Family Traditions #11: Easter 2012

"Family traditions give identity and belonging to each member." - James Dobson

Last year for the boys' first Easter we were on furlough. Both Jonah and Silas were sick that day and other than Easter baskets, I didn't really do anything special. With Eden's birth in March I didn't do much better this year at planning things out. I'm glad we are here and not in the States for Easter though. We aren't bombarded with bunnies and eggs. I feel the same way about the Easter bunny as I do Santa... there are just so many important things that I want my kids to take away from this Holiday, that we don't have time for the other stuff.

So this year, basically at the last minute, I tried to decide what was the most important thing I wanted to accomplish and just to focus on that. I wanted the boys to be introduced to the Easter story, so that it would begin becoming familiar over time. This is how we did that:

1: Incorporating the Easter Story Into Their Routines: Before nap time each day the boys and I have a little devotional together and then sing the traditional kids' SS songs. The week leading up to Easter we read this book each day for our devo. By the end of the week they started pointing at pictures in the book and telling me the parts of the story that really stuck out to them.

For our night night routine we sung resurrection hymns and choruses out of the hymnal.

2. Easter Manipulatives:

Here is a printable Easter set that I found via Pinterest. The boys colored it and then I cut it out and taped it together.

They had already been practicing telling the story back to me with a flannel graph set that I have. I made a flannel board for them at Christmas time and they really enjoy it. We use it to review their shapes and colors on a normal day, but for holidays we do something special!

I love hearing the specific things that they remember the most from the story. Jonah always put the rock to the side of the tomb and Silas made a point to say that it was empty!

The paper set was just another way to reiterate the message. I love this age because they can really start to digest things now!

{Jonah telling me about the angels}

They liked moving the rock and putting Jesus inside the tomb and then removing Him when He arose.

Here is Silas telling me about the cross. He has a helmet on because when we started talking about the soldiers guarding the tomb he decided that he and Jonah needed to dress up like them!

I was really surprised at how much of the story they retained and I pray that over the years they will come to cherish its message so that it can change their lives like it did their parents'.

3: Decorations: I like decorations because they let the boys know that we are celebrating something special. This year all I got done was a wreath for our door, but it is at least a start.

I hope that you and your families had a wonderful Easter celebrating Christ's victory as well!

CUTE ITEM OF THE DAY: The other day while I was filling up the bucket in the kitchen that Jonah and Silas take a bath in, Jonah put all the bottles of bubble bath and soap on the counter for me. This is how he very neatly arranged them...

he is definitely my boy!

The Devil Tried to Keep God Out But...

There is a large Kekchi community inside Santa Rita, the ex-guerrilla community we were kicked out of in March of last year. For some reason there is some type of bond there between us and them. Many of them stuck up for us and we appreciated it. We were not ready to stop working with them when we had to leave.

Jimmy wanted to give them the opportunity to attend the new Kekchi church plant in San Pancho. It is about 15 minutes away by car. He planned on hiring a micro bus each week to go by and pick them up. We were really looking forward to going back into this community and inviting everyone ourselves.

Marcos came by our house one day and told Jimmy that he didn't think it would be safe for us to go in. Beyond that they didn't want those responsible for getting us kicked out to know that the Kekchi were attending church... especially "Jimmy's church". So we didn't get to go invite them ourselves, but Marcos did. He told everyone! They asked us to send 2 micros in order to fit everyone, but we didn't believe that many would come. We sent 2 anyway.

We were so surprised Easter Sunday morning! 28 Kekchi adults from Santa Rita came, plus a slew of kids, plus 12 adults from another guerrilla community close by that also wanted to come.

I was in the kids part, so I didn't get hardly any pictures. There were so many familiar faces!!

{Our cupcake tombs for Easter}

{This is what Jonah and Silas do during the lesson. They are old enough now to participate during the craft time. There are plenty of adult volunteers to hold Eden... haha!}

I cannot express the thankfulness we feel to be with these people again. So many of them have not accepted Christ yet and others are very new believers. We got a second chance!! They came back last week too!

We were supposed to be out of their lives forever, but God worked it out. We bought land in San Pancho for our forever house and were planning on starting this Kekchi church long before we ever had a hint of anything going wrong in Santa Rita. I guess it was all part of His plan to make a way.

Our old friend Mateo from New Horizon, our first ex-guerrilla community, lives in San Pancho now, so he started coming!

Please keep praying for this new mission as it grows! And please praise the Lord with us for this opportunity!

Forever House #9

...our journey to rent free living, all the entertainment minus the headaches.

I haven't updated about our forever house since November. I cannot wait to live in a house with large windows to get some breeze in! I am so excited about having clean water coming out of the faucets and water pressure and enough power to actually get in the shower without flipping the breaker. I'm thankful about not having to pour money into a poorly built rental and then being at the owners' mercy for when they want their fixed up house back!

I was really excited to get to show my mom our progress. Here we are standing on our future front porch. The great room is behind us and you can see our backyard from the front door.

Besides the surround that will be laid for this front porch, all the other block for our house is complete!!! All that is left is... well... a lot! First there is the roof.

Before Christmas a third of our roof went up. Our house has a squarish great room in the center and then 2 rectangles on either side. One roof line is over one rectangle and the other is over the great room and the other rectangle. The larger roof line is being poured next week... I hope.

This is our great room with all the supports holding up the forms (in process) for the columns that will support our roof.

Jimmy researched a lot about roofs trying to decide what would fit our needs the best here. We wanted something secure, long-lasting, insulated and something that would work with our attic fans. Jimmy decided on an insulated pitched concrete roof with a wooden false ceiling so that we would have an attic. I am thrilled about having a rustic wood plank ceiling... even more thrilled about how cool the first roofed section of our house is feeling.

First the workers have to take the styrofoam in steel mesh panels pictured above laying in our great room and prop them up on sticks. (photo taken from back porch)

Here are the sticks!

Jimmy told the workers to look around for someone who had just poured a roof, so we could get a good deal on used sticks and they found these.

This is what the inside of our house looked like for a long time. They pour concrete over the panels and you have to have supports underneath them for 28 days while the concrete dries.

The workers build many of their own tools. They built this awesome ramps to carry the buckets of concrete up onto the roof.

I thought they were very brave... those buckets are heavy! They just ran up and down this ramp like it was nothing. They do it all the time I guess.

Then they smooth out the concrete.

This is one of the holes for our attic fans. We were fortunate enough to find some in Guatemala City so that we didn't have to have them shipped from somewhere else. This is the second hole for one of the fans. The first hole, after being marked while Jimmy was standing there watching, still ended up being cut in the wrong place... so it goes.

They even put a smooth coat underneath. This layer seems silly since you will only see it if you are in the attic, but its purpose is not an aesthetic one, but one of function. It protects the panels.

You will see the overhangs from the outside.

The first 2 weeks we were back from Guatemala City it was over 100 degrees most days... the hottest time of year. We visited our forever house several times during those 2 weeks and the inside of the roofed side of our house was very comfortable, like you were sitting in the shade on a nice day. The insulated panels make a big difference.

Remember our grass plugs back in November?!

This is what they look like now:

Jimmy bought our first lawn mower while we were in Guatemala City. We have such a pretty, flat yard perfect for little boys to play in. I am so thankful!

We had a sample window put it. We liked it, so it is staying.

Except for in the bedrooms our windows will just have screens. The windows in the bedrooms will have glass panels on the inside that you can close on the crazy hot nights we want to use a window unit.

The photo above is of our back porch. I think we will probably eat most of our dinners on that porch!

They poured a lid for our septic tank. (old picture)

Jimmy set up a wood shop in the back corner of our yard. He finally got to move all his tools out of the storage shed! (old picture)

He was still in the process of setting everything up when I took this photo. He will be building all of our closets, shelves, and the plank wood ceiling, so this shop will come in handy.

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY: One of our masons wired Jimmy's shop for him to save him some time. While he is a very skilled mason, an electrician he is not! All this and the switch was broken!

Good Friday

For Good Friday we observed the Lord's Supper at the mission in San Pancho. Lico was in San Pancho, so he came with us!

Tutor #4's wife, invited us over for supper before church. She is an excellent cook. She puts a lot of cabbage in her caldo and I think it is delicious.

I was nursing Eden while I took this photo, that's why its so wonky.

{Jimmy, Tutor #4, Lico, Pastor's daughter), & Jonah}

My boys are complete opposites in almost every situation.

Silas eats his tortillas like a Chapin. He dips them in the caldo with his hand and then eats them.

Jonah eats his tortillas like a gringo. He breaks them up like they are crackers, tosses them in the caldo and eats them with a spoon!

It is still incredibly hot here. Right before we left on Friday I asked Jimmy to cut my hair, it has been too much of a sweaty mess. He cut off 7 inches... brave man! Here is a photo of Eden and I Easter Sunday morning. It was in a pony tail again soon after.

I didn't take any pictures during the service. It was really a special time. Jimmy led the Lord's Supper and Tutor #4 preached. This new church plant is very different for us than the guerrilla village work. Maybe because it will always be our hometown church, maybe because we get to work with another family, I don't know, but we are enjoying the experience and thankful for the opportunity.

Rats, Cats, Snakes, & Lizards

There is a wonderful time of day at about noon where all 3 of my children are asleep at the same time for 2.5 hours or so. This is usually when I sew or update this blog. Well yesterday during that time someone came to the front door (they really are on the other side of the fence, but it is close enough to the front door not to have to open the gate to be able to carry on a conversation.) I was standing there talking and all of a sudden something very large crawled out of the plant on the wall next to me and ran down behind the couch. I yelled and moved to the window in the office to explain why I left so abruptly. They thought it was funny... I didn't.

There is a very important point to make here. We have been rat free since right before Thanksgiving. I'm not sure if we have ever been rat free before that. It was a beautiful thing to wake up to the smell of victory... dead rat in my storage room. I knew he was the last one and it took us almost 6 months to get him. RAT FREE for almost 5 months now is unbelievable. Jimmy even installed steel screens in the storage room and kitchen windows, so those jokers would have to show up with a hacksaw if they wanted in this house.

I called Jimmy right away because I was sickened that we might have another rat. Of course he was far away. He called Pedro, the gardener who cuts our grass. Jimmy mows our grass at our forever house, but we pay Pedro to chop our grass here with a machete. Anyway, he came over right away. He asked me if it might have been a snake... what?! I had not even thought of that. You are making it worse!!

I closed all the doors in our house, so that if it was a rat it only had access to our hallway and outside doors, then I gave Pedro a broom and stood on top of the boys' toy box. He looked all over for the dumb thing and couldn't find it. He even flipped the love seat over thinking it crawled in there.

Finally I saw something hanging off the fan. It was a huge ugly lizard. One of those that stands up on its back feet and walks. So much better than a rat!!! He grabbed it by the tail, but it wouldn't let go of the fan. Then he rips its tail off and it takes off towards me and I run yelling down the hall. Finally he barricades the thing off and shoos it, tailless, out the front door. My kids slept through the whole thing!

This guy has to think I'm an idiot. A couple months ago Pedro had to come over one morning and let me and the boys out of their bedroom because we had locked ourselves in there. Silas plays with the lock sometimes and it is on the outside so that he cannot lock himself in his room by himself. I forgot to check it before I went in there with them. Oh well, I'm glad he has a key to our gate or we would have been locked in there until Jimmy came home that evening.

A couple months before that I had to ask one of our neighbors to come get a cat out of our yard that our dogs had killed. They kept tossing it around like a chew toy. I tried to do it myself with a shovel, but I couldn't bring myself to look at it close up. Thankfully it wasn't his cat!

But... the time it mattered the most I took care of something myself. Before we left for Guate I was outside with the boys. They were playing on our rock patio. I was filling up the dogs' water dishes when I saw about a foot-long snake by the spigot. I yelled at the boys and dogs to get back and then I called Jimmy. I HATE snakes... more than rats. I described the snake to Jimmy. He was with Lico and Lico said it was poisonous. I then hung up the phone because the snake started to move towards the patio... where my boys were. If I lost this snake there is no way I would ever allow my boys on that patio again. I grabbed a shovel and started yelling. Then I went running towards the nasty thing. I chopped it in half... screaming while I did it. It must have been pretty cool looking because the boys kept reenacting it afterwards. There was a blood smear on the wall of our patio until the next rain. Jimmy called me back and I told him it was dead. He had been really worried and was very surprised to hear that it was dead. That's what happens when the mama bear comes out. The snake got too close to my boys!

So we are still rat free with only a couple small lizards living with us. I am very thankful!

A Prayer of Dedication

Yesterday we all went with Jimmy to the monthly Kekchi pastors' meeting in Sayaxché. Usually Jimmy goes by himself, but this month was special. Since we work in missions every weekend and aren't a member of a church here (soon it will be the church in San Pancho), Jimmy asked if the pastors would have a prayer of dedication over Eden.

{Domingo giving a report about his missions work}

This church in Sayaxché is the same place Jimmy holds the KBI modules. I would say it could possibly be one of the hottest places on this earth. I think it's only competition would be our current rental house. It has the same itty bitty windows and for some unknown reason half the time they are closed... why people... why?!

The high yesterday was 104 degrees. Luckily today the high is only 102. This kind of heat makes you crazy. You just walk around drenched and stinky all day and sometimes all night. Since our windows are so tiny, no breeze gets in. We have window air conditioning units in the boys bedroom and in our room that we run at night to be able to sleep, but when it is this hot, the concrete block heats up so much, that the air conditioners can't keep up. While we were in Guate, they must have hooked up more people to the transformer we are on because there is not enough power now to even run one unit in our house. My washing machine trips our breaker half the time. The wires get so hot in our roof that they just can't handle anything. Jimmy hoses off our roof every evening. This makes me even more thankful for our forever house where we have more windows than walls!!! I just have to make it a month and a half to rainy season and this should be our last dry season in this house. I am SO thankful.

So for now we drink lots of water and pray for rain!

We are so thankful for the friendship and partnership with these national pastors and missionaries. We were very honored to have them pray for Eden and for us as parents.

Pastor Mateo led the prayer. He is the legal representative for the Association of Kekchi Baptist pastors in Petén. He is also on the board of directors for the institute. (This is not the same Mateo that pastors in Poptún.) When the Kekchi pray they all pray out loud at the same time. It is a beautiful thing to hear and it is encouraging to us to see their love for our family.