is the back sidewalk. What good work Domingo the albanil did, si??!! The garage had to be car-free for a week, so it just happened that the 1st day we could drive on it was the day of the Millane's arrival. So we made a wee ceremony out of it:






The kids love to make our friends feel welcomed! And don't Juanito y Saron look good AFTER taking the red eye from LAX?? But Sharon was soon off to test out our bunk beds, having really earned red eyes by not sleeping at all on the flight down. And all the time this welcoming was going on, Guillermo was working on a new water challenge, not having any! We work off a cistern/pozo/pump system, and a part had failed so the well went dry, literally. G's solution was to hook up the city water, which we hadn't used cuz we have a well, don't you know, by running a long, skinny hose from the front of the property all the way to the backyard. When he checked it an hour later, the well was still dry. THEN Rosa told him we only get city water from 2 to 4 pm everyday. Who knew? G got an electrician to come out and together they got the part to work at least so the cistern could be filled while he went searching for a replacement part. (As of this writing, it STILL isn't fixed amd we have to juryrig it to keep water in the well)

Thursday was also Patsy's last sewing class before her journey to the states. She really made some progress with the girls; look at this almost complete quilted pillow top of one of the girls!Such an impactful ministry! Such an honour to have this op for the girls! Please keep Patsy in your prayers as she went to Texas for shoulder surgery.


Rosa de Amor also received 2 new girls on Thursday afternoon, sisters 14 and 9 yrs old. If you could only see their faces when new kids arrive; so scared, afraid, sad, mad, confused. And the younger girl, Gilda, has signs of malnutrition. Help Lord!


We also received mail from the sky Thursday; Sunday, the 11th, is election day here in Guatemala, and the incumbent mayor of San Lucas flew over our house dropping 100s of flyers so we would vote for him. NOT! The kids thought it was fun...until they had to pick up, and sometimes fish out of the trees, every last paper! What a waste!




Meanwhile, back in the backyard, chef Angelica, in the fancy white chef's coat, is working with Ana Gabriela, Marta, and Elsa, trying to hide from the camera. Floridelma, yellow shirt in foto on rt, also got to help out. Love the new use for diapers; not enough hairnets to go around,so, wa-la, quite handsome hair containers, don't you think? They all had fun AND learned a lot!
Ana Gabriela and Marta also got to help serve our meal that evening. Again, they did a fine job even though Guillermo seems to think he needs to get waaayyy out of Marta's way. I love these girls!



So here we are, the brand new board of Rosa de Saron, having not only our firstmeeting, but also our first meal together! Good food, good fellowship, good discussion, good purpose and reason, good God!




Whew! Glad to be moving onto Friday! Think I'm gonna use bullets for the rest of the week:
*went to Antigua ealry Friday for a meeting with the lawyer for RDS; walked right into a political rally parade so the Millanes got a peak at the goings-on politically, complete w/firecrackers, por supuesto!
*then we sent them off in their rental car for a lunch meeting in Guate. Directions: 1st get out of Antigua, then stay on the hy, passing 1 Walmart, and when you see the next one, turn; the restaurant will be across from Wally World! sounds pretty easy, right? Well, they did indeed make it, and since being late is fashionable here in country, they were quite fashionable! After they ate, they shopped, at Wally world, of course....and brought good food for Rosa and kids and goodies for RDS
*we returned to the Lily, oh wait, we agreed at the meeting the nite before that this will now be known as Las Rosas, most appropriate me thinks...so we returned to Las Rosas and got the dishes done and the room cleared since same room is the classroom and the psychologist's office. G still working on the water caper

* The 9th was also Floridelma's birthday; we do know this is the date, but there are conflicting birthdates/ages on the court paperwork for this young lady. She's either 15 or 18, or maybe somewhere in between, and she is not sure herself. Geez! So we picked 17 for this year. Needless to say, she was rather subdued. So glad we got to celebrate her so she knows she is loved despite the challenge she's been. Sort of like how Jesus loves me in spite of myself. tyj!
*we had the most delightful evening visiting in our wee sunroom w/Juanito y Saron, dining on apples and a delish spanish cheese Saron found at Walmart

Sabado: an amazing church from Villa Nueva
came with a delightful program for the kids.
Their team consisted mainly of teens/youngadults, and along with them came some Hebrews, rt foto, with a story to tell about a dad with 2 boys,lt foto, a pig who ate better than one of the sons, about second chances and reconciliation. Too fabu! The kids sat totally paying attention.

*Sharon y John got to hang out with the kids; here's a foto of Sharon visiting with Miguelito, her inspiration for returning to LBCC to learn more espanol. He is a really special boy, even when his face isn't painted!
*G, me, Juanito, y Saron made a Guate shopping trip in the afternoon, hitting Novex, Pricesmart, Wally world, and Cemaco, then G y Juan returned AGAIN later that night to retrieve a forgotten clipboard w/ALL John's notes. Wee.....Rosa had cena waiting for us: tamales and tortillas! Yea.

Domingo, 9/11...election day here
in Guate, also departure day for the Millanes. They took the bus w/the kids to Iglesia Elim; G worked on the clothesline as this is the only day washing isn't done;I walked to LaTorre to prep for almuerzo: stirfry veggies and tamarind jugo, oh, and some more of that spanish cheese. The kids gave them a warm, joyful sendoff. What fun and what an honour! bye

Agosto 29-31, 2011

"When you weep, whether from personal pain or disappointments, let God turn your tears of sorrow into tears of joy, hope, love, and expectation for those around you.
Let Him take your eyes off yourself. You will still cry tears, but they will be sweet tears - bittersweet tears." from Debby, a missionary in West Africa, from the book, "Voices of the Faithful", August 30th entry

Hi I'm late posting this...bother. But I'm gonna keep at this til it becomes such a habit I don't even know I'm doing it.....right.

Short time to work with, but always fabu stuff going on. Por ejemplo, look at what Nelson and Luis did with a
veggie bin: made a fine chariot for wee Rosita.Love how they worked together on this, and how Rosita knew by default that she should be the one to ride vs push/pull.

We celebrated Norma's birthday with a warm


apple caramel nut cake and relighting candles
since we didn't know exactly how many to light.
Katherin and Sarita, pictured here, prayed
for her, a delightful addition to the fiesta!

Septiembre 1-4, 2011

OK, still late, but here is something to even things out.....hopefully this is your first Christmas foto. Here in Guate, the poinsettias, or pascuas as they are called in spanish, quite interesting don't you think since we use pascua in the Easter season; can't have one without the other, si? Wait, I didn't finish my thought about the flowers....they are ready now, at least the ones in our yard. Guatemala is a big producer of poinsettias for the rest of the world, or at least north America. And I totally digress....
So, I'm in the OT now, and Job has been chronologically placed between Genesis 11:26 and 11:27, right after the Tower of Babel. So during this week, I was reading Job's story about suffering. SUCH an incredible experience. The Message has this to say about Job: "Every time we let Job give voice to our own questions, our suffering gains in dignity and we are brought a step closer to the threshold of the voice and mystery of God...The mystery of God eclipses the darkness and the struggle. We realize that suffering calls OUR lives into question, not God's.



Can anyone help me w/this foto? Who is that on the right? Or maybe, what is that??? Yo no se.Left is senorita Dorcas, wearing yet another beautimus huipil(traditional blouse)she wove her own self.




Not all birthday celebrations are happy here at the Lily. Lidia turned 16 on Sunday, the 4th, and she was anything but happy. She is one of the most responsible "grandes", doing chores that aren't hers just to lend a hand, taking care of the bebes because she loves to, and she is very tender. Her celebration here rather than with her familia was just too much for her. And while she KNOWS her home environment is dangerous and non supportive for her, still she missed her mama on this, her special day.
Please keep her in prayer as you think of her, like Carmen and Floridelma are doing in foto, right.