Our hearts are breaking

We just learned that a dear friend, deacon over youth at West Metro,  and amazing Christian brother fell ill and left this world suddenly and unexpectedly last night.  I can't even describe to you the pain we are experiencing here this morning and the shock.  I can not begin to imagine what it is like for his precious wife and children.  

James baptizing their oldest son Michael

What an amazing Christian father, husband and friend

We're blessed to have been touched by him and will treasure our memories of this great man.  

We look forward to seeing him again!  

Please all of you reading, if you will be in fervent prayer for the Olson family.  

Saying Goodbye

By now, many of you have heard from loved ones and know that we are in San Pedro Sula. just FYI if you haven't heard from your loved one...don't take great offense...it's those that can get internet access on their phones that were able last night to email and such.  And not even all of them.  

Anyway we made it to San Pedro Sula with no problems.  We're about to go eat b'fast in the hotel and then head for a quick stop at a market a block away.  Then it's off to the airport to begin our journey's home!!   Thank you for all of your prayers and love while we've all been away!!

Irlinda (she teaches in the school) came the night before we left to paint toenails.

She was there til midnight painting away.  

Jennifer getting some sweet love

One class after receiving their futbol socks (boys) and dresses (girls)

eating at a family's home.  Precious precious family!!

We're really proud of this wall!!!!

Fun together in the hotel

Charlton cleaning the "Great Wall"  

Antonio...with the bees nest that was cleaned off the wall in the prep work.  

Beach Clean up

Melissa working at the school

Kevin leading singing at the Limonal congregation

MaryKyle playing the flour game at the youth devotional

I just kept meaning to upload a better picture of our iguana friend

so thought I'd go on and do it!!

Currently we have people at the hotel preparing for a festival that Bruce and Julie are heading up for the school children today.  We also have a group of volunteers down at the wall giving it a 2nd coat and working on the columns .

We also have a small group finishing work at the Mision del Caribe congregation with Santiago.  

Also some at the school finishing the paintings for the sponsors, and another small group doing their best to finish the ceiling, wiring and fans at the school.  

Our last day will be filled to the brim!  

After lunch we go out with other Christians to distribute the clothes to families that live on the mountain.

And then....a special treat for the ladies tonight.....

one of the teachers from the school is coming up to the hotel and giving pedicures, no doubt while the guys play in the pool!!  

A fun ending to an amazing trip!!

We thank you again for sharing your loved ones with us.  Without them so much work could never have been accomplished.  So truly....THANK YOU!!!

  

Happy 4th!!

The stars and stripes were flying in Trujillo today to honor the US.
Really!!
If you didn't know, Trujillo was the first capital of Honduras.  So the US had an embassy here at that time.  Of course, the capital is now in 'Teguc' and the embassy is not here, but on the old beautiful bldg that was once the embassy many years ago they flew an American flag today in honor of the 4th of July. So cool!!

And really...what's the 4th without ice cream?  It wasn't homemade (boo-hoo)  but we did enjoy it immensely!  A few of us did get homemade liquados (like a milk shake or closer perhaps to an orange julius).  Not sure, but I think mostly all who did got mango....YUMMO!!  One of my favorites.

We had a super end to our campaign this morning!!  Another HUGE crowd!  Ricky did an amazing job (not a bit of surprise there) speaking about Our Christian family, the Church (Dago's last night was on raising a Christian family).

We also went to families houses for dinner.  We mostly divided up into 2's or 3's.  I haven't heard a single person who didn't have an amazing time and just love it!!  It was fun listening to all the stories.

Candido and Wendy came to the hotel after dinner.  Candido was dressed to swim, but Wendy looked gorgeous, as always, and was fully clothed.
Long story short, she and Jennifer Mills (GA) ended up jumping into the pool together both fully clothed and joining all those in the pool for races and a game of Pollo Frito (think Marco Polo).  It was a super fun night!!

Hope you had a blessed 4th as well!!!

Saturday

So another good day was had by all.

A group of us:

Sara,  Jack G., Cole, Ricky, Raquel, Christian, Revonda, Beth V.,  Savanna, & Jessica P.  Headed to the Museum in town....we warned them all it would be an interesting experience and it did not disappoint.
We played with the monkeys out back and waded in the river fed by a natural stream to cool off afterward. We also stopped by the grave of William Walker (look him up...interesting Trujillo history.  Perhaps I should offer a prize to who finds out first who he was and why his death is significant to Trujillo and Honduras....hmmmmmm)
Anyway.....then we stopped by a local grocery store so I could get a few supplies for an afternoon activity.
Of course seeing things like that and just experiencing the culture here can be fun...the trip ended for some by a fully cultural experience....piling into a taxi.  Jack, Cole, Sara, Savanna, Jessica and Revonda all piledi into a little bitty cab and headed back up the mountain.

Another group:
Tom, Jack V, Bruce, Julie, Walter, Leigh and Annina went back down to the school to work some more on the ceiling, lights and fans.

And the rest either went hiking in the rain forest with 'Pablo' or stayed to rest at the hotel.

After lunch, a few girls (Jessica P, Savanna, Jennifer, Beth V, Raquel B., Annina and myself) headed out here to Little Hands where we were met by 3 women from the local church.  They taught the girls how to wash clothes by hand in a 'pila'  Think washboard and huge concrete holding tank for water attached.  I have a picture a few posts back I think of my kids from behind washing their hands in one).  They got about halfway done before the rain picked up and it was just about time to go.  To treat them for their efforts I made a mango cobbler (and since I'd promised Annina one!!).  We were joined with our cobbler by Brenda Young and her crew from Washington who had just arrived and were getting settled in.  They will be here a couple of weeks working with Little Hands Big Hearts.

We had a great campaign tonight!!  I can't remember how many kids Aaron said they had in children's class tonight, I want to say 56, and that was with age limits so that it didn't include the youngest or the older kids.  Dago did a great job delivering a message on being a Christian parent in this world!

Tomorrow we will have our final campaign meeting.  'Pablo' will be taking the rental van out to pick people up early!  We will also be dividing up to eat dinner in church member's homes.

We thank you for your continued prayers and for your words of kindness!!

I pray you have a wonderful 4th of July!!!

And now what you all want.....I'm doing my best to get pictures uploaded and looking for different faces, but please please understand uploading pictures here is not at all like at home. It takes 5-10 min for each and every picture.  Last night I would click upload and then doze.....until finally I just slept too soundly to wake and click again.  I woke up this morning and that picture was still attempting to download several hours later.  ha ha ha ha!!  

Raquel (not me), Savanna, and Jessica P

working at the school.

Jeremy, Walter and Daddy (aka Jack) at the school

Laura, Kenzie, and Annina

(3 states represented in this picture!!!)

preparing the children's Bible lessons for the campaign

Left to Right

Barbara, a tiny bit of MaryKyle, Jennifer, Katee Jo, Sara, and Jessica G

doing some hard HOT work on "The Great Wall"

Bruce, Tom, Katee Jo, Jack, Cole, Jessica G, and Beth Ann enjoying some down time at the hotel

(again 3 states represented in this picture)

Katie C taking advantage of a little downtime and a cool breeze to update her journal

Tim cutting out an elephant trunk in preparation for children's Bible class.
Seen in the background:  Leigh, Aaron and Roxanna (the teacher her at Little Hands)

pictureless update

okay I need desperately to get ready to go...or we'll be late to pick everyone up to go for our field trips today.  So when they get home and talk about how we were late in the mornings be sure to explain it was all for you...so you could see or hear about their work here!!  :-)

Since I got some pictures to upload I wanted to just give an update of our efforts here since lack of time...and internet connectivity have kept me from posting the last few days.

We are all doing FANTASTIC! 

Truly.  So much so, that we had scheduled a team that had worked hard the day before to have some down time and rest time at the hotel yesterday morning, and first thing that morning our phone rang here at our house and it was someone saying “just a heads up no one that is schedule for rest time wants to, they want to work!!”   

I mean really…wow!!  What an amazing group of people we are blessed to be serving alongside! 

So we reworked the schedule and happily factored those folks back into work projects!! 

Several have VOLUNTEERED to get up with Walter and Daddy & be at the school this morning by 6am to work some more on the wiring and ceiling they are working hard to complete.  Let me tell you, it was amazing with all the new fans Walter (AL) and Aaron (MS), Daddy (GA) and team have installed and the eave vent/fans that we brought and have been started....just how cool that building in the school is now.   Wow!!!!!  Last night sitting in there even with standing room only at our campaign it was getting a little cold for me amazingly! 

Speaking of our campaign…..God is GREAT!  As I said, it was packed. 

We had taken our van out to an area called “Honduras Aguan” where the Mision del Caribe church is.  The minister out there, Santiago, planned to bring his truck as well.  It had looked like a storm was coming and rained just a little so they thought that would be PLENTY of car space to get everyone here as they thought some wouldn't because of the threat of rain.  But the church members out there invited neighbors and relatives just as they had talked about the importance of…..and 23 people loaded into our 15 passenger van and more than that were packed like sardines standing in the back and crammed inside the cab of Santiago’s truck.  10 people or more were not able to get here….sigh….so tonight we are arranging for another vehicle to drive out there and perhaps more trips 

We had a ladies class taught by Evelyn (The principal at the school) and translated by Maybelline (the director or Little Hands Big Hearts).  Then, a Men’s class taught by Ricky (minister at the West Metro church in Georgia) and a children’s class planned and taught by our North American and Honduran young people that are college age…ish..  It all went wonderfully.  The topic for last night was living as a Christian Woman/Man    God’s expectations are the same for Christians in North America and in Honduras so it applied to ALL of our lives!  It was a blessing to share in a class with my Christian sisters!!!

Tonight the men and women will be together and the lesson will be taught by Dago (one of the church leaders here), and then tomorrow for worship Ricky will be preaching. 

Please, if you will, keep these efforts in your prayers. 

This afternoon a group will join the Limonal congregation to do some evangelizing and also inviting to the meeting tonight.  Another group will head out here to Little Hands where ladies from the Buenos Aires congregation will be teaching our ladies/girls to wash clothes in a pila (I'll take pictures don't worry)  meaning by hand with a washboard.  We will be washing all the clothes we plan to donate that we've been wearing so that Monday we can get those distributed!  Then tonight after dinner it's night 2 of the campaign....another blessed day here in Honduras serving a loving Savior!!!  

Your families are blessing me each day….I thank you for sharing them with us and with our Honduran brother and sisters!!!

team building...merging from multiple teams from all over the US into ONE team working for the Lord!

Franklin (caretaker of the school) and Christian working hard

working hard to plan the Bible classes that take place during the campaign.

playing a fun/silly game at youth group Thurs night! Beth Ann being a GREAT sport....as always!!!

some girl chat time by the pool.....notice Savanna over to the left is braiding Revonda's hair.  So Revonda has limited head movement in this picture (thus so little of her head is showing!)

Need some help!

okay so it's come to my attention that the blog address was put in the Goodwood Church's bulletin incorrectly.  The Goodwood folks would love to have messages from home as well.
I have no contact info for anyone at Goodwood here at my house and will not have the modem with me at the hotel with the group today.
Is there anyone out there that can help me out and get a message to some folks at Goodwood that can pass the blog address along.....

Laura or Phil perhaps??  or if you are reading this and know someone that worships with that congregation....please help!!

These team members love your messages of encouragement...whether they know you or not.  They also love hearing messages from home (don't worry you can't leave too many and completely embarrass your kid or loved one...they are all appreciated).


Thank you so much!!!

a few pictures

I'm attempting to load some pictures, but wow is it challenging!!  I'll keep trying as I have time though so hopefully more of you can spot your loved ones!!  By the way, if you don't know, you should be able to click on the pictures and make them larger.  If you want to spot more gringos you'll especially have to in the first picture!!

This was before more came in tonight at our 'campaign'.  It was a great crowd!!!  

Can't wait to see tonight and tomorrow!!

Friends and brothers.  These two hit if off 3 years ago....and nothing has changed!

It's great to see them together again!

At 'the wall' We've joked about having t-shirts made up or to signify 

"I've been to the wall...and survived"

 Notice the angle at which everyone working on 'the wall' must stand while working.  Now imagine those stones wet with the soapy water you are using to scrub it with....this is the first crew that headed to the wall the first day.   The wall is now clean and pink!!  

My heart is filled with Joy from the Lord

In addition to all the many directions on projects we went today, we also divided up and worshipped with 3 different congregations.  

My family worshipped with the congregation at Limonal. We were, as always, was asked to lead some songs in English as well.  'Pablo' and I happened to have their youth group song sheets with us which includes a lot of songs in English and Spanish.  So he and Kevin used that to lead songs so we could all sing in our own language, but together. It was beautiful.  Just before the sermon 'Pablo'  lead "I love you with the Love of the Lord"  and switched to Spanish for the 3 time through and the praise lifted up in that building gave us all chills I think.  It was amazing!!  

We had some share some wonderful experiences tonight at our time together as a team after dinner and worship.  

Barbara and Jennifer both talked and shared about their experiences out distributing food to the families served by Little Hands Big Hearts and how amazing of an experience that was for them.

Beth Ann spoke of how amazing it was to get to hold a precious little baby tonight at church and snuggle with her and just enjoy spending time with the people.  

It was great to hear the experiences so many have had all over Trujillo!!

So far no one is sick just so you know. We are all trucking along and doing great!!  

Well, all but our fearless amazing leader, Emilson....the Honduran administrator at the school.  He's not feeling well at all.  So please if you will be in prayer for him!!  

We thank you for your prayers and love the comments.  If anyone from Kansas, Louisiana, etc are reading....please please we (And your loved ones) welcome you comments!!     

We all love reading them all so we thank you for them.  It's a such fun to share with everyone the messages of encouragement.  From those they know and those they don't....so Washington folks, etc....

You know how we love comments and getting messages.  It's fun for all at night to listen to them!