El tercero dia

Ha sido tres dias y yo tengo nueve mordidas en mi cuerpo de un insecto no se. Tomas dice que son unas pulgas, las chicas aqui dicen que no son pulgas, fewf, pero son zancudos porque son insectos negros. Ayayay, no se! La noche pasada, mientras haciamos nuestras devocionades, una arrana camino en la pierna de Josh. Nunca en mi vida habia veido una persona salto tan rapido que Josh en esa situacion. El libro de devocionades volvio al piso y Josh al otro lado de la sala mientras grito como una nina. Toda gente en la sala se reieron por una vez. Y que tipo de arrana era? Simplamente una padre arrana con piernas largas. Despues de una noche de bueno duermo, todo pero tres personas se levantaron bien. Hay tres personas en nuestro equipo que necessitan sus oraciones, no es un problema serio. Otro parte del grupo trabajo a fuera en el projecto. El projecto incluye muchos tubos no saben. Los hombres fuertes de nuestro grupo trabajaron todo el dia con los ninos del orfanato, algunos estan cansados. Las mujeres perfectas y bonitas  ayudaron con los ninos para mirar una pelicula al cine. Los ninos se disfrutaron mucho Alvin y los Tres Ardillas y otra pelicula, Gatos en Botas, y TinTin. Lindsey, Stacey, Kristen y Susan trabajaron en el jardin, cual es muy grande y fantastico. Ahora nostros estan cansados, sin Tomas, el nunca esta cansado y nunca se canse. Gracias por sus oraciones, muchas bendiciones y buenas noches.

It has been three days and I have nine bites on my body from an unknown insect. Tom says that it is fleas, but the girls here say that they are something else because they are black, not brownish. I hope they are right! Last night while we were sitting in the living area reading our devotions, Josh flew from his chair, screaming like a girl while throwing his devotional. The two went in opposite directions. You may ask, why did this occur, because of a spider. And not just any spider, a harmless daddy long legs. I have never seen a person jump so quickly or so far because of a daddy long legs. We all had a good laugh over that! 

After a good nights sleep, all but three people fell well. Prayers for health and strength for these three team members are  greatly appreciated, they are not seriously ill, so no worries, just a bit of a tummy ache. The rest of the group worked on the team project. It included digging and picking trenches to lay pipes, as well as working in the gorgeous garden. While digging, we discovered some more pipes and lines unknown to us.  It was great fun, I like to dig in the dirt! The gardeners included Kristen, Stacey, Lindsey and Susan. After lunch, all of the 150 children in the orphanage, along with most of our team were blessed with tickets to the movies. We were able to take them to see one of three movies, Puss and Boots, TinTin, or Alvin and the Chipmunks. The children loved this excursion! Seeing them so happy was such a blessing! Now we are very tired, except for Tom who is never tired and never sleeps, and Kristen is sitting here braiding my entire head, I'm a little worried! Hope all is well back home! Many Blessings and Good Night! 

~Alyssa

Day 2

We are exhausted!
   
Day 2 and we are in full swing!   The morning started early at 5AM with some of the guys going to the market to purchase the weekly produce for CB.  Tom, George and Pete all went.  It is always so fun be around when the two trucks come back, loaded with the beautiful bounty of fresh fruits and veggies.  Just a great reminder of God's goodness and provision here at CB!

7AM  found Susan and Alyssa heading down to the baby house.  The house parents have requested that we send some women down for the whole day - this is a 7AM-7PM shift with 14 little ones, 9 months - 3 years old.  This is, in my humble opinion one of the hardest jobs here - it is very exhausting and a non-stop day.  Susan and Alyssa enjoyed it very much and shared with our team during evening debriefing how incredible the house parents and workers are in the house.  So true!  Our team is rotating  3 workers in the baby house every other day with the other team that arrived here today, a college group from Southwest Baptist University.

While a few of the men were gone to market, Mike, Josh, Amy, Stacy, Lindsey and Kristen all got started on the plumbing project.  They are breaking up the flooring in two bathrooms in the main building, and putting in a larger diameter pvc pipe for better drainage. so they started demolition in the bathroom.  They had a lot of fun breaking up tile with a sledgehammer!  When the other guys got back, they started in as well.  Trenches have begun, and after a slight issue where we hit a water line and water was temporarily shut off to the orphanage, all continued well!  Actually, even this little mis-hap was good, for Mike found a connection that was ready to blow apart and would never have been seen if this didn't happen - isn't God good?!  This saved a lot of grief if it would have busted apart under ground!

Jill (me) spent the morning with the toddlers of Casa Alabanza, and Judy helped out in the Alabanza house with dishes and laundry all day.   We have a rotation schedule to help out with this house as well.   While we were doing this, the other girls started sorting all of the jeans / clothes donations from our church.  What a blessing here!

Right before lunch something we were privileged to see something amazing - something that I believe is unprecedented here.  The Verbo church in New Orleans shipped a container to CB full of donations.  For those of you that are unfamiliar with the size of a container - think semi-truck huge.  And it was almost full!!  This church sent down a large box for every child at CB with brand new shoes (most boxes had two pair), clothes, belts, school supplies and other miscellanies articles.  There were bikes, some office furniture, electronics, ceiling fans, computers, monitors, toys, games, school supplies - truly - it was amazing.  I have never, ever seen our salon so filled with boxes upon boxes of donations.

We sorted and delivered all of the boxes for the children, and still have more to do tomorrow, as far  getting boxes down to the bodega.   Wow.  What a blessing!  We are all physically sore and tired from work projects and unloading/organizing boxes.  A good nights sleep will do us all well!  We are excited to see what tomorrow brings!  Thank you for all of your prayers!


Buenas noches a todos!
-Jill

Day One

      Our adventure began yesterday morning at the excruciatingly early hour of 2:30am in the church parking lot. We packed the trailer and had a time of prayer before we departed with our team and a few others who came to see us off. It was an exciting journey from the start because we almost missed our connecting flight. We were headed to the terminal in Detroit and happened to look up at the board and noticed our flight to Houston was delayed. This caused a bit of a problem because we only had a 45 minute layover once we got there. Fortunately, we were able to get the airline to hold the flight for us. There is strength in numbers! 

       The entire team was exhausted when we finally arrived in Guatemala at around 2:30. The early morning combined with the rather uncomfortable airplane seats didn't lead to very much sleep. We were met at the airport by a few people from the orphanage and then proceeded to experience an exciting bus ride up the mountain. The driving in Guatemala is something else! The use of blinkers is non-existant, stop signs are optional, and motorcycles have free reign of the road (with no helmets, of course). After surviving the ride we finally arrived at Casa Bernabé.

       The first thing we did was take a tour of the orphanage. We visited a few of the houses and were introduced to the house parents. After a quick orientation there was a bit of free time, which many of us utilized for taking a nap. We then threw a birthday party for a few of the boys in Casa Esperanza (ages 9-12). There is apparently a Guatemalan tradition of smashing the birthday boy/girl's face into the cake. After we finished consuming all the cake, we hung out and played with the boys. The language barrier was a bit difficult, however it soon became evident that the kids didn't seem to mind. Smiles and hugs were all that were needed.

       After the party we had a quick dinner, even though none of us had an appetite after all the cake. We had a short debriefing session where we shared first impressions and prayer requests with each other. Then it was time to go to bed and rest up for our first full day.

       To be continued...

-written by Josh, Amy, Kristen, Stacey and Lindsey

The team:

Mike Rumbarger

Jill Rumbarger

Josh Rumbarger

Stacey Stark

Lindsey Stark

Kristen Forster

Amy Spykerman

George Van Hecke

Judy Van Hecke

Peter Crossman

Susan Stelzer

Tom McCarthy

Alyssa Strandbergh