Cucumbers for supper

Kevin has been growing some HUGE cucumbers and we have all enjoyed helping him eat them! We are amazed at how many cucumbers one plant can produce. He's also been busy mixing some more good soil and moving some things around. What a gardener!

Garry's back in the air today, taking some missionaries back to their remote home. They came out for a short break and got sick. After getting some help from a doctor here they are feeling better and heading home. These folks are teaching the Gospel for the very first time to a group of people and are excited to go home and continue the teaching!

Pray for the missionaries that God would give them the ability to communicate truth clearly. Pray for the group that's listening that God would reveal His truth to their hearts, convicting them of sin and His holiness.

Yeah, it's Saturday... well, actually it is Monday, but we are having a Saturday-like day! One of the fun things about a flight program is that you never know what is going to happen next or how your schedule will unfold!

Garry is home today and doing projects on the house with the boys. They are building a little shelf for the kitchen right now, which I will greatly appreciate! In between other things Garry has been back and forth to the the hangar several times, overseeing some work that is going on there.

It also rained hard this afternoon-- something we are always thankful for as it cools things down a bit! Garry and I went to the track to walk just before the storm hit, so instead of walking we just sat in the truck and talked!


We thank the many of you who have written expressing your support and prayers. God is at work and we don't doubt it. We simply keep asking Him to show us what part He wants us to play in His church and work these days!

Good afternoon! Garry is flying... or actually sitting at an airstrip waiting for the weather to improve so he can finish his flight.

This is a picture at the hangar here as Garry prepares to leave on a flight. RP-C660 is the airplane Garry has been working on lately.

He's been flying really high lately to get over weather as well as taking some "long cuts" around it. We are thankful for the relative coolness the rain brings, though!

A friend of a friend came to cut the grass in our yard. We usually just use clippers to cut it, but it is really long now so we've been looking for someone with a weed eater to take care of it. This gentleman didn't want to give me a price for the work-- he's hoping that my estimation will be higher than his set price, probably. So, what do you do? And what is actually fair?

We did school this morning and now they are getting some exercise at the badminton court. I think they are actually about the only kids there right now, which can sometimes be lots of fun.

Blah, blah, blah-- ever feel like no matter what you sit down to write, that's all that comes out? That is how I feel as I post here these days. God is doing some wonderful things and some huge challenges are facing us. Yet so many of these things involve other people and are hard to explain or are personal in nature. Other things are technical, and thus hard to express. Yet other challenges are so complex that trying to simplify them does nothing to communicate what they are. So we'd simply ask for your prayer these days, that God would work mightily on behalf of His Church here. Pray that we would be sensitive to what He is doing and clearly understand our part in all of it. And lastly, praise God because His ways are not our ways and He is an amazing God!

Yesterday we "babysat" for some friends. The couple were at the hospital after delivering a healthy baby the day before, and the older three kids came to have lunch with us and play for a couple of hours. It was fun to see the newborn on the way home from the hospital! This family works up north and is preparing to begin teaching in the fall!

In science we've been studying some chemical reactions, one of them Diet Coke and either salt or Menthos. We put come Diet Coke in a bottle and added salt-- no explosion, but a lot of fizz! check it out on the left:).

Garry is deep into a building project and working on the airplane these days.

Garry had a long flight day today. He was thankful for good weather! He took a load of cargo down south, picked up passengers from one location and took them to another, then brought another couple to town this afternoon. When he got home Kevin was able to go to the the hangar to help him wash the airplane and clean out the inside. After tidying up a bit, they joined Kaleb and I at the badminton court for some exercise.

The boys are currently enjoying tops! They have gotten some from tribal people and we're amazed at the variety between different tops. However, all of them seem to spin well! If you've never tried spinning a top, give it a go!

One of the things God is challenging us about these days is the power of prayer. The reality that unless we are dependent on the Father we are not where He wants us to be. We want to hear His voice about the different challenges we are facing, the decisions that face us every day, and the work that needs done.

Some of the decisions that are facing us these days relate to the girls that work in our home. One is 23 years old and would like to go back to school. However, she has 4 years of highschool left, and it doesn't seem there is a way to accelerate things here. Night classes aren't an option and she isn't interested in vocational training. We really would like to help. But how?! God is the One with the answers-- and not only that, He desires to communicate with us!

Privileged to be His kids...

Good morning! How was your weekend? Did you enjoy some time to relax and enjoy what God is doing in your life and ministry this weekend? We were thrilled to have a quiet weekend with some time to reflect. That I had a stomach flu was an aide to not getting too busy also!

The boys have been engaged with Lego again recently. We watched a Discovery program about aircraft carriers and the boats that travel with them. This started their imaginations going and they made a whole fleet!

Kevin's garden is growing and we've eaten some huge cucumbers! His tomatoes and bell peppers are also beginning to produce, so soon we'll have more things to enjoy!

Garry switched airplanes last week, only to get a low-compression cylinder after his first flight. This means he's back to the first airplane and working on the second one again. This week promises to provide him with some very long flight days, so we're praying the repairs go quickly and smoothly.

Today Garry and I are out to lunch with some friends to talk some business and catch up on one another's lives. Truly, friends are a blessing!

Someone reminded me that I haven't posted about the boys' badminton tournament. It was over a week ago, on Friday May, 11th. Including kids up to age 12, it was a great way to cement some new friendships, get some exercise, and find out how a tournament works. They both a great time and learned lots in the process.

Kaleb was eliminated after his first round of games. Kevin and Wesley, doubles partners, took first place! This is them with Kaleb and Oliver (one of the boys' trainers). Besides getting to play a lot of games and enjoying themselves, they got a cool trophy!

During the tournament the kids were given a snack-- a plate of spaghetti and a brownie Since the food didn't include any rice it wasn't a meal!

I enjoyed sitting with other moms and getting to know a few. One thing that continually surprises me is how many people have family in the US and Canada. During the tournament I met a lady whose sister is working in Dugald, Manitoba!

So that's the badminton tournament news... and I'll post about this weekend later!

VISITORS

Our time with our pastor and his wife was wonderful! Barry and Norine were such a blessing and encouragement to us. We enjoyed some great talks, good badminton, a game of Risk, some Take-Two, and breakfast at the Swiss Deli. We commented that we had more time with them in three short days here than we normally get in any one visit "home"!

Garry was also able to take Barry to one of our tribal locations. In this location our missionaries are just beginning the process of teaching through the Bible, sharing the character of God through the stories of the Old Testament. We've been excited to follow their teaching, but this is Garry's first flight in there for quite some time. The guys were able to attend one of the meetings as well as spend some time with the missionaries.

I thought you might enjoy this shot we took just before Barry and Norine left. Garry is preparing to leave on a flight up north and the jet is already in, beginning to unload passengers from Manila.

I'll be getting some more info up on the blog soon, but thought I'd keep this short!

Good morning! It isn't every Monday that starts as nicely as today did! I was up early this morning and enjoyed a bit of quiet and some time to do office work before the boys got up. Garry was at the hangar early to prepare for today's flight. The boys are nearly finished with school now, and I am encouraged to have some of my bookkeeping done already. Garry is on his way home from a couple of flights, probably eating his lunch as he flys.

This weekend we did something we've never done before-- we took part in a badminton "fun games" evening. The organizers had told us the games would start between 6 and 7, so we played it safe and arrived at 6:45. Of course, the lights in the court were off and nobody was there. When I asked the girls who were behind the desk if there were, indeed, games, they said "Yes, maybe at 6:30 or 7:00"! Culture:). We enjoyed several games as a family before people began to arrive at 7:30 and several more games before the "fun games" actually began at 9 pm! By midnight we'd all lost several games and decided to call it a night before the end of the games, which was predicted to be 2 am!

You might wonder what on earth we're doing playing badminton. Good question! We've found it to be a great way to meet people, as well as get some much-needed exercise. Without having had the opportunity to learn Tagalog, we need to find others who can speak English, and the badminton court seems to be a great place to do that. We were thankful for the time to be part of a small community here and to interact with others.

Good afternoon! Today has been rushing by as we keep working on the piles that accumulated while we were in Manila. Garry's been at the hangar. He'd hoped to do some e-mails, but his internet connection is down for some reason. So he's been working on the airplane, which is a lot more fun anyway!

The boys finished school this morning and have been working on making some tops, painting models, weeding their garden, and various other things. Ford also came to work today, and we are thankful that the gutters are cleaned and some of the grass cut! Also this afternoon a friend came to look at our washing machine. He was able to "sew" the broken plastic piece back together, which should cut down on the noise when we use the machine.

We are very much looking forward to a visit from our pastor and his wife next week! Barry and Norine will be here only a couple of days but we are looking forward to hearing about their months in Cambodia and also sharing what God is doing here!

Of all the boring things, I hate posts without pictures. So I just added a couple of random shots:). Blessings to each of you...

Yahoo! We're home! We had a wonderful, profitable time in Manila, and now we're glad to be back in Puerto, at our own house and living "normal life" again.

Our first couple of days in Manila were spent primarily with our new co-workers who are currently studying language. One day Garry and the other men were in meetings for a good part of the day, and the other ladies and I went to the mall.

Just before we came home we took a mini-vacation. It was a blessing to be quiet for several days and enjoy the comforts of a nice place in Manila. They had an incredible breakfast buffet, and I'm quite sure they lost money on at least some of us! The pool was lovely, and we spent quite a few hours swimming and soaking in some sunshine.

Today Garry was back in the air and the boys and I are getting back into the swing of school.