Every need...

Philippians 4:19 And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

Life during Construction!

Today is Monday...two of our children are in school and one in bed with a cough and fever.  We are hoping to hear from our atty this week as to when we will travel to Tegucigalpa.  To recap, we received information on September 28th that our papers were ready to be sent to the court and we would likely have our court date Friday, Oct 12th or the Monday, October, 15th.  We were grateful to have a date and made reservations, as we would fly into San Pedro Sula, pack the children and travel, by bus, to Tegucigalpa for the court date.  After making plane reservations and planning our departure, we heard rumblings of another strike, through news reports and our fellow Honduran adoption friends, but our attorney did not believe that this strike would effect us, because it was contained within specific IHNFA centers/orphanages and not impacting adoptions.  We arrived at 1:30 AM, Monday, October 8th and by 8:00 AM Monday, the strike had evolved into a GRAND event, including a blockade of the IHNFA building which lasted more than two weeks.  Unfortunately, our documents had not made it out of the building to court before the work shutdown, so we were stuck in limbo.  As of last Wednesday, we are "officially" out of IHNFA.  The courts are aware that we have been in country for 3 weeks, so we are hoping to receive word that we are signing this week.  Our atty is devising ways to expedite our processes that occur after we sign our final adoption decrees.

Example of Poor Construction

So, the past three weeks have been full of drama, activity, fun and concern.  Due to a significant increase in crime in the area, we have stayed close to home.  This has given us a new perspective on "real life" in my mother-in-law's home.  To be honest, my mother-in-law is a hoarder...a hoarder of useful and not so useful trash.  She saves cereal boxes, milk, yogurt and every kind of plastic or metal containers, bread bags, twine, etc.  Because the house is across from a field, it is ever dusty, dirty and full of creepy crawlies and spider webs.  Yesterday, an iguana fell from the roof into the bathroom.  We have killed tarantulas on the walls.  Every night, 25 or more geckos roam the ceilings and walls.  We have monsterous ants and little ones, too.  And, mosquitoes find ways to torture me inside, as well!  

Hermano Omar

Hermano Carlo

My mother-in-law has been taken advantage of on numerous occasions in attempts to fix up her home.  The house is in serious disrepair and in various stages of construction.  Reyes contacted a contractor to get a quote on finishing the work, started years ago but never completed.  This has created a haven for pests, rodents and slimy things.  The quote was very reasonable ($3000, including materials).  We are now in day 6 of the project.  I will be posting pictures later today.   It is messier and more unhealthy than I could have imagined.  Moving large pieces of furniture have uncovered years of dust and mold.  Concrete block construction is very dirty and smelly work.  And we are living and sleeping here during this construction...but Reyes has been keeping a close eye on finances, safety risks and construction progress and planning.  

(Across from the field)-Iron Fence and Window Covers Painted!

I will be so happy to see this finished...it truly has been a dream for 8 years, but one that we thought would be unattainable, especially with the enormous expenses associated with our adoption.  Only by God's grace and mercy could we complete this project; leaving my mother-in-law with a clean and safe environment and making new friends to monitor the home in the future.  We know that trips to Honduras, with 5 people, will be difficult when we return home.  This past weekend, I began to get overwhelmed with the events of the past three weeks, but as of today, I am staying positive as we start a new week in Honduras!

Roof completed!

Bedroom Floors completed!

Dirty Work!

Kitchen Sink to be plumbed today!

Kitchen floor to be completed today!

Plumbing for Kitchen Sink

Los Dias Pasan...

The days go by...and we wait!  Our attorney spent the day at IHNFA Friday, but the employees were never paid.  The seals remain locked in the building and unable to be accessed by the employees, so our documents are still being held hostage.  This has been VERY frustrating...but would be more so if we were in the U.S.   We have kept busy, preparing for our trip to Tegucigalpa and to leave my mother in law here alone.  Reyes has been fixing "Carro Amarillo" --the 1977 yellow Toyota Corolla--and we take it to go visit friends, pick up medicine for my mother-in-law and go grocery shopping.  We have been invited to attend church with friends this evening and we will take "Carro Amarillo".  Fortunately, it is only about 3.5 miles from home.


Once again, there is no school tomorrow, so we will stay at home and work on math and English, primarily.  We tried to go to the movies on Thursday, but everything was rated R...scary movies for Halloween.  My mosquitoes bites have gotten better...now, I have new ones =(  The Aloe Vera does help the most of all the treatments I have tried!


Hoping tomorrow yields new information!  Keep us in prayer...heading to the grocery store =)

Little Children

Matthew 19:14 Jesus said "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

We have been in Honduras for almost a week.  It has been wonderful to be with our family and friends, but this week has not been without it's sorrows and challenges.  There have been two murders, within a half mile from our home, of friends well-known in our community.  On Wednesday, at 11:45 AM, the long-time tortilla vendor was robbed and shot 13 times on the road 4 houses away.  On Friday, at 5:30 pm, a neighbor was travelling to his job as a security guard and passed two men beating another man, he slowed down, and was shot dead by the criminals, likely because he was in uniform and trained to identify them.  Because of this crime wave, we have stayed very close to home.  Though we have gone to the grocery store twice and Reyes took the boys to get their hair cut yesterday, we do not have reliable transportation or funds to travel too far (yes, the beach sounds very nice right now).  Our 1977 yellow Toyota Corolla is running...after a new battery.  But, it is far from safe!  Three times, the passenger door flew open driving down the road and one time the driver's door flew open....LOCO!!!

The children have a three day weekend...no school Monday because it is a holiday.  I just asked the kids what the holiday is on Monday and they don't know.   Jennifer says, "Huelga" or strike.  Possibly! She explains that this year they are in school through December, instead of November, due to all the missed school days, due to strikes.  AND, IHNFA remains on strike and according to our attorney, this strike is serious and may last a while.  Our documents are complete and ready for signing, but the people striking have blocked entrance to the building, including the Director of IHNFA.  We are not sure what options we might have, but Reyes is planning to call our attorney on Tuesday and his god-mother, the mayor of a Honduran city, this weekend.  More importantly, we are praying for a just and rapid end to the strike.  

The children have been enjoying the IPAD, IPOD and Cell Phones...we lost an Ipod and then found it!  Ants got into all of the food that I brought for our trip to Tegucigalpa =(  And we now have two sick munchkins who are not responding to our OTC medications.  I may learn all about the health care system here in Honduras.

But, the best moments have been watching PRAISE videos on YouTube, singing alabanzas acapella in the courtyard, praying together and reading and studying scripture.  PRICELESS memories which will have an eternal impact!!!

Day by Day

We woke up to a sick, lil' munchkin today...Cristofer has an earache, sore throat and a cough.  He will be home with us today and is feeling a little better after some Children's Tylenol.  He is currently reading Another Monster at the End of this Book on the IPAD!  I love that APP!   Another favorite is Mathopolis where the child pretends to be a firefighter and has to answer math problems to save the building and put out the fire...We are really enjoying that one, too!

So, we sent the twins off for what may be their last week of school in Honduras.  They will be home by noon...school is only half-day in Honduras.  Here is the BEAUTIFUL sampler that Jennifer made and will be turning into her teacher today.  I want to encourage her to continue with these skills and will look for thread and fabric in Honduras to take home with us.  Jennifer loves to draw beautiful pictures and I think she could do beautiful embroidery.  These would make great gifts for our family and her teachers!

Today is our friend, Michelle's, birthday...hoping to get together with her this evening for a little party.  Jennifer learned how to play, "Happy Birthday," on a piano app on the IPAD.  She was so excited!  Definitely must look into piano lessons when we get home!  The boys want to learn to play the drums and they are enjoying my drum set IPAD applications.  I am hoping my friend, Felix, will help me teach the boys to play the drums!!!  He is AWESOME!

I am so proud of Jefferson!  He is learning English very quickly and he is also drawing...using You Tube to learn to draw all of the Angry Birds!

The future is so very bright for our children!!!

The Journey Becomes an Adventure!

JEREMIAH 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future!

Well, October 8th, 2012 is the day that marks when our adoption journey FINALLY becomes an adventure!  Reyes and I have arrived in San Pedro Sula...and we will return as a family of 5...we may not know when, but we are trusting in the Lord's timing and perfect plan.

Everything about this trip has been different than our previous trips to Honduras.  First, we always stay for 10 days...exactly 10 day!  Since we will be here indefinitely, and we will stay in the Humuya Inn apartments for the Tegucigalpa part of our trip (4-6 weeks), we had to pack more clothes and toiletries.  And, we brought food with us, which is fairly atypical.  I don't know what we will find as we begin shopping at Walmart Tegucigalpa, but the prices at the grocery store in San Pedro Sula, La Antorcha, are REALLY high.  And since there are five of us...I have all of our hygeine products, extra socks and underwear, OTC medications, bug spray, sun screen, packets of food/mixes (onion & vegetable soup, chili seasonings, sloppy joe, gravy,  tuna, oatmeal, popcorn, gelatin, tea bags, kool aid, crystal light drink, cookies, mashed potatoes, stuffing, coconut, nuts, etc.---mostly light-weight foods that I need for recipes that I know how to cook, but that I wasn't sure would be available at Walmart...I will keep you posted on whether this was necessary), jelly, peanut butter, raisins, muffin tin and cupcake liners, cookie sheet, whisk, cooking spoon, measuring spoons, spatula, playing cards and rules to about 10 easy/children's games, crayons, markers, coloring books/books/flashcards, Ipod/Ipad/Smart phones (filled with educational apps....FILLED) and more that I will talk about later as we start unpacking the suitcases.  We will have a kitchen and a waffle maker, toaster and crockpot.  Kid Friendly RECIPES APPRECIATED!!!

So, a recap of the last week...We are assuming that we will be here for up to 2 months...after transitioning our work to our peers/colleagues...the next step was to prepare our household.  I decided to have my sister-in-law pick up our mail twice a week to monitor for bills I might have forgotten about rather than to put it on hold.  She will also check on the house and be available to call a repairman, etc. if something needs fixing.  We asked our neighbor, Joe, to cut our front yard when he does his yard, but we are hoping that the backyard can go 1-2 months while we are gone without turning into a jungle.  This time of year is very temperate in Texas, so we completely turned off the air/heat.  We turned off the water in the kitchen, because it has been giving us fits.  We left the outdoor light on, locked the deadbolts, turned on several curly bulbs around the house, and said a prayer over the house, because it is uncomfortable leaving it for so long.  All I can think about is SQUATTERS coming to live in it!!!   I also put our DISH on hold ($5 a month vs. $100), cancelled our Time Warner house phone/internet (never liked it anyway...will research new internet when I get home-$70 monthly savings) and put our Sprint cellphones on hold ($8 per phone...vs. $200).

Mariana's daughter, Karla, offered to watch our fur son, Osito (Little Bear), while we are gone.  However, Karla lives in Galveston...300 miles away!  When you are going to be gone up to two months, this savings is HUGE!  And, Osito will be happier staying with friends...I hope they give him back =)  Had to remember to buy a big bag of dog food for him...the little Tupperware container we use for 10 days is wholly insufficient.  After a last minute grooming disaster (our groomer's grandmother died and I had to find a replacement...on a Friday) and  instructions for what to do in an emergency, we had Osito squared away.

In planning our flight, we looked around the state for the best deal, as we are flying one way and will be returning last minute with 5 tickets to purchase.  We found Spirit Airlines, a discount airline that flies to "The Americas".  They only fly out of Dallas Ft Worth (DFW) and only into San Pedro Sula, but that works well for us.  Our one way tickets were $ 118 (plus baggage fees), via Ft. Lauderdale, for a 6 hour trip.  This is more than a 75% savings.  My SUPER AWESOME cousin, Amy, allowed us to park our mini-van at her house (15 minutes from DFW) and my WONDERFUL Honduran adoption friend, Emily, took us to the airport (my cousin was out of town over the weekend).  SMOOTH SAILING!!!  So GRATEFUL!!!

So, we are here...safe and sound...and ready for the ADVENTURE part to begin...Jefferson just woke up and is already having fun with the IPAD!!!  I don't know what our future holds...but so glad I know who holds our future!  One day at a time!!!