February

 

    In February we had 10 days with no visitors. We managed to get school done and just live for a bit. At the tail end of that stretch, Kenny's nephew died. He was born with Trisomy 13 so we knew this would happen sometime and had planned out how we would handle it. Kenny bought a ticket and flew to the US the next day. My aunt and a friend arrived the same day and with Amanda still being with us yet, we had a house of ladies! It kept me busy which was good, but I was still very ready to have my husband back. I was glad he could go and be with his family, but it was hard to stay behind. On February 20th, the three ladies at our house left and we had to get used to living with just our family again. We enjoy each and every one of our visitors but sometimes you just need time to live!

We stopped to see Lordina the beginning of February. We got a tour of the school and were very pleased with what we saw. I loved this Bible verse in this school of handicap children that are pushed aside and put down in their society. Their goal here is to help them see possibilities in their life.

  Lordina's class, Class 1.

   We also stopped to see Joel painting. Another wonderful example of someone that didn't let his handicaps stop him from doing something with his life.

                                               

  We also stopped at the zoo. It is exciting to see them expanding their zoo but the snake holding hasn't changed.

We were tired and hungry till we got to this American style coffee shop. And while we waited for our food I looked back and sure enough, I found this picture from 2019. Same snake, same boy!

   Kelsey had so much fun having a big sister for 6 weeks. And it was wonderful to have Amanda here!

 While Kenny was gone we took our visitors to the sea wall for a picnic on Sunday evening.

  One evening we went out for supper along the ocean. Kelsey was thrilled to match with her aunt.

It is hard to believe how fast these three are growing up! Till next year, all of them will go to school.

These two were kind of matching that night as well! They actually thought it was fun to take "brother" pictures.

Another evening on the beach. I could make a whole album of beach pictures by now but I just love storms over the ocean.

  A cow herd right along the main road.

  Saturday evenings still find us at the Iture mission house but things look very different than they used to. What used to be a yard full of noisy, happy children that often left us feeling exhausted and taken advantage of, is now a much smaller group that joins in a Bible study and then plays a bit afterwards. Sometimes I wonder, did we make a good decision? We have lost contact with a lot of children that used to come. But we also knew that things had to change to where everyone was enjoying it and it wasn't just a free for all. We hope eventually we can draw more in again but we decided we need to focus on quality of teaching and not numbers. One girl brought her twin cousins one evening. They were so much fun to watch together!

  Coloring is the high light. Some of them are done very quickly but some of them spend a long time making their pictures look beautiful. It is also a good time to sit and talk about all kinds of things.

 

Edna and Colleen had goat stew for lunch at Hans Cottage.

They decided it was good but more bones than meat!

We walked through a village with Wayne and Dorothy. I always need to pinch myself a bit. People seriously do live like this. Why did God put me in such good circumstances?

And then the irony of poverty next to wealth. We also spent a day at the beach where they were doing horse rides for another group that was there.