Good afternoon! It's a a beautifully sunny day here in Puerto! It's also very warm which reminds me of a song about thankfulness by Andrew Petersen. He shows how we are usually wishing for something different than we have! So, I'm trying to learn to be thankful for what is here, in this moment in time. Thankful I'm warm while many of you are still struggling through a long winter and lack of sunshine.

This great tower took the better part of our office floor for a day or more, so I thought I'd share it with you.

We enjoyed lunch with a new friend from Mindanao today. He came to help with some loading and logistics for an SIL Bible presentation. They are here doing a lot of flying this week, using our hangar. Garry has enjoyed the time with the SIL guys that he seldom sees! He is also preparing to fly for a team that arrives here on Saturday.

I need to run to town to pick up a few things and maybe stop for a coffee. The boys are busy with projects here at home... gardening and building a steam engine.

I trust your Easter celebration was filled with the joy of New Life and the promise of resurrection! We had a lovely Easter here, focused on Christ's resurrection and the many gifts that are ours. We also enjoyed spending the day as a family-- how blessed we are to be family not once, but twice!

Kaleb wanted to color and hunt eggs, so we did that yesterday also. Since we couldn't capture the true Joy of Easter on film, I thought I'd blog a couple of pictures of coloring eggs:).

This morning Garry left for the airport early and was soon in the air. He's picking up some teens who are headed back to boarding school for their final semester as well as delivering supplies to build a clinic. Loading plywood and other construction supplies into a Cessna 185 can be quite an adventure, so I'm sure he's not struggling with boredom today:).

We had a fun time with Suzy and the kids yesterday. Kaleb got a bit too close to the bees and has a half-closed eye to show for it. It's funny that Kevin has never had a swollen eye like this, but this is Kaleb's third time to get a reaction to something that swells his eye shut!

Today Garry finished up some paperwork for the inspection he did yesterday. We all plan to meet at Ben & Suzy's for lunch... I'm taking a poppyseed chicken dish and some salad over. I also tried some gluten-free brownies, but they look a little hopeless. I'll watch the kids for a while so Suzy can go do painting at their new house.

Happy Good Friday! While we remember Christ's death and his offering for us, we look forward to His resurrection. Death to bring New Life! In this country many people believe God is actually dead on "Black Saturday" and it shows in the way everything is closed up tight and faces are somber. Pray for this town and this country-- though there is a lot of outward religion, there is a lot of darkness here.

I'm off to lunch now. Have a wonderful day-- remember that we died with Him and we live by Him!

Garry's back in the air, taking supplies to a team down south then delivering construction supplies for a clinic at another location. It's just after noon now, and he just told me it looks like the rain may be coming... I'm praying that rain changes course so he can finish what he's doing there! Ben is with Garry today, doing some of the flying and learning routes and approaches.

No, this doesn't have anything to do with flying (except that the pilots decided this beach would make a great emergency landing strip), but this was a fun day at the beach enjoying the NTMA team!

I tried my hand at making cottage cheese yesterday... I'm not sure what I did or didn't do, but it certainly doesn't taste like I'd expected. Anybody have a recipe they'd be willing to share? If so, I'd love to have it!

Good morning! It's sunny and bright here today-- makes me feel cheery:). Garry is at the hangar answering e-mails and doing some office work this morning. Tomorrow he'll start flying again with Ben.

The boys and I are doing school. Kevin has finished his math and is writing a letter to the boy he sponsors in Honduras. Kaleb is working on his math now.

This afternoon a friend is coming to help Kevin in his garden. They hope to mix some new "bokashi" for planting and making compost. Kaleb is hoping they'll stop long enough for a good game of marbles sometime in the afternoon.

One of the things we've been talking about lately is the power of prayer-- to change us, situations, and other people. Can you believe that the Ruler of the Universe is asking us to pray and we take it lightly?

2007 STATISTICS

No doubt some of you find numbers more interesting than others do. Just for fun I thought I'd post some information from our flights last year.

327 safe flights completed
185 hours flown
32 tons of cargo hauled
560 passengers flown

While those numbers are very small compared to a company back home devoted to flying, they represent a lot of hours for one pilot for which flying is just one of many jobs! We are thankful that we've been here to provide this service to our missionaries.

In fact, we're glad to be here because it's God's work and we're privileged to be a part of it!

Wow, it has been a long time! Garry spent just one afternoon at the aviation offices in Manila and was able to straighten out his papers and get his medical during that time. He was still lacking a checkride to get his final license, but he has now completed that and is ready to begin flying again tomorrow!

We had a lovely break in Manila and arrived home late last week. We've spent last week trying to catch up at home and in the office... and are just now getting to the blog. We apologize for how long it's taken us to update you on what's going on here. We appreciate your many prayers and words of encouragement. We know God is up to something. We know we are in a spiritual battle for the souls of men and the growth of the church, and prayer is key to victory becoming reality!

We are thankful to have about finished this week's school. While the boys are not working at their desks they've been staying well occupied. Kevin's lettuce continues to grace our table and keeps on growing! He's spent a lot of hours in his garden this week. Currently he's making a new bed in which to grow pinto beans. Someone gave him some seeds and we're interested in how they'll grow. We don't know anything about them, so if one of you gardeners out there have helpful hints, we'd love to hear them!

Kaleb has been keeping himself busy with a Physics set he was given as a gift. He's learning lots about gears, power, and speed as he builds different projects and changes the parts out. It's actually quite interesting to me as well since I've never really thought that much about this aspect of physics!

Since arriving home we've all been a bit sick with a stomach virus or some such thing. A friend told us yesterday that the water we buy is not well enough filtered for this time of year: many people are sick because of the water just now. With the food allergies and diet issues we're dealing with already this has been a bit discouraging. We pray that we'll soon be healthy again and able to do what God is calling us to do here on this island!

On another note, Ben and Suzy found a house and are close to moving in! They've about finished the work they needed to do on the inside and are getting ready to paint.