It's a Rock!

We have lots of rocks on our property. Here's one I found, while walking in the woods. I thought it looked interesting, so I toted it home, and today Allen cut it open for us, so the kids and I could see the inside.








Cool, huh?

Pleasant Dreams

BOOM!

Earlier tonight, while I was working in my bedroom and the rest of the family was watching a movie, we heard a sudden, VERY LOUD BOOM! It wasn't quite shake-the-house loud, but it was loud enough that we all mistook the sound for an odd, out of the blue, short clap of thunder.

Not long after, one of Russell's friends called, to tell us that it was a meteor crashing to the earth nearby! Well, that was exciting, for sure, but it turned out not to be correct. We learned later that the noise we heard was a sonic boom, from the space shuttle Endeavour, as it re-entered the atmosphere just before landing in Florida.

That was pretty exciting, too!

A Brief Update

Once again, I've carefully kept myself from announcing to the world that my husband was away from home. It just seems like information you don't want to broadcast, for security reasons. But he has been away, and now he's back!

Allen flew to Florida a few days after Christmas. He rented a truck in Miami, and purchased the solar panels for our home. Then, with the panels in the truck, he started driving north, collecting donations all along the way. Friends in Jacksonville had collected Christmas gifts for us to distribute, so he picked those up. My family in Sarasota also had a collection of gifts, as well as various items for our family. He collected those as well, then headed further north.

In North Carolina, a church runs an annual gift-making ministry, and he collected 1000 shoebox gifts from them.

Up in Maryland, our home church and other local friends had additional donated items for us. Allen also purchased a hot water heater and . . . this is a big one . . . a dishwasher for our new home.

The container is in transit, and soon we will be working through exactly how much we will have to pay for all of this, as it passes through customs. Then comes the fun of emptying the contents of the container, sorting it, and distributing all of the gifts and donated items (mostly used clothing and bedding) to the poor of Lempira. It's a huge job.

When Allen returned after his trip to the US, he whisked me away for a four day get-reacquainted trip to the cute colonial city of Copan Ruinas, which is about 2.5 hours from our home. We had a lovely little getaway, and I won't even apologize for not blogging during this time!

A Glimpse of my Kitchen

We've been working hard to make our new home "homey." As I mentioned in an earlier post, it's all one big room (except, happily, the bathroom is a private walled off corner), and we've had to create some sense of rooms within the one big room. I used my bookcases - of which I have many, thanks to the carpentry skill of Allen and the kids - to create walls. Rachel attached woven mats to the backs of the bookcases, since they all have open backs.

Allen and the kids also made and painted my kitchen countertops, and Rachel took a trip to the nearby city of Santa Rosa de Copan, purchased fabric, and created curtains for the cupboards. We do have serious dust issues, so covering the cabinet openings is important. We also like the less-cluttered look of not seeing everything in the cabinets.



There are still several more cabinet openings which need curtains. Rachel is taking a bit of time every day out of her schoolwork to finish these for me. I'll try to post a picture of the entire kitchen when she has finished.

My No-Internet Mornings

Recently, we've been experiencing very thick fog at dawn. We don't get much rain this time of year, so I'm sure the plants appreciate all the water in the morning air.

I'm not as appreciative as the plants, because the fog socks us in so that my internet connection can't connect. That makes me sad, not to mention giving me that feeling of being "cut off" from the world. I always get this feeling in thick fog, but even more so when my internet isn't working!

Here are a couple of pictures, to give you an idea of our fog. First, the view from my clothesline when the fog has lifted:



The "view" from my clothesline at dawn:



Although by 8am or so the fog will appear to have lifted, we continue to have limited (or no) internet until about noon. I'm trying to think positively, about how much other work I can accomplish if I'm not online, but it's hard. I really like my internet connection, when it's connected.

It's the Critter-of-the-Day Club

Well, I'm trying to get away from posting about the bugs, snakes, and such that we are finding out there - but really, it's hard for me to resist, 'cause I find it so much fun!

The lovely specimen above was found by David, and is about 1.5" long. I'm not a big bug fan, but I do think the markings on this one are kind of pretty.

Making a warehouse a home . . . making a home a warehouse

For the past month, the kids and I have been spending a great deal of time creating a home out of one huge room, since we are living in the warehouse/bodega until our permanent house is built. The only problem with this (well, maybe just one of a few problems) is that in addition to needing a house, we also need a warehouse. So, the building has to serve both purposes at once.

Happily, we also have a 20' shipping container on the property, and we use that for some storage throughout the year. Once each year, however, we receive an entire 40' container of donated items, as gifts for the pastors with whom we work, and for children in our area. (This container is supposed to arrive before Christmas, but this year the arrival was delayed, and we're just about to receive it.) Not only do we have to have space to unload the contents of the container, but we also need to have room to sort these items for distribution.

So, now that we've almost got this warehouse looking like a home, we're going to figure out how to shift things around, to use our home as a warehouse for a month or two.

I'll try to post pictures soon - I've been waiting until I could get some nice ones, so my readers aren't appalled at our living conditions. The situation isn't so very bad, really, but I just haven't been ready to show it to the world! ;-D

DON'T LOOK - if you don't like snakes!

Yes; another day, another creepy, crawly, slithering, biting critter. Don't say I didn't warn you, okay?

I wasn't even going to put this one on the blog. I mean really, it isn't even poisonous, so why bother? But after taking pictures and all, I thought I might as well put them here.

The story behind the snake:

The girl cats (we have three) live in the team house, where the older children currently have their bedrooms. Recently, the girl cats have been delivering gifts to Rachel and Bethany's bedroom with alarming regularity. The gifts have included dead mice, scorpions, and lizards.

This morning, the girls awoke to find the cats playing with a small snake in their bedroom. The snake wasn't moving, so the girls scooped it up into a shallow dish and brought it to show to me. We do think it best to try to identify the snakes here, so we are aware of which are poisonous, you know.

So, the girls hand me this dish with the snake, and tell me that it is a dead snake the cats had in their room. I take the snake, and am looking at it quite closely when . . . it MOVES!

Well, I think I might have screamed, and the snake definitely flew through the air (along with the dish) and landed on the floor. Since the snake was stunned (again), the girls scooped it up into a larger container (with a lid, this time). No live snake loose in the house = a good thing, I'm thinking!

We've been looking online for an identification for the snake, but meanwhile one of our workers has told us that it is locally called a "garbage snake" because these snakes are often found burrowing in the trash. It is also not poisonous, so we can be grateful for that!

Now, here's the snake:




Eventually, I believe, I will post on something other than bugs and snakes. I sort of hope it will be soon. :-D

I know I'm going to give you the wrong impression here

Really, REALLY, we are having a great time in our new home, and we are feeling quite at ease and happy with the life we are leading. I wanted to say that before reporting our second scorpion sting. I also need to add a disclaimer: Gus has given me permission to share this story.

Okay, here we go.

You first need to know that our new home has two buildings, but only one of those buildings has a working bathroom. Gus was in his bedroom, in the building with no bathroom, and he felt the urge, so he grabbed his handy roll of toilet paper and headed off into the woods.

After, umm, well, you know, he reached for the roll of toilet paper. If you grab a roll of toilet paper, intending to unroll some paper, you might grab it by sticking two fingers into the hole in the roll. Anyway, that's what Gus did, and he got stung by a scorpion that was hiding inside his roll of toilet paper!!!!!

Now, Gus doesn't know whether the scorpion had just crawled in there, or if he'd carried it from his room, hidden inside the roll, but what he did next shows an incredible degree of quick thinking while in a "crisis." Gus reports that he first used the toilet paper for the purpose for which it was intended, and then he searched for, found, and killed the scorpion (which had fallen to the ground after stinging him). Additionally, he carefully and intentionally killed the scorpion without squashing it, thinking that I would want a picture for the blog! What a trooper! I just hope you're all appropriately appreciative of his efforts.

Gus is fine, by the way. We're all fine, but we're learning to be cautious!

Fighting off an invasion!

Rachel discovered the invasion attempt, and ran for the bug spray. We didn't run for the camera until later, so these pictures weren't taken until the invasion was at least partially foiled. Rachel wants me to assure you that the time the ants tried to invade the team house was much worse than this invasion. Just so you know.

Bethany took the pictures. I'll show the side of the building first, then some closer shots, so you can get the idea, but you really need to click on the pictures (for the larger versions) to see what we're trying to show you. It's hard to take shots close enough to see something as tiny as an ant, while taking the shot from far enough away to see that there are lots of them.






On a lighter note, my dish drainer was also invaded this morning:


Building strong immune systems, that's what it's all about! ;-D

Yes, we do have power!

I'm sorry I haven't written about it here earlier. Russell traveled safely to San Pedro Sula and back last weekend, and purchased the new generator. It is working great, charging up our batteries and running our freezer and washer. Here's what the power schedule might look like, on a normal day (HA! Like we have such a thing as a normal day around here!):

6 am - I get up and plug in the refrigerator, and maybe check the news and emails on the internet (this is using power from the already-charged batteries).

7 am - Gus gets up, and starts the generator. Once the generator is running, we are charging up the batteries and we plug the freezer directly into the generator.

8 am - After breakfast, we switch from running the freezer to running the washing machine. The batteries continue to charge.

11 am (or so) - The timing depends on how many loads of laundry we have to wash, but once the laundry is done we unplug the washer and plug the freezer back in.

1 pm - After lunch, we turn off the generator, and unplug the freezer and the refrigerator.

5 pm - When he comes in for supper, Gus turns the generator on again, so that the batteries are well charged for the night. We probably run the generator about 2 hours or so at this time, and we make sure the refrigerator and freezer are plugged in during this time.

So, we now have power (though slightly limited) all the time, as long as we keep up on the charging schedule. Once the solar panels come, we'll have that power source, instead of running the generator all the time.

So far, so good! Thanks for the prayers!

Oh right, like I needed to know this . . .

We have rattlesnakes on our property. Last night Bethany was walking between our two buildings, at twilight, and she almost stepped on one! It was a teensy snake, about 2 feet long. I'd share a picture, but by the time the boys had killed it, the snake was pretty mashed up.

Lovely. I'm sure to sleep better now, knowing this.

Edited: I decided to include a picture of the tail end of the snake, with the mashed up parts cropped out. Here you go:

Our Power Station

I'm still dealing with minimal power - it would seem that we will be purchasing a new generator tomorrow. Meanwhile, here's a quick picture of our power set-up. We have batteries, battery chargers, an inverter, and miscellaneous other equipment that is a mystery to me.


Scary looking, isn't it?

Hopefully just a blip

We've been living full time in our new home since Christmas Eve, and we've been successfully running a generator to charge our batteries, from which we run the inverter to power the items we consider electric necessities.

But - yesterday the generator broke down. It is in the shop now, and we are praying that it will be repairable, but we aren't totally optimistic. It was a lack of oil in the engine problem, which can be a life-ender for these machines.

I am using the last bit of power available to me now, to cool down the fridge one more time, and let people know that we might be disappearing from the internet again for a bit of time. Please pray with us that the generator repair will be do-able. If that does't work out, we'll be purchasing a new generator, but budget restraints (and lack of availability in Honduras) will almost certainly require us to purchase a smaller, less powerful, and less reliable generator than the one we have been using.

Thanks for praying!

Our first scorpion sting!

Yesterday morning, while moving some boxes (as part of the unpacking process), Rachel encountered a scorpion. It was apparently on the box she picked up, and she was stung on the inside of her forearm, not far from her elbow. We have seen many scorpions on our property, and had been advised that the variety we have here isn't especially dangerous.

Thankfully, this indeed turned out to be the case. Rachel was in some significant pain for an hour or so, and the rest of the day her arm didn't feel right - she compared it to the after effects of a strong electrical shock (she shocked herself last year, on a damaged refrigerator cord, so she knows something about this). The actual sting was a tiny red mark, and her arm didn't swell at all.

We're grateful to know that the danger from these scorpions isn't great, since we have so many of them about!

Russell squashed the scorpion, so I don't have a picture to show you. Maybe next time?

I'm back!

Today, after what was (for me) a very long interval, I am reconnected to the internet! I will still be needing to be careful of how much time I spend online, as we get our permanent power situation settled, but I'm thrilled to be able to get on at all.

Thanks to all who have prayed for us during our time of transition. I'll try to write a real update soon, with all the details of our move.

The scariest (to me) part of the move is tomorrow!

Tomorrow morning we will be attempting to disconnect, move, reconnect, and point our satellite internet system.

Lots of the systems at our new house are very new - in fact, as I write this, Allen is working to get the electricity from our bank of batteries to the outlets, so we don't have to continue running everything on extension cords.

But the part of the move that makes me least comfortable is when we disconnect my internet, and then try to reconnect it. Would you pray with us, that this would go smoothly? That we wouldn't damage the equipment in the move, that we will be able to reconnect everything and get it pointed correctly, without any trouble?

Thanks so much! Watch for me on the other side, to let you know that I'm reconnected!

Merry Christmas, and we're almost done moving!

Just a quick update. Today (Christmas Eve) we are moving like maniacs. We'll have Christmas in our new home. We have water, a working toilet, a shower (cold), electricity (created by a generator and stored in batteries) and a working kitchen sink. Really, what more could we want?

Well, there is the teensy question of internet. In the next couple of days, Allen will disconnect our internet and move the satellite dish to the new location. Please pray that we are able to reconnect quickly and easily.

Today is not a holiday for us, as we tie up lots of loose ends, and move large appliances and such. Tomorrow we'll probably only take off half the day. Allen is leaving on Monday for a month in the US, and he doesn't want to leave us without everything fairly well under control here.

Kirstin and my parents have really saved the day - Christmas Day - for us! Our container shipment didn't get here before Christmas (partially due to delays related to the political situation this year) so my parents packed suitcases full of gifts, and a Christmas ham, and brought them to us. They also brought Kirstin, who helped drive loads of stuff and people back and forth between the two houses for her entire visit! We had hoped to have so much more done before their arrival, but our unexpected trips related to our residency put us far behind schedule. I hope they're glad they were able to be useful, instead of sorry they came!

I must run now, but I wanted to let you know how things are going here. Even though we are having a remarkably untraditional Christmas this year, we are trying to remember to be grateful, in the midst of our busyness, for God's True Gift.

Have a blessed Christmas!

The First Day (part 3): The Boring Part

Russell drove the beige Land Cruiser, carrying Trish, Gus, Boo and David. The majority of our drive was on beautiful new roads, with the exception of the one hour driving on dirt - but even that was mostly smooth, well-packed dirt. We were ahead of schedule, the roads were clear, the scenery was beautiful, and the vehicle ran well. Really, isn't this the most unbelievable part of the whole story? We even bought Domino's pizza for dinner, in the city of Siguatepeque. When we reached the city of Comayagua, we stopped for the night at a hotel. (If you like maps, you can find both of these cities on the map I posted with the previous portion of this story.)

Allen and Rachel (in the white Land Cruiser) had made it to the bank in San Pedro Sula in time to complete the financial arrangments, and they were on their way to rendezvous with us in Comayagua. They encountered some really bad road construction delays late in the day, including one spot where they sat for an hour and a half without moving at all, so they were about an hour behind us.

We all settled in for the night, knowing that we needed to start out early the next day, as we wanted to get to the Immigration office as early as possible. We still had a nice chunk of road to traverse to get to the capital. We don't visit Tegucigalpa often, and we didn't know the location of the Immigration office, so we also had to figure on some extra time for getting lost, and turning around, and such.

Next time: Our day at the Immigration office